Family Guy’s 3 Star Wars Parody Episodes, Ranked Worst To Best
Family Guy spoofed the original Star Wars trilogy with three hilarious special episodes. In Family Guy’s early seasons, every other cutaway featured a Star Wars reference; it was clear that the writers were big fans of George Lucas’ space opera. It was a stroke of genius to do a whole episode set in a galaxy far, far away, casting Family Guy characters in all the iconic roles and retelling the classic story with ZAZ-style cinematic satire. The ensuing episode, “Blue Harvest,” quickly became a fan-favorite, so, naturally, two sequels followed, tackling The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.
The producers even struck a deal with Lucasfilm to use all the right sound effects, design elements, and John Williams music, so Family Guy’s Star Wars parodies have an authentic feel that makes their tongue-in-cheek comedic content even funnier. Known collectively as Laugh It Up, Fuzzball: The Family Guy Trilogy, these three Star Wars parodies marked a high point in Family Guy’s history. But some of these episodes were better than others.
3
It’s A Trap!
By the time the Family Guy writers parodied Return of the Jedi in “It’s a Trap!,” their heart wasn’t in it anymore. They openly admit in the opening text crawl that they didn’t want to do a third Star Wars parody, but Fox wouldn’t let Seth MacFarlane take the time off to make Ted unless they finished the trilogy. So, they spoofed Return of the Jedi begrudgingly, which is never the formula for great comedy. “It’s a Trap!” is Family Guy’s most rote, uninspired, and by-the-numbers Star Wars parody by far.
As a half-hearted effort, “It’s a Trap!” is both a lackluster Family Guy episode and a massively underwhelming conclusion to the show’s Star Wars parody trilogy. But, while the behind-the-scenes doom and gloom shows in the laziness of the writing, there are still some really funny moments in “It’s a Trap!” In order to goad Luke into taking up his lightsaber, the Emperor roasts his voice actor Seth Green’s career. Plus, there’s a searing line about how few female characters there are in the original Star Wars movies. Even when it’s not really trying, Family Guy can deliver some laughs.
2
Something, Something, Something, Dark Side
Family Guy lampooned what is widely regarded to be the best Star Wars movie, The Empire Strikes Back, in “Something, Something, Something, Dark Side.” And while it wasn’t Family Guy’s best Star Wars parody, it did come close. It’s hard to make fun of a perfect movie, because there are no obvious flaws to exploit, but Family Guy’s writers still managed to come up with plenty of great gags. When Leia turns the Falcon back to pick up a one-handed Luke, “Turn the Ship Around” — a parody of Vicki Sue Robinson’s “Turn the Beat Around” — plays on the soundtrack.
A lot of the episode’s funniest moments come from recreating classic Empire moments with Family Guy’s signature raunchy shock humor. When Leia tells Han, “I love you,” Family Guy replaces Han’s “I know” with a much more direct “F*** off.” “Something, Something, Something, Dark Side” brilliantly subverts Empire’s iconic cliffhanger ending by replacing it with the cliffhanger ending of a different hit sequel, Back to the Future Part II.
1
Blue Harvest
“Blue Harvest” isn’t just Family Guy’s best Star Wars parody; it’s one of the best Family Guy episodes, period. Over the course of the Laugh It Up, Fuzzball trilogy, the writers slowly became disillusioned with the additional workload of producing special hour-long episodes and lost their passion for spoofing Star Wars. But when they covered the original 1977 movie in “Blue Harvest,” that passion was alive and well. They were genuinely excited to reimagine their favorite movie as a Family Guy episode, and that enthusiasm shines through on the screen.
This episode is a non-stop stream of great gags. These gags range from spot-on lampoons of moments from the movie, like the cantina band playing the same song over and over again, to delightfully random non-sequiturs that have nothing to do with Star Wars, like Han and Chewie trying to get a second-hand couch from the Death Star’s trash compactor back to the Falcon. “Blue Harvest” is Family Guy at its best: wonderfully absurdist, shockingly dark, and pop-culturally pitch-perfect. The show’s subsequent Star Wars parodies had their fair share of laughs, but they never reached the heights of “Blue Harvest.”
8/10
- Release Date
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January 31, 1999
- Network
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FOX
- Showrunner
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Seth MacFarlane
- Directors
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Peter Shin, Pete Michels, John Holmquist, Greg Colton, Brian Iles, Julius Wu, Joseph Lee, Joe Vaux, Mike Kim, Steve Robertson, Dan Povenmire, James Purdum, Dominic Bianchi, Dominic Polcino, Bob Bowen, Monte Young, Zac Moncrief, Michael Dante DiMartino, Bert Ring, Seth Kearsley, Scott Wood, Chuck Klein, Brian Hogan, Gavin Dell
- Writers
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Steve Callaghan, Patrick Meighan, Mark Hentemann, Cherry Chevapravatdumrong, Tom Devanney, Alex Carter, Alec Sulkin, Wellesley Wild, Gary Janetti, Andrew Goldberg, Mike Desilets, Anthony Blasucci, Matt Weitzman, Kirker Butler, Damien Fahey, John Viener, Brian Scully, Ted Jessup, Chris Regan, Matt Pabian, Garrett Donovan, Ricky Blitt, Aaron Lee, Julius Sharpe
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Alex Borstein
Lois Griffin / Tricia Takanawa / Loretta Brown / Barbara Pewterschmidt (voice)
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