‘Family Guy’ strikes back

For its second “Star Wars” spoof / tribute, “Something, Something, Something, Dark Side,” “Family Guy” takes on “The Empire Strikes Back.” The show doesn’t have a great history with extended story arcs (see the three-episode Stewie movie), but by sticking to only double episode length and not arbitrarily chopping the episode into separately-aired segments, Seth MacFarlane and company make it work.

Although they’ve visited the “Star Wars” universe before in “Blue Harvest” and referenced it countless times in the series, the jokes are surprisingly fresh. Recent seasons have suffered from unevenness, but most of the rapid-fire jokes succeed.

The most impressive part of the show has to be the animation: The space travel scenes are almost as detailed as in “Empire” and are the most ambitious visuals the show has ever attempted.

MacFarlane, Seth Green, and the producers, writers, and director of the episode all contribute a commentary, which is funny, but not particularly informative or essential. There’s also a table read of the episode, just in case you wanted to know what the voice actors look like. With a relatively short show, a few more special features might have been nice.