I couldn't find a thread about this - my apologies if I missed one that's already been started. Anyway...wow this was disappointing. I guess I should have expected that given the current state of both shows. It would have helped if they had attempted to crossover the styles of the shows as well, rather than just inserting Simpsons characters into tired Family Guy gags.
I don't watch either show anymore, however I've started DVRing The Simpsons so I can catch the Futurama crossover episode (which I think airs in October). I didn't know the Family Guy crossover was a Family Guy episode. I missed it. From what everyone is saying, I missed nothing. I did catch the premiere of The Simpsons which I turned off after about ten minutes.
And I'm going to be a sucker and watch the Futurama crossover as well, even though I don't watch either show anymore. Maybe since the Family Guy staff won't be involved there's hope it will be better?
I saw the trailer on Youtube for the crossover, and I wanted to take FOX over just to cancel the show and put it out of it's misery. I saw a "Futurama" episode where Fry picks a Bart doll out of the trash. I can't believe that is a "I didn't do it" Bart doll from his short "Krusty the Clown" stint, so it's got to mean TS is a TV show, therefore not real in the "Futurama" unvierse.
Bender did cameo in one of the Simpsons episodes which takes place in their near future, but as with all things Simpsons anyway, it's basically within the continuity of the episode itself. Crossovers like this will be written by the staff of one show or the other, not both; in this case it's the Family Guy people leveraging another property into its own. So it's just like when Stewie abducted the TNG cast, or they did the Star Wars shows... I wasn't expecting anything more than dropping the visiting characters into the same FG structure with the same FG effect. Nothing new here. Mark
The Futurama episode will be awesome. Bart does something to screw up the future so the Futurama people come in and try to fix it in the past. It's pretty much Terminator. And even Matt Groening knows The Simpsons sucks because the tagline he has for the crossover is "The show out of ideas meets the show out of episodes".
The crossover was very good. Simpsons hasn't been good for awhile, and Family Guy has been going down hill, but this crossover was very entertaining and was actually funny at times. It used both shows casts well, and I think it was probably done as well as it could have been. Even as someone who doesn't watch Simpsons much anymore, I liked how the characters were used. I'd definitely recommend watching it if you like Simpsons and Family Guy.
Peter also briefly appeared on Simpsons before. In the episode where Sideshow Bob was mayor of an Italian town, a guy looked through the 'Big book of criminals', and Peter Griffin was wanted for the crime of 'Plagiarismo'. Got to give credit to the seals though for picking out the 'Simpsons' ball.
That was the only part I laughed at. It was stupid, so so stupid, and I couldn't not. The rest of the episode, though, left me pretty cold. I guess I wanted more payoff from various things, like Stewie going all Hannibal Lecter on Nelson. Definitely.
They're manatees, damnit! But, seriously, that's the only time a parody or critique has totally ruined a show for me. It's just impossible to watch FG after you see that.
Yeah, the car wash bit was the only thing I laughed at. The rest was just awful. Admittedly, I haven't watched The Simpsons in years, but it seemed like the episode was written by someone who hadn't seen The Simpsons in years either, because it seemed like it was all based on early Simpsons tropes rather than anything new, like the style and jokes hadn't evolved at all in 25 years. Cue person responding that it hasn't evolved in five... four... three...
The car wash gag was funny, I'll admit (but it went on way too long). The only other part I laughed at was the bit at the gas station, which was just so absurd that I couldn't help but snicker. Everything else, though ... woof. The Stewey material was especially bad.
As a huge fan of both shows, I loved the crossover! It was hilarious and I nerded out just to see them interacting with each other. I particularly loved Peter and Homer being friends... and then their epic chicken fight at the end.
He was also in a Halloween episode segment about Homer being cloned. The "camera" scanned through a crowd of Homer clones, some of older designs, and Peter was amongst them.