Review: American Dad “Family Time”

Overview:

Driven by the allure of endless free food, Stan takes his family out to enjoy the fruits of a new buffet. All of the Smiths are excited to relax and gorge themselves on this luxury, but their relaxing dinner takes an unexpected turn that goes decidedly off-menu.

While the Smiths are content to pig out on food, an existential crisis isolates Roger and pushes him to pursue one of his most unconventional personas.

Our Take:

Never underestimate the power of a free buffet.

American Dad is often at its best when it allows the entire Smith family to share some chaos together. All of their similar, yet contrasting, personalities know how to perfectly enable each other and it’s always the recipe for some exaggerated spectacle. This season of American Dad has featured more episodes than usual where the entire Smith family get to operate as a unit, all of which have gotten chances to explore and test the family in different ways. “Family Time” stands out from the rest of this season’s group outings since it takes such a simplistic, sedentary event–a buffet–and is able to take it to some genuinely surprising and entertaining places. “Family Time” isn’t quite a bottle episode, but its stripped down nature allows American Dad to explore some very rewarding territory.

Any episode that’s so simple and character focused is going to be very reliant on its dialogue and “Family Time” has an excellent script from Zack Rosenblatt that’s full of constant hilarious digressions and the dialogue-heavy episode never disappoints. It’s specifically an occasion where the entire Smith family are allowed to bounce off of one another and “Family Time” takes advantage of this with inspired discussions between these characters with something as benign as a buffet acting as the catalyst for it all. Every member of the Smith family enters this gluttonous  food-based adventure with different levels of enthusiasm, which also helps “Family Time” become much more effective. Stan is always the type to get extremely invested in any of his passions, but his overwhelming enthusiasm towards buffets is a consistent driving force for the comedy in this episode.

It’s inherently a lot harder to pace an episode like this that minimizes plot in favor of character digressions. “Family Time” finds a rhythm that works as it slowly shifts from each character and gives all of them their own fun, little setpieces that break down a different aspect of “buffet culture.” It’s a solid enough structure for an episode that can initially feel like it meanders at times, but it’s clear from the start as to what kind of vibe this episode wants to create. The beginning of “Family Time” effectively recreates the relaxed, affable nature of a buffet. The episode’s fractured structure shares the wealth between each member of the Smith family and pushes the idea of camaraderie, which is what Stan values most about buffets. 

“Family Time” could have easily existed entirely within the swank new buffet, but it cleverly builds in a natural way to relieve pressure from its central storyline by pulling Roger out of it. The “hang out” energy and the heightened extremes of the buffet material connect, but those that aren’t fans of its style at least have a creative Roger subplot that provides a breather to everything else. It’s a decision that American Dad doesn’t have to make and they’ve certainly been more fearless with some of their stylistic risks in the past, but in this case the material that’s explored with Roger is compelling enough that it doesn’t feel like it robs the buffet plot of any substance.

“Family Time” is a deceptively layered episode of American Dad that on its surface level isn’t doing anything crazy, but it’s full of extreme turns and unexpected decisions that really make it memorable. This is an episode that contains at least a dozen dead bodies and yet it also works as a sweet reminder of the strengths of the Smith family. “Family Time” is able to function in whatever mode it finds itself in, whether that’s grand spectacles or just hilarious dialogue. Much like any good buffet, “Family Time” offers up a little of everything and will leave audiences feeling fulfilled in the end.