Missing ‘Family Guy’ Pilot Episode Resurfaces After 27 Years – See it Here (VIDEO)

The original, scrapped version of the pilot for Family Guy has made its way online after years of being “lost” to the world.

Animator Robert Paulsen, who’d worked on the now-hit Fox adult animation comedy, shared the 1998 video version years after it was “lost” to the archives on his website, and others who tracked it down decided to share it with the world.

Fans commenting on the video had some interesting observations to share about it indeed.

“This looks like how Family Guy looked in that one South Park episode,” one user noted. “It’s like someone tried to draw family guy from memory,” another added.

The original, scrapped version of the pilot was previously partly available to those who bought the 2003 DVD box set for Family Guy Season 2 in the bonus content section of the offerings. However, it was only the first seven minutes that were available, whereas Paulsen’s shared version was over 16 minutes in length (embedded above).

Family Guy was created by Seth MacFarlane, and, after this version of the pilot was screened for executives at Fox, the network gave the show the green light. The pilot that eventually made it to air in 1999 was called “Death Has a Shadow” and featured several similar elements of the original pilot.

One notable difference is the voicing of certain characters, which was done by MacFarlane in certain instances where others would later be cast.

“Chris is 13 but sounds like a drunk frat boy,” one user noted of the sound differences. “I love how 90% of the voices are just Seth MacFarlane,” said another.

Some of the viewers preferred certain elements of this version: “Lois being blonde makes a lot more sense. Especially since Chris is blond,” one person noted. “I like how much more of an ACTUAL family they were in this, its nice to see that Meg is just a chill character and isnt the butt of every joke,” noted another.

One commenter, meanwhile, was stricken by just how much consistency there was with the comedy in this very early effort at a Family Guy episode.

“‘Jeremiah’s Witnesses’ yeah this show has been heat since day one,” said one YouTube user in response to a key joke in the video.

Family Guy, Fox, streaming on Hulu and Disney+