As a big fan of Family Guy and a long standing geek, sorry, fan of Star Wars, it was a matter of time until I got my hands on the Family Guy spoof of Star Wars IV: A New Hope (that's the original one, often just referred to as Star Wars).

WHAT IS IT?

The writers of Family Guy found themselves making references to Star Wars in the scripts so often that the law team said they had to get permission from Lucasfilm. As it turns out, Lucasfilm were so nice that the Family team eventually decided to push their luck and ask for permission to make an entire Star Wars spoof and again Lucasfilm gave them the go ahead. The end result is a 45 minute (i.e. double episode length) Family Guy take on Star Wars, which is the opening to series 6. We also get a whole bunch of features, which I'll come to later.

Trivia: Blue Harvest was the name used by Lucasfilm when filming Return of the Jedu on location in a forest, in order to avoid fans who would try to infiltrate the set if they knew what was really being filmed.

THE PLOT

Do I really need to outline the plot of Star Wars? Really? Seriously, if you have to lower my rating, then do so, but I really think anyone reading this who doesn't at least have an idea of the plot should go and buy themselves a TV! Or perhaps just accept that this isn't the product for you.

I can be a little more sympathetic to those who are unfamiliar with Family Guy. In brief, Family Guy is an adult cartoon about the mis-adventures of the Griffin family. Peter is essentially the main character; he's the father of the family and in an obese buffoon. Lois is Peter's largely sane wife and it's her that looks after the family, 17 year-old daughter Meg, 15 year old son Chris and baby Stewie. Meg is an angsty teenager who is plain and unpopular, Chris is as fat as and arguably more moronic than his dad and Stewie is a megalomaniacal genius bent on world domination and murdering Lois. The family is completed by Brian the dog, who can talk (a fact the other characters accept as perfectly normal) and is generally the most grounded and sensible member of the family, except that he has an alcohol problem.

CHARACTERS/CAST

Peter Griffin (voiced by Seth MacFarlane) stars as Han Solo
Lois Griffin (voiced by Alex Borstein) as Princess Leia
Chris Griffin (voiced by Seth Green) as Luke Skywalker
Stewie Griffin (Seth MacFarlane) as Darth Vader
Brian (Seth MacFarlane again) as Chewbacca
Quagmire (also Seth MacFarlane) as C3PO
Cleveland (Mike Henry) as R2D2
Herbert the OAP (Mike Henry) as Obi Wan
Mayor Adam West (Seth MacFarlane yet again) as Grand Moff Tarkin
and Meg Griffin (Mila Kunis) in a cameo as the creature in the trash-compactor

MY OPINION

Things start off in a way that will be immediately familiar to any fan of The Simpsons, where several episodes start with a power-outage or TV breaking down, leading one of the characters to tell a story. In this case, Peter retells the story of Star Wars. To be honest, I'd have preferred the writers to skip this somewhat tired segue and simply start off with the Star Wars parody. Anyway, we're quickly into the story, beginning with an amusing version of the 'text scrolling through space' that introduces Star Wars.

One of the first things to strike me, once the Star Wars story had begun in earnest, was that the animators had surpassed themselves. Spaceships, other vehicles and spacescapes are rendered so well that, at times they look almost like they could be shots straight from the film, reworked in a similar way to A Scanner Darkly (or the video for Take On Me, by A-Ha). The depth of detail is certainly beyond anything you'll see on Family Guy or its contemporaries elsewhere. The explosions added by the special effects team are so good that until I watched the version with commentary (did I mention that I'm geek?) I assumed they were actual explosions from the original film. Much of the musical score actually is the original score, taken directly from Star Wars, with variations to the music done so well as to be seamless.

At first, I wondered how they could fit the whole plot into such a short feature, but they actually do a very good job of covering all the major plot points, with enough time for a whole load of asides to the plot in true Family Guy fashion. The characters from Family Guy are blended very nicely with their Star Wars counterparts, giving us, for example, C3PO/Quagmire making sexual innuendos whenever he can and R2D2/Cleveland complete with afro and sporting a dew-rag whilst in the desert.

For fans of Star Wars there are a number of direct quotes from the film that are funny for no particular reason when said by the Family Guy characters. Furthermore, there are some almost direct quotes that are even funnier. One of my favourites is when Chris/Luke walks into Leia/Lois' cell dressed as a stormtrooper:

Leia: Aren't you a little fat to be a stormtrooper?
Luke: Well stay here and rot, you stuck up b*tch!

Fans of Family Guy will be aware that most episodes are littered with pop-culture references and this outing is no different. There self-references, references to McFarlanes other show and a number of cameos by characters from other films, but I don't want to spoil the surprise by listing them.

FEATURES

As I mentioned earlier, there are several features here, including a commentary for the main feature from Seth MacFarlane and a number of the production team. It's actually pretty funny and offers some interesting bits of trivia. Another reason to watch again with the commentary is on that there are a number of things going on in the background of shots that you may have missed the first time, so it's handy to have Seth point them out to you.

'A conversation with George' is a twelve and a half minute interview between Seth MacFarlane and Star Wars creator George Lucas. Seth MacFarlane is so funny and charismatic in his own right that I was happy to watch him here, even if he was entertaining a man I now hate with a passion for creating the wretched second Star Wars trilogy. Anyway, it's an amusing, laid-back chat that starts out based around this project in particular but which veers away considerably.

'Once in a Lifetime: The Making of Blue Harvest' is a pretty standard behind the scenes featurette. It lasts for around 18 minutes and is thoroughly entertaining. The thing that comes across the most is the passion all parties concerned have for Star Wars and consequently this project. The animators in particular display a charming boyish enthusiasm because they're now being paid to draw things that they love to draw anyway.

'Animatic version' is the entirety of Blue Harvest shown in storyboard form. I really didn't see the point in this one, so I turned it off after the first couple of minutes.

'Family Guy clip show' is nine mintues 30 worth of clips from Family Guy episodes, each parodying or in some way referencing Star Wars. They're very funny, but nothing new for fans of the show.

'Something something something darkside teaser' is exactly that, a teaser clip used to advertise Blue Harvest. It's exactly as pointless as the inclusion of trailers on most DVDs.

'North by North Quahog' is a complete episode of Family Guy. I'm not really sure why they bothered to include it, because it's not a new episode and it's not really related to the main feature. It's certainly funny and well worth watching, but once again it's nothing new for the devoted fan.

PRICE

It's currently available from Amazon.co.uk for £9.98 or from E-Bay for around £5 (plus P&P). Whilst those prices are pretty reasonable, I'd recommend waiting until the Family Guy parodies of The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi have been released because there will no doubt be a box set will extra features (probably) at a better price. Therefore, when I selected 'yes' to recommend this product, it's a 'yes, but not yet'.