In a turn around of fate for Family Guy's Brian, Stewie travels back in time to save his friend.

AFTER more than 230 episodes, Family Guy is still going strong and is just as inappropriate as ever.

The animated series has been a gold mine for creator Seth MacFarlane, who signed a $100 million deal with Fox in 2008 to keep producing the show.

Despite it being one of the most loved shows on TV, there are some surprising facts that not many people are aware of:

Stewie: He’s arguably the most popular character on the show, but the role of Stewie Griffin (voiced by Seth MacFarlane) is also the most confusing. The most commonly asked question about Family Guy is whether or not the other Griffin family members can understand what Stewie says.

“It’s whatever’s funny at the time,” MacFarlane said at the 2011 Comic Con.

He later added that most of the family members can hear Stewie but because he’s a baby they tend to ignore what he says.

Chris Griffin: Seth Green based the voice of Chris Griffin on Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs. When he went in to audition for the role of the dopey teenager, he was dared by a mate to do his Buffalo Bill impression rather than a surfer voice which most of the other actors were auditioning with.

“All of a sudden they were like, ‘Oh that’s funny, maybe make it younger and a little more weird’ and I was stunned when I got the part,” Green said.

Brian: Series creator Seth MacFarlane is the voice behind Stewie, Brian, Peter and Quagmire, but which one’s his favourite? Brian the dog. MacFarlane said that he enjoys that character the most because he doesn’t have to put on a different voice, he just uses his regular voice. When he’s voicing the other characters, MacFarlane usually leaves the booth with a sore throat.

Meg: The Griffin’s teenage daughter Meg is quite possibly the most abused character on TV. She cops it from all of the other family members, and according to MacFarlane it’s a result of “a bunch of male writers not knowing how to write for a teenage girl”.

Star Wars: Seth MacFarlane started putting Star Wars references in Family Guy, but then they became so frequent that Fox became worried they might get sued. So they told MacFarlane that he needed approval from Lucas Film (the company behind Star Wars) if he wanted to continue including them. MacFarlane assumed Lucas Film would say no, but to his surprise they found the references hilarious and gave him permission. This resulted in an hour long episode called Blue Harvest in which the Family Guy characters were recast as Star Wars characters.

Flintstones: Ever wondered why there are so many references to The Flintstones and The Jetsons in Family Guy? It’s because Seth MacFarlane used to be a writer for Hanna-Barbera before creating Family Guy.

Salaries: Last year, the four main voice actors on Family Guy (apart from Seth MacFarlane) got a big pay rise. Alex Borstein (Lois Griffin), Mila Kunis (Meg Griffin), Seth Green (Chris Griffin) and Mike Henry (Cleveland Brown) successfully negotiated for up to $225,000 each per episode.

Running joke: Every episode includes at least one instance of a character saying “What the hell …”

Family Guy Season 13 is out on DVD now.