Reception
In a slight improvement over the previous week, the episode was viewed in 9.66 million homes on its original airing, according to the Nielsen ratings. The episode acquired a 3.4 rating in the 18–49 demographic, tying with The Simpsons, and edging out series creator Seth MacFarlane's second show American Dad!, in both ratings and total viewership.
Reviews of the episode by television critics were mostly positive, noting its "hilarious beginning and the nice ending." Dan Iverson of IGN praised the episode, stating that the episode "looks to show that this fifth season is going to bring the series back to the irreverent basics that made it so appealing." Iverson went on to comment that some of the jokes were "extremely funny" and that "the episode had it all, from the Electric Company bit to making fun of people who drive Hummers and watch movies like Madagascar." In the conclusion of his review, Iverson gave the episode an eight out of ten. Brett Love of TV Squad also gave the episode a positive review, calling the installment much better than the previous two episode's from the season, "Stewie Loves Lois" and "Mother Tucker", but criticized the storyline's similarity to the South Park episode "Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes". Love commented negatively on the portrayal of Peter working at the superstore, however, stating, "it's a fine line when they go retarded with Peter. Sometimes it plays really funny, and sometimes it just gets annoying."
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Famous quotes containing the word reception:
“To aim to convert a man by miracles is a profanation of the soul. A true conversion, a true Christ, is now, as always, to be made by the reception of beautiful sentiments.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“To the United States the Third World often takes the form of a black woman who has been made pregnant in a moment of passion and who shows up one day in the reception room on the forty-ninth floor threatening to make a scene. The lawyers pay the woman off; sometimes uniformed guards accompany her to the elevators.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)
“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)