Written by Pirata Hermosa
Finally, the episode too controversial for television is released on DVD. If you know anything about the show, you can make a pretty good guess what the story is about.When Lois (Alex Borstein) returns to her college reunion, she runs into her former roommate she once experimented with. When Peter (Seth MacFarlane) finds out, he expects a threesome, but much to his chagrin she wants Lois to be her surrogate. Against the wishes and opinions of the rest of the family, Lois decides to go ahead with the idea. But as soon as she becomes pregnant she hears that her friend and her friend’s husband were killed in an automobile accident. That leaves her with the difficult decision of what to do with the child now that she would be responsible for taking caring of the baby. And of course, everyone in the family has an opinion. Thus starts the abortion debate.
It’s pretty obvious why this one episode isn’t allowed on network television, but compared to a lot of other things they deal with on Family Guy it seems pretty mild. And if you compare it to an episode of South Park, it’s extremely tame. Overall it’s not worth all of the hype it gets or the “Banned From TV!” headline. It’s pretty much what you’d expect from any other episode other than the fact that they deal with the abortion issue, which is always a hot topic.The DVD only contains this one half-hour episode from the series. There are also a handful of extras and a commentary with MacFarlane and the cast.
“Seth and Alex’s Almost Live Comedy Show” – A half-hour variety show that aired in 2009 with MacFarlane. There is some animation, musical numbers, and guest stars while both actors do impressions and comedy skits. It’s just okay and a little odd watching MacFarlane doing all the different voices.“Live and Uncensored Table Read” – The cast sits in director chairs in front of an audience and does a table read of the Partial Terms episode.
“Animatic” – The storyboard presentation of the episode. It’s a very rough drawing and includes some additional jokes that were cut out or changed in the final edit.“Family Guy Songs” – You can place the DVD into your computer and download nine songs used on the show in the MP3 format. The songs are “Drunken Irish Dad”, “The Friendship Song”, “Give Up the Toad”, “Me And Jesus”, “My Fat Baby Loves to Eat”, “Prom Night Dumpster Baby”, “You and I Are So Awfully Different”, “You Do”, and “You Have AIDS”.
If you’re a collector and have to have every episode, then you’ll most likely go out and get Partial Terms of Endearment. But if you’re just a casual viewer it’s probably a good idea to weigh the price versus getting just one episode.Article first published as DVD Review: Family Guy - Partial Terms of Endearment on Blogcritics.
