Nowadays, the word “hack” gets used a lot. I’m not sure whether you can label Seth MacFarlane a hack because it’s obvious he has a little talent and intelligence if he can fool millions of people and multiple television networks in buying into his shtick. You have probably heard how Seth McFarlane had signed a $100 Million deal making him the highest paid writer writing for television. This lucrative deal involves his two current shows, Family Guy and American Dad, as well as the upcoming spinoff, “The Cleveland Show”. Seth has a team of writers behind all three of his shows. It’s not just him and a couple people writing these shows. Yet he gets all the credit and makes loads of cash. It’s a team of writers much like The Simpsons.

These shows are the easiest type of shows to write. Most jokes in American Dad could be rotated into a Family Guy script, and vice versa. That’s the formula with most Seth MacFarlane shows. The jokes are never character jokes or jokes that would only work on that specific show or specific world. For instance, take The Simpsons and Futurama. The jokes in Futurama are about robots, technology, aliens, satire on science fiction, etc. Those jokes work in Futurama because the plot takes place in the future. Those jokes wouldn’t make as much sense in The Simpsons because it’s an entirely different type of show. That was the point of Futurama. They made Futurama because it was a completely different concept. If they wanted to make a show like The Simpsons, then they would just buy more episodes of The Simpsons.

But with Family Guy, American Dad, and The Cleveland Show, the jokes are interchangeable and could work on any of those 3 shows. The only real difference in the shows is that they give each family member a different “twist” to make it feel different from the other shows. So instead of a baby like in Family Guy, they have an alien in American Dad. Or instead of Meg, they have some hippie chick named Haylee.  American Dad and The Cleveland Show are just recycled Family Guy ideas repackaged as a brand new series with new characters.

After seeing clips of “The Cleveland Show” which stars the minor black character from Family Guy, I’m positive that it’s really just Family Guy with an African American twist. You’ve got the smart-alecky baby. For talking animals, instead of Brian the dog, you have two bears for neighbors. The drawings and animation are literally the same. All three shows have that Hannah-Barbera style look to them from the 60’s-70’s. Many of the male characters have giant chins or jaws in all three of these MacFarlane shows.

You don’t see the South Park creators making a bunch of spin offs and rehashes of the same show. They put all their focus and time into South Park. When Larry David was finished with Seinfeld, he went to do Curb Your Enthusiasm.  He didn’t make a show that was exactly like Seinfeld.  He did something a lot different.  Mike Judge didn’t make a show exactly like Beavis and Butthead.  No, he went and pursued new types of shows like King of the Hill.  Different concept, different style of humor with a different story.  This is why I question MacFarlane as a writer.  When Sealab 2021 got cancelled, the creators did a really different type of show with Frisky Dingo.  Can’t Macfarlane be creative once in his life? Lets say hypothetically that Seth MacFarlane did write most of the episodes for each one of his shows. He would be thinning himself out of material quickly and creatively. Coming up with great plots and quick humor for three different shows simultaneously is not a walk in the park. But it gets harder when all 3 of these shows are ALL shows about animated families. At least if you’re going to do three different shows, it would be a good idea to make them…ya know… as different from each other as possible.  Not just two alternative versions of Family Guy.

I remember hearing good advice from someone. Why bother pitching a show by saying, “It’s like Lost” or “It’s like The Office”. If NBC wanted more of The Office, then they would purchase new episodes of The Office. They don’t need another show exactly like The Office. Which boggles my mind about Fox. Fox must either be out of ideas or they don’t have the balls to do anything that’s risky or interesting. So now Fox has FIVE…count them…FIVE shows about animated families. Are you kidding me? The Simpsons, King of the Hill, Family Guy, American Dad, and now this stupid Cleveland Show.

Boy Fox, what a way to raise the bar for television. I could just imagine the sales pitch that Macfarlane gave the people at Fox.

Seth MacFarlane: Okay…It’s like Family Guy…

(You can hear “Oooos” and “Ahhhs”. You can see dollar signs popping up in their eyes.)

Fox Executive: That is all we needed to hear.

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