While you’re some of you are pining for the Dr. George O’Malley swan song that will never be on the new season of Grey’s Anatomy, others will (probably) be missing out on The Family Guy‘s snarky insensitivity about abortion. Oh the humanity!
Seriously folks, this “breaking news” from Comic-Con sounds like a nefarious marketing plan cooked up to sell DVDs. The Family Guy can get away with making intentionally offensive jokes about any and everything that gets people in a tizzy from racism to rape to Sarah Palin and John McCain being Nazis, but somehow we’re supposed to believe that a new episode about abortion was relegated to the cutting room floor? Come on, Seth. We’re not buying it.
“Partial Terms of Endearment” isn’t the first FG episode to get the snip; that honor goes to “When You Wish Upon a Weinstein,” a Jew-centric episode that was pulled from the 2000 season. To make our argument a little more convincing, the episode ended up airing three years later after it had been released as a bonus episode on the Season Three DVD box set.
While “When You Wish Upon a Weinstein” did result in a money-seeking lawsuit — which the judge dismissed — from the publishing house that owns the song “When You Wish Upon a Star,” there was little fanfare otherwise. At least not more than usual. But how many Family Guy fans do you think bought that box set because they knew they’d get that never-before-seen 23 minutes of MacFarlane’s raunchy comedy?
“20th Century Fox, as always, allowed us to produce the episode and then said, ‘You know what? We’re scared to f–king death of this,'”MacFarlane has said. FOX says that no such decision has been made.
Listen, Seth. We get the joke, and despite the cringe-worthy moments now and again, we love your show. Now don’t patronize us with your little “FOX and I don’t see eye to eye” ratings-boosting schemes. Leave that kind of drama to ABC.