Ted Becoming A TV Show, With A Familiar Premise

The plot of Seth MacFarlane’s movie Ted was basically a deconstruction of your typical children’s fairy tale story: a little boy wishes for his teddy bear to come to life, and it does, and the story usually ends there. Instead, Ted takes place many years after the fact, when John and his bear have both become burnout losers in their late 30s. Cue the jokes. (I won’t be commenting on the movie’s quality or lack thereof as I’ve never seen it.)

But Ted’s not dead: after a sequel failed to generate enough interest, the crude fuzzy thing has found another way to survive. Seth is now working on a Ted TV series for Peacock, set as a prequel. The show will take place in 1993 with a sixteen-year-old John, just now beginning to realize Ted won’t make the rest of his life a breeze.

There is one common thread through nearly all of MacFarlane’s TV shows, and it’s the aggressive influence of his two favorite programs: All In The Family and Star Trek. Family Guy is about a boorish lout who opens each episode playing at the piano with his wife; American Dad drew the connection closer by introducing a daughter with opposite political viewpoints, much like Archie Bunker’s kid; and then The Orville was basically Star Trek through a Seth-ian lens. When Seth hosted the Oscars, he turned half his performance into a Star Trek homage complete with Shatner guest-starring as himself.

The Ted TV show is — surprise — using the All In The Family formula yet again. The series will introduce John’s father, “a blustering, blue-collar Bostonian who thinks he is the unequivocal boss in the family, and doesn’t like anyone challenging him, particularly his liberal-minded niece, Blaire.” Seth needs to get a new favorite show! Or at least commit to a fourth season of The Orville (all signs point to Season 3 being the end).

The Ted show is set to premiere on Peacock in the future.