Full Analysis of The Family Guy

Introduction
Aim of this analysis is to check if and in what parts The Family Guy resembles transmedia project. Why are we interested whether this project is an actual transmedia example?


Well, “Let's face it: we have entered an era of media convergence that makes the flow of content across multiple media channels almost inevitable” and the analysis goal is to check how well the content flow is planned in The Family Guy (Jenkins, 2003). If we then look at the content we should also assess its proper use on different platforms and adjustment of several projects to the story world. Because there are many series extensions only most relevant ones were selected for this analysis.
In order to check The Family Guy we will use academic sources balanced with audience and reviewers opinions to have a clear insight of the project. At first, The Family Guy will be checked according to Jenkins’ 7 concepts of transmedia to have a general overview if we can actually say about The Family Guy transmediation. Later on, we will have a closer look on the products that build The Family Guy world followed by the critique of its weak sides and suggestions of how to improve the concept.

What is The Family Guy?
Show called The Family Guy is a Fox production created by Seth MacFarlane for adults even though, it is an animated series it presents a fictional dysfunctional family of the Griffins: Peter (dad), Lois (mom), Meg (daughter), Chris (son), Stewie (the youngest son), Brian (dog) and their friends and relatives.
The narration in the fictional city of Quahog lasts for over 13 years now, as it was aired for the first time in 1998, it consists of 173 episodes of 10 series. The subjects in the show are usually dependent on the cultural references which are bind with the family life that has actual no time line.
The show is constructed with the main story, short story and a bunch of gags that may  reference to modern culture, flashbacks (usually self-referential humour) or catch phrases (like Quagmire’s ‘giggity giggity go’). This is purely entertaining show for adults that was criticised for its racist and sexists jokes, negative image of religion or presenting dysfunctional family relations. The gags are rather simple and easy to consume so its artistic value is rather low what was another cause for the show criticism.

7 principles of transmedia in The Family Guy

Spreadability vs. drillability
The first thing that has to be investigated is the capacity of The Family Guy to spread its content through media networks in order to expand both its economic and cultural value (Jenkins, 2009a). The fact is, that the programme has its Twitter and Facebook official and unofficial profiles, YouTube is loaded with UGC and clips from the show, and there are 19 podcasts on iTunes to listen or download. The Family Guy also appears on different media platforms, besides television series and its spin-off The Cleveland Show there are comic books, flash games, video games and live performances, DVDs, collectibles, costumes, mugs, etc. Therefore, spreadability of the programme may be acknowledged, however, we may observe a lack of drillability, the notion presented by Mittell and understood as an encouragement for fans to dig deeper in order to discover the complexity of a story (Mittell cited in Jenkins, 2009a). Fan pages of the show consist usually of episodes’ descriptions, transcripts, quotes or flash games but it does not really contribute to drilling into the story. The same with comic books, video games or books. There are only few things that may contribute to the show drillability and it is its spin-off, live performances or a book called Stewie’s Guide to World Domination (and those three examples presented will be argued as well), albeit there is a great amount of other products with a total lack of drillability that will be presented in the following chapters. It was predicted by Mittell who stated that sometimes the franchise sustains spreadability but does not offer any real depth to drill at the same time which in this case fully apply to The Family Guy (Mittell cited in Jenkins, 2009a).

Continuity vs. Multiplicity
The other notion to investigate is continuity of the story world in transmedia franchises and the show itself which contributes to ‘coherence’ and ‘plausibility’ of the plot and which is appreciated by hardcore fans who collect bits of information to have a whole picture of the story (Jenkins, 2009a). Unfortunately, on fun forums dedicated for The Family Guy people complain about certain lacks in the story world, “This is kind of to my point, which is people placing expectations on Family Guy of having a coherent plot and universe” (Nohomers, 2010). Brickrd (a forum user) suggests that the show’s universe is not coherent, thus, not plausible for viewers. It is not a problem of the program only as on web sites dedicated to review games the same voices rose about the franchise game with 3 different plots of 3 characters from The Family Guy, “The game only attempts to tie these storylines together in the loosest way possible, but lack of coherence aside, it's still pretty funny stuff.” (Navarro, 2006). Those voices may indicate a lack of continuity in The Family Guy universe but, it does not influence on the multiplicity of content created by fans which is enormous. YouTube clips that present Peter’s Griffin family as Sonic characters, numerous mash-ups with American Dad, Gears of War or Star Wars, people dressing up as the series characters, wiki pages and many others. The Family Guy fans like to retell the stories in alternative ways, from different points of view and these stories are usually kept in the frames of the story so e.g. relationships between the characters are preserved, the places where the story may happen, as well. Multiplicity of content produced by Fox is enormous as well, we may read the family story in comic books, books, we may play various mobile, video, board or card games, play with The Family Guy toys, etc. Multiplicity of content would be also confirmed, then.

Immersion vs. Extractability
The fans entrance into the story of The Family Guy was only symbolic, two performances of Family Guy Life! were limited only to reading old episodes aloud by the cast members from the stage. The audience did not acquire any new knowledge about the story nor took part in the show so unique and personal experience of a viewer may be arguable. However, when it comes to extractability, which means merchandising, the variety of products is huge: adult costumes of each character, masks, an interactive playset, belt buckles, mugs, t-shirts, board games, wristbands and numerous other gadgets will not let you forget about for favourite show.

Worldbuilding
The fundamental notion of Transmedia Storytelling is worldbuilding which, due to the complex universe, well-constructed characters, enables the producer to make transmedia extensions not always build around the core narrative but assuring different entry points to the universe. Seth MacFarlane created a spin-off of The Family Guy called The Cleveland Show where the main character is Peter’s friend who moves to Virginia and sets up a new family. There are several episodes where they talk to each other by phone however, no direct meetings were presented in both shows since Cleveland moved and other closer relations between shows do not exist as well.
“The concept of world building seems closely linked to the earlier principles of immersion and extractability since they both represent ways for consumers to engage more directly with the worlds represented in the narratives, treating them as real spaces which intersect in some way with our own lived realities.”                                                           (Jenkins 2009b)
Besides a range of collectibles that engage fans, there are also several entrance points to the story from different platforms like comic books, flash games, DVDs, podcasts and video games.
Unfortunately, all of the things produced on the basis of The Family Guy’s  story are decreased by one important factor creating the story world: negative capability. “Simple references to people, places or events external to the current narrative provide hints to the history of the characters and the larger world in which the story takes place” do not usually occur in the story (Long, 2007:53). Only few times Peter mentioned e.g. Cleveland’s removal to Virginia but this do not actually constitute and contribute to the notion of negative capability in the overall story. What is more, Ruppel’s notion of intermedial hooks, which refers to migratory cues: hints made for viewers to look for some more information in other sources that the main narration just to provide a better understanding and make the story more enjoyable for audience, does not exist in the story world as well (Long, 2007:59-60).
Summing up, the world of The Family Guy is not really a complex structure and certain lacks restrain audience to enjoy it more on different platforms, with additional information or with a clear connection to the spin-off story. In the way as it is created now, the story of The Family Guy does not seem as a universe waiting to be discovered, but rather a simple story of a family and their friends.


Seriality
The notion of seriality does not refer to existence of series’ episodes only, it is a broader sense explained by Jenkins,
“We can think of transmedia storytelling then as a hyperbolic version of the serial, where the chunks of meaningful and engaging story information have been dispersed not simply across multiple segments within the same medium, but rather across multiple media systems”.                                                                                                      (Jenkins, 2009b)
On one hand, we have video games and comics that engage people with other platforms than the television series only. On the other hand, those are not meaningful chunks that help us to get some additional information of the story world connected with the main narrative. As I presented some arguments in the previous section of continuity vs. multiplicity the story’s extensions are not coherent to the main narration and do not expand the story world with some new characters, events or locations. Those are just pieces of stories placed in the story world that do not have any relation to what happens in the series, the main narration plot. Thus, we cannot perceive them as enriching pieces of the story that in turns questions the seriality notion in the case of The Family Guy.

Subjectivity
The next thing ascribed to transmedia production is its subjectivity, the possibility to release transmedia extensions which will explore the main narration through new eyes and give new perspective to the story (Caddell, 2009). The examples of subjectivity are mobisodes and webisodes, which do not exist in The Family Guy production. There is, however, one dimension of subjectivity that is applied in almost every episode of the series: back stories. The show is full of flashbacks from the previous episodes or the events ‘before’ the main narration start, e.g. Louis takes part in a porn movie before she meets Peter. The back stories create a bit more complex vision of the story however, usually the past events do not influence on the ‘recent’ plot thus, their meaningfulness is rather minimal. They are used as a self-referential humour that enriches the plot but not the story world itself.

Performance
The last notion of transmedia production is performance which refers to fan produced transmedia extensions that can become a part of the narrative. There are signs of fans’ activities of that kind however, there are no contests created by MacFarlane that would encourage viewers to take part in the creation of the story. There are several fan club pages albeit, I have not found any trace of e.g. fans’ meetings nor real clubs where people could meet and share their experiences, ideas connected with The Family Guy. Therefore, as Jenkins (2006) said, cultural activators and attractors exist in the form of The Family Guy wikis or fun clubs that recombine in new ways the materials creating new forms of cultural expression. It amplifies the audience creativeness and it lets sustain popular interest of the programme (Jenkins, 2006).

Elements of The Family Guy world

Franchise
As most of the media productions now, The Family Guy has a wide range of products for its fans to collect, watch or play with. It is pointless to single out every piece available in the internet however, some estimated value of The Family Guy logo on market can be presented. Even though, the data is a bit old, we may assume that the numbers rather increased through the years than declined.
“Reports have valued the Family Guy franchise at as much as $1 billion. Though neither Fox nor MacFarlane's team would confirm that number, a little back-of-the-envelope math indicates that it is overly conservative. At a reported $2 million per episode, Family Guy has garnered at least $400 million up front from syndication. DVD sales have totaled almost another $400 million, while 80 licensees have contributed at least $200 million from sales of various clothing and baubles, actual and digital. Fox's ad revenue off Family Guy can be estimated at at least $500 million over the years.”                                                              (Dean, 2008)
The variety of The Family Guy franchise will be examined for its adequacy in transmediation the project.

Comic books
As the UGO web page informs The Family Guy comic book was to be published in July 2011 by Titan Comics. It was suppose to consist of a main story, a short story and a gag strip, just like the show itself. Unfortunately, there are no reviews of that comic book, so we cannot be sure if it was actually published. Due to that, there is no information about the narration plot so we do not know whether it is going to expand the story world of the show or not, if the creator decides to introduce any new characters, locations or events that would influence or be in correlation with the main narrative. However, it may be another entrance to the story world if it is done well.

Books
Family Guy: Stewie’s Guide to World Domination a graphic novel was published in 2005 and written by the show producer Steve Callaghan. It presents the story of the youngest family member in Griffin’s family, Stewie who is willing to rule the world and due to that he storages weapons, time machine and other appliances empowering him to gain success.
The guns Stewie created and collected as well as the time machine is presented in the series and used from time to time, e.g. in series 10 episode 5 Stewie and Brian (the dog) come back to the pilot episode of the series using the time machine. The world enhancement by this book may then acknowledged as it presents the minor story of one of the family members, it expands the story world and there are references to it in the main narrative.
Family Guy: It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One is a humour book published in 2007 that is a biographical monologue of Lois Griffin. The books presents her memories of growing up, her attempt to be Quahog’s mayor and the book covers events shown in one of the episodes of the 5th season with the same title.
Due to the fact that the book does not present any new information that what we know from the show therefore, it cannot be perceived as a meaningful piece that would enrich the story world as it is rather an adaptation of the episode.
Family Guy and Philosophy: a Cure to the Petarded is a collection of 17 essays which explore the connection between the series and historical philosophers. The books shows Family Guy philosophies however, it does not expand the overall story world as it is only funny mash up of philosophical sentences implemented in the show environment but has nothing to do with the main narration or the story events.

Video Games
Family Guy Video Game! is the first game produced on the basis of television series story about Griffin’s family. The game is available for Xbox360, PSP and PlayStation2, it consists of 22 levels which you can complete as Peter, Brian and Stewie. The game main plot does not introduce any new relevant pieces to the great narrative, does not expand the universe by some new events and mini-games repeat gags from the television show but the positive thing to point out is its coherency to the main narrative (Navarro,2006). You can enter the story world with a new platform to play as one of the characters but what you have is just a repetition of the show and not its enhancement.
THINGS TO COME
New video game is being developed by Activision Blizzard.
Family Guy Party Game on Xbox 360 is being made.

Mobile Games
Family Guy Time Warped is an Apple game available for fans buy on iTunes. Stewie and Brian travel in time visiting ancient Rome, Egypt or Wild West. Game’s developer tried to ensure coherency and authenticity with the main narration as the game was treated as an episode of the series (planet-familyguy, 2010). No fans’ complaints found about the game so we may assume that the aim was fulfilled and the game was coherent to the story.
Unarmed and Dangerous is a game released by Fox to promote Family Guy: Something, Something, Something Dark Side movie. The players aim is to attach cut off limbs of Luke Skywalker (Chris Griffin) as he is fighting with Darth Vader (Stewie Griffin). The game is not a part of The Family Guy narrative as it is just a tool to promote the movie and does not constitutes any new entry point. (Mobygames, 2009).
Family Guy Uncensored is a mobile game where you explore multiple levels and 7 mini-games as one of five playable characters. Player can visit familiar places in Quahog, meet Peter’s friends like Joe, Cleveland or Opie, the game is coherent to the main narration and you can take part in Quahog’s life however, it does not enhance the story world by new characters, locations or events that would be included in the main story line.
The game was revamped for the iPhone, available on the App Store and a special mini-web-site was launched to promote the mobile game but it does not exist anymore (planet-familyguy, 2009).

Browser Games
Family Guy: Written In The Stars is an interactive site created by Fox to promote the release of Family Guy: Something, Something, Something Dark Side movie. You can write your own screen crawl after you choose ‘mild’ or ‘spicy’ option and provide some words that will fill the blanks in the existing story.
It is a product which does not add anything to the story world but is made to provide enjoyable movie promotion.
(available here: http://www.familyguywritteninthestars.com/)

There are numerous games that use The Family Guy environment and characters to play with: Save the Couch, Torture Chamber, Stewie to the Egg, Family Guy Quiz, Stewie Shooter, Peter vs Giant Chicken, Peter Griffin, Ultimate Peter Griffin, Family Guy Match, etc. (familyguygames.net). Those game are not always coherent to the story, they do not enhance the story world, the only aim is to entertain players by releasing new pieces of The Family Guy  franchise.
THINGS TO COME
MMO game called Family Guy Online is now during its beta testing so we may expect it to be fully available in the internet soon (Familyguyonline, 2011).

Live performances
Four live performances with The Family Guy cast reading old episodes was organized by Fox in Las Vegas, Los Angeles and New York. Musical numbers from the show were also performed on stage as the show was being recorded and sold as DVDs and CDs. The show was only a live adaptation of old episodes however, it let fans take part in the show, participate, watch and feel like it was all real hence, but all in all, it still seems as an adaptation. On the other hand, we may argue like Scolari does, “If we consider that every translation is a process of text transformation, in which you  always lose and win something, maybe the adaptations could be incorporated as one of the possible strategies of transmedia narratives” and perceive adaptation as a way to enhance the well known universe by its new discriminants (Scolari, 2011).

Feature films
Laugh it up, Fuzzball: The Family Guy Trilogy is a parody of 3 original Star Wars movies with characters from The Family Guy on 30th Star Wars’ anniversary. It was aired in on television and released on  DVD and Blu-ray. The trilogy was not a continuation of The Family Guy story and it was not coherent to the main narrative as e.g. the family relations changed, Stewie was Dart Wader so he was Chris’ father, thus the movies were not entry points to The Family Guy world.
THINGS TO COME
In 2008 Seth MacFarlane announced that he is working on a story for feature film adaptation as an old-style musical with dialogues.

Spin-off
The Cleveland Show is a spin-off where the minor character from The Family Guy show is a protagonist. Peter’s friend, Cleveland, moved to Virginia in order to set up a new family. There are not much references about each others in the shows, sometimes Peter and Cleveland call each other however, no common plot or events were created yet to bind those two shows together. More about the show will be presented later on.

UGC
Another important part of the story universe is user generates content (UGC). Scolari says,
“Transmedia narratives can be represented as a centrifugal process: from an initial text a narrative big bang is produced, in which new texts will be generated to reach user-generated content. From this perspective, transmedia storytelling generates a textual galaxy.”
(Scolari, 2011)
Indeed, the world of UGC in case of The Family Guy is a vast source for more in-depth analysis, however what is to be told for sure is the fact that the story inspires people not only to make simple clips or mash-ups with different movies or cartoons, as I will present some examples that attest some people live with The Family Guy!

First of all, they want to create their own gags for the story. Dump your homemade Family Guy cutaways here! on www.toonezone.net is only one out of plenty forums where you can try your creative skills.

Then you can make certain things that will remind you about your favourite show by e.g. making a cake with Quagmire, Peter or Stewie’s face (coolest-birthday-cakes.com) or DIY Halloween costumes of your favourite character.

People engage in creating a complex wiki sites about the show like familyguy.wikia.com or fan sites with quotes, videos, transcripts, soundboards or games from the show.

We also have plasticin figures, artificial nails, wool homemade toys, tattoos, masks and many other things produced with the cartoon characters. Fans do not only play The Family Guy board or card games but they create new ones. Rules of one of the party games begins like this:

“The Family Guy Drinking Game is intended for anyone at least 21 years of age who happens to be a fan of the popular animate show "Family Guy." Learning the basic rules of the drinking game allows you to plot your strategy to win while simultaneously playing the game with your friends. Since it is a friendly game, feel free to add or remove rules as you see fit.
Instructions:
Rule #1
Gather with a group of friends and turn on a "Family Guy" DVD of past episodes.

Rule #2
Make sure every member of the game has a full drink.

Rule #3
Take one large sip of the adult beverage anytime Peters says "sweet," Peter gets hurt, any character consumes alcohol or the episode features a "cut scene."

Rule #4
Take two large sips of the adult beverage anytime Stewie tries to kill Lois, Stewie creates a devious plan, Stewie does something feminine, Stewie gets a weapon, Brian and Stewie fight, Peter laughs or there is a commercial break.
[…] “
(eHow contributor, 2011)

There are of course many more rules to that game that vary depending on what web page you are looking at but it only attests to how popular the show is.
All of the homemade things based on The Family Guy show are created to enrich everyday life, to make it more interesting and funny. People want the show to be a part of their lives and they adjust the cartoon universe to their own purposes. The Family Guy characters live not only in the story universe but also in all environments their fans want them to be.

Critique on The Family Guy as  a transmedia project

LACK OF COHERENCY AND PLAUSABILITY
One of the things that highly influenced the media in the last 10-15 years is the world wide web evolution around the world. Thanks to the internet we may both consume and produce content which enabled people to create so called collective intelligence. Long cites Jenkins in his work,
“Transmedia storytelling is the ideal aesthetic form for an era of collective intelligence. Pierre Levy coined the term, collective intelligence, to refer to new social structures that enable the production and circulation of knowledge within a networked society. Participants pool information and tap each other’s expertise as they work together to solve problems”.                                                         (Jenkins in Long, 2007:28)

One of the examples of collective intelligence are fan forums that discuss the latest episode’s plot, investigate cultural references or hidden messages. Forum users are usually hard core fans with a wide knowledge about the show and as they keep track of the narration they are the first ones who display incoherence if that happens.
What can be often read on The Family Guy forums regarding the narration does not differ much from what NoSanninWa wrote on Animesuki forum, “Well, The Family Guy does use interchangeable and random jokes with no respect to any type of coherency or plot focus” (Animesuki, 2006). Unfortunately, as I mention in the subchapter Continuity vs. Multiplicity where under the topic “Does anyone else find this really annoying about family guy?” people complain about the plot inaccuracies thus, we may certainly say that people expect a complex project as The Family Guy to be coherent (Nohomers, 2011). It is even more complicated with all sorts of mobile or games where the family relations are not maintained, locations or events are different to the main narration and not only they have not influence on the main narrative but are irrelevant and not correlated with each other at all. iPhone game Family Guy Time Warped Review presents that lack of consistency,They also encounter historical versions of other Family Guy characters, like Lois as a sultry saloon girl and Quagmire as a deviant Roman emperor named Quagligula” (Podolsky,2010 ).
The same problem exists in the Star Wars Trilogy mentioned in the subchapter about feature films where it was pointed out that the family relations of the show characters are violated. As Long writes, “Special attention must be paid to developing a stage upon which multiple storylines (often in different media types) can unfurl, and every story must maintain the consistency of that world”, what in The Family Guy case do not exist (Long, 2007:48). That lack of coherency contributes to decrease in plausibility in The Family Guy products’ consumption especially by fans and the story may become incomprehensible for other viewers in the future due to the enhancement of a wide variety of The Family Guy products.

INSUFFICIENT WORLDBUILDING
Even though, the universe of The Family Guy is enhanced by The Cleveland Show or Stewie’s stories about dominating the world, most of the products do not really create a feeling that The Family Guy universe is something more. One of the possible explanations of it may be given by Long,
“A storyteller looking to craft a potential transmedia narrative should carefully craft the world in which that story exists, and then make passing references to elements in that world during the course of the narrative to simultaneously spark audience imaginations through negative capability and provide potential openings for future migratory cues”.                                                                                                              (Long, 2007:60)
In spite of the fact, that some signs of negative capability exist (utterly insufficient as for such a complex project) migratory cues are not its implication. There are no intermedial hooks that would entertain audience, create mystery and make the story more enjoyable, which in the end makes the story world quite poor in audience’s reception as we are limited to one location, the same family members and friends. If any back stories are presented, usually as flash backs, they do not enhance the story world and do not give any additional information about the character’s history but are made only as gags unrelated to the main narrative.

Furthermore, if the story world is not built well enough, transmedia extensions will suffer from a weak narration or universe. Jenkins says, “A good character can sustain multiple narratives and thus lead to a successful movie franchise. A good "world" can sustain multiple characters (and their stories) and thus successfully launch a transmedia franchise” (Jenkins, 2003). And as there are no doubts that Peter or his relatives and friends are good enough to sustain a huge franchise, there are doubt is the world itself may be a universe for transmedia project, though.
If we look closer to the spin-off we will find signs indicating that a spin-off is not a successful world enhancement. Roberto Bianco in USA Today said, “The characters here creak, including the talking bear who mirrors the alien in American Dad [another MacFarlane’s cartoon] and the dog in Family Guy, and the watered-down setup now feels like a copy of a copy of a copy” (Bianco, 2010). The primal idea for the show: creating a cartoon series with Afro-American family that would show the other side of the US society, with their problems and by their eyes did not succeed in the end. It occurred that the universe structure of The Family Guy was too rigid and by changing anything in it would not fit into the concept. McWhorter wrote on his blog,

“Cleveland, however, has been plunked into a virtual blow-by-blow reproduction of Peter Griffin’s situation in Quahog. The bloated, goofy son is a Chris Griffin retread. The randy, hyperarticulate toddler, an especially shameless retread, is a dusky Stewie. The hillbilly neighbor (white, for the record) is a stand-in for sex addict neighbor Quagmire. The low-key Every-hombre Latino immigrant neighbor who happens to be a bear and yet is casually treated like a person is perhaps the funniest thing on the show – or would be if we hadn’t been enjoying the exact same bit from Family Guy’s dog Brian for ten years now”.
                                                                                            (McWharter, 2009)
Moreover, it is not the matter of repeating the characters patterns in the show but the spin-off is way more similar to the original show. Poniewozik writes in The Magazine Arts,
But Cleveland pretty quickly became Family Guy II, with similar characters and dynamics (Cleveland's toddler stepson Rallo is essentially Black Stewie) and the same taste for quick-fire cutaway jokes and pop-culture references (including self-conscious ones about white writers making sitcoms about black people)”
                                                                                (Poniewozik, 2009)
As a result instead of having a parallel story to The Family Guy, that would enhance the world view for some new characters, with different social, ethical and ideological background we have a show with well known mechanisms, repeated relations and characters’ patterns. Both spin-off and the comic book (from subchapter comic books) repeat the same structure as the show and what we have in The Cleveland Show is actually a black version of The Family Guy with the same aesthetics, level of cultural references, dynamics and structure.

Summarizing, the world built in The Family Guy may be questioned in the case of its complexity and possibility of creation parallel stories. The universe may not be built well enough to produce relevant and successful enhancements as in the example of spin-off presented.

BRANDING
Even though, I was not able to present all of the products signed with The Family Guy logo, it is a clear fact that the range of franchise and merchandise is huge. As Jenkins says, it is one of the transmedia imperatives to produce goods that will entertain the audiences,
“Offering new levels of insight and experience refreshes the franchise and sustains consumer loyalty. Such a multilayered approach to storytelling will enable a more complex, more sophisticated, more rewarding mode of narrative to emerge within the constraints of commercial entertainment.”
                                                                                                          (Jenkins, 2003)
There are however, two problems followed by franchising and merchandising in The Family Guy case.
First of all, due to the wide variety of products, the universe coherency is arguable, which influences negatively the fans reception of the story. The relations between characters, locations and events are changeable though, may not be clear to a common viewer.
Secondly, many projects to supervise result in a weak preparation of the final product. As Bromley says about MacFarlane’s work, “I know that will rub some people the wrong way, because Seth Macfarlane has a ton of money and doesn't always put out the best product, but I calls it like I sees it” (Bromley, 2011). This lack of ideas, time of willingness to put heart in every product from The Family Guy  series is broadly commented by the series fans, common viewers and reviewers. Navarro writes on gamespot.com about the first video game that was supposed to be a hit but turned out differently,
“Unfortunately, the part where you actually play Family Guy isn't enjoyable at all. The gameplay is a perfect example of the "throw a bunch of ideas at the wall and see what sticks" mentality, but in this case, nothing is polished enough to stick, and it all ends up on the floor in an ugly, unenjoyable mess.”
                                                                                            (Navarro, 2006)
Unfortunately, the lack of proper work on each project and the amount of badly prepared products creates a belief that the story itself is not the most important part but selling it to as many and in as many different ways as possible. It is believed that every weak project can be sold if it has a brand’s logo on it what many think is the case of The Family Guy franchising.
Finally, the notion of making profits leads us to the last questionable part of whether The Family Guy is a good transmedia project or not. Multiple stories based on The Family Guy universe were made for different platforms which contributed rather to the commercial success than to the transmediation of The Family Guy. According to Jenkins’ transmedia storytelling discriminant: let each platform does what it does best in presenting your story  we got to another questionable point of The Family Guy  project (Jenkins, 2003). Podolsky concludes his iPhone game review with these words,
“Family Guy Time Warped will probably be a disappointment if you're looking for an interactive experience that lives up to the wildly entertaining TV show. Enjoying the video clips shouldn't require us to play a mediocre game, so we'll stick with the DVDs and late night reruns instead.”
(Podolsky, 2010)
The question is if it was one time failure to present the story on inadequate platform or the universe itself is not flexible enough to appear on different platforms and create multiple entry point to the universe.

Conclusions

There are many questions from a purely academic point of view whether The Family Guy is a transmedia production. Many things would indicate that the producers at least try to make an impression of transmediation: there is well acknowledged spreadability of The Family Guy content in different mediums, on different platforms, there were attempts to create an immersion by live performances, where the audience participation was rather arguable, though, extractability in The Family Guy works well along with franchising.
On the other hand, however, drillability in this universe does not really exist, worldbuilding is poor because of certain lacks in the universe building like wisely used negative capability and intermedial hooks which in turn restrain audience from fully enjoying the show, seriality of the show or subjectivity are rather marginal actions along with lack of performance which in spite of the audience creativity and willingness to create the show is not used.
The biggest problems that The Family Guy faces are lack of coherency, insufficient (or badly presented) universe and not well-planned branding.
As it was stated before the range of products signed with The Family Guy sign as well as the show itself lacks of coherency. Audience and reviewers find more and more imprecision in the universe where the family relations, back stories vary in different productions. In turn, it affects plausibility of the story and may finally lead less hard core fans to a feeling that the story is actually incomprehensible what will result in declining numbers of viewers. If only the producers kept the track of the plot in all franchise, merchandise and the show the problem of coherency and decreasing plausibility would end.
What is even more vital and not really well developed or badly used in The Family Guy is its universe. The characters are strong enough to support massive franchise however, the universe does not create the feeling that there is something more going on that just the main narration in the television show. As the show does not have any migratory cues, that would make it more enjoyable for the audience and that would engage the audience on a deeper level, it rarely uses negative capability and not in the way that would enhance the main narration. Even if flashbacks are shown, they usually are boiled down to gags and jokes that do not add anything meaningful to the story itself.
Furthermore, the story enhancement, its spin-off called The Cleveland Show had a great potential of being a real unfolding piece of transmedia project for The Family Guy. Unfortunately, instead of creating something new and meaningful the show happens to be The Family Guy black repetition. It occurred that the show concept is not flexible enough to absorb other ideas of presenting the universe. Well known patterns of characters, relations, show’s dynamics and construction were repeated and instead of other point of view, point of view of Afro-American family, with different ethnical, ideological and geographical background, we have a takeoff on The Family Guy. That kind of repetition is hard to call a real enhancement of the universe however, from the audience’s point of view it is a parallel story in the same storyworld. The question is:  if this universe is constructed well enough to support other stories creating a real transmediatic production?
In the end, what contributed to weak results in final Family Guy products is bad or insufficient supervision on many projects with its logo. Either lack of time or willingness influenced on badly prepared products that in the audience and reviewers’ eyes make no sense to the overall story or jar on with their bad quality. The conviction that a strong brand sells even a weak product results in distributing multiple stories on different platforms by different mediums but rather than creating a transmediation producers are focused on commercial success. In pursuit of delivering more products to entertain audience it happened that the stories were presented on inadequate platforms contradicting a crucial notion of transmedia: each medium does what it does best (Jenkins, 2006:95-96). And the question of the universe flexibility and capability of sustaining different mediums remains.
If we look at Mittell’s description of transmedia in the light of a current analysis there are reasonable doubts about perceiving The Family Guy as a transmedia project,
“Thus these complex comedies selectively engage the norms of serial form, weaving certain events into their backstories while ambiguously discarding other moments into the more commonplace realm of forgotten episodic histories, a distinction that viewers must either overlook as inconsistency or embrace as one of the sophisticated traits of narrative complexity—evidence of fan practices online suggest that the latter is more common once audiences accept the shifting rules as one of the sophisticated pleasures offered by these complex comedies.”
(Mittel, 2006)
This analysis unfolds two things, first of all, the amount of content placed on different platforms does not constitute the transmedia project and, second of all, well build universe and strong characters have to be kept and maintained in all products signed with its name. There are many things to change in The Family Guy to fully acknowledge it as the transmedia production however, it also may mean that it is not the producers plan for that show and they have chosen another path to follow, e.g. some hybrid of cross- and transmedia as they believe it is better for the story.

*After in-class presentation of the subject I would like to add one last comment that came to my mind while discussing the subject at the University and which makes The Family Guy case more complex.

I understood one obvious thing when I was presenting it that previously escaped my attention. The show is about a pure entertainment, it's like a stand-up comedian. He's point is not to create the story line, complex and coherent universe because to make people laugh, and I believe it is the core idea of the show as well, is to let people enjoy the gags, jokes and situational humour without the ballast of keeping track of the connections, influencing events, etc. The aim, goal and way to sell The Family Guy to people, then, is just to make it entertaining and create as much content, on as many platforms as possible just to let people rest and relax in many different ways, and make them laugh at stories placed within The Family Guy environment (not the universe) that is known for its simplicity, created just to put as many funny situations as possible and make them irrelevant to the narrative in a way, to avoid those complexities. Do we want to know how did it happen that Lois took part in a porn movie before meeting Peter? No! We don't want to know it as it is not funny, it wouldn't add anything entertaining to the plot and the show is all about simple funny gags, served to the audience one after another. Then my conclusion is now, that it was even not meant to be transmedia because complexity restrains people from just enjoying the funny show and that is probably a good example of a project that shouldn't be transmediatic because it would not be so simple and easy entertainment then, if we had all the correlations, events, characters relations in our minds.

I just wanted to share with you my final conclusion because somehow, until I told it loud in the classroom I did not look at it like this and only thought about all the drawbacks from transmedia storytelling point of view and somehow the broader concept, view, perspective  was lost between Jenkins’ 7 concepts and my critique. But as we all know, knowledge is a thing that has to be developed all the time and it is good to take a step back of what you have done and have a critique eye on your own work as well.



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