Top 10 Best Family Guy 4th Wall Breaks

Ah yes, remember the beloved TV Guide? “Family Guy” certainly does - so much so they poke fun at it in season eight’s “Dial Meg for Murder.” After hearing the rodeo is coming to town, Peter signs up to be a cowboy almost immediately. To ease Lois’ exasperation, he points to the TV Guide and tells her that this week’s episode is supposed to be about him getting into trouble at the rodeo anyway. This is true to an extent, as Peter is... um…molested by one of the bulls. We were promised some lighthearted zaniness, not a cross-species assault! Then again, the ‘Guide’ always did have a penchant for mincing words. We really should have seen it coming.

Chris certainly isn’t the smartest member of the Griffin family. In fact, he’s probably the stupidest - so stupid that he can’t even set up a basic flashback. While eating dinner with the family, Chris states that it’s even wilder than his dinner at the Sullivans. We then cut to the Sullivan family table, where Chris genuinely compliments Mrs. Sullivan on her cooking. It’s the perfect anti-joke, and both Peter and Lois proceed to berate Chris for his inability to procure a proper flashback. Ironically, this meta joke about a failed cutaway is funnier than quite a few of “Family Guy’s” actual cutaways.

It turns out that Peter gets REALLY excited when characters in movies say the title of the movie. To reinforce the joke, we are taken to a movie theater where Peter gets excited watching the title-dropping “Clear and Present Danger,” “As Good as It Gets,” and “Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.” Later in the episode, Peter is pulled over and Brian gets arrested for possessing marijuana. One of the arresting officers proceeds to denounce Brian’s behavior, calling himself a “Family Guy” and causing Peter to lighten up again. And we gotta say, the line was not nearly as contrived as it could have been. Well done, writers.

In the tenth season episode “Meg and Quagmire,” Quagmire tries to seduce Meg after she turns eighteen. He decides to take her to his sex cabin (because of course he has a sex cabin), prompting Lois and Peter to chase him down. However, they become stuck in traffic because the “Family Guy” animators haven’t completed drawing the road ahead. It’s a great visual gag, complete with a blank white landscape, an unfinished road, and some crude drawings of trees. We think this is easily one of the smartest and most visually inventive fourth wall-breaks in the show’s history, even if it’s not exactly the funniest.

Now if you want both hilarious AND inventive, we present you with the “Cowardly Lion Gynecologist.” After Kevin unexpectedly shows up at the Griffin house, Peter tries to set up an absurd flashback by comparing him to Benedict Arnold Drummond. The “Family Guy” producers don’t know what to do with this confusing setup, prompting them to scramble and air a random cutaway about the Cowardly Lion being Lindsay Lohan’s tentative gynecologist. This in turn prompts Peter to grow frustrated over the producers’ seeming lack of professionalism. There’s just so many mini jokes rolled into one overarching fourth wall-break that we have to give props to the writers.

The “Family Guy” writers know how offensive they can be, and as such, always remain one step ahead of the incensed viewers. This is the case in “Road to the North Pole,” when Stewie compares Santa’s industrial and scuzzy workshop to Bridgeport, Connecticut. Brian tells Stewie to prepare for the angry letters, and the show cuts away to a pissed off Bridgeport citizen writing a letter to “Family Guy”. The show doesn’t stop there, however, and continues with the Bridgeport jabs by including a belching factory in the background and having the man proudly defend all the squalid aspects of the city. Luckily, it seems like the real Bridgeport citizens have taken the joke in stride.

“Back to the Pilot” is one of “Family Guy’s” most creative episodes, and it contains a brilliant three-pronged fourth wall-break. Having time travelled to the pilot episode, Brian and Stewie watch the family set up cutaways and then stand motionless in the kitchen as the cutaway plays out. The joke ventures even further into meta territory by presenting the “Family Guy” ‘actors’ during a modern-day cutaway in which they just relax and pull out their phones. And finally, the show points to their own habit of having way-too-long cutaways, having Peter smoke a cigarette during a lengthy Al Harrington gag. It’s a fourth wall-break inside a fourth wall-break inside a fourth wall-break! Talk about taking the self-referential humor to the next level!

We think it’s safe to say that absolutely no one was expecting this bit! Aside from maybe “The Simpsons,” which features a different couch gag every time, most intro songs remain consistent throughout a show’s run. And if people don’t skip the intros, they almost certainly tune out due to repetitive boredom. “Family Guy” throws a massive wrench into the opening number in “Whistle While Your Wife Works,” when Peter falls down the staircase mid-song and crushes a backup dancer. We also see the walls of the studio as the camera angle changes, and Stewie eventually tells the operator to turn the camera off. It was a wonderful and hilarious way to subvert the audience’s expectations, and it’s easily the show’s most ingenious opening sequence.

In one of the show’s cruelest cutaway setups, Peter tells Brian that one of his white shirts was ruined at a wine tasting at Michael J. Fox’s house. We all know where this joke is headed, but the show throws us a hilarious curveball when, instead of a rude cutaway, Peter appears against a white background and tells the viewer the joke was too sad to show. He goes on to say that Michael was really nice about the incident and even wrote Peter a cheque for the damages, though in illegible scribbles. However, by the end of the cutaway, Peter is notified off-camera that they’ve decided to show the gag after all, and “Family Guy” goes back to doing what they do best - being incredibly rude to celebrities.

Before we look at the greatest 4th wall-break, here are a few honorable mentions.

“Desperate Housewives”
“The Father, the Son, and the Holy Fonz”

Fans Went Ballistic
“Dr. C and the Women”

The Fine Programs on FOX
“Death Is a Bitch”

“We’ve Been Canceled!”
“North by North Quahog”

Oliver Platt
“Underage Peter”

Remember when “Family Guy” got ahead of the offended Bridgeport viewers? Well they flip it on the audience again in season seven’s “Stew-Roids,” when Peter spends most of the episode inappropriately complimenting Chris’ new girlfriend. By the end, Connie gets knocked down at a party and Peter walks in to declare that she needs help. He then lays himself on her body, and, knowing that this is the breaking point for most audiences, turns to the camera and accuses the viewer for being sick and twisted as nothing bad is actually happening. It’s a perfect example of “Family Guy’s” self-referential nature, its penchant for directly addressing the viewers, and its ability to deflect criticism through intelligent meta humor. In short, it’s the perfect fourth wall break.