Good morning, adult animation fans — we’ve got a feeling that Sunday is going to be a wonderful day. That’s because “American Dad!” is set to return to original home Fox this weekend after spending the last decade at TBS.
“It’s certainly a miracle. I did not expect this to happen at Fox, to come back here. We were on Fox for eight years and then TBS for 10 years, so when TBS wasn’t going to make any new scripted shows, I thought we’ll probably go to Hulu if we come back. That didn’t end up happening,” co-creator Matt Weitzman told TheWrap. “We won the jackpot! It’s fantastic to know that Fox wanted us back — it’s a much bigger platform, obviously.”
“I don’t even know how often it’s ever happened, that you go away for 10 years and then suddenly arrive back at home base. I think I giggled for about three days,” he continued. “And we’ve got another 56 episodes coming, at least, so we’ll be airing our 400th. It’s really special and I’m extremely grateful to be able to make more episodes and make people laugh a little bit longer. I’m very, very happy.”
Indeed, after debuting in 2005, Seth MacFarlane’s other hit cartoon aired its first 11 seasons on Fox before moving to TBS in 2014 for its most recent 10. The four-season renewal “American Dad!” received alongside its homecoming will also put the show well past the 400-episode milestone, with the Season 22 premiere airing this Sunday.
“There was a period of time where we didn’t know what was going on, so I just decided to write a script. Then it turned out that with the renewal, we had a much more shrunken schedule. There’s one [back on Fox] joke, but overall, we’re just going to keep on making the show that we’ve been making,” Weitzman teased of the return episode. “We’ve gotten to a place where we know what we’re doing. We still have all the same writers — we’ve lost a few of them, because budget cuts — but by and large, everybody’s here and all the artists are the same. The whole process is the same, so the show shouldn’t feel different to anybody. We’re going to say a few less curse words like we used to get away with on TBS, but I like to think that that’s not what the show is.”
And “American Dad!” isn’t alone. “Family Guy,” “Futurama” and “King of the Hill” have all faced various cancellations and unexpected renewals despite indisputably earning their places in pop culture history.
“It’s a tricky balance, because they can still see it as something that kids want to watch. So even though in this day and age there’s way more adults watching this stuff than there are kids, it’s the temptation that kids are going to be drawn toward it,” the co-showrunner explained. “So they want to protect kids — even though every child now owns a cell phone, so they have access to far more horrible things than this show will ever create.”
So what exactly has changed for Stan, Francine, Hayley, Steve, Jeff, Klaus, Roger and the rest of Langley Falls over the last 21 years?
“You don’t get away with as much. The world has obviously changed in a lot of ways. Degrees of sensitivity have increased in some ways; some for better, some for worse,” Weitzman shared. “When I was on ‘Family Guy,’ I was just trying to come up with whatever insane thought that crossed my mind, and that’s what everybody in that room did. You can’t show cigarettes on TV anymore, can’t show characters lighting up. I’ve had to throw out a pipe on a bookshelf because that one’s inappropriate. You can’t show an ashtray with cigarette butts.”
Plus, his fellow co-creator MacFarlane is still heavily involved as the voices behind both Roger and Stan Smith (with sister Rachael MacFarlane providing the voice of on-screen daughter Hayley).
“The system now has become where I will note the script, explain what’s going on, because he doesn’t have time anymore to even do table reads. He’s walking into that script completely fresh, so I’ll give him as many notes as I can,” the EP noted. “As far as I know, Seth does like the show. He’s so fantastic. I can’t tell you how grateful I am that he is still willing to do it after this much time. He could do so much else … The best thing I ever did was hire his sister, because he can’t say no to her — and she is exceedingly talented, too.”
Ultimately, the Smiths will be the same family you know and love whether you know them from Fox, TBS, Hulu or even Roger’s Place.
“We just kind of try to remain true to the characters and the essence of the show. Obviously, it has evolved. We used to be this political show and then we became much more of a family show, and now we’ve just gotten bigger and weirder. I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Weitzman concluded. “I thought I was going to be thrown out of this business a long time ago, so the fact that they’re going to keep me around? I’ll abuse that privilege.”
“American Dad!” returns Sunday on Fox and streams the next day on Hulu.
