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Seth MacFarlane is undeniably a force to be reckoned with in Hollywood, particularly in the TV space. As the creator of long-running shows such as “Family Guy” and “American Dad,” his creations are now fixtures of the pop culture landscape. But even heavy-hitters miss every once in a while. For MacFarlane, his biggest miss to date came in 2013 when Fox picked up his live-action multi-camera sitcom “Dads” to air. Riding high at arguably the biggest moment in his career, the network seemed to think it couldn’t lose. What it wound up with was an unrivaled critical misfire.
How bad was the response to “Dads,” exactly? Amazingly enough, it ranks as the worst-reviewed sitcom on Metacritic with a dreadful 15 “Metascore.” It should be noted that the site only counts titles with seven or more reviews. Setting aside any technicalities, “Dads” is a widely-panned failure that lasted just a single season spanning 19 episodes before getting the ax. The cancellation order came before the final episode aired in July 2014.
Co-created by Alec Sulkin and Wellesley Wild, “Dads” was a comedy about two successful gaming entrepreneurs/best friends (played by Seth Green and Giovanni Ribisi) whose lives are upended when their dads have to move in with them. Attempted comedy ensues. The dads were played by Martin Mull (“Clue”) and Peter Riegert (“The Mask”).
The series was originally given a six-episode order by the network before being picked up for a full season. Fox was, understandably, bullish on its prospects. It had MacFarlane as one of the key producers and a promising cast. Plus, MacFarlane was coming off of the resounding success of his movie “Ted,” which made an astounding $549 million at the box office, spawned a sequel, and later gave rise to a prequel TV show on Peacock. What could possibly go wrong?
Dads couldn’t overcome its terrible start
Why were critics so violently opposed to “Dads” upon its release? It was labeled, largely, as unfunny and offensive. As one example, there’s a moment where Green’s Eli and Ribisi’s Warner force Brenda Song’s Veronica, an Asian-American woman, to dress as an anime girl to arouse potential Chinese investors. Warner’s dad Crawford, played by Mull, at one point says, “You can’t trust (Chinese people). There’s a reason ‘Shanghai’ is a verb.” MacFarlane is no stranger to controversial humor as “Family Guy” includes an awful lot of it, but it didn’t land in this case.
Fox was well aware of the discourse and the network even released a trailer for the show (above) which includes some of the bad reviews, such as HuffPost calling it “offensive,” along with positive comments from fans. Ahead of the premiere at a press event in August 2013 (per CNN), Wild acknowledged to reporters that the pilot episode of “Dads” might have had its perceived problems, but that they would aim to fix those as the show went on:
“We want to keep [‘Dads’] insulting and irreverent, but the most important thing is that it’s funny. If we missed the mark in the pilot, we’re shooting to hit it better in upcoming shows.”
To Wild’s credit, it often does take time for a show to find its footing. MacFarlane’s own “The Orville” took an entire season to figure out what it should be. The reception to the show was just too sour, however, and the audience wasn’t there for Fox to give it any more rope. A second season was never going to be in the cards for this one.
In a September 2013 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, while discussing the show’s controversies and terrible reception, executive producer Mike Scully took aim at critics, suggesting that they needed to exercise more patience:
“I think the audience is much more willing to let a show evolve than critics are. Critics used to know how to watch pilots and understand that it’s just a template for what a show will be. Critics seem to have forgotten about the evolution of the show and that most get off to rocky starts. You don’t have everything figured out your first episode or even your first season.”
For those curious, “Dads” is available to rent or purchase on Amazon Prime Video.
