The Inside Joke About Meg on Family Guy

I’ve often heard complaints about the character of Meg Griffin on “Family Guy” and I wanted to touch on how the use of Meg is an example of Family Guy’s strength.

For those that don’t know (READ: Skip this paragraph if you’re already familiar) , Meg is the middle child on the animated family sitcom and she’s inexplicably the butt of her otherwise decent family’s jokes. Her dad won’t openly admit that he even likes his daughter. Aside from being not as attractive as her mother, no reason for this is ever given, and that incongruity is the source of humor.

Speaking of incongruity, isn’t it ironic that the girl playing Meg is played in real life by an actress beautiful enough to convince movie going audiences that heart throb Justin Timberlake would be swooning all over her? In fact, considering Hollywood’s obsession with the question “Is a beautiful actress capable of truly embodying the soul of a not-so-beautiful woman?”, then either a) Mila Kunis is more worthy of an Oscar than Charlize Theron or Nicole Kidman because she’s really nailing the whole ugly thing better than “Monster” and “The Hours” or b) perhaps, it’s not that hard to play ugly and it says more about our male perception of outward beauty that it’s such an issue.

OK, enough philosophizing and let us get back to my theory on why Meg is written the way she’s written:

Look at the E! Hollywood True Story of any family sitcom and you’ll see that behind the scenes, the Seaver kids on Growing Pains or the…