Family Guy Presents 'Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story' by James Ellaby

Not so long ago, it seemed like we would never get to see anything new from Family Guy; that it had gone the way of Futurama and we'd just have to make do with watching the old episodes on DVD. Fortunately, enough of us bought those DVDs - and sent in those death threats to Fox executives - that they decided to bring it back. How kind of them. So, now we have a fourth and fifth series to look forward to and here's a little bonus feature-length 'film' for us to enjoy. Aren't we lucky?

Well, it seems that some Family Guy fans don't think so, as they have complained about the quality of Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, pointing out that it's basically a three-part episode jammed into a feature-length story, and that is certainly a fair cop. It is split into three parts and does flag at times, but is still jam-packed full of everything we love about Family Guy.

For a start, there's the bookend sections, which sees Tom Tucker and Diane Simmons reporting on the premiere of the movie, with plenty of favourite characters from the series showing up, including the Evil Monkey and the jar of Kool Aid (oh yeah!), who is now going out with Drew Barrymore. Of course.

While it is a little lazy to just shoe-horn in as many in-jokes as possible, it is also nice for fans to see little glimpses of some of the show's funniest moments, so we'll forgive Seth McFarlane that little indulgence. So, what of the story itself? Well, like any Family Guy episode, the story is never really that important, as it is only ever an excuse for plenty of random and surreal events to occur around the plot.

But, for what it's worth, Stewie has a near-death experience and then sees a man on TV who he thinks is his real father (after all, he's hardly the spitting image of Peter is he?), so he sets off across the country to find him. If that sounds like a thin premise for a 90 minute movie, then it pretty much is, but there's plenty of other stuff going on around it, as well as all the crazy pop culture references you'd expect. Thankfully, very few of them are so American that we don't get them, which was often a flaw in the TV series.

If you've ever seen Star Wars, Thundercats (class!) or Bugs Bunny, then you're pretty likely to enjoy this, unless the thought of seeing Cheetara on the toilet or Elmer Fudd finally murdering poor Bugs upsets you. Of course, there is plenty of humour that strays just a little too far beyond the realms of good taste, particularly the tale of how the late Ray Charles was really blinded, while they use the non-TV format to get a good few swear-words in, though not even remotely close to the level of South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut.

However, this is still very much a long episode of Family Guy, rather than a movie. While Trey Parker and Matt Stone used the feature-length format to great effect, you get the feeling that Seth McFarlane probably planned this to be just three episodes and then threw in a few swear-words and took out the credits in between the three parts. But, beggers can't be choosers and there are loads of laughs here in what is a perfect taster for the long-awaited return of Family Guy.