And Then There Were Fewer

"And Then There Were Fewer" is the hour-long season premiere of the ninth season of the American animated television series Family Guy. It originally aired on Fox in the United States on September 26, 2010. The episode follows the citizens of the fictional city of Quahog in the non-fictional U.S. state of Rhode Island after they are invited by actor James Woods to his stately mansion on a remote island. While there, a series of murders occur, and the group struggles to determine who committed the mysterious acts, before ultimately attempting to escape from the island, and avoid being murdered themselves. The episode borrows its premise and title from Agatha Christie's 1939 murder mystery And Then There Were None, while also serving as a parody of the 1985 film Clue.

The episode was written by Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and directed by Dominic Polcino. It received high acclaim from critics, who praised its storyline and cultural references, and is generally considered one of the best episodes of Family Guy. According to Nielsen ratings, it was viewed in 9.41 million homes in its original airing. The episode features guest performances by Drew Barrymore, H. Jon Benjamin, Max Burkholder, Colin Ford, Patrick Stewart, Ashley Tisdale and James Woods, along with several recurring guest voice actors for the series. It was the first Family Guy episode to air in 16:9 and high definition. The episode was nominated for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series at the 63rd Primetime Emmy Awards. "And Then There Were Fewer" was released on DVD along with two other episodes from the season on December 13, 2011. The show confirmed afterward that it was “canon,” and those characters that died (e.g., Diane Simmons, Muriel Goldman, etc.) would not be brought back in the future, save for James Woods, as he is seen in the thirteenth episode of season 10, "Tom Tucker: The Man and His Dream", in which he tells Peter and Tom that paramedics brought him to a secret science lab made for celebrities and revived him.

The Griffin family and most of the known residents of Quahog are anonymously invited to a dinner party in their honor at a mysterious cliffside mansion. Upon their arrival, their host is revealed to be James Woods, who states he has become a born-again Christian thanks to his new girlfriend, Priscilla, and wishes to repent for all his wrongdoings.

Early into the night, as James and Priscilla go to the kitchen, Quagmire's girlfriend Stephanie is mysteriously shot and killed when she sits in James's seat, leading the guests to believe that James intends to murder them all. Though they try to run, a thunderstorm destroys the bridge, stranding them. After discovering that Stephanie's body has disappeared and returning amidst accusations, James pleads innocence before he, too, is stabbed in front of the guests by an unseen killer with a knife during a power outage, causing Priscilla to faint. Trapped on the remote estate with no way of contacting anyone due to the storm and being out of cell phone range, the guests realize that the killer is among them.

The guests find the suppressed gun that was timed to fire at the chair Stephanie was sitting in, leading them to realize that it was intended for James and that Stephanie was killed by accident. While searching for clues, they realize that many of them have motives for wanting revenge on James. After finding and reading a notebook of James's past misdeeds in a secret room, Mort's wife, Muriel, disappears after it is discovered that James was blackmailing her into supplying him with free medicine, causing everyone to suspect her as the culprit. The guests split up into teams to search the mansion for Muriel. However, she turns up dead soon after by being stabbed in the back with the same knife used to stab James. They realize Priscilla is also missing, making everyone think she is the killer. Jillian's husband, Derek Wilcox, goes to an upper balcony to find a cell phone signal and contact the police but is killed with James's Golden Globe Award.

Back with the other guests, Consuela points out that the award is missing. Everyone decides to travel as one group and search everyone's rooms. Eventually, Meg locates the bloodstained award underneath Tom Tucker's bed. Tom suggests that Priscilla planted it there, but they then discover her dead body in a ceiling vent of the room. Tom is thus believed to be the killer and is chased and caught by Peter, Joe, Carl, Dr. Hartman, Quagmire, Seamus, and Mayor Adam West.

The next morning, Tom is arrested, and the guests prepare to leave. Lois goes to talk to Tom's co-anchor, Diane Simmons, only to intuitively realize Diane is the true murderer when Diane shows her a dress for her solo debut on the news, even though Diane could not have known that Tom would soon be leaving. Exposed, Diane holds Lois at gunpoint and reveals that she had secretly dated James until he dumped her on her 40th birthday, around which Tom arranged for her to be replaced by a younger woman as co-anchor. Seeking retribution against both James and Tom, Diane bribed Priscilla, who was revealed to be a station intern, to have James become a born-again Christian and throw the dinner party so she could murder James and set Tom up for the crime. Her plot went awry upon Stephanie's accidental death, forcing Diane to stab James following the power outage, and later Priscilla and Muriel when they saw Diane tampering with the evidence, and Derek was killed to prevent the first responders from arriving early. However, Diane admits that the mysterious disappearance of Stephanie's body was the only detail she was clueless about; a cutaway reveals that her body was stolen by Quagmire likely for necrophiliac purposes.

Diane then attempts to kill Lois by forcing her outside to a nearby cliff, only to be shot and killed herself, following off the cliff in the process. Lois thanks her unseen savior and leaves, unaware that it was Stewie, armed with a suppressed sniper rifle, who saved her. He only did it proclaiming that he's the only one who has the right to kill Lois, showing that he hasn't given up on that goal.