Family Guy is known for its pop culture references. While The Simpsons can be counted on for relatable family situations crossed with absurdist humor, Family Guy can always at least be depended on for a good movie parody. One of the movies the show has parodied the most is Star Wars. Most episodes will contain at least one Star Wars gag, and apart from that, the show has also dedicated three entire special-length episodes to parodying the original trilogy. There have been ton of great Family Guy jokes about George Lucas’ space opera saga.
“There’s nothing to do downtown!”
“Blue Harvest” is Family Guy’s Lucasfilm-sanctioned parody/remake of A New Hope, with characters from the show being cast as characters from the movie. In an early scene, drawn from the moment in the film where Darth Vader demonstrates Force-choking on an Imperial officer who dared to question his authority, Stewie’s Vader gets into an argument over real estate with one of the officers. As he Force-chokes the officer, he uses the property’s proximity to downtown as a major selling point and the officer says, “There’s nothing to do downtown!” It’s a ridiculous way to skew a terrifying moment from the movie.
Everybody nods before the Battle of the Great Pit of Carkoon
Family Guy’s parody of Return of the Jedi was aptly titled “It’s a Trap!” In the opening act – which, like the movie, culminates in the Battle of the Great Pit of Carkoon – all of the characters nod to each other before R2-D2 tosses Luke’s lightsaber in the air and instigates the fight. In the movie, everyone nods once, with a tense orchestral sound from John Williams’ score punctuating each other. However, in the spoof, there are dozens of nods between all the different characters, each punctuated with the tense Williams brass tone. It ends with Caddyshack’s Judge Smails saying, “Well…we’re waiting!”
Peter attacks a wall with Kylo Ren’s lightsaber
It’s surprising to see Family Guy make a reference to Disney’s new Star Wars sequel trilogy, because they hardly ever even made a reference to the prequel trilogy – they’ve been solely dedicated to the original trilogy for years. Still, the gag worked really well.
Peter was getting fed up with not winning any of the bar games when he was hanging out with the guys at the Drunken Clam and he responded with a Kylo Ren-style outburst. He took out a lightsaber with the little side-blades that Kylo Ren has and started smashing up the wall, a la The Force Awakens.
“You are smothering me and I need my space.”
Family Guy’s remake of the Star Wars trilogy got a lot of laughs out of Han and Leia’s relationship – told through Peter as Han and Lois as Leia – but this is arguably the funniest. While some moments came off as harsh (when Leia says, “I love you,” in Family Guy, Han says, “F**k off,” instead of “I know”), this one hit the nail on the head. When Leia frees Han from carbonite and takes him off Jabba’s wall, she goes to give him a hug and tell him how she feels and then Han abruptly says, “You are smothering me and I need my space!”
Peter’s Sandpeople choir
In one of Family Guy’s earliest Star Wars-based cutaway gags, Peter Griffin is trying to organize a choir of Tusken Raiders. They’re all just screaming over each other and Peter can’t get them to settle down and practice, despite the fact that the benefit they’re playing is just a few short hours away. When the Sandpeople all disperse, Ben Kenobi assures Peter that although the Sandpeople frighten easily, they will be back – “…and in greater numbers.” Peter is comforted by this, because he thinks that having more Tusken Raiders turn up to the benefit will give their choir “a richer harmony.”
“I didn’t realize Greenberg was a Jedi name.”
In the episode “Peterotica,” Peter starts writing erotic fiction and self-publishing it. He makes a small fortune until it all comes crumbling down when a man crashes his car while listening to one of Peter’s audiobooks and he gets sued. Since Carter Pewterschmidt put up the initial $10 investment for Peter to publish his own work, the burden falls on him when a lawyer named Scott Greenberg comes knocking. Carter hits a button to open a trapdoor that sends Greenberg into a pit to fight the Rancor, but he manages to escape like Luke. Carter quips, “I didn’t realize Greenberg was a Jedi name.”
Donald Trump as Jabba the Hutt
It was only a matter of time before Family Guy did a Trump episode, and in the most recent season, an installment named “Trump Guy” was just that. In the episode, Peter becomes the new White House Press Secretary, so the family heads down to Washington to meet the administration. When they get there, the President tries to assault Meg, and it’s a clear reference to Jabba the Hutt.
After the confrontation, Mike Pence is shown perched next to Trump in a parody of Salacious Crumb. The Family Guy writers have explained their decision to include the scene: “We wanted to touch on this aspect of Trump’s public face, without putting Meg in too compromised a position.”
“Play that same song!”
The band at the Mos Eisley Cantina has become an iconic part of film history, with the song that they play in A New Hope becoming as recognizable as any tune from any other movie. However, there’s one thing about it that bugs some fans – and the writers of Family Guy are clearly among those fans – and that is that they only ever play the one song. In “Blue Harvest,” there’s a great joke about this where the band leader asks the crowd if they have any requests and then answers his own question in a different voice: “Play that same song!”
Jedi laser eye surgery
In one of Family Guy’s non-sequitur cutaway gags, we see Luke Skywalker running a laser eye surgery business using his lightsaber. Right before another procedure to give a woman perfect eyesight, Obi-Wan tells him to use the Force. Luke tries to contest Obi-Wan’s thinking, saying that he might not need the Force if he’s just going to make an incision with the lightsaber, but Obi-Wan insists and Luke tries to do it with the Force. He ends up sending the lightsaber right through the woman’s eye and tells Obi-Wan, “Are you happy?” to which Obi-Wan replies, “I’ve never been happy.”
“I sandbagged you?”
In this recreation of the scene where the Rebels are planning the Death Star trench run, the pilot that Luke Skywalker upstaged with his knowledge of womp rats takes the young Jedi hero to one side. He calls him out for “sandbagging” him in front of everybody and he and Luke get into an argument about whether or not it’s a big deal. Then, as the pilot storms off and Luke is left with a confused look, the Curb Your Enthusiasm theme music comes up on the soundtrack as the camera slowly closes in on Luke’s Larry David-esque facial expression.
