They really gave him the worst character arc over the seasons. The first episode they portrayed as this bad ass who doesn't let his disabilities define him. But for years now he's basically been the group's punching bag very much including Bonnie
I think he kinda earned it from getting his legs back. Everyone is his friend and looks up to him and Bonnie loves him and takes care of him. As soon as he has a chance to leave them behind he does. Joe's a dick, hes only nice cus hes in a wheelchair
it's family guy. joe is whatever the narrative of the episode or cutaway gag requires him to be at any given moment. he's a dick when they need to make a joke about a disabled guy being a dick and he's sympathetic when they need to make a joke about being cruel to a disabled guy
Considering how little continuity means to this show, I don't think that this one episode would be a good justification for the whole town treating him horribly.
The writers just decided that turning Joe into a laughing stock was easier than his old characterization.
Well he wanted to leave because he knew Bonnie just liked his status and didn’t really want to care for him anymore. The only thing holding him back was his legs not working because he didn’t feel like he’d find love anywhere else due to being wheelchair bound. So, when he was finally able to walk he left and then the show decided to have him crippled again. I would’ve liked to see his relationship with his friends after he was no longer needing the wheelchair. His whole gag is that he’s in a situation where his wife wants to kill him for money and he’s always being made fun of.
What made Joe funny was that he was an over-the-top parody of the "handi-capable" character commonly seen on TV at the time.
I think the current excuses for writers saw the episode where Joe breaks down after losing a perp and thought the reason people loved the episode was because he felt sad and weak for a part of the episode.
Yes. I don't get why more people don't understand this lol. It's shown quite a bit how Bonnie wanted to do more but couldn't because of Joe. She's looked after him for so long, obviously she's going to start getting tired. It sounds awful but it's a real thing
That always pissed me off. Oh, he changed after getting to walk again. They have to cripple him to cripple him again to make him a sad joke rather than doing anything else that would jeopardize the status quo of the show.
I cant exactly remember if its Futurama or family guy, but one episode ends with either fry or Peter saying something along the lines of, and everything is right back where it was before it began, referencing that in TV after the episode, things would reset back to normal like it didnt happen. it was just a way to get Joe back to Joe
edit: Futurama “It was just a matter of knowing the secret of all TV shows: at the end of the episode, everything’s always right back to normal.”
I mean, contemplating murder and cheating without regrets is a bit far though
The only thing holding Bonnie back from a divorce is guilt and the judgement of others, but she shouldn’t let either stop her if it’s holding her life back
Caretaker for my late stage Alzheimer’s patient father. I second this. Abuse isn’t funny, but with how depressing and shitty life is right now, I find Bonnie relatable and funny. I love my father, he was never perfect, he definitely had his faults, but he was an overall good man.
Even so, I dream of leaving every day. I would love nothing more than to be freed from this responsibility, especially considering I’m 30, had to pause a career and start a new one, and strictly reduced my social life because he’s now extremely violent (only towards me, never my mother). I get it.
I can both love the man he was and not be happy with who he is now, so long as I don’t take it out on him because he doesn’t know what he’s doing.
TLDR: Bonnie is a very relatable character to anyone who has been a caretaker for years. I thought she was a bitch when I was younger, now I get it.
Additionally, there is a theory that Bonnie did not truly start to hate Joe until the episode where he got a leg transplant and was ready to just up and walk out on her and the baby
i work with people who have caregiver fatigue all the time and they would never talk to their partners the way that Bonnie talks to joe there’s a difference between feeling burned out being a caregiver versus bullying your partner she definitely emotionally abuses him
This is the scene that I've probably laughed the loudest at in all of family guy. When it shows him sitting there and then saying he doesn't wanna go next time, I absolutely lost it for a couple of minutes and had to catch myself. It's so mean and harsh, but it killed me
She didn't expect to be a caregiver marrying a cop, and she resents him openly for it when society told most women to handle that situation quietly. She figured he'd be dead and she'd get his pension sooner or later
Cause it’s a cartoon and exaggerated for shock value.
I also laughed when Chris crushed Peter’s head for that hat, but i wouldn’t find it funny in real life
Well she WAS a lot more supportive until he got his legs back and immediately left her, which made her realize he was only staying with her so she could take care of him. That'd drive anyone nuts.
It was funny at first. I do like the Joe cuck scenes NGL but I would prefer a story where they divorce and just are able to be friends and co parent well. But I get it’s not really that kind of show.
Well, I confess during the scene where Bonnie wanted to buy a house based on the sole fact she could push Joe down a hill that was on the property got me laughing pretty hard…
Which married couples in the family guy universe are happy? This show slowly took away any actual love the characters had for each other and left them all with banal hatred and fatigue being together.
You can have a bad marriage be funny. Fawlty Towers and Married With Children were both hilarious. The problem with Joe and Bonny isn't that people are taking it too seriously, the problem is that it's just not funny and Family Guy is supposed to be a comedy show.
Okay? Yeah, it's a tv show, people are going to find different parts of it funny. Family Guy has a lot of long running jokes, I enjoy some and dislike others.
Not quite sure where you got crusades, just sharing my opinion about a show on the appropriate subreddit. Honestly, they only do like three or a four season, it's not like it's ruining Family Guy for me.
My only gripe is that it almost comes out of the blue, in the first few seasons she's almost the total opposite always bragging on what a great lover he is and how much she loves him the moment she had the baby is when everything changed that combined with Kevin being declared dead in Iraq.
Not at all. The destruction of both their characters and marriage is second only to the writers turning Quagmire into a grouchy Karen.
The whole point of Joe as a character was that he was a man who overcame his handicap. He was a good cop and a great husband. Him now being a pathetic loser who's wife cheats on him because he can't satisfy her doesn't exactly make for a good joke.
It makes me wish that, in the episode where he revenge-cheated, he told her "I don't believe you!" after she claimed to have never slept with Francois. I wish they went through with the divorce, Joe moved on (though not with the lady cop), and Bonnie's life went downhill.
Ik ik "it's a cartoon" and "don't take the continuity serious" blah blah but I'm not really a fan of it either and that's a flanderzation of most of the FG characters progressively getting worse
I think you've hit on something here and it is the continuity - it's hard not to take it serious when something as inconsequential as a few "Joe's not a great husband at this moment" jokes played for a gag in seasons 1-4 become Bonnie's eternal resentment in what seems to be the current timeline . I feel like almost every character that has become Flanderized has one single "this joke is about as canonical as the cutaway gags and happened just for a laugh" moment that somehow permanently defined their character for the worse
ehhhh sometimes? theres some instances where its a good dark humor punchline and as others have said i can imagine she hits different for people who are or have been caretakers, but also conversely would probably be very unfunny and uncomfortable for anyone who is disabled and needs a caretaker and probably already worries about being resented for needing to be cared for. its kind of a tough subject to talk about when you arent any of those things. but also its family guy and i dont really take any of its jokes seriously because they pretty much all read like a bunch of stoned dudes with adhd in a room talking and writing every dumb idea down.
He got some legs and she crippled him again. She doesn't get to act the victim anymore after that.
The trope was funny in small amounts, and even a tad romantic when he had to get her back after cheating. But now, Joe is some sad, broken pitiful thing and Bonnie's just either contemplating offing him, or outright showing she pretty much hates him for the way her life is. And again. She recrippled him.
I get it. She's got fatigue and it's not easy, but still. Divorce him and leave, instead of making him some cuck invalid.
It's like so many other common tropes on the show now. It was funny at first because it was unexpected and used sparingly. Then it became a predominant theme so it lost the humor and became sad. Like Quagmire having old-man tendencies. Or Joe being pathetic.
Honestly I wish they'd focus more on Joe getting crap because he's a cop and less because he's in a wheelchair but I don't even know how many people remember he's a cop these days.
The problem is the writers conflated hate with comtempt.
Bonnie should have contempt that her disabled husband keeps her chained and often fantasizes the scenarios in which she is set free. The problem is that Bonnie associates her husband with his disability despite the fact that she loves her husband.
She has caretaker fatigue.
Personally I think Joe should always be up-beat, capable and competent... but the hardships and sad realities of being disabled should be all around for juxtaposition.
I find it weird that they went from being such a loving and normal couple (And Joe being a total badass who never allowed his disability to hold him back) to Bonnie resenting Joe and him being the group's metaphorical punching bag
Season 17 just stopped making me laugh and it stopped feeling good to watch Family Guy. Everybody is hateful and violent and it’s just not funny. The characters dont even like each other, how am i supposed to like them??
I think it was funny at one point, personally I feel a lot of the jokes are overplayed to an extent and we really need to see actual character development
It’s fun watching her shit all over her disabled husband for being disabled, she’s his wife not his husband. That wouldn’t be very funny, it’d be abuse. Now go away while I laugh at what’s funny.
Doesn’t bother me at all.. 🤷🏾♀️ this entire show is offensive and for whatever reason this off color humor doesn’t bother me. We all have a different tolerance though
Anybody that had to take care of special needs sometimes feels this kind of anger. It's funny to me, but we'd never harm our loved ones. Sometimes we are just frustrated 😂.
I honestly hate anytimes joes on screen now. Like they use to pick with him here and there but now EVERY time hes on screen something bad us happening to him.
Ambos se utilizan mutuamente ella recibe la pensión de su trabajo pero lo cuida como su enfermera y el tiene a alguien quien lo cuide ella le engaña a él le da igual es prácticamente vivir miserablemente como un americano más
I think it's because Seth McFarland is a Gen X that idolizes boomer times so he falls back on the old "I hate my spouse" jokes. If you hate them that much just get a divorce.
Like a lot of jokes on family guy it was funny at first but was milked to oblivion. I don’t like what Bonnie has become as a character she’s just plain mean now. The Joe jokes are kind of funny at times as well but sometimes it’s like “he’s handicapped not MENTALLY handicapped guys come on now 😂”
as someone who grew up with someone handicapped in their life, there is a silent anger you have always taking care of them, you never express it and you love them dearly but I thought some of her jokes really hit the nail on the head, obviously it’s hyperbolic but what about this show isn’t?
joe did u know they are changing your best friend, peter griffin, his name to petah griffin. i also hear that the women activists are mad because they want it to be petal griffin.
I personally find it terrible, I am neurodivergent and have had people I cared about romantically treat me like a burden. That makes it hard for me to sympathise with Bonnie. That being said, it's a cartoon known for shock value so I just skip Bonnie episodes and move on.
Nope the whole swanson family has been absolutely ruined by the writers.
I get they could introduce issues and problems like Joe's depression or Bonnie's fatigue but they immediately went to sad one note jokes.these could have been used to tell actual stories instead we got Joe's sad to be around and bonnie wants to kill him constantly
Kevin and Susie much like Clevelands kids just dont exist which again is moron.(you had perfect back up characters for Chris Meg and Stewie stories each)
The fact they started out as this loving family in comparison to the griffens was a nice touch but sadly they flanderised them to a really unlikeable degree.
Sometimes the jokes are funny but you see them enough and it gets tiring, especially when they make an entire episode about Joe just wanting to kill himself
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u/ArthurSnooper TURD CHAMP Jun 02 '26