T.M.I. (South Park)

For other uses, see TMI.

"T.M.I. (South Park)"

"T.M.I." is the fourth episode of the fifteenth season of the American animated television series South Park, and the 213th episode of the series overall. "T.M.I." premiered in the United States on Comedy Central on May 18, 2011. In this episode, Cartman posts the boys' penis sizes on the bulletin board. He throws a fit and once again finds himself in the principal's office. This time he gets sent to anger management therapy. "T.M.I." was written and directed by series co-creator Trey Parker, and was rated TV-MA L in the United States. The episode is in part a satire on the extreme fringes of the U.S. Tea Party movement, implying that their righteous anger displayed by that group is in fact motivated by their having small penises.

Plot

At South Park Elementary, Cartman rants at length over the results of the students' annual school physicals, thinking that teachers have posted a list of all the boys' penis sizes in the hall for everyone to see. Believing the results to be inaccurate (especially since he is at the bottom of the list), he measures every boy's penis and posts his own findings in the hall. He is soon called to Principal Victoria's office, where he learns that the first list actually showed how much every student had grown in height since the previous year's physical. To make matters worse, Cartman has found that his penis really is the smallest of all the boys in the school. At a consultation session with a psychiatrist, Cartman is tested to see how he deals with anger. While initially showing no emotion during the session when the psychiatrist tries to incite him into anger with fat insults, Cartman silently uses an iPhone to send fake chat logs and a fake police report that indicate the psychiatrist was involved in an affair with a 14-year-old over the internet. The psychiatrist's wife is notified, calling her husband before committing suicide over the phone. Cartman then menacingly replies to the psychiatrist by stating that he is not fat, just big-boned.

Soon after, Cartman is sent to an anger management class along with a member of the Tea Party, a "wigger" (Wayne D), a Marine, Tuong Lu Kim (City Wok Guy), the Tall Goth and six others. It soon becomes apparent that every person in the class has issues with their tiny penis size. Meanwhile, Randy Marsh gives a talk to the fourth grade class about human sexual behavior and presents a ridiculously complicated formula for calculating "adjusted penis size," or "T.M.I.", a reference to BMI. Soon afterward, the Surgeon General of the United States presents her own talk to correct Randy's inaccurate information, giving her own bizarre formula that prompts Randy to beat her up in front of the class and ending up at anger management as well. Randy and Cartman incite the group to riot against the federal government.

They take over a Federal Express shipping center, mistakenly believing it to be a government office, Randy names their group the "Pissed Off and Angry Party" and presents their demands to a national television audience; the resignation of the Surgeon General, Obama's birth certificate, "mom's to stop trippin'", and to "fuck Kyle". The movement spreads around the country, with other FedEx locations being taken over. Even Butters joins in when he realizes that his T.M.I. is not as high as he thought according to the Surgeon General's new T.M.I. formula. In response, Cartman's psychiatrist develops a theory that the true source of everyone's anger is their embarrassment over their very small penis sizes. After he informs the Surgeon General, she addresses the nation on TV. She says that although her formula for calculating T.M.I. is accurate, the national "average" value has been re-defined downward to 1.5 inches (3.8 cm). The violent movement instantly breaks up, since every man involved now falls into the "above average" range - except for Cartman, whose penis remains under the new average. Cartman's frustrated remarks are dismissed by the Pissed Off and Angry Party's former members as they proclaim that "America is back!"

The T.M.I. System

Randy Marsh tells the students that they can get their T.M.I. rating with the following formula:

"Length times diameter plus weight over girth divided by angle of the tip squared."

${L\times d+{W \over G} \over \angle {\alpha }_{t}^{2}}\,\!$

However according to the U.S. Surgeon General the correct formula for T.M.I. is

"Length times girth over angle of the shaft divided by mass over width."

${{L\times G \over \angle {\alpha }_{s}}\div {M \over W}}$

Cartman's psychiatrist claims "I have found a direct correlation between anger and T.M.I." and presents the equation

"Anger equals length times width over mass-squared minus angle of the shaft plus yaw"

$\mathrm {Anger} ={\frac {L\times W}{M^{2}-\angle {\alpha }_{s}}}+\mathrm {yaw} \,\!$

However, the Surgeon General claims their official formula is "true solid science" and "100% accurate". To resolve the anger crisis, the Surgeon General goes on television to say the national average has lowered from 6 inches to 1.5 inches, thus anyone with a T.M.I. larger than 1.5 inches is considered "above average".

Reception

In its original American broadcast on May 18, 2011, "T.M.I." was seen by 2.415 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research.

The A.V. Club, IGN, and Assignment X all gave "T.M.I." generally positive reviews. Sean O'Neal of The A.V. Club rated the episode A- and praised it as a character-based episode "that managed to turn the minute, ridiculous happenings in a small Colorado town into a microcosm of what's going on in the country." Ramsey Iser of IGN called "T.M.I." "a solid episode with plenty to like" but not "top of the line South Park material", giving a rating of 8 out of 10. Carl Cortez of Assignment X wrote that "T.M.I." was "not perfect, but good", and compared it favorably with the two preceding episodes. He praised it for its simplicity and "the inspired lunacy that makes South Park so great".

External links

• "T.M.I." Episode guide at South Park Studios
• "T.M.I." Full episode at South Park Studios
• "T.M.I." at IMDb
• Template:TV.com episode