Although The best jokes in Family Guy might be timeless, but the show itself has inevitably started to show its age. With over 780 episodes to its name, The Simpsons is still the longest-running scripted primetime American TV show in history, but Seth MacFarlane’s darker, edgier animated sitcom is starting to catch up.

As of May 2025, Family Guy has aired over 430 episodes. This is an achievement that once seemed impossible when the show was canceled after three seasons and seemed destined to become another under-appreciated, short-lived cult classic. However, once Family Guy was revived, the show never struggled to find an audience again. season 24’s renewal proves just how much the show is still going strong, even though its own creator and star itted that he thought it would end a lot earlier.

Seth MacFarlane Said Family Guy Should Have Ended After Seven Seasons

MacFarlane Made The Comments After Family Guy Season 10 Premiered

In an interview with TheHollywoodReporter after the release of Family Guy season 10, MacFarlane itted that he thought the show should have ended more than a decade ago. The show’s creator, who also voices Peter, Brian, and Stewie Griffin, said “Part of me thinks that Family Guy should have already ended. I think seven seasons is about the right lifespan for a TV series.” Family Guy season 7 ended in May 2009, around a decade after the show’s original 1999 premiere.

Collage of Quagmire dancing with Lois, Peter shocked dressed as Han Solo, and a battered Peter and Lois in Family Guy
Related
15 Best Episodes Of Family Guy

Family Guy has remained a massive hit over two decades because of episodes like these, which are the best in series history.

The interview in question took place in October 2011, when season 10 was beginning to air. Interestingly enough, this season featured a string of episodes that made viewers give up on Family Guy, including controversial outings like episode 2, “Seahorse Seashell Party,” and episode 3, “Screams of Silence: The Story of Brenda Q.” Like many episodes, these attempted to do something new with the show’s formula, but their dark themes and sensitive object matter were too clumsily handled to succeed.

Family Guy Season 23 Proves The Animated Sitcom Doesn’t Need To End Yet

MacFarlane’s Series Still Has Potential Despite Its Issues

MacFarlane’s comments seem to reflect pretty poorly on Family Guy, suggesting that everything after season 7 is disposable or extraneous. However, this isn’t quite true. Although part of MacFarlane thought the show could have ended after season 7, some of Family Guy’s best episodes arrived after this watershed moment. ittedly, the worst episode of Family Guy ever was also released later, in season 12. However, the mixed fortunes of later seasons are no reason to write off the entirety of seasons 8-23. Like any long-running sitcom, Family Guy has its stronger and weaker seasons.

The best episodes of Family Guy season 23 prove that the series is still playing with its legacy and reinventing old storylines, gags, and characters in ways that feel fresh and original.

Although the show’s outright classic episodes certainly became rarer after season 10, this could be chalked up to the over-familiarity of the show’s premise and characters. After all, the so-called Golden Age of The Simpsons is also said to have ended around the same point. The best episodes of Family Guy season 23 prove that the series is still playing with its legacy and reinventing old storylines, gags, and characters in ways that feel fresh and original. For example, season 23, episode 5, “The Chicken or the Meg,” managed to turn two overused jokes into a compelling plot.

Family Guy is available to stream on Hulu.

The family’s overblown hatred of Meg and Peter’s inexplicable feud with a giant chicken were both very funny early on, only to become overused and predictable after a couple of years. In “The Chicken or the Meg,” these plots anchor a surprisingly poignant story where Meg leaves the Griffins to the giant chicken’s family and Peter realizes he truly misses her. Meg’s subsequent defeat of the giant chicken and return home is a genuinely surprising, fun, and cathartic twist that reminds viewers Family Guy still has some life left in it, despite what its creator may have once said.

Source: TheHollywoodReporter

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Your Rating

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Family Guy
TV-14
Animation
Comedy
8/10
28
7.9/10
Release Date
January 31, 1999
Network
FOX
Showrunner
Seth MacFarlane

Cast

See All
  • Headshot Of Alex Borstein
    Alex Borstein
    Lois Griffin / Tricia Takanawa / Loretta Brown / Barbara Pewterschmidt (voice)
  • Cast Placeholder Image
    Gary Beach
    (voice)

WHERE TO WATCH

Streaming
BUY

Directors
Peter Shin, Pete Michels, John Holmquist, Greg Colton, Brian Iles, Julius Wu, Joseph Lee, Joe Vaux, Mike Kim, Steve Robertson, Dan Povenmire, James Purdum, Dominic Bianchi, Dominic Polcino, Bob Bowen, Monte Young, Zac Moncrief, Michael Dante DiMartino, Bert Ring, Seth Kearsley, Scott Wood, Chuck Klein, Brian Hogan, Gavin Dell
Writers
Steve Callaghan, Patrick Meighan, Mark Hentemann, Cherry Chevapravatdumrong, Tom Devanney, Alex Carter, Alec Sulkin, Wellesley Wild, Gary Janetti, Andrew Goldberg, Mike Desilets, Anthony Blasucci, Matt Weitzman, Kirker Butler, Damien Fahey, John Viener, Brian Scully, Ted Jessup, Chris Regan, Matt Pabian, Garrett Donovan, Ricky Blitt, Aaron Lee, Julius Sharpe
Franchise(s)
Family Guy