Excellence in Broadcasting (Family Guy)

"Excellence in Broadcasting" is the second episode of the ninth season of Family Guy. The episode guest stars the late Rush Limbaugh himself.

Summary
When Brian learns that Rush Limbaugh is going to be at the Quahog Mall for a book-signing, he decides to go down there and give him a piece of his left-wing mind. However, when Rush unexpectedly comes to Brian's rescue, Brian has a political change of heart.

Why It's Anything but Excellence

 * 1) It's basically a 22-minute jab at conservatives and a sermon for Seth's political views.
 * 2) * Basically, the episode calls conservatives a bunch of racist punks.
 * 3) * Even if Seth wasn't writing or directing this, he should've said no to making anymore political episodes.
 * 4) The episode uses the overused “character changes into the exact opposite of themselves only to revert back for the sake of status quo” plot cliche as it did that with Brian by turning him into a left-wing hypocrite and goes back to being himself at the end. Such a cliche has already been used many times in this show and American Dad!
 * 5) Brian is unlikable in this episode, he became a left-wing hypocrite ever since Rush Limbaugh saves his life.
 * 6) *Before that, after hearing about Limbaugh at Quahog Mall, he immediately rushes straight there just to verbally abuse him.
 * 7) *Brian attacks Nancy Pelosi via waterboarding. Whether you hate her or not, she doesn't deserve that kind of torture.
 * 8) Lois acts like a bitch over Brian and his politics. Why didn't she do that before over him basically being the pope of Seth MacFarlane's political views?
 * 9) It feels pointless and out of place; politics-related episodes like this one work on a show like American Dad!, as that one was intended to be more political, but do not as well on Family Guy.
 * 10) The musical number "Republican Town", while pretty good and catchy, can be insulting to Republicans.
 * 11) This episode just seems to exist to point out why it would be worse for Brian to be a conservative than it is for him to be a liberal.
 * 12) Judging by how the episode acts, it seems that it was also made in response to the backlash made towards Brian’s general character and Flanderization. As the writers seemed to have made Brian a conservative for the episode to point out why it would be bad if he was conservative instead of liberal for the whole show, the writers apparently thought that many viewers hate Brian because he is a liberal and that the people who were making the complaints were all conservative, which is not the case.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) "Diane can't be with us today. Where is Diane, Ollie?" "She dead!"
 * 2) Rush Limbaugh does a good job portraying himself in this episode, and considering all the jokes at his expense here, he is at least a good sport about it.
 * 3) Stan's cameo in this episode is decent after Brian read Rush Limbaugh's book, even saying "Good, good for Brian".
 * 4) Republican Town is a pretty good and catchy song.

Reception
"Excellence in Broadcasting" has a rating of 6.6/10 on IMDb, and The A.V. Club graded this episode with a D.

Trivia

 * This episode was the first episode to be released with the HD intro, although later airings of "And Then There Were Fewer" use this intro.
 * Despite their political differences, Seth MacFarlane and Rush Limbaugh were friends in real life.
 * Unfortunately, Rush Limbaugh sadly passed away in 2021.