Family Guy-Season 2 (1999)

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General		Extras
Category	Animation	Main Menu Introduction Menu Animation & Audio
Rating
Year Of Production	1999
Running Time	336:32
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Various
Studio Distributor	Twentieth Century Fox	Starring	Seth MacFarlane Alex Borstein Mila Kunis Seth Green
Case	?
RPI	?	Music	Ron Jones Walter Murphy

    The Griffins are back for their second season. The show has gotten better in every way when compared with the first season, both in the quality and the quantity of the humour. It is laugh-a-minute animation, unlike Futurama or The Simpsons, which tend to take a few minutes to build up to punchlines. The humour in Family Guy ranges from slapstick to erudite, mostly presented through hilarious flashbacks.

    Seth Macfarlane, the creator of the show and voice of Stewie and various other characters, continues to produce one of the most inventive animation shows aimed at an adult audience. The Simpsons recently has been putting more innuendos in the show that adults would understand, but Family Guy shows it all full-on, and I would not consider this to be an appropriate show for pre-teens.

    Below is an episode listing for the season, spread over 2 discs. The descriptions are not really spoilers in any way, but if you do not want to know anything about the episodes at all, please skip down to the Transfer Quality section now.

    Disc One

    Da Boom: When Peter is told by a chicken giving away free coupons about the Y2K bug affecting all the computers in the world, he locks his family away in his basement for the final minutes of the millennium. No one believes him until planes crash, computers shut down, and all the nuclear weapons destroy most of the world. As one of the few survivors, the Griffen family trek across the country in search of the only food source that could survive the holocaust... a stockpile of Twinkies. 22:26

    Brian in Love: After random findings of urine-stained carpets around the house, blame is put on Stewie. To rectify the problem, Peter is to potty train Stewie. When it is found to be Brian having the problem, he is sent to counselling to find out the source of his accidents. All this leads to Brian realising he is in love, and having a problem dealing with it. 22:29

    I am Peter, Hear Me Roar: Peter is caught sexually discriminating against women at work, and is sent to a women's retreat to learn about the opposite sex. While at first being resistant to change, Peter soon learns that he cannot treat women with disrespect. His change leads him to act like a woman. So much so that Lois misses his charm, and sets out to change him back to being the chauvinistic self he once was. 22:35

    A Picture is Worth a 1,000 Bucks: Chris gives Peter a painting that he created, and in turn Peter sells it to an art critic for $5000. Chris then is asked to create more artwork for an art show, but is told to stay away from his parents so he can release his artistic personality. 22:33

    Fifteen Minutes of Shame: Meg is upset with the way her family is treating her, and they end up on a Jerry Springer-esque talk show. The end result is the family signing up for a 6 month Big Brother-esque show, which causes conflict amongst the family. 22:35

    Road to Rhode Island: Brian is sent to pick up Stewie from Lois' mother's house. But when Brian gets drunk and misses the plane, it is up to the two to band together for a road trip across the country to get home before Lois suspects anything has happened. 22:24

    Let's Go To the Hop: After a drug named 'Toad' is released on the streets to the kids of Quahog, Meg is caught with a frog in the pocket of her pants. This alarms Peter, who decides to go undercover at Meg's school as a student to teach the kids not to do drugs. In the process, he becomes the most popular student at school, leaving Meg to be as unpopular as ever. 22:11

    Dammit Janet: Lois gets a job as an air hostess. Peter takes advantage of this by getting free flights around the country. Stewie is entered into daycare as a result and falls for Janet, one of the other babies. 22:37

    Disc Two

    There's Something About Paulie: Peter learns the hard way about the perils of not listening to Lois. He buys a lemon of a car, and to fix the problem, he gets the mob to destroy it, therefore getting a new car. In return, Peter is required to escort the mobster's nephew around, who misunderstands Peter, and puts a hit out on Lois. 22:29

    He's Too Sexy For His Fat: Peter throws the family into chaos after getting plastic surgery to remove all his excess weight. Stewie gets fatter, Chris is still fat, and Meg is wanting to follow in her father's footsteps. Lois, while at mesmerised by Peter's good looks, tries to change Peter back before he loses his family. 22:35

    E. Peterbus Enum: Peter decides to get a pool installed in his yard, but his council does not have him on their city plans. Peter decides to become president of his own small country. When he invades U.S. soil, the army surrounds his country and declares war. It is up to Peter to make peace when Lois becomes sick of being at war with the neighbours. 22:35

    The Story on Page One: Meg is told she will not get into the college she wants unless she participates in an extracurricular activity. She decides to try the school newspaper. Her first submission is swapped over by Peter, who writes about Meg's idol, Luke Perry, accusing him of being gay. In turn, Luke Perry sues the Griffen family, and it is up to Peter to undo all his wrongs. 22:19

    Wasted Talent: Determined to beat an old rival, Lois sets out to win a trophy for having the best piano student play at a concert. When she realises that Peter is an excellent pianist, she enters him into the competition. The only problem is that he can only play when totally drunk. 22:35

    Fore Father : Peter tries to teach Chris to be a man by getting him a job at a golf driving range. Peter then discovers Cleveland's son has great golfing ability, and ignores Chris who is trying to impress his dad. 22:29

    When You Wish Upon A Weinstein: Peter is impressed by a Jewish man who saves Peter from losing money. He believes that the Jewish can do anything, and is convinced that converting Chris to Judaism will make him successful. 21:40

    It is interesting to note that these episodes are not in broadcast order, nor in the order produced. Fox has done this with Futurama, in which the broadcast seasons are different to the production seasons. Still, with a show like this, it does not matter in which order they are shown.... just give me more to watch. Next year, 35 more episodes are being broadcast, due to a surge in popularity of the program in connection with the show being released on DVD. I cannot wait.

Video

    The transfer is presented in a 1.33:1 non 16x9 enhanced aspect ratio, the same as Season One, albeit without all the video problems that accompanied Season One. Season Two offers a superior image in every way.

    The main problem with Season One was the MPEG compression artefacts. With high movement scenes, blockiness appeared around the moving images, and was quite annoying to watch. This has been corrected this time around. There are only a couple of MPEG compression artefacts which appear, but they are barely noticeable.

    Colours are plentiful. Not overly done yellows like The Simpsons, but more natural skintones which are pleasing to the eye, with the appearance of the characters growing on you over time.

    The image is as sharp as animation can get. There are no noticeable video artefacts, apart from the minor MPEG compression artefacts referred to above.

    There is one English subtitle track, which matches up exactly to the dialogue onscreen. One annoying aspect of the subtitles is in their placement. They do not appear in any one specific place, and can appear in all corners of the screen. On several occasions, I missed where the line was until it almost disappeared. My personal preference for subtitles is for them to be located at the bottom of the screen.

    The discs are dual layered. The layer change takes place in between episodes on both discs, therefore will not spoil your viewing by pausing for a second.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    A single English 2.0 channel audio track at 192kbps is what we have here, and while this does not sound as appealing as Season One (English 5.1 at 384kbps), you will not be disappointed. It is surround encoded.

    There are no sound problems whatsoever. All dialogue is totally clear.

    The surrounds are used throughout - with this show, a surround-encoded track is pretty much as good as a 5.1 track.

    LFE comes into play from time to time, mostly during Stewie's dreams, which consist of him using a bomb or laser gun which requires deeper sounds. It is not overly used, but is of enough substance to make it worth having a subwoofer.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Main Menu Introduction

Menu Animation & Audio

    This consists of a picture of the family sitting on the couch watching TV next to the menu choices. Every 10 seconds, one member flashes on screen and makes a sound, be that a laugh, a cough, or a whine. It is quite humorous when you leave it going for a while, and it eventually loops back to the start.

    In each episode selection submenu there are options for subtitles, chapters, a back button and a play button. A screenshot of each episode gives a clue to what you are going to watch, if you know them as well as I do.

    In Region 1, the first two seasons of The Family Guy were released together as Volume 1. Concentrating on the Season 2 comparison, we lose out big time.

    The Region 1 DVD released misses out on:

• Episode - When You Wish Upon a Weinstein

     The Region 4 DVD misses out on:

• Spanish 2.0 channel surround encoded soundtrack
• French 2.0 channel surround encoded soundtrack
• Spanish subtitles
• Commentaries: Let's Go to the Hop, He's Too Sexy for His Fat, and E. Peterbus Enum
• Behind-the-scenes featurette
• Deleted scenes
• Internet promos

    The Region 1 release is the obvious choice. One episode, When You Wish Upon a Weinstein is absent from the U.S. release. It was banned from broadcast in the U.S., but was released on Volume 2 (Season 3) in Region 1.

    The Family Guy is one of the funniest animation shows to hit the screens, yet was cut short by network greed. These episodes will tide you over until Season 3 comes out on DVD, with Season 4 being broadcast in 2005. This release has excellent video and audio quality, but is missing all the extras that the U.S. were lucky enough to have included.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall