Summary (spoilers after):
Brian gets to know the son of his new girlfriend. In the meantime, Peter, Quagmire, and Cleveland go for a joyride in Joe’s brand-new corvette and end up totaling it.
Our Opinion:
It’s appropriate that America’s “favorite family” is making a comeback as we wrap up the Valentine’s Day weekend. This episode features Brian falling in love with a shoe store employee in addition to Peter and his pals wrecking Joe’s uncle’s corvette. This episode continues the series’ regular theme of Brian being a ladies’ man (or dog), which typically pays off handsomely. A woman’s best soulmate is a man’s best buddy, and you really can’t go wrong with that. However, the episode primarily centers on Brian making friends with his girlfriend’s son, which acted as a welcome, if unsurprising, change of pace from that relationship. Even though that segment had some heartfelt moments, it wasn’t enough for me to adore this episode as much as Brian did his new love.
The plot consists of two disconnected stories packaged together. Out of the two stories, I like the Brian section best because it has a compelling narrative that at least made me care about Brian and his relationship. The corvette segment, which consisted solely of Peter running over Oscar from Sesame Street, was an unnecessary addition that lacked any clever humor or storytelling. Once Peter and his pals wrecked the car, it started to take off, but I thought the way they wrapped up the part was really weak. The entire cast once again did their part by injecting humor and some dynamic energy into each of their individual personas. The comedy didn’t work for me, which is the problem. Especially the section where they advertise the show in German, it had some passable gags that could have helped the episode. However, the comedy’s delivery was insufficiently skillful to make the quips endearing or hilarious. Maybe it was getting old watching the show.
Another mediocre episode from the 19th season of the show is “Boy’s Best Friend.” I only really liked the Brian chapter due of the characters and the decent storyline. On the other hand, the Corvette portion was only included to help fill the allotted 30 minutes. There is no love for this poor episode tonight.