"Stewie Kills Lois" and "Lois Kills Stewie" form a two-part episode of the sixth season of the animated comedy series Family Guy, which was produced for Season 5. Respectively, both are the fourth and fifth episode of their season, and they premiered in the United States on Fox on November 4 and 11, 2007. In the former, housewife Lois receives cruise tickets from anthropomorphic dog Brian, and invites Peter on the cruise with her. This upsets Stewie, and he ultimately appears to murder Lois while she is on the cruise, only to find out that she had survived the attack as the year passes. In the latter, Lois is able to expose Stewie as the villain that he is, but he soon accomplishes his dream of world domination.

"Stewie Kills Lois" was written by David A. Goodman and directed by John Holmquist, while "Lois Kills Stewie" was written by Steve Callaghan and directed by Greg Colton. Both episodes received relatively positive reviews for their combined story arc and cultural references. "Lois Kills Stewie" featured appearances by Patrick Stewart, Paula Abdul, Randy Jackson, and Simon Cowell, and both episodes featured cameos by various recurring voice actors for the series.

Plot[link]

"Stewie Kills Lois"[link]

It is Lois' birthday, and Brian gives her a pair of cruise tickets with the intention of traveling with her, but she invites Peter instead. Stewie is upset at not being invited on the cruise, and concocts a plan to embarrass Lois. Brian makes Stewie realize that he has never followed through with any of his plans, and he resolves to change this. Meanwhile, Peter proves to be a frequent embarrassment to Lois. A mortified Lois walks onto the promenade to be away from Peter, but is confronted by Stewie, who has traveled to the ship by speedboat, and shoots at her, sending her overboard.

Six days pass since Stewie has killed Lois and Joe informs Peter that he has called off the search for Lois since he and his police squad cannot find her. A year passes since then, and Stewie indirectly reveals to Brian what he had done. Disturbed by the revelation, Brian vows to bring him to justice. Stewie realizes that keeping the evidence of his crime as souvenirs is too risky, and disposes of his gun and his drawings depicting Lois being killed. After Peter reveals that Lois' life insurance policy has recently been cashed, Joe, Quagmire, and Cleveland search the residence, and find Stewie's souvenirs; Joe is convinced that Peter is the one who killed Lois. At his trial in the murder, Peter is sentenced to life in prison, but Lois, suddenly appears in the courtroom, and reveals that Stewie tried to kill her.

"Lois Kills Stewie"[link]

Everyone is shocked that Stewie would try to murder Lois, but she insists that he is evil, and explains what happened; after being shot at and falling overboard, she was rescued by a merman, and became employed at a fat camp and later a diner, where she found a new boyfriend in a white supremacist also visiting the diner, as she had developed amnesia. She eventually regains her memory after being attacked at a supremacist rally, and returns to Quahog. While Lois explains her situation, Stewie escapes, captures and restrains his family when they return home, and shoots Cleveland dead when he visits. Stewie kidnaps Brian and forces him into driving him to the CIA, where he gains access to a supercomputer and takes control of the planet's power grid, thus dominating the world.

After Stewie implements numerous draconian laws, Lois becomes angered and prepares to assassinate him. Lois and Stewie engage in a fight at the Oval Office when she arrives; Lois eventually gains the upper hand and prepares to shoot Stewie, but she cannot bring herself to do so, since he is her own child. Stewie takes the opportunity to disarm her and prepare to kill, but is shot dead by Peter. They then start to cry over Stewie's dead body and are devastated. Just before Peter and Lois leave the room, it is revealed that much of what has happened was actually a computer simulation. Brian is upset the whole thing was a "dream sequence", although Stewie argues that a computer simulation is totally different. Stewie then claims that he is not ready to kill Lois or take over the world....yet, meaning that he's putting up these plans in the future. As Brian and Stewie argue over the differences between "dream sequence" and "computer simulation," Stewie claims that it was not as bad as the finale of The Sopranos, but, as in the Sopranos finale, the picture is abruptly cut off to a black screen, followed by the end credits.

Production[link]

Actor Patrick Stewart guest starred in "Lois Kills Stewie".

"Stewie Kills Lois" and "Lois Kills Stewie" are the 100th and 101st episodes of Family Guy respectively. They are the fourth and fifth episodes of the sixth season of the show. "Stewie Kills Lois" was written by executive producer and former Futurama and South Park writer David A. Goodman.^[1] The episode was directed by John Holmquist.^[2] "Lois Kills Stewie" was written by recurring voice actor and future showrunner Steve Callaghan and it was directed by Greg Colton.^[3] Colton and Callaghan previously worked on the season five episode "Whistle While Your Wife Works".

Before the airing of the episode, a 100th episode tribute special aired on the Fox Broadcasting Company, hosted by MacFarlane. The special showcases various clips of MacFarlane's favorite moments from the last 99 episodes of the show.^[4][5] It also included MacFarlane asking people questions related to Family Guy.^[6]

"Stewie Kills Lois" and "Lois Kills Stewie", along with the final five episodes of the fifth season and the first seven episodes of the sixth season, were also released on DVD under the title "Volume 6" by 20th Century Fox in the United States and Canada on October 21, 2008, five months after they had completed broadcast on television.^[7] The DVD release also features bonus material including deleted scenes, commentaries, and a 'making of' feature.^[7]

Both episodes aired before the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike, and were the last episodes to air before it. In November 2007, Variety reported that MacFarlane had joined the strike and refused to complete more Family Guy episodes.^[8] A spokesperson for Fox said: "Our hope is that he returns to work and completes his non-writing obligations on those episodes".^[8] Fox aired two new episodes during November 2007.^[9] The following episode, "Padre de Familia", was the first of these two episodes to air.^[10] The strike ended on February 12, 2008 and the series resumed airing regularly.^[11]

In addition to the main cast, actors Patrick Stewart, Phil LaMarr, and American Idol judges Simon Cowell, Randy Jackson and Paula Abdul guest starred in the episode.^[12][13] The episode also featured the recurring voices of actress Jennifer Tilly and Patrick Warburton, and writers Danny Smith and John Viener in minor appearances. Future showrunner Mark Hentemann also made some appearances.^[3]

Cultural references[link]

When Stewie becomes disappointed that Lois did not take him on the cruise, he relates that he has not expressed it much since he saw The Lake House. Peter and Lois watch the sunset; Lois noting that she feels like Kate Winslet's character in Titanic, but Peter believes that she was portrayed by Philip Seymour Hoffman.^[14] Leonardo DiCaprio is also referenced in the scene.^[14]

The cliffhanger ending where Lois returns to reveal Stewie as her attempted killer is a tribute to part one of the Star Trek: The Next Generation two-parter "The Best of Both Worlds" with similar cliffhanger music and "To Be Continued..." title cards. Since they're both Trekkies, Seth MacFarlane and David A. Goodman had wanted to use the cliffhanger music from "The Best of Both Worlds" if they ever got up to 100 episodes of Family Guy. Paramount wouldn't give them the rights, however, so composer Ron Jones, who wrote the music for "The Best of Both Worlds" and several other episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, wrote and recorded the music heard in the episode.^[15]

While looking for Stewie, Joe and other police officers travel to the Fortress of Solitude, where the maid Consuela works for Superman.^[12] Stewie is seen participating on American Idol in a cutaway, singing "Lost in Your Eyes" before judges Simon Cowell, Randy Jackson and Paula Abdul.^[14]

American Dad! characters Stan Smith and Avery Bullock make a crossover appearance in "Lois Kills Stewie" when Stewie hacks into the supercomputer.^[4] This crossover is extended on the Volume 6 DVD when, before the confrontation, Brian and Stewie first bump into Stan and Bullock in the restroom. The episode concludes with a reference to The Sopranos as the screen blacks out on Stewie criticizing the series' finale.^[12][14]

Reception[link]

Ahsan Haque of IGN rated "Stewie Kills Lois" a 9/10, while rating "Lois Kills Stewie" a 9.4/10, saying "For the hundredth episode of Family Guy, Seth McFarlane and friends tackle the subject of one of Stewie Griffin's greatest ambitions — his not-so-secret desire to kill his mother. For the disturbed fans waiting for some form of a matricidal manifestation, you can feel comfort knowing, without spoiling too much, that the youngest Griffin absolutely means business and ensures that he doesn't fail this time around. [...] There are some tense courtroom moments, a birthday celebration with the gift of Lionel Richie, a cruise ship, machine guns, and the reappearance of the Kool Aid Man that help round out this carefully crafted and well-told cohesive storyline. With the amount of cheap manatee jokes kept to a reasonable level, this episode also manages to find an excellent balance between comedy and storytelling. It's a fantastic way to celebrate the Family Guy one-hundredth episode milestone. [...] With the writers' strike in full effect, it seems that this might be the last new episode of Family Guy we'll be seeing for a while. It's a bittersweet way to end the abruptly short season as the quality is reminiscent of the series' brilliance from the early years and it seems like the show was really starting to hit its stride for the season. Hopefully the series will be able to live up to the high bar set by this two-part classic upon its eventual return."^[12][14]

Richard Keller of TV Squad gave "Stewie Kills Lois" a much more negative review. He pointed out that the episode was hyped because before the episode aired a retrospective premiered featuring clips from the last 99 episodes, he stated that the episode was a huge disappointment. He stated that he did not find the episode funny, but rather disjointed, with little story and too many cutaway gags and flashbacks.^[5] In his review of "Lois Kills Stewie", Keller gave a much more positive review. He did mention that the end of the episode was somewhat predictable, as they had killed Cleveland and Stewie. He commented positively to some of the jokes of the episode, and in the overall he mentioned he liked the two episodes, but he was not so keen of the ending of the episode.^[17]

On her review of "Stewie Kills Lois", Genevieve Koski of the The A.V. Club rated the episode a B+. She commented that it was "a bit weird" that the show was focusing on Stewie's desire to kill Lois, since in the last couple of seasons the Stewie and Brian dynamic had taken precedence, while Lois was being more foil to Peter than Stewie. She felt that most of the cutaway humor felt familiar and that there was no real moment that would deserve any callback status in future episodes. He did praise the cliffhanger, stating that he was intrigued about how the storyline would turn out. She also praised the storyline and liked how it was able to create drama.^[4] In her review of "Lois Kills Stewie", Koski rated the episode a B, calling the end of the story a bit predictable as she thought that the deaths of Lois, Cleveland and Stewie were a one time joke. She praised and disliked some jokes and gags in the episode, including Stewie demanding praise for his macaroni picture of an owl and Lois' salvation via merman, respectively. She commented that the fight sequence was extended and highly choreographed.^[13]

"Lois Kills Stewie" was voted #9, and "Stewie Kills Lois" was voted #8 on BBC Three's list of Top Ten Family Guy Episodes.

References[link]