Fox television has pulled an episode of Seth Macfarlane's animated series 'Family Guy' from television and internet sites after several unrelated clips were spliced together to depict a bombing at the Boston Marathon. Creator MacFarlane slammed the mash-up as "abhorrent," after it came just a day after two bombs killed three people and wounded 176 at the finish line of the annual marathon.

A Fox spokeswoman said the network had pulled the recent 'Turban Cowboy' episode of Family Guy from being rebroadcast, and that network officials were working to take down YouTube videos. The clips are taken from an episode in which character Peter Griffin drunkenly drives over runners in order to win the Boston Marathon, though the makers of the video took advantage of an unconnected storyline in which Peter unknowingly becomes friends with an extremist who gives him a cell-phone which detonates a bomb. "The edited Family Guy clip currently circulating is abhorrent. The event was a crime and a tragedy, and my thoughts are with the victims," MacFarlane, who recently hosted the Oscars, wrote on Twitter.

Television networks in the US frequently review material that might be considered sensitive after national tragedies such as the marathon bombings. Similar reviews were conducted following the Newton, Connecticut school shootings and Superstorm Sandy in 2012. In the UK, Film4 has dropped the movie Four Lions from its schedule next week. Chris Morris' comedy is about a group of British Muslims planning a bomb attack at the London marathon.

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