TVSquad

(S06E11) Brian learns that he had an illegitimate 13-year-old child from a previous relationship (voiced by Harvey Fierstein). The child is dropped off at the Griffin household and Brian now has to raise him.

It should be noted that this season has been shortened to 12 episodes, most likely due to the writer's strike. The season finale will be shown next week. The remaining unfinished episodes will be part of next season's broadcast.

The jokes were very acerbic this episode. Okay, it's usually very acerbic every episode but examples like Brian's response to his ex-girlfriend's confession of being molested by her father of "So...you do go all the way?" crossed a line for me. It was one of those jokes I was afraid to laugh at. The Doug Henning joke was another one.

The show, as usual, gets some clever pop culture jokes in. I remember those Owens Corning Fiberglass Insulation commercials with the Pink Panther from when I was a kid. In fact, he's still their cartoon mascot after all these years.

The Count Crotchula joke was funny for about five seconds. Similarly, the Matthew McConaughey joke went a little long, but the ending was funny. "You suck donkey ass." "You can't prove that." It sounded like Seth Green doing the McConaughey voice, but I'm not certain about that.

I'm glad the episode mentioned the arithmetic problem of Brian having a teenage son before I had a chance to. This is a method that Family Guy has used before. It shows that a story can still work even when writers acknowledge the logical inconsistencies of a story (even going so far to using it to their advantage).

Of course, there is still confusion about exactly what Brian is. He can be confused like a dog when a bag is put over his head yet he can father a human child. Perhaps he's a space alien.

When Brian visited his Baby Mama with Stewie, she had one of those "Hang In There" kitty posters on the wall in the background. Marge made a joke once on The Simpsons about the same poster. It's another case of "Simpsons Already Did It".

The moment of Brian and Dylan bonding over a joint was very Jerry Springer (I was thinking the same thing when Stewie started chanting "Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!"). Only on Family Guy could such an event lead to a turn around in Dylan's life. I know of several parents who are the overprotective, obnoxious sort that Brian became.

Some other good bits from the episode: the joke about the goodbyes in the Wizard of Oz, when Dylan beat up the evil monkey in Chris' closet, "Boy, there is a lot of feces in here.," "I'm a girl. I don't even like the good Monty Python sketches.," "Thank God I'm full of Play-Doh.," "'Knock, knock.' 'Who's there?' 'You're there.'"

The plywood cut-out folk art joke was a repeat from a previous episode and wasn't really funny the first time.

This week's episode was pretty good. It had it's ups and downs but it came out ahead overall. It could be because the writers have had the time between episodes to get creative. I have my doubts about the season ending on a high note next week because technically it would have been a mid-season episode, but I'm hoping to be proven wrong.