TVSquad

(S05E09) For the first time in a month and a half, we finally have a new Family Guy. I'm not sure I understand the thought process behind the programming at Fox, but the bright side is it means we'll have plenty of new episodes for the second half of the season.

The FG team went back to familiar territory this week, bringing us another "Road to..." episode. If you close your eyes really tight, you can almost see the eventual special edition DVD commercial. Like "Road to Rhode Island" and "Road to Europe" before it, this one was split into two separate stories that had virtually nothing to do with each other. And also like those that came before, I preferred the Stewie and Brian story.

Up to this point, the Behind The Camera series of TV movies has doled out an equal measure of campiness and seriousness for each show it's covered. But most of the shows they've covered don't have the dark history of Diff'rent Strokes. So, for Behind The Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Diff'rent Strokes (NBC, Monday at 8:00 ET), producers Stanley Brooks and Scott Anderson decided to concentrate more on the downfall of each of the show's child stars. But, unfortunately, the movie drifts too often into melodrama and gives a very unbalanced view of what contributed to the fates of Dana Plato, Todd Bridges, and Gary Coleman.

Could there be any sitcom in TV history that's more star-crossed than Diff'rent Strokes? All three of the young stars of that show went through multiple problems after it left the air in 1986: Gary Coleman's parents allegedly stole all the money he earned from the show; Todd Bridges struggled with a drug addiction and had run-ins with the law; and Dana Plato ended up dying from a suicidal drug overdose. So, when NBC decided to give the Behind the Camera movie treatment to the show (remember they did the same thing with Mork & Mindy, Three's Company, and Charlie's Angels), it was inevitable that they'd make the movie a cautionary tale about what the child stars went through.

But here's the interesting part: Even though the movie is subtitled The Unauthorized Story of Diff'rent Strokes, both Coleman and Bridges have decided to participate in the production; they'll be seen in interview segments interspersed with the dramaticized depictions of the show's history. Bobb'e J Thompson, the cute kid from The Tracy Morgan Show, will play Coleman, and Todd Bridges mother will be played by Verda Bridges. Yep, Verda is Todd's sister, folks. Talk about being involved...