It's no secret thatFamily Guy creator Seth MacFarlane is a flake of a nerd. His series contains endless pop culture references, generally to various elements of nerd civilisation, includingMonty Python,Back To The Future,Lord of the RingsandIndiana Jones. But the fandom well-nigh referenced in the animated series has to beStar Wars.

Family Guy began making references to theStar Wars films every bit early on equally Flavor 1, with characters frozen in carbonite, escape pods used and Jabba the Hut even making appearances. Finally, in the hr-long Flavor 6 premiere,Family Guy went all-in with a full parody ofEpisode Iv: A New Hope titledBlue Harvest -- a reference to the false working title of the original Star Wars.That eventually led to Family Guy parodying all three originalStar Warsfilms: A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.

How Family Guy's Star Wars Episodes Came to Exist

MacFarlane discussed the Star Wars parodies in Family Guy's Flavor 11 retrospective episode "200 Episodes After." "Nosotros had done a number of Star Wars gags on the show, and they were so frequent eventually Pull a fast one on legal said to united states, 'If you lot're going to keep doing these, we have to get clearance from Lucasfilm, because in that location's just no mode we're not going to get sued,'" he recalled. "And we said 'Ah, well, God, that'southward the end of information technology,' you know, 'nosotros're not going to be able to do these anymore.' And Lucasfilm surprised us by saying, 'Yeah, no, we like this.'"

With the blessing of Lucasfilm,Family Guy created three 60 minutes-long specials: Flavour 6'due south, "Blue Harvest" a parody ofEpisode Four: A New Promise; Flavour 8'south "Something Something Something Dark Side," a parody of The Empire Strikes Back; and Season 9's "Information technology'southward A Trap," a parody of Return of the Jedi.Each episode is a retelling of the pop film, usingFamily Guy characters in theStar Wars roles. Much to the delight of fans of the sci-fi films, they actually do an fantabulous job of accurately relaying the story.

Robot Chicken Parodied Star Wars First

ButFamily Guy isn't the but testify to parody the Star Warsfranchise. Long earlier shows like The Simpsons had their ownStar Wars specials, Seth Light-green, who voices Chris Griffin onFamily Guy, used his sketch comedy stop-motion bear witnessRobot Cravento poke fun at a galaxy far, far away. The testify aired a 22-minute special calledRobot Chicken: Star Wars, making references to all of the franchise'sfilms, including Episodes I-Three, which weren't parodied onFamily Guy.

The playful rivalry betweenFamily unit Guy andRobot Craven is referenced throughout MacFarlane's series, but especially in "It'due south A Trap." In one of the concluding scenes of the episode, Emperor Palpatine (Carter Pewterschmidt) is trying to upset Luke (Chris Griffin) by badmouthing Seth Green, who voices Chris. The sequence is entertaining, with Palpatine trying to get a rise out of Luke by claiming Seth Green has never made whatever pop films, while likewise making specific reference to "that God-awful puppet show," Robot Craven.

At the stop of the episode, the scene returns to the Griffin family in their living room, where Peter (voiced by MacFarlane) and Chris argue about which Seth is worse, with MacFarlane'south characters advocating for himself, while the others vote for Green.

The Future of Family Guy's Star Wars Episodes

The episodes were an instant striking, not only with fans ofFamily Guy andStar Wars, but also with George Lucas himself, at least co-ordinate to MacFarlane.

"As a matter of fact, when the starting time 'Blue Harvest' episode was most to air, nosotros were invited up to his ranch and we saturday down and watched information technology with him," MacFarlane told the Los Angeles Times in 2009. "We were half-expecting him to say, 'Yous know what? We can't allow this to air.' But he brought his son, and they were both into information technology."

Nonetheless, despite the success of the Star Wars episodes, Family unit Guy is unlikely to tackle the prequel or sequel trilogies. According to Sulkin, "[Disney] is a lilliputian more hard to bargain with," making the chances of another collaboration minuscule. That didn't stop MacFarlane and his creative team from having fun at Star Wars' expense, though. In the 2010 straight-to-video special "Information technology's A Trap," Peter remarks that the Family Guy spinoff The Cleveland Show might practise Episodes I-III.

While more Star Wars episodes may be off the table,Family unit Guy will surely go on to reference MacFarlane's favorite films, television shows and moments in popular civilisation, including a galaxy far, far away.

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Alex Payne (64 Articles Published)

Alex is a Toronto-based writer/professional person nerd. She has a degree in Cinema Studies from the University of Toronto, and has seen merely about every horror motion-picture show ever made. Alex is obsessed with all things DC, The Simpsons, Legend of Zelda and the Fallout serial, to proper name a few. If she isn't decorated re-playing Breath of the Wild, she tin can be found writing YA novels in her spare time. Follow @HeyAlexPayne on Twitter and Instagram

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