The Simpsons Paused One Classic Gag Because Family Guy Kept Copying It

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The rivalry between "Family Guy" and "The Simpsons" may not be all that culturally relevant now, but at one time it was a fairly tense affair. As "South Park" pointed out with its "Simpsons Already Did It" episode way back in 2002, Matt Groening's seminal animated series is inescapably influential and no matter how hard a new adult animated series tries, it will ultimately end up using a storyline that hews closely to a "Simpsons" episode. Even real life can't help but be influenced by the show, with "The Simpsons" predicting dozens of real-life events and cultural developments before they even happened.

But with its focus on a boorish father figure as the head of a dysfunctional family, "Family Guy" always seemed a little more indebted to "The Simpsons" than other shows. This in and of itself was the cause of the two shows' infamous rivalry, which started after the "Simpsons" episode "Treehouse of Horror XXIII," in which a group of Homer clones featured Peter Griffin himself. "Family Guy" had a surprisingly bleak response to this in the 2007 episode "Movin' Out (Brian's Song)," in which Quagmire forces himself on Marge before gunning down the whole Simpsons family. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Fox ensured this "joke" was cut from the episode, but the "Simpsons"/"Family Guy" feud had been well and truly ignited.

During those intense early-aughts years, "The Simpsons" was never forced to cut any attempts to poke fun at "Family Guy" — mostly because the show avoided horrific sexual assault "gags." However, the writers did take it upon themselves to self-edit, cutting a certain type of joke that had come to define the humor on Seth MacFarlane's show.

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In the years since the "Simpsons"/"Family Guy" rivalry began, there has been a cooling of tensions, with the two shows eventually crossing over for a full episode in 2014, before crossing over once again, this time along with "Bob's Burgers," in 2023. What do longtime "Simpsons" writers really think about "Family Guy" now? Well, a lot of them have since worked on both shows, so there's certainly nothing like the ire that existed between the two series back in the day.

Still, for fans of either show, it's fun to delve into the history of this monumental TV beef. Particularly interesting is the way in which "The Simpsons" writers did more than take jabs at "Family Guy." As revealed in the DVD commentary for the season 3 episode "Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes?," "Simpsons" writers intentionally stopped writing cutaway gags after "Family Guy" ran that particular type of joke into the ground.

In the episode, Mr. Burns is informed that Homer's health exam has revealed his sperm to be sterile. As a way to appease his employee, Burns makes up a fake award, "The First Annual Montgomery Burns Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence," which comes with a cash prize of $2,000. When the family debates what to do with the money, Marge suggests buying a new washer and dryer set, before the episode cuts to a shot of the basement where the family cat, Snowball II, almost gets flattened by the runaway appliances.

In the commentary track, producer and season 3 showrunner Al Jean reacted to this cutaway joke, saying:

"We had started doing these jokes a lot more at this point, where we would cut away to some unrelated visual. We did it a lot for a couple years, then we did it less, then 'Family Guy' started doing it, and then we really didn't want to do it anymore."

In response, Executive Producer James L. Brooks says, "And then we knew it was dead," with Jean responding, "Once they were copying us."

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Though the show moved away from using cutaway jokes as it went on, these quick gags actually made for some of the best moments on "The Simpsons." Surely every fan remembers Homer's "Land of Chocolate" daydream? The show was full of this kind of humor during its early years. Hans Moleman's orange-eating class ("Just eat the damn oranges!"), or Homer's vision of starting a new life under the sea, during which he eats all the "friendly crustaceans" he can. These are some of the funniest moments in the show's history, and it seems they actually directly inspired "Family Guy" creator Seth MacFarlane.

During a SXSW interview (via Forbes) MacFarlane admitted that "The Simpsons" was directly responsible for his show's frequent use of cutaways, even citing Homer's "Land of Chocolate" fantasy as an example. "There were things like that they used sporadically," he said. "You recall each one of those so well that it seemed like it was a stylistic thing because they were so memorable." In MacFarlane's view, however, "The Simpsons" used cutaways "in limited form," and the "Family Guy" creator actually went into his show thinking about how to use such gags "structurally."

Indeed, "Family Guy" turned this particular form of humor into an art form, to the extent you can now find compilations of the show's best cutaways from any given season, and lists of the top 10 cutaway jokes in "Family Guy" history. But as time went on, this comedic style actually became a reason why many disliked the show.

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Over the years, "Family Guy" started to take some heat for its reliance on cutaway jokes, with "South Park" famously lampooning the show's writing staff, depicting them as a tank full of manatees who pick up "idea balls" and drop them in a joke generator to create what Cartman calls "one random interchangeable joke after another." MacFarlane addressed this kind of hate during his SXSW appearance:

"It's something that in later years has almost become something that's s**t upon in writers circles. And it's interesting because those are the hardest things to write. When you're dealing with story-based comedy it's almost easier. With the cutaways, you need to develop a brand new premise, storyline, arc, all in just a few seconds."

As "The Simpsons" has faded into irrelevance and "South Park" has become a sort of cultural Rorschach test, it's interesting to think about "Family Guy" and its place in culture. The show has come under a lot of fire, in part due to its reliance on non-sequiturs, flashbacks, and cutaways. But "Family Guy" has some undeniably classic episodes that clearly had a major cultural impact. While MacFarlane has spoken openly about being influenced by "The Simpsons," the show also had its own unique sense of humor that went beyond just cutaway gags.

As "Simpsons" writer and co-showrunner for season 3, Mike Reiss, wrote in his book "Springfield Confidential," "When 'Family Guy' debuted 10 years into 'The Simpsons' run, our younger writers were incensed: 'It's just vulgar!' 'It moves too fast!' 'It's nothing but pop culture references!'" If anything, then, while you can accuse "Family Guy" of merely being a "Simpsons" rip-off, clearly the "Simpsons" writers themselves felt it was a much different show to their own, which they'd presumably never say was "vulgar" or "nothing but pop culture references."