Star Wars may not be as popular as it once was, but parodying and spoofing off of George Lucas’ space saga certainly is. Hardly anyone knows that better than the writing staff of Family Guy, who even before producing their initial takeoff of A New Hope, would sneak a Star Wars cutaway gag into every other episode of the series. The last season of Family Guy began with “Blue Harvest,” which recast the Griffin family, their friends and neighbours into various parts in the first Star Wars movie. The success of the episode made a sequel inevitable, so in “Something, Something, Something, Dark Side,” patriarch Peter gathers his family ‘round once again to tell the next chapter of the tale.

First, the bad news, because what should have been a game of one-upmanship between “Dark Side” and “Blue Harvest” seems more like a case of lost mojo. “Blue Harvest” definitely had a better balance overall between the generous homage to the source material and typical Family Guy subterfuge and zany non-sequiturs. Sometimes it seems as though without a joke fitting the circumstance, the writers simply let the story carry on as it did in the original Empire Strikes Back. But the good news is that some of those gags thought up for “Dark Side” are hilariously spot-on, and the writers have also found a couple of lapses in Empire’s logic that they easily exploit. Think: “Han’s clothes” as a hint to one example.

Another fun gag in “Dark Side” is learning which Family Guy players are featured as the new characters introduced in Empire Strikes Back. One interesting juxtaposition we get is Lando Calrissian, “the only black guy in the universe,” being played one of Guy’s few Jewish characters, Mort Goldman (in black face, of course). Quahog Mini-Mart manager Carl fills in for Yoda, and though his cult-happy, movie title name dropping may have worked well in one or two other appearances, it gets old fast when one of the Jedi tests that Luke/Chris faces is naming the best scene in Teen Wolf. Carter Pewterschmidt subs for Emperor Palpatine in a hilarious bit involving the Emperor getting rid of old CDs after transferring them to his iPod. But in the most natural fit of all, we get the Giant Chicken playing Boba Fett. Sadly though, this doesn’t lead to an uproarious chicken fight through the Star Wars Universe.

But this being Family Guy, what we mostly remember is the laughter. Meg gets slighted again for her part in the story, more laughs at the expense of Robot Chicken and Seth Green are had, and the opening crawl cuts into Fox for dropping the ball so far as giving the Star Wars licensing rights to Lucas back in ’77. The pop culture riffs are spot on with Dog the Bounty Hunter being included with Boba Fett and IG-88 in Vader’s meeting, Han Solo skiing up for some Juicy Fruit on Hoth and an episode ending letter from Doc Brown stranded in 1885. “Dark Side” may not be home run, but it’s at least a run. It should please both Family Guy and Star Wars fans alike, and since this won’t appear on TV till May, it’s worth at least a rental. The DVD includes audio commentary, Family Guy facts and a sneak peek at the Return of the Jedi spoof “We Have a Bad Feeling About This.”