Planet Family Guy

Canada’s Global Television network has unveiled its fall primetime schedule which will include the The Cleveland Show alongside other Fox animated shows Family Guy and American Dad simulcast with Fox’s Animation Domination Sunday night schedule.

Channel 4 have picked up the rights to screen the first season of the new Family Guy spin-off, The Cleveland Show, on E4 in the UK. The BBC, which screens Family Guy on the youth channel BBC Three after FXUK, bid (controversially) for the new show but lost out to its commercial rival. The BBC will continue to show Family Guy.

Channel 4 used to show Family Guy before the BBC took on the hit animation. However, 4’s poor scheduling of the series in post-watershed slots led to terrible cuts from the episodes and poor ratings.

Fox have announced their 2008/2009 mid-season schedule with no mention of The Cleveland Show; this implies that the new Family Guy spin-off will probably not be seen until fall 2009 now.

A new Family Guy spin-off is on its way featuring Cleveland (Mike Henry) and his new family; The Cleveland Show is scheduled to air on Fox some time in 2009. Cleveland’s character will no longer be part of the Family Guy cast and his new show will see him move to his home town Stoolbend, Virginia, where he moves in with his high school sweetheart. Seth MacFarlane has said that Cleveland may still return to Rhode Island for visits as, ‘crossovers are cool’.

Cleveland’s new family in Virginia includes his new love interest and former high school sweetheart Donna (Sanaa Lathan) and her two children, flirtatious 16-year-old daughter Roberta (Nia Long) and 5-year-old son Rilo (Mike Henry) who loves the ladies. Cleveland Jr. will also be joining his father, but has put on weight since his Family Guy days. Neighbors include talking anthropomorphic bears, a loud-mouth redneck couple, and a British Family seemingly stuck in the Victorian era. Additional voices include Seth MacFarlane and Kevin Richardson as a redneck.