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With how much I enjoyed season 11 on rewatch, I was expecting this season to get better as well. Unfortunately, that was not the case...

A lot of the issues I had with season 10's plotting emerged back this season, to the point where the jokes are quite literally the only thing that keep most of these episodes from being worse. Except honestly, I think the show's jokes are becoming more of a mixed bag rather than consistently good. I've been noticing more attempts by this show to do more "edgy" and out-there episodes, like an episode where Roger is giving birth to Jeff or an episode where Roger and Klaus have sex (genius). Or how about an episode where Stan gets addicted to killing himself? Now, I do realize this show's had out-there premises since all the way back in season 3. There was an episode about Stan kidnapping his mom's boyfriends and sending them to an island, and an episode about Stan driving a man to suicide in his attempts to convert him to suicide. But what made those episodes better was they were grounded in character and the jokes were never just about how edgy they were. Both those episodes, despite being ridiculous, somehow still felt natural and I could make sense of their plots. How about "Kloger'? What am I supposed to get out of Roger and Klaus having sex? It's an episode that has some jokes that I did like, but I found my time wasted because the episode never got me to care at all about anything that was happening and the edgy idea stopped being funny 5 minutes in.

I get that the TBS era was considered the all-edgier version of American Dad, but there needs to be substance as well. This season for the most part has a lot of the really weird, crazy ideas that American Dad used to do, but without any of the tight, clever writing it used to have. As for the jokes feeling more mixed, its for the very same idea that they think just having a character making an offensive or gross comment constitutes a "joke." Like, saying a character had a blowjob isn't funny to me. Or an entire last act of a large family murdering each other. Its the type of stuff that just doesn't sit well with him. That being said, this show's humor can still be good, heck even consistently good. "Camp Campawanda" had a pretty sucky plot, but the jokes were actually pretty good, which is why I gave it the mixed rating. I can say the same for "Bahama Mama," but I actually didn't mind the plot of that one as much even if it wasn't the best.

I also think the characters are starting to get dumbed down this season. Stan feels more stupider here than he's been in any other season, and I've never enjoyed that characterization... I always liked him more for being a hard-ass with a child-like interior, but this season seems to rely on him for just being plain dumb. Francine's crazy side is played up more here and that led to a lot of unfunny moments with her, and unfortunately this'll only get worse after this season. Roger is back to being a really boring character, I swear every one of his episodes (or subplots) feels like they are recycling an old conflict they did with him, or doing the same jokes they always do with him. I think the fact that the route they've gone with him is making him as evil as possible means that there would be a point where they couldn't make him even more evil without having him trying to kill the family in every episode. Even some of the Roger episodes I liked this season felt like retreads. I enjoyed "The Talented Mr. Dingleberry," but the idea of a persona so evil he locked it up was kinda already done in "Ricky Spanish." and that episode was much, much funnier.

The last thing I'll say is that this season had three of the biggest duds in awhile, the worst episodes since "Shallow Vows." The first is Bazooka Steve, an episode which had the audacity to rehash one of the Simpsons' most infamous episode and somehow make it worse, with a ridiculous third act and an awful message at the end. "The Bitchin' Race" surprised me with just how utterly boring it is, as well as being the unfunniest episode so far. I groaned at almost every joke, and not to mention the family feels quite stripped of their personalities, something I was surprised to see this early in the TBS run. Lastly there's "Family Plan," an episode that has Francine actually revisit her birth parents, but it ended up being a complete wasted potential with Francine having her worst characterization all season, and ending with a last act of Francine's entire family murdering each other over a phone plan. Like, this is what the episode decided to do with this premise? What a disappointment.

As lame as this season was there are some redeeming qualities. If there's one thing I think the TBS era improved on its Hayley and Klaus, because they feel more like characters now. Hayley's nowhere near my favorite character but she didn't have that many bad moments this season, although that might also be because she didn't do too much this season. As for Klaus, I like that they are playing his more hipster side more, and some of the subplots he got himself involved into were fun. His episode where he played a role in the main plot, "A Nice Night for a Drive," was quite poorly written for the most part, but otherwise Klaus is becoming more entertaining. I will also say that although there were only 5 good episodes, those good episodes are ones worth checking out, especially "The Long Bomb," a really fun action-packed episode that also works as a really neat episode between Stan and Hayley.

I wrote more than I probably should have, but that is because this is the start of the decline era, at least in my opinion, and its only going to get worse from here. This season really surprised me with just how monotonous it was, but at least we are still at the point where there's a sufficient number of decent episodes. Spoiler alert, there's going to be a point where even that isn't the case.

Description
With how much I enjoyed season 11 on rewatch, I was expecting this season to get better as well. Unfortunately, that was not the case...

A lot of the issues I had with season 10's plotting emerged back this season, to the point where the jokes are quite literally the only thing that keep most of these episodes from being worse. Except honestly, I think the show's jokes are becoming more of a mixed bag rather than consistently good. I've been noticing more attempts by this show to do more "edgy" and out-there episodes, like an episode where Roger is giving birth to Jeff or an episode where Roger and Klaus have sex (genius). Or how about an episode where Stan gets addicted to killing himself? Now, I do realize this show's had out-there premises since all the way back in season 3. There was an episode about Stan kidnapping his mom's boyfriends and sending them to an island, and an episode about Stan driving a man to suicide in his attempts to convert him to suicide. But what made those episodes better was they were grounded in character and the jokes were never just about how edgy they were. Both those episodes, despite being ridiculous, somehow still felt natural and I could make sense of their plots. How about "Kloger'? What am I supposed to get out of Roger and Klaus having sex? It's an episode that has some jokes that I did like, but I found my time wasted because the episode never got me to care at all about anything that was happening and the edgy idea stopped being funny 5 minutes in.

I get that the TBS era was considered the all-edgier version of American Dad, but there needs to be substance as well. This season for the most part has a lot of the really weird, crazy ideas that American Dad used to do, but without any of the tight, clever writing it used to have. As for the jokes feeling more mixed, its for the very same idea that they think just having a character making an offensive or gross comment constitutes a "joke." Like, saying a character had a blowjob isn't funny to me. Or an entire last act of a large family murdering each other. Its the type of stuff that just doesn't sit well with him. That being said, this show's humor can still be good, heck even consistently good. "Camp Campawanda" had a pretty sucky plot, but the jokes were actually pretty good, which is why I gave it the mixed rating. I can say the same for "Bahama Mama," but I actually didn't mind the plot of that one as much even if it wasn't the best.

I also think the characters are starting to get dumbed down this season. Stan feels more stupider here than he's been in any other season, and I've never enjoyed that characterization... I always liked him more for being a hard-ass with a child-like interior, but this season seems to rely on him for just being plain dumb. Francine's crazy side is played up more here and that led to a lot of unfunny moments with her, and unfortunately this'll only get worse after this season. Roger is back to being a really boring character, I swear every one of his episodes (or subplots) feels like they are recycling an old conflict they did with him, or doing the same jokes they always do with him. I think the fact that the route they've gone with him is making him as evil as possible means that there would be a point where they couldn't make him even more evil without having him trying to kill the family in every episode. Even some of the Roger episodes I liked this season felt like retreads. I enjoyed "The Talented Mr. Dingleberry," but the idea of a persona so evil he locked it up was kinda already done in "Ricky Spanish." and that episode was much, much funnier.

The last thing I'll say is that this season had three of the biggest duds in awhile, the worst episodes since "Shallow Vows." The first is Bazooka Steve, an episode which had the audacity to rehash one of the Simpsons' most infamous episode and somehow make it worse, with a ridiculous third act and an awful message at the end. "The Bitchin' Race" surprised me with just how utterly boring it is, as well as being the unfunniest episode so far. I groaned at almost every joke, and not to mention the family feels quite stripped of their personalities, something I was surprised to see this early in the TBS run. Lastly there's "Family Plan," an episode that has Francine actually revisit her birth parents, but it ended up being a complete wasted potential with Francine having her worst characterization all season, and ending with a last act of Francine's entire family murdering each other over a phone plan. Like, this is what the episode decided to do with this premise? What a disappointment.

As lame as this season was there are some redeeming qualities. If there's one thing I think the TBS era improved on its Hayley and Klaus, because they feel more like characters now. Hayley's nowhere near my favorite character but she didn't have that many bad moments this season, although that might also be because she didn't do too much this season. As for Klaus, I like that they are playing his more hipster side more, and some of the subplots he got himself involved into were fun. His episode where he played a role in the main plot, "A Nice Night for a Drive," was quite poorly written for the most part, but otherwise Klaus is becoming more entertaining. I will also say that although there were only 5 good episodes, those good episodes are ones worth checking out, especially "The Long Bomb," a really fun action-packed episode that also works as a really neat episode between Stan and Hayley.

I wrote more than I probably should have, but that is because this is the start of the decline era, at least in my opinion, and its only going to get worse from here. This season really surprised me with just how monotonous it was, but at least we are still at the point where there's a sufficient number of decent episodes. Spoiler alert, there's going to be a point where even that isn't the case.