One of these characters is no longer extant.

If you haven’t watched this weekend’s episode of Family Guy and you’re offended by spoilers, just turn around right now and head in the other direction.  Otherwise, read on.

From struggling afterthought with a cult following to massive hit to target of protests and bannings, Fox’s cartoon series Family Guy has been through a lot of ups and downs during its run, but at its core, Family Guy‘s one shining star–aside from Seth MacFarlane himself–is MacFarlane’s barely-disguised canine double, Brian Griffin.  Brian was the first character from the show I saw on a tee shirt, and the first character from the show that people seemed to really take to as he’s the one who offered up the show’s first real catch phrase, “Whose leg do you have to hump around here to get a dry martini?”  Since then, it’s been mostly smooth sailing for the show and the character.  Crazy things would happen and, the next week, everything would be back to normal.  Not so much.  Family Guy has decided to kill off Brian in a shocking turn-of-events.

“As soon as this idea came up, we started talking about what the next couple episodes could be and we got very excited about the way this change will affect the family dynamics and the characters,” said Family Guy executive producer Steve Callaghan in a Q-and-A with E!  He added, “It seemed more in the realm of reality that a dog would get hit by a car, than if one of the kids died. As much as we love Brian, and as much as everyone loves their pets, we felt it would be more traumatic to lose one of the kids, rather than the family pet.”

So, in a bid to shock viewers, the show kills off a lead character rather than, say, Meg or Mort or someone else the show doesn’t do a lot with.  Or they could have killed off some of the characters from The Cleveland Show before moving them all back to Quahog to rejoin the Family Guy cast after the cancellation of the spin-off show.  Granted, the Griffins have already replaced their dog with a new one (voiced by the great Tony Sirico), and I haven’t actively watched the show in eight or nine seasons, but when the creator and lead voice actor exits his favorite role, it’s either because he’s spreading himself too thin on other projects or the show is going downhill.  In this case, maybe both?

Tags: family guy, television, fox, seth macfarlane, brian griffin, family guy kills a major character, family guy kills off a character, brian griffin killed off on family guy, animation, cartoons, steve callaghan

I’ve never had a problem eating food from a gas station.  Just two weeks ago, I ate a couple of hot dogs purchased from a gas station.  They were delicious.  That’s not the first time I’ve eaten gas station food, and I doubt it will be the last.  There’s nothing like a fun food novelty. […]

Commissioner Roger Goodell gathered 32 NFL owners for one big question.  One of the league’s most wanderlust-stricken franchises is looking to move again.  The Oakland-Los Angeles-Oakland Raiders, tired of gutting it out in a run-down stadium, were once again looking for greener pastures.  Only the Miami Dolphins refused to cooperate.  With a vote of 31-1, […]

In 2006, an injury to Dallas Cowboys starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe opened the door for an undrafted free agent by the name of Tony Romo to take the helm of America’s Team and lead the Dallas Cowboys to an early playoff exit.  Bledsoe went from starter to afterthought in a season.  Now, the circle continues […]

For 89 years, Oscars has never had a major mistake.  The last few Oscars might have had a few flubs, but at least they never got the most important category of the night wrong.  Well, that’s now changed, all thanks to OG Bonnie and Clyde legends Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway.  When Faye Dunaway called […]

Tom Brady has been wildly successful, if controversial.  He’s the first quarterback ever to win five Super Bowls and only the second player to do so after Charles Haley.  Unlike Haley, Brady won all his Super Bowls with the same team, the New England Patriots.  The only thing that seems to be able to stop […]

Ben Affleck, no matter what you might think of him, is a talented actor and director.  He’s got the goods, but he’s smart enough to know when he’s in over his head.  All along, since he took on the mantle of Batman, he’s had his eyes on writing, directing, and starring as the Caped Crusader. […]

In May, students for the for-profit American College of Education were running into some problems.  Their access to email accounts and course information was locked down by Google, who had disabled their accounts.  The reason why?  A fired IT worker for the American College of Education locked the school out of their Google cloud account. […]