Forum:Coverage: Inside Family Guy/"Doctor Who Farted"

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Introduction

Argh, this freakin' story. This supposedly official Family Guy crossover is, to put it lightly, causing its fair share of headaches. When we're not arguing what to even call the thing, we're debating over whether our coverage should extend beyond the skit itself to cover the setup, thus making Lois, Meg, Chris, Stewie and Brian official characters (which, in that context, they absolutely should, as I've argued). But before all that, we should talk about whether this scene is even eligible for coverage here to begin with.

This page's existence has led to the creation of a number of peripheral pages (actors like Rachael MacFarlane, studios like Fuzzy Door Productions, TV channels like ITV2, and, of course, the series itself), and it all hinges on an unsourced claim that the BBC gave their permission to the Tenth Doctor and the TARDIS's use.

The closest we have to any sort of acknowledgement by the BBC is that the skit's original reveal at San Diego Comic-Con 2016 was the subject of a news article on the official Doctor Who website.

On Family Guy's end, there is no acknowledgement of the BBC in Inside Family Guy's ending credits. Two other potential sources I've suggested looking up are the episode's DVD commentary (assuming it has one), and the official publication Inside Family Guy: An Illustrated History. WaltK ☎ 19:32, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Discussion

Yeah, if there's no evidence it's licensed there probably shouldn't be a page for it - its acknowledgement may be just enough for an overview as a "connected series", but no more than that (the current pages being made redirects to it). (Also, I feel like if it is licensed, it'll be difficult to split from the full episode considering the way it's framed.) Cookieboy 2005 ☎ 22:34, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I mean, I think splitting it from the full episode is actually very easy to do because it segments itself really neatly thanks to it being the very first scene of the episode, but I seem to be in a minority on that belief. WaltK ☎ 22:47, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

I think I'm against Family Guy retaining its overview page if Doctor Who Farted (or whatever we're calling it) is deleted. The minor offical acknowledgement can be sufficiently covered at Cultural references to the Doctor Who universe/2010s and the newly-minted List of fan works in which official actors reprised their roles.

I would like for the two sources Walt suggests in the OP to be checked before this thread is closed but if that's not possible I would lean towards deletion with the current available evidence, specifically the lack of the BBC in the episode's end credits. Borisashton ☎ 20:52, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

For future reference, here are all of the relevant pages made so far, for easy roundup for deletion in the event that's our ruling:

WaltK ☎ 08:46, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

Have long considered this something we needed to take care of eventually. At most, this short should be added to List of fan works in which official actors reprised their roles, or something similar. Otherwise it should not have a presence on our site, unless we can prove it was approved. Likewise, I do support us having pages on content which did have BBC involvement, such as Whodle (video game). OS25 🤙☎️ 18:40, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

Well, the fact that it was the subject of a news article on the official Doctor Who website might be enough for it to have its own page under our reworked policy on fan works, but nothing more than that. Cgl1999 ☎ 06:11, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

I feel I'd agree if, say, a Big Finish short trips story mentioned the events of the story. But as it stands, I don't think a news article saying "Hey this exists" is ground for even the short to have a page. Perhaps a mention on a larger page, sure. For instance, I think there was discussion of a larger article discussing fan projects discussed in DWM. Something like that. OS25 🤙☎️ 20:35, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

I've learnt a couple of things;

The back cover of FG's season 15 DVD boxset makes no mention of there being audio commentaries. In fact, it lists just three bonus features with no indication of there being any more.
The IFG book does not appear to be an episode-by-episode guide like I was led to believe, and the snippet I saw elsewhere that led me to believe there was a section on the episode is actually from a section about show's writing process.

Long story short; we've basically lost our only two possible leads in finding out for certain that this was licensed. Maybe I'm wrong about the book and there's actually more to it than what Amazon's digital preview provides, but the outlook isn't looking good. WaltK ☎ 16:40, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Well, in my opinion, we should presume this wasn't licensed unless further proof against this idea arises. If it turns out in 6 months that there's an interview with Seth MacFarlane calling this licensed - fine, we'll restore the page. But as it stands, with no credits and this entire thing being based on a BBC website promoting the episode... I don't believe this was licensed. OS25 🤙☎️ 21:49, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Conclusion

Right, what User:OttselSpy25 said. We have no evidence that this is licensed and no particular reason to assume it should be. All it warrants for the time being is mentions at Cultural references to the Doctor Who universe/2010s and List of fan works in which official actors reprised their roles. The page itself should be made a redirect to the former, and associated pages deleted. If it transpires that it was somehow licensed after all, we'll recreate it.

Whether Family Guy (series) itself should remain under the circumstances is probably a topic for Forum:Real world franchises with DWU connections: Qualification speedround.

As always, thanks to everyone who participated in this thread. Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 13:20, 7 September 2023 (UTC)