When I think of intertextuality, the main example that comes to mind is the animated comedy shows like South Park, Family Guy, American Dad, etc. The main draw of these shows is that they connect to and make fun of real life events or people. For example, season 24 episode 1 of South Park that deals with the characters going through the COVID-19 pandemic.
Occasionally though these shows will do a sort of parody of other popular franchises. My favorite example of this is the Star Wars family guy specials. On the surface the special might just seem like a straight parody of Star Wars: A New Hope but in reality the intertextuality of the episode draws from other parodies of the same movie. Take Stewie for example, who has a comically large Darth Vader helmet as a nod to another Star Wars parody: SpaceBalls.
Another layer of intertextuality is added with all the references to events that occurred on set of the Star Wars Episode IV. Louis Griffin as Princess Leia exclaims that she is not wearing underwear, many Star Wars fans are aware that Carrie Fisher did not wear underwear on the set of the movie because George Lucas told her that no one wears underwear in space. It is intertextual connections like this that take the Star Wars special from being a parody to something much more complex. There are several layers of connections present, much deeper than just a straight satirical copy of the events of A New Hope.
One reply on “Intertextuality in Family Guy Star Wars”
As a Family Guy and Star Wars fan who also has a particular fondness of these episodes, I couldn’t help but sink my teeth into this. While I think you raise many good and arguably overlooked points about intertextuality here what with how the show makes references to things that happened on set as well as in the actual film and even parodies other star wars parodies, there is one other huge piece of the puzzle that you missed in my opinion. I would add that family as a particularly meta or self aware adult cartoon show has an element of intertextuality in and of itself already and so there are running family guy jokes that make their way into the star wars parody, using this other text to make these preestablished running gags less expected and therefore even funnier like making Meg all the ugly monsters is something you have to be both a family guy fan and a star wars fan to laugh at. Also the fact that the AT-AT continues the infamous hurt knee gag when it falls.