 A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away ...
Or, well, two or so years ago, in a store in your town …
The Family Guy guys decided to turn one of its cutaway gags into a whole episode, complete with its own cutaway gags. Instead of doing a five-second parody, Seth MacFarlane and crew transposed the cast of their show into the first Star Wars movie, Episode IV: A New Hope. Entitled "Blue Harvest", the season six premiere set up Chris as Luke, Stewie as Vader, Peter as Han, Lois as Leia, Brian as Chewbacca, Quagmire and Cleveland as C-3PO and R2-D2, and replaced the rest of George Lucas's creations with denizens of Quahog. Following the success of the Episode IV parody (and the two Robot Chicken Star Wars specials), MacFarlane has continued the story into Something Something Something Dark Side, parodying The Empire Strikes Back for a full hour. The cast stays the same, the humor follows the expected lines.
Family Guy consistently and heavily relies on its infamous cutaway gags. Something Something Something Dark Side eschews that, for the most part, by following the plot of The Empire Strike Back very closely. Luke and the rebels fight the Empire on Hoth, bail the planet, and split up; Luke goes to train with Yoda while Han and crew take the Millennium Falcon to Bespin, meet up with Lando Calrissian, and get screwed over by Vader. Luke reunites with them, finds out that Vader is his father in one of the classic surprise moments in all of cinema, gets his hand chopped off, and the gang regroups to set up the plot of Return of the Jedi.
For the bulk of the special, the plot is obvious. Assuming you've seen, well, any media of the past thirty years, you know all the beats: Han gets frozen in carbonite after ad libbing "I know" to Leia's "I love you!" Darth Vader says "Luke, I am your father" and slices off said son's hand. Etc. With Family Guy, you're looking more to see its characters fitted into the plot. The angry chicken that Peter fights once every season or so becomes Boba Fett, while Meg gets her predictable put-down in her casting. Mort Goldman oddly gets his skin darkened to become Lando Calrissian. (Supplemental features mention they considered Magic Johnson or a cast member from The Cleveland Show for the role). Chris's boss (voiced by animation excellence H. Jon Benjamin) replaces Yoda.
 After that, you've got to add the MacFarlane twists. Whether it be fourth-wall shattering oddities inherent in the original flick (pointedly stated with Brian's asking just why Lando wears Han's clothing at the end of the movie), or the straight-out plot-swaps (Star Wars is not the only franchise that gets riffed in this special), these notes and changes are where the special shines.
For a single disc release carrying less than an hour of material, there are a surprising number of extras. "Family Guy Fact-Ups" are Pop-Up Video/A.D.Vidnotes notes that come up throughout the episode explaining some references or pointing out how many voices Seth MacFarlane does in the special (25, to be exact), and would be a welcome addition to the DVD releases of the main series. A crew commentary is nice as usual, and gives you another reason to watch the special all the way through. There are two table reads from a pretty poor angle for the most part, one covering two acts of the special found on this disc, and one a preview of the next parody, "We Have a Bad Feeling About This". The final two features are some animatics with commentary alongside the finished footage, and a featurette about the art behind the poster design.
Something Something Something Dark Side falls into an interesting niche. Family Guy fans might be uninterested in the world of Star Wars, given that its primary demographic appears to be stoned/drunken frat boys who are too young to have seen the movies without Lucas' controversial retouches. Star Wars fans might have heard it all, or even have answers to the things that are questioned. (If so, the whole "Lando wearing Han's clothes" thing just BEGS to be answered.) If you're the appropriate pop-culture fan that can enjoy the best of both worlds, this DVD is surprisingly packed with both extras and entertainment. If not? Just wait for it to air on FOX or Adult Swim.
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