It's a Trap!

"It's a Trap!"
Family Guy episode

DVD cover
Episode no. Season 9
Episode 18
Directed by Peter Shin
Written by Cherry Chevapravatdumrong
David A. Goodman
Featured music "The Games That Daddies Play"
by Conway Twitty
Production code 7ACX21/7ACX22
Original air date May 22, 2011
Guest appearance(s)

"It's a Trap!" is a direct-to-video special of the animated series Family Guy which later served as the double-episode season finale of the ninth season and is the final part of the series' Star Wars parody trilogy Laugh It Up, Fuzzball.[1] The home video was first released on December 21, 2010 and later aired on Fox in the United States on May 22, 2011.

The episode was written by Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and David A. Goodman and directed by Peter Shin. It retells the story of Return of the Jedi as "Blue Harvest" did with Star Wars and "Something, Something, Something, Dark Side" did with The Empire Strikes Back by recasting characters from Family Guy into roles from the film.[1][2]

Plot

The Griffin family experience another power outage, forcing them to reluctantly go through Return of the Jedi.

Rather than setting up the plot, the opening crawl states that Fox insisted Seth MacFarlane complete the trilogy. It makes reference to his then-upcoming film Ted in the sentence, "But Fox suddenly had dollar signs in their eyes, and they said, 'Seth, if you don't do Jedi, we're not gonna let you leave to go direct your movie."

Darth Vader (Stewie) arrives on the new, partially constructed Death Star, where Imperial Moff Jerjerrod (Roger from American Dad!) informs him that the new battle station no longer has the design flaws of its predecessor, except for a hole that could destroy the station if fired upon. Vader warns Moff Jerjerrod that they should fix that problem before the Emperor (Carter) arrives.

On Tatooine, R2-D2 (Cleveland) and C-3PO (Quagmire) find Jabba the Hutt (Joe)'s palace in order to initiate a plan to save Han Solo (Peter), still frozen in carbonite for posterity. Leia (Lois) unfreezes Han who releases a long fart. Their reunion is cut short when Jabba captures her and she is outfitted provocatively, and shackled by Jabba's side. Han, meanwhile, is thrown into a prison cell with Chewbacca (Brian), who got caught eating out of Jabba's garbage.

Luke arrives at the palace and attempts to bargain for the release of his friends. Jabba opens a trap door and Luke falls into a pit where he battles and kills the Rancor (Rush Limbaugh). Afterwards, Jabba orders Luke and his friends to be eaten by the Sarlaac (Meg). During the execution ceremony, Luke gives Jabba one last chance to release him and his friends. When Jabba refuses, Luke initiates an assault on Jabba's crew with the help of Lando Calrissian (Mort), disguised as one of Jabba's henchmen. Many of Jabba's men are knocked into the Sarlaac including Boba Fett (Ernie the Giant Chicken) (according to a dying guard, Boba just fell off). Distracted by the carnage, Leia chokes Jabba using her slave chains while her fellow rebels commandeer a transport ship. Luke, Leia, Han, Chewie, Lando, R2-D2, and C-3PO all fly to safety.

Luke and R2-D2 fly to Dagobah so Luke can finish his training with Yoda (Carl) while the others rejoin the rebel fleet. On Dagobah, Yoda explains the final part of training is to face Vader. In his dying words, Yoda reveals that Luke has a sibling. The spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi (Herbert) appears to Luke and further explains that his sibling is Princess Leia, "the only God-Damn woman in the galaxy."

The rebels begin planning an assault on the new Death Star. Admiral Ackbar (Klaus from American Dad!) explains that the plan will be the same as the last time they destroyed the Death Star, except now they must first destroy a shield generator located on the forest moon of Endor.

In order to land on the forest moon of Endor, Han uses a stolen Imperial ship and old access code to sneak past the Empire's blockade. Vader allows them passage on to the moon, knowing Luke is aboard the ship. When they reach the moon's surface, the rebels are spotted by Imperial soldiers. The soldiers attempt to retreat to warn others of the rebel attack, but Luke and Leia stop them in an elaborate bicycle chase sequence. Separated from the others, Leia is befriended by Wicket the Ewok (Tim from The Cleveland Show).

Luke, Han, Chewie and the droids fall into an Ewok trap while searching for Leia. They are captured and brought to the village where Leia is being housed. The Ewoks believe C-3PO is a god and begin to worship him. Luke tells Princess Leia they are siblings, but Leia claims to have already known that. She then introduces a Conway Twitty cutaway.

Following Yoda's advice, Luke surrenders to Vader in order to confront him. Vader tries to convince Luke to turn to the dark side. Luke refuses, but is delighted to find out that it is taco night. The two meet with the Emperor, who reveals that Luke's friends are walking into a trap on the forest moon. When this revelation fails to anger Luke, the Emperor begins to mock actor Seth Green (who voices Chris). Luke defends Green saying that he's been in successful projects, only to have The Emperor saying the negative side of Green's roles. Luke becomes enraged and begins dueling with Vader.

Back on the forest moon, Han leads the rebels to the shield generator. Complaining about a lack of dark plot content, he forces the three technicians inside to dig their own graves with their helmets, then ordering one of them to stab his companion to death and wear his face. Before they can carry out Han's disturbing orders, however, the company is ambushed. The Ewoks help the rebels escape from the Imperial troops and destroy the shield generator, while Lando and Nien Nunb (Rallo from The Cleveland Show) lead the attack on the Death Star.

Luke finally subdues Vader after Seth Green is further mocked, but he refuses to execute him and join the dark side at the Emperor's request. The Emperor then incapacitates Luke with his powerful Force lightning. Because Luke asks Vader politely for help, Vader gathers his remaining strength and kills the distracted Emperor by throwing him into the reactor core. Vader and Luke manage to flee the Death Star before Lando and his crew blow it up. Unfortunately, when Vader asks Luke to help him remove his mask (to "look on you with my own eyes"), Luke accidentally twists and breaks Vader's neck.

Everyone rendezvous back at the Ewok village to celebrate the rebels victory over the Empire. While the Ewoks kill the wounded Imperials, the spirits of Obi-Wan and Yoda appear to Luke, alongside the spirit of the redeemed Anakin Skywalker (Stewie), who angrily accuses Luke of murdering him and starts swearing at him.

The Griffins' power returns just as Peter concludes the story, Meg then asks Peter "What about the prequel trilogy?" with Peter suggesting that The Cleveland Show might do the prequels (though that show's subsequent cancellation has made such parodies impossible). After that, Chris asks Peter another question about how come he says in the story that Seth Green is a douche. Peter answers saying that in his opinion that Green has done a lot of unsuccessful projects and that Green sucks. Chris retaliates with saying that he thinks Seth MacFarlane is a douche. Peter, Stewie and Brian (all voiced by MacFarlane) defend MacFarlane as a talented young man with fresh ideas and good humor. Chris tells the three in anger that he got the whole idea of Family Guy off The Simpsons, with Meg and Lois supporting Chris that MacFarlane "only brings ten new episodes of the show a year" and "we get it, he watched a lot of television in the 80s" (a reference to the show's many cutaway gags referencing 1980s television). The argument ends with Peter claiming that people will just remember the laughter, before the family looks awkwardly at each other.

Cast

Background

It was announced in March 2009 the show had read through an early draft of the script under the working title, Episode VI: The Great Muppet Caper.[3] The second working title, We Have a Bad Feeling About This, was a reference to the recurring catchphrase that is used in the Star Wars films. The settled-upon title is a reference to the line by Admiral Ackbar in the film, which became an Internet meme through YTMND.

Due to the declining number of Family Guy characters, the episode also features characters from American Dad! and The Cleveland Show: Roger appears as Moff Jerjerrod, Klaus appears as Admiral Ackbar, Tim appears as Wicket the Ewok and Rallo appears as Nien Nunb. Stan was originally going to appear as Wedge Antilles, but his part got cut (he is still mentioned when Lando orders him to destroy the Power Station in the main reactor of the Death Star).

The role of Meg Griffin continues to be minor, this time taking the role of the Sarlacc.

The episode featured voice cameos from Patrick Stewart and Michael Dorn reprising their roles of Captain Jean-Luc Picard and Lieutenant Worf from Star Trek: The Next Generation, Adam West, Carrie Fisher and Rush Limbaugh as the Rancor (Limbaugh had previously made a cameo as himself in "Blue Harvest").[4] At the Sarlacc Pit, when the Rebels keep nodding at each other to fight back against Jabba's minions, an image of an impatient Ted Knight appears from a clip of Caddyshack ("Well, we're waiting!").

Production

David A. Goodman co-wrote the episode, along with Cherry Chevapravatdumrong.

The episode was written by Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and David A. Goodman and directed by Peter Shin, in his first episode since the fourth season. A preview of the reading of the episode can be seen on the "Something, Something, Something, Dark Side" DVD extras.

Home media

Both the Blu-ray and DVD versions, titled Family Guy Presents: It's a Trap!, were released on region A and region 1, respectively, on December 21, 2010,[5] Region 4, on December 22, 2010, and in Region 2 on December 27, 2010.[6] It was broadcast on the Fox network May 22, 2011 as the 9th season finale. It was also released in the trilogy collection, Laugh it up, Fuzzball.

References

  1. 1 2 "What's coming in Family Guy's new Star Wars spoofs". SCI FI Wire. Retrieved 2009-12-15.
  2. ↑ "Comic-Con 2009: Family Guy Spoof Empire". StarWars.com. Retrieved 2009-12-15.
  3. ↑ "Family Guy to parody Return of the Jedi". thrfeed.com. 2009-03-04. Retrieved 2009-11-23.
  4. ↑ Family Guy: It's a Trap! Coming in December Archived July 30, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  5. ↑ "Family Guy — The Final Star Wars Parody Announced - 'It's a Trap!'". TVShowsonDVD.com. Retrieved July 23, 2010.
  6. ↑ "Family Guy: It's a Trap! – Star Wars spoof, part 3". TechStyles.com.au. Retrieved September 27, 2010.

External links

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