Imaginationland Episode II

"Imaginationland Episode II"

"Imaginationland Episode II", or "The Drying of the Balls" (as it appears on DVD), is episode 1111 (#164) of Comedy Central's animated TV series South Park. It originally aired on October 24, 2007.

Plot

At the beginning of the episode, Cartman says "Previously on Battlestar Galactica", much like the opening titles of the mentioned program. Butters briefly hallucinates he is home, but finds he is still in Imaginationland. A variety of evil creatures, including monsters, horror movie murderers, and comic book super-villains burst through the destroyed barrier gates and kill the terrorists who freed them before turning their attention on the good creatures. The Mayor urges everyone to flee to the castle in the Gumdrop Forest. Before he can try to get Butters home, the Mayor himself is impaled by an Alien and taunts Butters to click his heels three times to get home.

Butters is then on the run from one evil character after another; (a Predator, Jason Voorhees, an army of Imperial stormtroopers and Medusa from Clash of the Titans all attack him). When the evil characters have finally ended their rampage and argue about their next move, Butters ends up on the run with the Lollipop King and Snarf from Thundercats. The dying Mayor tells them to go to Castle Sunshine and to watch out for the evil characters. The three encounter the evil creatures who have captured Strawberry Shortcake and view from a safe distance. They assault, torment and jeer her and Jason Voorhees gouges out one of her eyes. Just as the Minotaur orders to kill her, the Christmas Critters from Cartman's story in the episode Woodland Critter Christmas appear, claiming they can do better. They want to make her eat her eye, then give her AIDS by urinating in her eye socket. They set off to find some AIDS in the forest, much to the stunned surprise of the other evil characters (Jason mutters "I would not like to meet the kid who dreamed up those guys!").

Meanwhile, Kyle and Stan are being interrogated at The Pentagon. The kids learn of a portal into Imaginationland, controlled by the government. The portal powers up when the boys sing the Mayor's Imagination song, which they quickly realise is difficult to sing (because, even though the lyrics are simple ("Imagination"), the exact intonations are required).

Cartman breaks into the Pentagon and convinces the officials to let him drag Kyle away for the promised oral sex in the conference room. Cartman gloats too long and an alarm interrupts them. The American government had sent in a group of soldiers, as well as Kurt Russell (because he was in "that one movie that's kind of like this"), into Imaginationland. They radio back information that they found a group of "talking woodland Christmas critters". Stan, recognizing the critters from the Christmas story written by Cartman in the Woodland Critter Christmas episode, quickly tries to warn them to flee, but the Woodland Critters gang rape the soldiers before he can. A moment later, ManBearPig breaks through the portal into the Pentagon. He kills two workers and grabs Kyle on the neck. An injured employee reverses the portal, and Manbearpig and Stan are sucked in. Due to the way ManBearPig held Kyle (by the neck), he is asphyxiated and pronounced dead, as not even two zaps from a defibrillator gets his heart going again. Cartman, realising Kyle won't suck his balls if he's dead, gets shocked and angry by this and manages to revive Kyle via CPR. However, Kyle, once again, remains unaware that Cartman saved his life.

In Imaginationland, Butters, the Lollipop King, and Snarf arrive at the Castle (which has a very strong resemblance to Rivendell from Lord of the Rings). The guards suspect Butters is connected with the terrorist attack and bring him before the Council of Nine, consisting of the nine most revered of all imaginary characters: Aslan, Gandalf, Glinda, Jesus, Luke Skywalker, Morpheus, Popeye, Wonder Woman, and Zeus. The council meet with Butters, and determine that he is "The Key", a legendary boy who will save them all, much to Butters' disappointment. Butters doesn't like this, but Luke says to him that he has no choice but to do it if he wants to get back home again. The good characters of Imaginationland prepare for battle with their evil counterparts.

Back in the Pentagon, the general, seeing that the imaginations have gone running wild, orders for a nuke to be launched through the portal. At this time, Kyle awakens in the hospital with Cartman at his side, whose plans for him are still going forward as the episode ends.

Council of the Nine

• Aslan from The Chronicles of Narnia
• Gandalf of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings
• Glinda of The Wizard of Oz
• Jesus of the Bible
• Luke Skywalker of Star Wars
• Morpheus from The Matrix
• Popeye of the comic strip and cartoon series
• Wonder Woman of DC Comics
• Zeus of Greek Mythology

Cultual references

• The portal into imaginationland is an obvious reference to the portal in Stargate. Akin to that, the portal also requires a "sequence" to be activated.