Family Guy Boston Marathon episode pulled from websites

Fox has pulled a recent episode of Family Guy from its websites that depicted people being run over by a car at the Boston Marathon.

The television network says it has no plans to air it again soon.

In the episode, main character Peter Griffin has a flashback about crashing into runners to win the race.

A hoax clip on the web has also been criticised after it joined the scene together with another showing Griffin making friends with an extremist.

When Peter, who is voiced by Seth MacFarlane, dials a mobile phone a friend has given him, explosions and screams are heard in the background.

The edited clip makes it seem as though the explosions were at the marathon but they appear later in the same episode, called Turban Cowboy, and are unrelated.

Some commentators have since implied that the show "predicted" the bombings.

Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane criticised the hoax clip on Twitter and offered his condolences to the victims of Monday's bombings at the Boston marathon in which three people died and at least 176 were injured.

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

Officials at Fox say they are working with YouTube to take down edited clips on the site.

A previous episode of Family Guy was pulled after last December's Sandy Hook school shooting in which 20 children were killed in Newtown, Connecticut.

Meanwhile, Film4 has taken the film Four Lions out of its schedule next week after the Boston Marathon bombings.

Chris Morris's comedy is about a group of British Muslims planning a bomb attack at the London Marathon.

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