Episode title: “The Most Adequate Christmas Ever”
Series: American Dad
Season: Four
Written by: Jim Bernstein
First transmitted: December 16 2007
Back to
American Dad we go, after a pretty poor attempt by MacFarlane’s other franchise to present their take on the holiday season. One thing you can say about this show, whether you like it or not (I did, for a time) is that they know how to do Christmas specials, and they usually pull out all the stops. Given that this is almost the same length of time into the series that the previous one was (six years later, yes) it’s a vast improvement on
Family Guy.
Stan comes home on Christmas Eve and promptly denigrates and insults the family’s efforts at decorating. He leads them into the woods to cut down a new Christmas tree, unhappy with the one they have, but is so picky that none of the ones they suggest will do. Eventually they become so fed up with him that they leave him to it. He finds the perfect Christmas tree, all right, but when he cuts it down it falls on him and kills him.
He wakes up in Limbo, where he demands a second chance, and so must go to court to prove he deserves one. Here, he is given a lawyer, unfortunately the worst in the business; Michelle is known for having lost her first ten cases by agreeing with the prosecution! She has not yet earned her wings, and Stan’s case seems hopeless as evidence is submitted by the opposing attorney demonstrating his callousness, selfishness and sense of always being right and never listening to anyone. Michelle tries to use one example of Stan’s supposed self
lessness, but it turns out to have been a dream. He is now boned, and Michelle tells him he can at least console himself with the thought that his family will soon be joining him, as he left them to die in the snow, taking the keys of the car when he left in search of the perfect Christmas tree.
Unable to secure a second chance, Stan falls back on old habits and pulls a gun on the judge. When His Honour laughs and says mortal guns don’t work here, he takes one from a guard. Now he has a Heaven gun (seriously, says someone in the crowd, why do we have these things?) and forces his way out of the court, taking Michelle hostage, demanding to be taken to Heaven to see God personally. Gatecrashing Jesus’s party, they split up and Stan goes looking for God. Stan finds God (sorry, couldn't resist!) but he is not in the mood, and when Stan threatens him with the gun he tells him to get a grip. When Stan puts down the gun and walks away, God tells him that was all he wanted, for Stan to admit to himself that he couldn’t control everything all the time and didn’t always know everything. He returns Stan to his family, also granting Michelle her wings. Home again, Stan praises the efforts of his family on their Christmas decorations, while Roger points out there is a hooker with wings outside the window watching them.
Notes
How is it that neither Hayley, whom we know has kept some dubious company in her time, nor Roger can just hot-wire the car? I mean, if they’re all freezing to death… though Roger doesn’t seem to be bothered by the cold, and he’s about as selfish as Stan is. Still, does he want to be left out here alone? And doesn’t he have a thing for Steve? At worst, he should want to save him. I will admit that when Seth or his people try, they can do two things really well - mythology and science fiction. Roger’s planet, when we see it later, is very well thought out, and here we have chariots which, when the whip is cracked, bring into being an invisible Pegasus to pull them. We also have a huge Griffin (ha ha very clever) to take people to Heaven, and archangels who fly with burning swords. It’s very impressive. I also like when Stan gets to God’s office, he approaches the Almighty’s desk and trips over something. Darkness falls. God drawls “Stan, you unplugged the sun.”
Considering how they seem to hate being compared to
The Simpsons - and with, at this point, almost twenty years on them by their rival - it’s perhaps odd that Stan emulates Homer in their first Christmas episode, detailed in the first post, when he goes looking for a Christmas tree. Like the tight-fisted patriarch of the Simpsons family, Stan goes into the woods and tries to chop down a tree. However his story differs in that he does this in the full knowledge - and presence - of his family, whereas Homer went off alone to accomplish this deed in secret, probably embarrassed that he couldn’t afford a real one. Stan could surely afford one, but for whatever reason decides to cut down his own - probably against state laws, but who knows - and in so doing secures his own demise. Perhaps there’s a lesson to be learned there? Or, as David Bowie said as Pilate in the movie
The Last Temptation of Christ, no, probably not.
It’s a good tale, a metaphor for a man who has to control every aspect of not only his, but his family’s life, and who always thinks he knows best. There are elements of
It’s a Wonderful Life in it of course, and it’s hardly an original idea, but to be fair it’s very well executed, and the outcome is handled decently. It’s also a cute touch to note that the character of God does indeed look like a grown-up form of his son. Perhaps letting the episode down though, it concentrates almost entirely on Stan, there being no role for anyone else once he dies, meaning we see the family for about the first two or three minutes, and then again at the end, and that’s it. So if you don’t like Stan, or you’re a fan of Roger, you’re out of luck in this episode. They do make the most of their reduced screentime though, Francine as usual laying down the law, Steve getting his pee frozen, while Hayley, well, she just basically stands around. Roger has a few okay lines but mostly is very much underused. Again, we end on the standard
American Dad theme, no festive version, and, unlike the previous
Family Guy episode, no Christmas wishes from the characters.