The Worst Episode Of Family Guy, According To IMDb

While it may not always get lumped in with the greatest, longest-running animated shows of all time like "The Simpsons" or "South Park," Seth MacFarlane's "Family Guy" does deserve to be in that conversation. First premiering on Fox in 1999, the animated sitcom has survived cancellation multiple times and MacFarlane has no plans to end the show currently. 23 seasons and well over 400 episodes deep and the Griffin family isn't going anywhere.

Relatively few scripted shows in the history of television have lasted more than 20 seasons, but those that do have low points to go along with the highs that keep viewers interested. It's just the nature of the beast. When it comes to "Family Guy," what is the lowest moment? If IMDB is to be believed, that moment came in 2019 during the show's 17th season with an episode titled "You Can't Handle the Booth!"

The episode, which was the 325th of the series overall, currently holds a pretty lousy 4.2/10 rating on IMDB. For those who haven't seen it, the outside-the-box episode sees the Griffins recording a DVD commentary track for a season 16 episode (one that didn't actually air) titled "New Phone, Who Dis?" While it starts out as a pretty simple gag, some major drama between Peter and Lois emerges, as Peter reveals he was married once before to actress Sarah Paulson, the Ryan Murphy regular who has starred in shows like "American Horror Story" and "Ratched."

Ultimately, it comes to light that Peter makes a lot more money than Lois, which causes tension. Things get exceptionally meta when MacFarlane appears as himself in the recording booth alongside Mila Kunis and Seth Green, explaining to the Griffins that they are merely cartoon characters who aren't real. It's pretty strange, admittedly.

Now, is this truly the worst episode of the show? That's clearly a matter of personal opinion but, for what it's worth, "Family Guy" season 17 isn't held up as one of the show's strongest overall, to put it kindly. So it was part of a weaker period in the show's run. That said, for my money, it's at worst an imperfect experiment, but still inventive and bold. As someone who has watched the first dozen or so seasons of the show many times, and kept up with later seasons sporadically over the years, this is far from the worst episode to come out of the 25-year run.

DVD commentary tracks were, at one point, a huge thing in the industry. The Griffins even joke early on in this episode that it's an outdated thing. They still happen, but physical media sales are a shadow of what they used to be. Even at their height, these were for hardcore fans and not average viewers. So it's entirely possible that many people watching this episode found the whole exercise pointless. It certainly goes off the rails in the back half of the episode, but the first half is full of great gags and several laugh-out-loud jokes, in my humble opinion. The commitment to the bit is at the very least admirable.

Can one rightfully say that "You Can't Handle the Booth!" is up there with the likes of the best episodes in the history of "Family Guy" to date? Not a chance. But it is still a big swing and an attempt to do something different. It's hard not to respect that so late into a show's run, rather than doing something lazy or repetitive. To keep things fresh after so many years, new ideas need to be explored. This was an imperfect attempt at a new idea. That's at least commendable.

"Family Guy" is streaming on Disney+ and Hulu, or you can grab your favorite season of the show on DVD via Amazon.