Family Guy' Episode Yanked by Fox After Scenes Combined to Depict Boston Bombing

Fox has pulled an episode of "Family Guy," which aired a month ago, that depicts mass deaths at the Boston Marathon, and has no immediate plans to air it again.

Fox spokeswoman Gaude Paez said Tuesday the episode has been removed from Fox.com and Hulu.com. The episode shows the protagonist Peter Griffin killing marathon runners with his car and in a later scene detonating a bomb with his cellphone. Some have spliced these scenes together to depict Monday's bombing.

The creator of the show, Seth MacFarlane, vented his anger over the edited clip on Twitter:

The edited Family Guy clip currently circulating is abhorrent. The event was a crime and a tragedy, and my thoughts are with the victims.

— Seth MacFarlane (@SethMacFarlane) April 16, 2013

In the March 17 episode, Griffin is asked by sports announcer Bob Costas about his performance at the marathon. A flashback shows Peter mowing down runners with his car.

(Image: YouTube screenshot)

"I'll tell ya, Bob, I just got in my car and drove it," Griffin says. "And when there was a guy in my way, I killed him."

Later, Peter befriends a terrorist who, unbeknownst to him, is plotting to blow up a bridge. When Peter dials a cellphone the friend has given him, explosions and screams are heard.

On some websites, an edited clip has been circulating that fuses the two scenes, making it seem — incorrectly — as if the explosion was at the marathon.

Here's a look at one of these clips:

As TheBlaze pointed out Tuesday, the clip was even involved in one of the many conspiracy theories now surrounding the tragic event where three were killed and more than 170 injured.

Some commenters implied that the show "predicted" the bombings.

Yahoo! News called attention to the fact that this isn't the first time events in a TV show seemed to coincide with real events occurring at a later date. It noted "The Lone Gunmen," which ran as a pilot, revealing a plot to take over and fly a 747 into the World Trade Center -- this was a year before the attack on 9/11. "The Simpsons" too had an episode with an image that seemed to allude to the events of 9/11.

--

Related:

• The 'Man on the Roof' and 4 Other Conspiracy Theories Surrounding the Boston Bombings
• News Station: Do These Pictures Show the Second Bomb and a Suspicious Man?
• 'Terrifying': 5 Boston Bombing Heros Who Put Aside Their Fears to Save Lives During the Chaos

The Associated Press contributed to this report.