Review: Family Guy “The Boys In the Band”

The boys are back in town.

Spoilers Below

I’ve been a Family Guy fan for a long time, and it really never fails to disappoint at what it’s best at– nihilism and insanity. Just the craziest kind of envelope-pushing shock-based stuff.

In this first episode of season 15, “The Boys In the Band”, they start it right off with some creepy Willy Wonka innuendo, then some gross-out stuff. As always, there are bits that go on a little uncomfortably long, but end up with a good payoff gross-out and a belly laugh (Chris at the airport).

And then, right after, we get a gross euphemism from Chris (not the episode’s last), and Olivia’s back!

Basically, in “The Boys In the Band”, Stewie and Brian make a duo that performs children’s songs. Their band is called Red Shirt Blue Shirt. The band and songs are both reminiscent of the folk band Peter and Quagmire formed in the season 12 episode “Into Harmony’s Way”. And I suppose this premise all started when Stewie and Brian composed “I want to have intercourse with you (relations)” all the way back in the season four episode “Don’t Make Me Over”. How many bands are these characters going to make?? (Chris’ band, Peter and Lois’ band…)

The side story of this episode is that Chris gets a “job” helping Quagmire run his sex life. Which is…bizarre and disturbing. And hilarious.

All in all, very funny stuff. There are some duds along the way (the Muppets cutaways are never really funny). And of course, Olivia is a wrench in the gears. Playing both sides.

The ending is also very reminiscent of the ending of “Into Harmony’s Way”. Things get resolved, and the end of the episode has one more funny gag- just….wow. Mort.

Anyway, a great start to Family Guy’s 15th season. It will be very cool to see what else MacFarlane and company has in store for us this time around.