‘Family Guy’s Giant Chicken officially dead, says producer

Ernie, the giant anthropomorphic chicken from Family Guy, is definitely dead, according to the cartoon’s creators.

First appearing in season one of the show, the character was part of an ongoing joke in which he and Peter Griffin repeatedly engage in long, comedic fights. Peter usually gets the best of Ernie, leaving him for dead, only for a final shot to reveal the chicken is alive and still enraged.

Questions over the character’s future were asked after Season 23 episode The Chicken Or The Meg, where Peter’s daughter Meg begins dating Ernie’s son, Nugget. While the father initially embraces her, he soon gives her an ultimatum – break ties with Peter or stop seeing Nugget.

Realising Ernie is as stubborn as her father, Meg refuses and engages in her own feud, which ends with her decapitating the chicken. The graphic scene seemed to be a final bow for the character, who is a fan favourite from the show’s beginning. Many characters have died only to mysteriously come back, but executive producer Alec Sulkin confirmed to TVLine that Ernie is no more.

“I think that the chicken has gone the way of all flesh,” he said. “Honestly, I feel like we got so many great set pieces out of the giant chicken fighting with Peter that they became hard to top. It’s a lot to ask of our production crew, and we may have just gotten the best out of that character.”

Recently, Family Guy’s creator, Seth MacFarlane, decried what he saw as a deluge of “pessimistic” modern TV shows. “There was a lot of hope, and some of the blame lies right here in this town” he said The dishes that we are serving up are so dystopian and so pessimistic. And yeah, there’s a lot to be pessimistic about, but it’s so one-sided. There’s nothing we’re doing that’s providing anyone an image of hope.”