Dead Connie Society

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Dead Connie Society is Family Guy fanfic by Lurkerbunny. It started out with a simple question: "What If Robin Williams did a guest voice on Family Guy?"

The plot: Meg Griffin has decided to take poetry class as an elective in hopes that she will not only find a place to express herself, but also a place away from her tormentor, Connie D'Amico. Unfortunately for Meg, Connie is in the class for the sake of being near a cute boy. But fortunately for Meg, the teacher, Rodney Weaver is a free-thinking Blithe Spirit who inspires her. And he's cute too. As time goes by, Meg's feelings for Mr. Weaver grow stronger, and soon it becomes clear that he also has feelings for her. He manages to talk the rest of The Griffin family to into treating Meg right, but meanwhile, Connie is determined to make Meg look bad in front of him. She ends up humiliating Meg in swimming class while Mr. Weaver is in the room, but instead of making him dislike Meg, she ends up triggering a flashback to his own humiliation by a girl not unlike her.

It's payback time.

The first fanfic I've completed in four years (though you really don't want to know about my early stuff, you really don't), Dead Connie Society is filled with tropes, many referred to by their trope names. It's got a lot of jokes that in many ways are true to the spirit of the show (which means there is some Dead Baby Comedy as well as some stuff I came up with at the last minute). It may not ever become a classic, or even a cult classic, but hopefully it's decent enough that I won't go down in history as someone who wrote a Family Guy fic that's bad even by Family Guy standards.

Posted on Deviant ART in three parts on October 12, 2009.

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Featured Tropes (Hoo boy)

• All There in the Manual: I attempt to clear up things that might be confusing about the fic in my DA journal. It's pretty much the text equivalent of a DVD Commentary. I try not to explain too many jokes though.
• Actor Allusion / Celebrity Paradox: I had a lot of fun with this one:
  • Mork and Mindy appear as characters in their show but also in the "real" world.
  • Meg and Mr. Weaver have a discussion about film (while stoned) where Meg mixes up Jeff Daniels and Jeff Bridges. Mr. Weaver corrects her by telling her that Jeff Daniels was the one in RV and and Jeff Bridges was the one in The Fisher King.
  • In the Animated Actors ending (see below), Chris asks Robin if he'll ever appear on Robot Chicken. This actually has basis in reality.
• All Men Are Perverts: Mr. Weaver is the chivalrous kind, but as for everyone else... oh dear. Chris and Peter get excited when they hear Lois and Meg are going to have a "Girl-to-girl" talk. Tom Tucker and Principal Shepherd both say perverted things about Connie after her death. Even Mork is uncharacteristically randy. Then there's the cameo by Fritz the Cat... and of course, who else but Quagmire?
• Animated Actors: In the very end where it's revealed that Mr. Weaver (and Mork) were Robin Williams in costume. As he says his goodbyes to The Griffins, they all compliment him (in their own, er... unique ways).
  • What's more Mind Screw-y is that Connie D'Amico is shown alive at the end, complaining to a friend on her cell phone about her character getting killed off. And then Robin Williams accidentally runs her over with his car. Three times.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: In the end, Mr. Weaver and Meg get off for killing Connie after two other officers tell Joe how Connie drove their daughters to suicide, awakening Joe's Papa Wolf side. However, Mr. Weaver gets fired after he and Meg get off in the pool.
• Art Shift: Several scenes, if really animated, would call for Mr. Weaver (and Meg) to become Animesque (see Self Fanservice, below).
• Author Appeal: Dear lord, where to start?
  • Well, obviously: Robin Williams. Not just Robin Williams, but Robin Williams as the story's Mr. Fanservice, playing two characters, one being Mork and the other one being a savior for the show's Butt Monkey. By then end, he's a Memetic Sex God, as it's revealed that he and Lois had an affair in the past, that he and Meg actually had sex during the course of "filming", and then there's Pam Dawber's reaction to working with him for the first time in years:

Robin: Pam... it has been so long since we've seen each other! Who'd have thought it would take Family Guy of all shows to- (she grabs him and kisses him for several seconds) Pam: I have missed doing that SO MUCH! (walks away, satisfied)

• • I have a thing about teacher/student relationships in general... Yeah.
  • Non-sexual examples include the soundtrack (there are a lot of songs used in this fic. So much that I made a playlist of them), and of course the TV Tropes Shout Outs.
• Non Sequitur Scene: Well, this is Family Guy, so the typical "manatee jokes" are expected, but this fic has a cutaway within a cutaway: After a cutaway to Quagmire in bed with Mork and a very angry Mindy, Mork prompts a flashback to when Exidor invited them to an orgy. It ends badly.
  • Also, Retro Rachel, as noted below.
• Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick: Twice.

Lois: Well, it's just that sometimes teenage girls can be such a pain to raise. Sometimes you lose your temper... sometimes you say things you don't mean... sometimes you dump hot spaghetti on her face and shove the meatballs down her throat during her "vegetarian" phase.

And later:

Meg: So, what are we going to do to her? Are we gonna hack her Facebook account? Are we gonna raid her Myspace page? Are we gonna rape her?

• Character Filibuster: Twice. First Mr. Weaver rants about how modern culture is so paranoid about adult men working with or helping out younger girls because they think there's only a sexual motive behind it. On one hand it's somewhat funny because he really is interested in Meg that way, but there is sad truth behind it too. And then there's his rant at the end about bullies (Particularly, the attractive ones) getting away with everything, which is even longer.
  • Parodied when Connie starts ranting about how certain things are only loved because of nostalgia... and then she dies.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Thomas, the cute boy who Connie joins the poetry class for. He says nothing and doesn't play any important role in the main plot until the end where he helpfully tells Meg where Mr. Weaver went after being fired.
  • Also, it's mentioned in the news report on Connie's "suicide" that two girls (Shannon Claire and Ashley Dunnstock) committed suicide after attending Connie's 14th birthday. This isn't elaborated upon, but later in the story, Joe comes to arrest Mr. Weaver with Officer Claire and Officer Dunnstock...
• Chivalrous Pervert: Mr. Weaver lets inappropriate remarks about Meg's breasts slip out several times, but he still genuinely cares about her, and she still finds him charming.
  • He also finds teen pop stars Miley Cyrus and JoJo attractive, but also annoying. And yes, the JoJo thing was a deliberately Squicky Cast Incest joke (she played Robin's daughter in RV). Ain't I a stinker?
• Comic Book Time: Lampshaded.

Meg: [Connie's torment of me has gone on] Ever since middle school. I remember the exact day I met her: September 1, 1995. Mr. Weaver: (pause) How old are you again? Meg: 17.

• • Also:

(as Connie is buying beer with a fake ID) Joe: Hey, she shouldn't be here! Cleveland: Oh I don't know. It's kinda hard to tell her age considering she and Meg and all the other high school girls seem to have been in the same grade forever. Quagmire: Yep, if there's one thing I love about Quahog, it's the vaguely-aged high school girls. Giggity, giggity, giggity!

• Disco Dan: Retro Rachel, an Eighties-obsessed fan character who appears in only one scene for no real reason. What we do know about her from her short appearance is that she's meant to be a rare sympathetic example of this trope, since she contrasts her peers' ignorance.

Retro Rachel: What-ever! You know, this whole scenario is a big rip-off of Heathers. When I get home, I'm gonna go watch it... on VHS. And then I'm gonna read a book! Boy #1: What's VHS? Boy #2: What's a book?

• Expy: Mr. Weaver, of John Keating... at first.
• Fetish: Meg likes Mr. Weaver's hairy arms, while he thinks it would be hot if she wore Connie's fluffy pink jacket during sex. * Hilarious in Hindsight: This fic was completed long before "Dial Meg For Murder" aired, but it was pretty awesome to see Meg deliver some sort of soda-related punishment to Connie on-screen (even if it wasn't fatal). Oh, and the dominance kiss. Looks like my scene of Meg suggesting she and Mr. Weaver rape Connie together wasn't that far-fetched.
• Humor Dissonance: The scenes where Robin's characters are supposedly improvising (to the delight of other characters. Well, most characters anyway) aren't really funny. That is because although I am quite good at spoken improvisation, I cannot capture Robin's magic in a fanfic. Rest assured, were this an actual script to be recorded in a studio by Robin, those parts would say "Robin can go off here".
• It's Been Done: Every single character lampshades the fact that yes, we're homaging Heathers.
  • Later, Meg wants to honor Mr. Weaver by re-creating the "Oh Captain My Captain" scene from Dead Poets Society, but one classmate points out that the scene was already parodied in "The one where Brian becomes a teacher". She does it anyway at the airport.
  • Then there's a literal example of The Simpsons Already Did It when Mr. Weaver hands Meg a note saying "You Are Meg Griffin". He gets confronted by Matt Groening's lawyers on the plane
• Kent Brockman News: The fact that JOLT cola (and other sodas from the company) are still being made is more discussed than Connie's "suicide". In addition, Tom Tucker makes inappropriate remarks about Connie on the air.

Tom Tucker: So, there you have it, the tragedy of a girl raised to be a beauty, only to end up a self-loathing beast. Next up, the hot topless women that Google didn't let you see on Street View... until now!

• Lampshade Hanging: Of tropes in both the fic and the show proper.
• Moral Event Horizon: It's revealed that Connie drove two girls to suicide at her 14th birthday party, and it's implied she did the same several other girls at different times. Also, she and her friend, Gina, tortured the "ugly kids" in a way not unlike Abu Ghraib (And that wasn't actually meant to be funny, but more of a way to show how horrible Connie really was. Although I wouldn't put it past the actual show to put something like that in there.)
• Noodle Incident: It's never elaborated upon how Connie drove those girls to suicide, and Meg doesn't even want to bring up the "paper bag incident". Also, "Giggity" apparently means something really dirty on Ork, but if even Quagmire's never heard of it, You Do NOT Want to Know.
• One-third Plot Reference: A combination of Dead Poets Society, Heathers, and World's Greatest Dad.
• Overprotective Dad: Parodied in one scene where Peter forces a burqua and purity ring onto Meg, and then tells Lois to hold her down so he can force her into a chastity belt.
• Race For Your Love: Parodied near the end.
• Rule of Funny: A lot of the jokes, as per the show as usual.
• Rule 34: Referenced in the dialogue by Brian and Stewie, who are not only familiar with it, but deeply traumatized by it.

Stewie:Actually, I quite like the one where you and I- (Brian punches him)

• Running Gag: "They still make JOLT?"
  • Funny Aneurysm Moment: Two weeks after this fic was published, I found this article on how JOLT might go out of business. *headdesk* Once again, the world hates me.
• Script Fic
• Self Fanservice: Parodied. When Meg first looks at Mr. Weaver, she sees him in Animesque style with *deep breath* Bishie Sparkle, Love Bubbles, Dramatic Wind, rose petals blowing by, and even soft focus (making him possibly the first ever Gaussian Guy. She sees him this way several times during the course of the fic. He's even this way during the closing credits.
• Shout-Out: Oh boy.
  • Mr. Weaver is named after the song "Dream Weaver", which plays during Meg's Self Fanservice fantasies. His first name is Rodney because, well, I wanted him to share initials with his "voice actor".
  • Most of Mr. Weaver's dialogue is from Robin Williams' stand-up acts. While this at first may seem like plagiarism, it's actually realism, as Robin does slip some of his stand-up lines into his roles (sometimes he's had more than one role use the same line). Some of his other dialogue is parodies of his movie lines. And a few lines are things he's actually said to me when I've met him.
  • The publisher, Steve Lehmann is named after Michael Lehmann, director of Heathers. And of course, the late Ashley Dunnstock has the same last name as Martha (the fat girl) from that movie.
  • And of course, plenty to this very wiki:

Connie: (laughs derisively) Poor, deluded Meg. You will never be truly happy. You know why? Because you're the universe's Butt Monkey. You were MADE to be the butt monkey. Even if the universe throws you a bone... or banana or whatever once in a while, it will soon be taken from you because Status Quo Is God. Meg: Oh yeah? I'm savvy too. And I know this is all a dream. I'll just think of something really loud to wake me up.

• Spoof Aesop

Mr. Weaver: I guess the lesson here is that if someone is horrible enough, you can get away with killing them out of revenge! Meg: Really? I thought it was that you shouldn't torment the "different" kids in high school. (narrows eyes) Because you'll pay for it. With your life. Mr. Weaver: Well, either way is pretty warped.

• Stylistic Suck: Both Meg and Mr. Weaver's poetry.
• Take That: Twilight, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Miley Cyrus, and Meg-bashers (hell, bullies in general).
• Teacher-Student Romance: Meg and Mr. Weaver, obviously. A flashback cutaway shows that this was also the (thankfully one-sided students love teacher) case when he taught elementary school.
• The Eighties: The era Mr. Weaver was in high school. Also the obsession of Retro Rachel, of course. However, while Family Guy typically has a nostalgic view of the era, one cutaway shows that Robert Crumb's sex-and-drugs obsessed Fritz the Cat did not have a good time then. (Ironically, the latter two hook up at the end, at least temporarily.)
• Too Dumb to Live: Connie, who doesn't grasp that hiding drain cleaner in a bottle of soda would be a more obvious deception than hiding it in a mug (well, more like Too Hung Over To Live, but it's the same result).