South Park

For other uses, see the television series.

South Park
File:Southparkseason10opening.png
Created by	Trey Parker Matt Stone
Starring	Trey Parker Matt Stone Isaac Hayes (1997–2006) Mary Kay Bergman (1997–1999) Eliza Schneider (2000–2003) Mona Marshall April Stewart John Hansen Jennifer Howell and Adrien Beard
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	155 (list of episodes)
Production
Running time	22 min
Original release
Network	Comedy Central
Release	August 13, 1997 – present

Template:Infobox TV ratings South Park is an American, Emmy Award-winning animated television comedy series about four fourth grade school boys who live in the small town of South Park, Colorado. The series was created and is written by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, and has been distributed and aired by Comedy Central since 1997. It is mostly known for its comedic handling of current events and its pop-culture parody.

Since its premiere on August 14, 1997, 155 episodes have been produced over eleven seasons. One more season is planned, with an option for renewal at the end of Season 12. In recent years, each season has been aired in two halves, in spring and in autumn. The eleventh season began airing on March 7, 2007.

Origins

South Park began in 1992 when Trey Parker and Matt Stone, at the time students at the University of Colorado, met in a film class and created an animated short called Jesus vs. Frosty. The crudely made film featured prototypes of the main characters of South Park, including a character resembling Cartman, but referred to as "Kenny", and an unnamed character who resembled Kyle bringing a murderous snowman to life with a magic hat.

In 1995, FOX executive Brian Graden, after seeing the film, commissioned Parker and Stone to create a second short film to send to friends as a video Christmas card. Titled Jesus vs. Santa, it resembled the style of the later series more closely, and featured a martial arts duel and subsequent truce between Jesus and Santa Claus over the true meaning of Christmas. This video was later featured in the episode "A Very Crappy Christmas" in which Stan, Kyle, Cartman, Kenny and Mr. Hankey "save" Christmas for the town. The video was popular and was widely shared, both by duplication and over the Internet. This led to talks to create a series, first with FOX, then with Comedy Central, where the series premiered on August 13, 1997. During the first four seasons of South Park, a clip of the short can be seen in the opening sequence within a billboard; Jesus vs. Frosty can also be seen on an old television.

The fictional town of South Park is visually based on Fairplay, Colorado, located in a large valley also named South Park. The characters in the show were originally based on the personalities and demographics of Boulder, Colorado, but have evolved since the show's inception.

Evolution

South Park's early episodes tended to be shock value-oriented, and featured more Pythonesque humor than later episodes. Although satire had been used on the show occasionally in its early and middle years, it has become more evident around the eighth season. Such examples include Michael Jackson visiting South Park ("The Jeffersons"), the boys seeing The Passion of the Christ ("The Passion of the Jew"), rednecks when South Park residents lose their jobs to immigrants from the future ("Goobacks"), which also satirises liberal views of immigration and an episode featuring a "Paris Hilton" toy video camera ("Stupid Spoiled Whore Video Playset").

The pilot episode, "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe", took three months to make and was produced using construction paper and traditional cut-out animation techniques. However the version that aired was different than the original version. Current episodes duplicate the original, amateurish look using modern computer animation tools — first PowerAnimator and then Maya, which Parker and Stone have described as "building a sandcastle with a bulldozer" on the VH1 special Inside South Park. This allows for a short production schedule that enables the creators to respond quickly to current events. For instance, the December 17, 2003 episode "It's Christmas in Canada" depicts the capture of Saddam Hussein a mere three days after his capture by U.S. forces, even referring to the "spider hole" where he was found. In the case of this and the Elián González episode ("Quintuplets 2000"), the creators stopped and changed production of an episode to focus on these events. Another example is the "Trapper Keeper" episode which originally aired just eight days after the 2000 U.S. presidential election and featured a kindergarten class president election being delayed by, among other things, an undecided girl named "Flora", an obvious reference to the undecided vote-count in the state of Florida.

In 2002, the episode "Free Hat" was aired. In this episode, prompted by Kyle's comment on Ted Koppel's Nightline that changing E.T. would be like changing Raiders of the Lost Ark, the South Park depictions of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg decide to alter the first Indiana Jones film. Soon after "Free Hat" aired, the real Lucas and Spielberg announced that they would not be altering Raiders of the Lost Ark for DVD release, contrary to rumors. Parker and Stone jokingly claimed on Inside South Park that the episode prevented any alterations from happening.

On September 9 2005, Comedy Central struck a deal with Parker and Stone for three more seasons of the show. The network has committed to three more seasons of South Park over the next three years, meaning the show will run until at least 2008. Parker and Stone will continue to write, direct, and edit every episode of the show, bringing the series total to 181 episodes by the end of its twelfth season. [7] Edited versions of South Park episodes, with the TV-14 rating, began broadcasting in syndication on September 19 2005 on various local channels around the U.S.

Characters

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Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny drawn photorealistically in the episode "Free Willzyx."

Matt Stone and Trey Parker voice most of the series' male characters, while April Stewart and Mona Marshall currently voice most of the female characters, which were formerly voiced by Mary Kay Bergman and Eliza Schneider. Other voices are currently provided by Adrien Beard (Token Black), Vernon Chatman (Towelie), Jennifer Howell (Bebe Stevens), and John Hansen (Mr. Slave).

Main characters

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The boys dressed for Halloween (left to right: Eric Cartman, Kyle Broflovski, Stan Marsh and Kenny McCormick) in the episode Pink Eye.

Prior to season four, the main characters of the show were four third grade students (often called "the boys" when as a group for easier reference).

Stanley "Stan" Marsh

Often the "straight man" of the group. Generally good-natured and clear-thinking, a bit over-sensitive at times, Stan usually tries to come up with logical solutions to their outrageous situations. Designed as the alter-ego for co-creator Trey Parker, Stan often attempts to summarize the message or moral of the episode, though sometimes without success. His best friend is Kyle and their relationship is central to several episodes.

Kyle Broflovski

Easy-going, Jewish (but not particularly religious), skeptical and intelligent. He hates Cartman because of his constant ridiculing of his faith. Kyle is effectively the alter-ego of co-creator Matt Stone. Along with Stan, Kyle often provides a reasonable perspective on the crazy behavior of the adult world around them. Kyle is often depicted as the most moral member of the four.

Eric Theodore Cartman

Eric is an overweight little boy who seems to hate almost everything. Often the catalyst for the plot.

Cartman commonly acts in a manner directly opposed to, or against, that of the other boys. Cartman regularly insults Kyle for being Jewish, and Kenny for being poor. His pretentious ways often cause him to be disdained by the other boys, who continuously wonder why they keep putting up with him. He also demonstrates an uncanny ability as a businessman and leader, and was seen dressed in a way that mimics Adolf Hitler three times. Cartman also occasionally serves as a mouthpiece for some of Parker and Stone's more extreme social commentary and has a rabid hatred for anyone he considers to be a "hippie" (one episode was devoted to Cartman's career as a hippie exterminator, Die Hippie, Die). Cartman is also often referred to as a "fatass" by the boys, especially Kyle. In the earlier episodes, Cartman would respond by saying, "I'm not fat! I'm just big-boned!"

Part of his behavior may be due to the unorthodox way in which he was brought up, the lack of a male father figure in his life, and that his mother, Lianne Cartman, is an intersexual who is also commonly acknowledged to be a "crack whore" and spoils Eric with gifts, food, and giving into his many irrational demands. She was, in fact, featured on the cover of one issue of Crack Whore magazine and has been known to appear in German "scheiße videos" with Mr. Mackey, the boys' school counselor. Mrs. Cartman is the one person with whom Eric shares a mutually affectionate and loving relationship.

Kenneth "Kenny" McCormick

Kenny comes from a poverty-stricken family and is the most worldly-wise of the four boys. He is often sought out for answers when the other boys encounter a sexual term they have never heard before. His speech is difficult to understand due to the fact that his parka hood is closed around his face, although all of his lines are real dialog that are always understood by Stan, Kyle and Cartman. In some episodes, however, Kenny's dialog is visible by closed captioning. Furthermore, when he says two of his lines in episode 806, The Jeffersons, and "Goodbye, you guys" in South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, his speech is not muffled, because his hood is removed.

During the first five seasons, Kenny served as the eternal victim, routinely killed in a number of grotesque ways meant to entertain during each episode, only to appear in the next episode without explanation, and only occasionally escaping this fate. At the end of the fifth season, Kenny died and remained dead through numerous following episodes before coming back. Parker and Stone explained at the time that this was due to their feeling creatively boxed in by the requirement to kill Kenny in each episode.

In Season 6, he was replaced by Butters, and later Tweek as the boys' "fourth friend". However, due to Kenny's lasting popularity, he was included in a story arc involving his soul being trapped in Cartman's body, who had drunk Kenny's ashes, believing them to be chocolate milk mix, and then brought back permanently for the seventh season; his deaths have since been much more rare. The show's oldest gimmick, existing from the first cardboard concept video, began with Stan shouting, "Oh my God, they killed Kenny!" followed by Kyle responding, "You bastards!" whenever Kenny is killed. This is sometimes parodied, being applied to other characters (such as Chef in "The Return of Chef") or by a variation on the theme.

Leopold "Butters" Stotch

Butters appeared in early episodes, but only became a regular character upon Kenny's departure in season 6. He has since been used almost as regularly as the main 4 boys.

Butters is nervous, naive, easily manipulated, and repressed — while at the same time remains ironically optimistic, wistful and sometimes insightful. He is often punished by his callous and overbearing parents, and is meanwhile blatantly vilified, taken advantage of and/or disregarded by Cartman, Stan, and Kyle. Adding to the tragic nature of his character, his birthday is September 11.

When Kenny seemed to be permanently dead in season 6, the boys tried Butters out as their fourth friend for a while, and when it did not work out, as the boys considered him to be "lame", a spurned Butters adopted the alter ego of "Professor Chaos", whose costume is clearly inspired by that of Dr. Doom, and he employed a sidekick called "General Disarray" (Dougie, a first-grader). Butters tried various schemes to destroy the world, but his niceness and general ineptitude doomed all of his efforts. His character is based on animation director, Eric Stough.

Other characters

Family members

Main article: List of South Park families

South Park has a number of different families, who are a recurring theme of many episodes. There are five main families, who are distinguished from the rest of the townsfolk; the Marshes, the Broflovskis, the Cartmans, the McCormicks and the Stotches (Butters)

Townsfolk and other residents

Main article: List of other South Park residents

Many of the South Park characters are classed as "townsfolk", such as the incompetent cop Officer Barbrady or the City Wok Guy. They can also be classed as "other residents". Most of the cast are townsfolk.

School staff

Main article: List of staff at South Park Elementary

South Park Elementary is a main location in the show. The boys' teacher, Mr. Garrison, is the most frequently-seen member of the staff. He had a sex change in the episode "Mr. Garrison's Fancy New Vagina", and he now goes by Mrs. Garrison. The boys' school counsellor is Mr. Mackey. The school's principal is Principal Victoria. Several past characters who worked at the school were killed off, including Ms. Choksondik and Ms. Crabtree. The school's cafeteria, Chef, was also killed off, though he was brought back as a Darth Vader-like being at the end of that episode. The episode was intended to parody the fact that the real life voice of Chef, Isaac Hayes, left the show due to one episode in which his religion, Scientology, was mocked.

Students

Main article: List of students at South Park Elementary

Most characters are the children at South Park due to the fact that the main characters are children. They range in ages from kindergarteners to porn-loving 6th Graders.

Occasional characters

Main article: List of occasional South Park characters

The occasional characters have appeared in about three episodes each. They range from Big Gay Al to Towelie, a talking towel who enjoys smoking marijuana. There are also many religious characters who are occasional characters such as Jesus and Satan

Minor characters

Main article: List of minor characters on South Park

Minor characters have appeared in at least two episodes. Minor characters range from God and the Crab People to the gerbil, Lemmiwinks. There are also minor characters who are human such as the temporary substitute teacher from the fourth season, Mr. Wyland.

One-off characters

Main article: List of one-off characters on South Park

One-off characters are featured characters who have appeared in only one episode. They include such characters as Mr. Jefferson and most of Cartman's family members (other than his mother).

Episode guide

Main article: List of South Park episodes

Animation style

One of the most notable features of the South Park animation style is that the characters tend to move their limbs as little as possible, except when they need to do actions other than walking. Construction paper cut-outs were used in the original pilot animation and in the first episode made for Comedy Central. Subsequent episodes have been produced by computer animation that provides the same look, although the appearance of the characters and scenes has become less crude over time largely in order to enhance the comedic effect. Special effects such as prepackaged explosions have replaced cardboard-style fires, and light shading has been used to highlight "sappy" or movie-like moments and Eric Cartman's propensity for striking dramatic poses. Some episodes also contain sections of live action as well, such as Tweek vs. Craig, Cat Orgy and Mr. Garrison's Fancy New Vagina

CorelDRAW is used to create the characters, which are animated using Maya. The style of animation used for South Park was inspired by the paper cut-out cartoons made by Terry Gilliam for Monty Python's Flying Circus, of which Trey Parker and Matt Stone have been lifelong fans. For perspective, the average episode of The Simpsons takes six to eight weeks to create, while episodes of South Park are usually completed in six days (although some, such as AWESOM-O or Woodland Critter Christmas have taken only three or four). This enables the show to keep up with current events, such as the capture of Saddam Hussein.

Music

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The boys sing as Fingerbang

For full article, see the List of South Park songs.

The show's opening theme song is an original musical score performed by the band Primus. The song has been remixed three times in the course of the series (as of the second half of season ten), and certain lines have been altered (see below). In season 10 the title music is the song "Whamola" by Colonel Les Claypool's Fearless Flying Frog Brigade, from the album Purple Onion. Les Claypool is the singer and bassist in both Primus and Frog Brigade.

Kenny's lines in the song, like the rest of his speech in the show, are muffled by his parka hood, which covers his entire face except for his eyes. However, Kenny's lines have been revealed by South Park Studios. In seasons 1-2, he says "I love girls with big fat titties, I love girls with deep vaginas," in seasons 3-5, he says "I have got a 10-inch penis, use your mouth if you want to clean it." From season 7 to the first half of season 10, Kenny says "One day I'll be old enough to stick my dick in Britney's butt." The current lines are not known at this time.

The general unintelligibility of Kenny's lines has helped them avoid being censored by television networks on a number of occasions, although the gist can usually be understood. It is sometimes easy to comprehend the lines, given the context in which they are delivered. The syndicated versions of the show usually do censor Kenny's vulgar lines.

Popular songs such as "Kyle's Mom is a Stupid Bitch" originated on the show, but the creators' musical abilities were not frequently used until the release of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut. The film's soundtrack (co-written and produced by Grammy-winning composer-lyricist Marc Shaiman) featured songs like "Blame Canada" (nominated for an Oscar; see below), "I'm Super," "La Resistance Medley," "Hell Isn't Good," "Mountain Town," "Uncle Fucka," "Up There," and "What Would Brian Boitano Do?." Several of the songs from the movie are satires of tunes from Disney cartoons. For instance, "Mountain Town" is highly similar to the song "Belle" from Beauty and the Beast. "Up There" is a take-off of two different Disney songs, "Out There" from The Hunchback of Notre Dame and "Part of Your World" from The Little Mermaid. "La Resistance Medley" spoofs both "One Day More" from the stage musical Les Miserables and "Tonight" from West Side Story.

Parker and Stone have, on occasion, performed these songs (and others) under the band name DVDA.

In the show, Eric Cartman will often burst into song to convey a false altruism or optimism that belies his baser motivations. In Red Sleigh Down, he sings Poo-Choo Train, an unnervingly cheery Christmas carol, in an obvious attempt to convince Mr. Hankey and Santa Claus that he is worthy of Christmas presents. In "I'm A Little Bit Country" Cartman sings Paula Cole's anti-war song "I Don't Want to Wait" while beating someone to death (Cartman also sings the song as an homage to his Dawson's Creek Trapper Keeper in the episode Trapper Keeper). In "The Death of Eric Cartman", Cartman sings "Make It Right" with Butters in a weak attempt to reconcile his sins. In "Roger Ebert Should Lay Off the Fatty Foods", Cartman sings the Donna Summer song "She Works Hard For The Money" during an audition for Cheesy Poofs. In the episode "Simpsons Already Did It", Cartman sings about how the Sea People will "take me away from this damn planet full of hippies." In the episode "Ginger Kids", he sings a song about tolerance once he realizes he's not one of the "Gingers" and that he just convinced every Ginger in town to exterminate non-Ginger people. Cartman also uses the song "Heat of the Moment" in episode 513 ("Kenny Dies") to convince the U.S. Senate to approve stem cell research. Lastly, there is Cartman's mental quirk that forces him to finish singing Styx's Come Sail Away whenever someone sings a few bars of the song. As soon as he learns this, Kyle, who has a strong and explicit hatred for Cartman, takes advantage of this and forces Cartman to finish the song so many times that Cartman becomes literally unintelligible.

Cartman was also the lead singer for Faith+1, a Christian band he formed with Butters and Token in the episode "Christian Rock Hard", singing several "Christian" songs by taking sexually suggestive love songs and substituting erotic words such as "baby" and "darling" with "Jesus."

In "Fat Butt and Pancake Head", Cartman's hand puppet (who pronounces her name as "Hennifer Lopez" and is revealed at the end to be a con man named Mitch Connor) recorded a hit single entitled "Taco Flavored Kisses", inciting the wrath of the real Jennifer Lopez.

Additional musical contributions to the show come from the band Primus, which performed the original opening and ending themes for the show, and formerly from Isaac Hayes, who voiced Chef's singing of usually-sexual songs to explain certain adult themes to the boys. The Chef song Chocolate Salty Balls was released as a single in the UK in 1998 to support the Chef Aid album and became a number one hit.

Many episodes also feature highly melodramatic musical scores to comically exaggerate the emotional content of the scene. For example, melancholy music plays in the background when Timmy sends away his beloved pet turkey, Gobbles, in the episode "Helen Keller! The Musical".

Controversy

Main article: Subject matter in South Park

The show has faced numerous controversies and what many people find to be taboo subject matter, since its inception, from its use of vulgarity to its satire of subjects such as religion and cults (such as Scientology), sexuality, and global warming. Stone and Parker are self-described "equal opportunity offenders" and episodes often lampoon all sides of a contentious issue, rather than taking a concrete position.

Public protests

The show's provocative, adult-oriented material quickly drew protest from various spokesmen, who deemed the program offensive, and South Park merchandise (especially T-shirts) were banned from a number of public schools, day care centers, and other public places. This occurrence is similar in a manner to the prohibition of Bart Simpson T-shirts in the early 1990s, after The Simpsons was accused of contributing to juvenile delinquency. Comedy Central defended South Park by noting that the show is given a "Mature Audiences" TV rating (TV-MA) and is not meant for children to watch. They also pointed out that it only airs the show during night-time hours and never during the day, when children may be more likely to see the show. In fact, at least for the earlier part of the show's run, trailers for the series did not run until after 9 PM.

More recently, the program has received some publicity over their use of the deceased Steve Irwin in an episode where he shows up at Satan's Halloween party. Typically this issue rated a few short paragraphs in mainstream newspapers.

Vulgarity

In the episode "It Hits the Fan", South Park broke the swearing record by using the word shit a total of 162 times uncensored. The 22-minute episode averages one 'shit' every eight seconds, and there was a counter throughout the episode displaying the number of times it was said. A song by Mr. Garrison that consisted of, 'Hey, there, shitty shitty fag fag, shitty shitty fag fag, how do you do?' (sung to the tune of the title song from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang), repeated for two verses, provides an example of how 'shit' was so abundantly used. This was meant as a satire of an episode of Chicago Hope, in which one of the main characters said the phrase "Shit happens!" without being censored. An additional gag in this episode allowed homosexual or bisexual characters to use the word "fag" freely, while heterosexual characters were bleeped when attempting to use the same word (this episode suggested explicitly that Stan's uncle Jimbo was actually gay or bisexual, as he was able to say "fag" without being bleeped).

Also, in the episode entitled "With Apologies to Jesse Jackson", the word nigger was used throughout the entire episode for a total of 42 times.

Scientology

Main article: Trapped in the Closet (South Park)

In November 2005, South Park satirized the Church of Scientology and its celebrity followers, including actors Tom Cruise and John Travolta in the top-rated episode, "Trapped in the Closet". R&B star R. Kelly is also featured in the episode, in a nod to his 12-part "hip-hopera" called "Trapped in the Closet."

In Trapped in the Closet, Scientology leaders hail Stan as a reluctant savior while Cruise locks himself in Stan's closet and will not come out, due to Stan's not praising his acting. During the episode, numerous characters requested that he "came out of the closet". "Coming out of the closet" is widely used as a term for homosexuals revealing their orientation; Tom Cruise has often been rumored to be gay.

Dubbed 'Closetgate' by the Los Angeles Times, the controversy continued as Comedy Central pulled the episode from a scheduled repeat on March 15, 2006 at the last minute (although it has since been repeated several times). It is alleged that Tom Cruise threatened Paramount with withdrawal from promotion of his latest film Mission: Impossible III if the episode was re-broadcast (both Paramount and Comedy Central are owned by Viacom). Though Paramount and Cruise's representatives deny the allegation, The Independent reports that "no one believes a word of it". In typical satirical form, Parker and Stone issued the following statement, with several mocking references to Scientology: "So, Scientology, you may have won THIS battle, but the million-year war for Earth has just begun! Temporarily anozinizing our episode will NOT stop us from keeping Thetans forever trapped in your pitiful man-bodies. Curses and drat! You have obstructed us for now, but your feeble bid to save humanity will fail! Hail Xenu!!!"

The Los Angeles Times reported that, "For Stone and Parker, Closetgate will be the gift that keeps on giving" because there are likely endless story lines that can follow, considering South Park's consistent satirizing of Scientology. This episode was also recently nominated for an Emmy, and is included on South Park's 10th Anniversary DVD, called "South Park The Hits: Volume 1". This episode is also included on the DVD Recorder, called "A Collection of Funny Episodes."

As a parodic response to The Church of Scientology's litigiousness, the final lines of the episode feature Stan taunting the church to sue him, and the ensuing credits read only "John Smith" or "Jane Smith".

Isaac Hayes

Main article: The Return of Chef

Isaac Hayes, who played Chef, the longstanding confidant of the boys on the show, quit unexpectedly days before the spoof on Scientology was to re-air. A Scientologist himself, his reasons for leaving were intolerance, stating, "There is a place in this world for satire, but there is a time when satire ends and intolerance and bigotry towards religious beliefs of others begins...Religious beliefs are sacred to people, and at all times should be respected and honored." However, some have suggested that Hayes may have been pressured into quitting by leaders within his faith, since less than a week before quitting he had stated in an interview on the Opie and Anthony radio show that he was fine with the Scientology episode, that Matt and Trey were "equal opportunity offenders", and that "people who cannot take a joke need to take themselves less seriously".

In response to Hayes' departure, Stone commented "He has no problem - and he's cashed plenty of checks - with our show making fun of Christians." Parker and Stone evidently decided to kill off Chef's character instead of revoice, and used South Park's 10th season premiere, "The Return of Chef", as a chance to lambaste Scientology again. At the end of the episode, Kyle gives a heartfelt eulogy and mentions that he'll always remember Chef as he was, and that they shouldn't be mad at him; they should be mad at "the fruity little club that scrambled his brains." This episode was played at the DVD Recorder with "A Collection of Funny Episodes."

Arguably, the first time the show satirized Scientology was in the short "The Gauntlet", which aired during the 2000 MTV Movie Awards. Though the short was primarily a Gladiator parody, with the characters fighting Russell Crowe in the Roman Colosseum, it included "John Travolta and the Church of Scientology" arriving in a spaceship to defeat Crowe and attempt to recruit the boys into Scientology. Travolta, along with his fellow Scientologists, was depicted as he appeared in the infamous Battlefield Earth.

Catholicism

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The pope depicted in Bloody Mary

In December 2005, the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights protested the season finale episode, "Bloody Mary", for its depiction of a statue of the Virgin Mary bleeding from her rectum. The group claimed a victory when Comedy Central voluntarily canceled a scheduled airing of the episode which coincided with the Christian holiday season. In early 2006, Comedy Central denied that they were bowing to that group's request to pull the episode from future repeats and DVD releases. In New Zealand, C4 pushed the airing date for the episode forward after much publicity from Catholic bishops who urged a boycott of the station and its advertisers. The protest backfired as viewer numbers increased by 600% during the episode. The episode was later referred to the Broadcasting Standards Authority where they ruled, "The material in the cartoon was of such a farcical, absurd and unrealistic nature that it did not breach standards of good taste and decency in the context in which it was offered". It has since been rebroadcast on Comedy Central. SBS in Australia has "deferred" the episode possibly due to their recent problems with the "Trapped in the Closet" episode. The episode has aired in Australia on the Pay TV channel, The Comedy Channel.

In February 2006 in the Philippines, authorities threatened to ban the showing of South Park on television as it offends the sensibilities of the predominantly Roman Catholic country. South Park is still shown in the Philippines with 1-hour double episodes, though doing so has become a politicized issue, and its future in the Philippines is unknown.

In 2001, South Park was shown on public television between 9pm-10pm slot at the now closed Channel V Philippines (formerly Citynet UHF Channel 27 handled by GMA Network). Because most of the programs in the Philippines are highly viewed in primetime slots, it is rated as PG (Parental Guidance) with all of profanity and such, censored.

On August 2, 2006, Comedy Central reran the episode at 10:00 PM EST.

Islam

Most recently South Park has indirectly attacked the rising censorship in its April 2006 two-part episode, "Cartoon Wars Part I" and "Cartoon Wars Part II". The creators challenged Comedy Central by ending Part I with the disclaimer that the second part of the two-parter episode, will only be shown if Comedy Central does not "puss out".

The following episode, "Cartoon Wars Part II", that aired April 12, 2006, replaced the scene of Muhammad on Family Guy with a title card stating that Comedy Central had refused to show a depiction of Muhammad on their network. With the episode, the South Park boys make an impassioned, anti-censorship plea to a network exec named Doug, a reference to Comedy Central president Doug Herzog. This comes months after the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy in Denmark, in which an editorial cartoon depicted Muhammad also in a satirical way. However, he can in fact be seen in the season 10 opening credits from the episode "Smug Alert!" onwards and was featured in the "Super Best Friends" episode, which aired on July 4, 2001, though at the time there was no pre-existing controversy.

It has come out via AP television writer David Bauder that Comedy Central did in fact, citing safety concerns, opt to censor the image of Muhammad, a situation that was satirized in "Cartoon Wars Part II". Furthermore, while the channel refused to broadcast an image of Muhammad, Comedy Central opted not to censor images of Christ, the president and the American flag being defecated upon. Stone and Parker's choice has drawn fire from frequent South Park critic William A. Donohue of the anti-defamation group Catholic League. Donohue has called on Parker and Stone to resign out of principle, and was quoted as saying, "The ultimate hypocrite is not Comedy Central — that's their decision not to show the image of Muhammad or not — it's Parker and Stone". It should be noted though, that Stone and Parker made the choice to mock Christ to illustrate the hypocrisy in censoring the mockery of one religion and not another, echoing their similar stance on Scientology. Additionally, the images were shown in the context of an Islamic leader's humorously anti-climactic response to the portrayal of Muhammad (and were thus not very graphic). The humor of this situation came from the fact that this was labeled as "al-Qaeda's reaction," which was expected to be violence.

Judaism and Mormonism

In addition to the above examples, South Park has repeatedly satirized both Judaism and Mormonism (the latter principally through an episode explicitly titled "All About Mormons"). Neither community has had representatives publicly speak out about the satire.

Recurring themes

Political issues

Stone and Parker spend a great amount of time on current events and issues of the day. Although many critics find the show's commentary politically incorrect, the stance that the show takes reflects the beliefs of the creators. Both creators have at one time or another described themselves as libertarians. Politically-active celebrities have been ridiculed on the series, as well as liberal and conservative ideas, stereotypes and actions. Bill Clinton was ridiculed on the show, appearing twice, as was George W. Bush who appears or is thematically referenced eight times. (He was shown as a tool of Satan in one episode, and in the 9/11 conspiracy episode of 2006 he is portrayed as the mastermind behind a conspiracy within the 9/11 conspiracies, he also appears in "A Ladder to Heaven", where he says what really happened with Saddam Hussein after his death). Liberals are portrayed as being snobby intellectuals, arrogant hippies or anxious yuppies, and conservatives as bible thumpers, angry rednecks and greedy businessmen, hence the characters "Aging Hippie Liberal Douche" or "stoner" and "Pissed Off White Trash Redneck Conservative" or "racist". Both sides are portrayed as imposing their views on others and generally having a malignant influence.

Ironically, Stone and Parker are extremely disdainful of any person they perceive to be overly preachy and lecturing about their political or religious views.

The episode that aired the week following the 2000 presidential election used a school election to poke fun at Florida's inability to certify a winner and Al Gore's contesting of the results. The episode included an angry Rosie O'Donnell coming to the defense of the loser and finally getting gruesomely killed, in another example of how the show is highly critical of celebrity activism.

The term "South Park Republican" was coined after Parker and Stone claimed to be Republicans whilst receiving an award from the liberal advocacy group, People For the American Way (PFAW) in 2001. At the same time they declared TV producer Norman Lear, the founder of PFAW, to be one of their heroes, and Lear subsequently worked on South Park. More recently, a small movement has sprung up of youngish, South Park Conservatives who hold ideas from extreme ends of the political spectrum. In an interview in the March 13,2006 Time magazine, the two stated that the only reason people might peg them for conservatives is that they are willing to mock anti-smoking laws and hippies. They also stated that the show could just as easily be pegged as a show supporting liberal ideologies. The interview ended with Parker quipping, "We still believe that all people are born bad and are made good by society, rather than the opposite", and Stone adding, "Actually, I think that's where we're conservative". In an interview with Rolling Stone, they stated that the "South Park Republican" tag was a "dumb notion."[8]

Parker and Stone are apparently critical of political correctness and satirize it by contrasting the child and adult's public personae. Whenever a sensitive issue is explored or a crisis occurs, it is expected that all the adults in South Park will overreact, whilst the children will act calm and collected about it. Examples of this can be seen in episodes such as Child Abduction Is Not Funny, Smug Alert! and Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow.

Gay rights

The show has supported gay rights through satirizing the opposing side with the normal over-the-top South Park style. In the episode "Follow That Egg!", gay marriage is deemed "too offensive" to people with religious values who suggest that it should be re-designated as something else. (Ironically, the person responsible for igniting the debate about gay marriage in this episode is Mrs. Garrison, a post-op transsexual). At the end of the episode however, gays are shown as capable of raising children, and gay marriage is made legal in South Park. In "Cripple Fight", the creators take the position that the Boy Scouts of America should not have been forced to allow homosexuals to be Scoutmasters, while at the same time mocking the Boy Scouts for trying to exclude homosexuals from the organization. They use the example of a married heterosexual child abuser to suggest sexuality is unrelated to child abuse. Furthermore, in an earlier episode "Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride", homophobia is portrayed sarcastically when Mr. Garrison says to Stan when he asks what a homosexual is, "Gay people, well, gay people are EVIL, evil right down to their cold black hearts which pump not blood like yours or mine, but rather a thick, vomitous oil that oozes through their rotten veins and clots in their pea-sized brains which becomes the cause of their Nazi-esque patterns of violent behavior. Do you understand?" The episode also features Stan Marsh stating that it is okay to be gay, and was nominated for an award by GLAAD. At this point in the series, Mr. Garrison hadn't yet come to terms with his sexuality.

Transsexual rights

"Mr. Garrison's Fancy New Vagina" touches upon transsexual sex-reassignment surgery, and plastic surgery ethics on a whole (Kyle and his father become a tall black boy and a dolphin respectively). Mr.Garrison gets reassigned because he still cannot come to grips with being gay, so figures he must be a woman trapped in a man's body, therefore making it perfectly normal to like men. He subsequently becomes extremely homophobic much like the earlier years of the show. Upon discovering he cannot menstruate or get pregnant, he concludes that he is "just a guy with a mutilated penis" and wishes to switch back. In the end of the episode, everyone is back to normal except for him, his testicles having been destroyed when Kyle, unknowingly, jumps and blows his testicles used to support his knees.

Child abuse and neglect

Child sexual abuse and child neglect are recurring thematic elements in South Park. For example, emotional, verbal, and physical abuse is usually inflicted upon Butters in episodes in which he appears. Cartman is shown several times as a target of actual or attempted sexual abuse, such as when he unknowingly gets involved with NAMBLA. There is other evidence where he has been sexually abused in the episode "Simpsons Already Did It" where after getting semen ("sea-men") from a sperm bank, he is filling up a fish tank for his "sea people" and tells his friends that he got the rest of the semen from a guy in an alley who told him to "close his eyes and suck it out of a hose". This scene is partially censored on some local networks. In the episode "Fun with Veal" Cartman cries "No, uncle Jesse! No!" while sleeping, but this is most likely a reference to a popular character on either Full House or The Dukes of Hazzard. Matt Stone and Trey Parker are very good friends with John Stamos, the actor that played Uncle Jesse, further supporting this conclusion. The episode Fat Butt and Pancake Head depicts a sexual encounter between Ben Affleck and Cartman. In "Hell on Earth 2006" various depictions of Catholic priests with naked young boys on leashes reference the ongoing controversies of priests abusing altar boys. In fact this subject had been referenced in "Red Hot Catholic Love" and is not a stranger to the South Park world.

The treatment of this theme ranges from realistic to cartoonish. For example, the character Butters Stotch clearly has some psychological issues as a result of the treatment he suffers at the hands of his parents; he is incontinent (in "AWESOM-O", Cartman has to put a suppository in his rectum), has low self-esteem, and wrings his hands (although, strangely, Butters is also an unfailingly optimistic character and is one of the few genuinely nice people in the whole town, which often makes him a constant target for ridicule and abuse). However, his parents' emotional manipulation of him is shown as extreme. At one point, they try to sell Butters to Paris Hilton. Butters reveals that he has received anilingus from his uncle when detectives are questioning the children whether Chef has molested them, and in "Butters' Very Own Episode" his mother tries to kill him when she goes temporarily insane after learning of her husband's gay bathhouse proclivities. Butters, of course, survived with no knowledge of what was going on, until his parents publicly admitted what had happened (thus, yet again, crushing Butters' hopes for a functional family).

While Cartman and Butters have more overt personal experiences with their families, to the point of farce at times, Kenny, Stan and Kyle have also been shown to be neglected on a more subtle level.

Kenny comes from a poor family and, as a result, he and his siblings are shown to be malnourished due to his family's poverty. His father is an unemployed, barely functioning drunk who, while not abusive towards Kenny, is usually shown verbally arguing with his wife or being berated by her.

Stan suffers from a subtler type of neglect. His father, Randy Marsh, often goes to extremes as the result of whatever instigating incident or conflict is seen in a given episode. In one episode, after he and Sharon separate, he ends up at a party for much younger people at Cartman's "clubhouse". In another, he decides, when told that alcoholism is a disease that he has no control over, that he should abandon all responsibility with the substance because it's not his fault. Often getting swept up in whatever is happening, Randy often puts common sense second - sending Stan out into the world alone to avoid abducting him, forcing the family to convert to atheism or Mormonism, leading the pack on global warming hysteria, et cetera. Stan's 12-year-old older sister Shelley regularly physically and verbally abuses Stan and considers him to be subhuman. His relationship with his mom is less strained and Sharon seems typical, despite rare outbursts between herself and Randy, though in one episode admits that she considers Stan's happiness secondary to her own. She and Randy are completely blind to Shelley's abuse of Stan.

Kyle suffers at the hand of Cartman's continual anti-Semitic slurs. Kyle's mother is over-protecting, attempting to censor the world that her son and the rest of the children experience, but in the process bulldozing Kyle - often dismissing his opinions, thoughts and feelings, and destroying his reputation and general wellbeing. Her belief in her own moral compass and hatred of the toilet humor of Terrance and Phillip has led her, in the episode "Death", to lead South Park residents to New York to commit mass suicide to force "Cartoon Central" to cancel the animated "Terrance and Phillip" show. In South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, she convinces the American government to start a war with Canada over the Terrance and Phillip movie, Asses of Fire.

Religion

Multiple episodes have tackled the shaky logical foundations of cults, religious leaders who exploit worshipers for money, and the general problems with following religion too literally. Perhaps most indicative of what the writers perceive to be a blasé notion towards over-fervent worship, the show's depiction of God in physical form is a strange hybrid of many animals. Further deepening the satire is God's claim to be a Buddhist. The show suggested at one point, in a joking matter, that heaven is full of Mormons who spend eternity cheerfully singing songs and making craft projects (explicitly stating that this is because that is the one "correct" religion). The South Park movie indicated that Heaven, or at least Kenny's vision of it, was filled with beautiful naked women. However, in the episode "All About Mormons" the show implies that Mormonism is a complete hoax made up by Joseph Smith Jr. Other episodes discuss anti-Semitism and Jewish jokes. The family of Jewish character Kyle exhibits common Jewish stereotypes, like his strict demanding mother is a conservative activist and his father is a lawyer dressed in Modern Orthodox Jewish garb.

In addition Jesus has been shown multiple times, living in South Park and hosting a public access call-in talk show (Jesus and Pals). In one episode he fights Satan in a boxing match and is depicted as being hopelessly outclassed. (Within the world of South Park, Jesus died in 2002, saving Santa Claus from Iraqis; Santa said that, from now on, Christmas should be a celebration of Jesus). In a third season episode, "Jewbilee", at a Jew Scouts camp, Moses appears in the form of the Master Control Program from Tron and tells the assembled children in an ominous voice, "I desire... macaroni pictures". He also appears this way in "Super Best Friends" and with VCR capabilities to boot.

The criticism of anti-religion is also apparent in South Park. In "All About Mormons" Stan ridicules the Mormons for believing a story that offers no proof. However, at the very end, a Mormon named Gary whom Stan had been hanging out with for most of the episode delivers his side of the story:

• Gary: "All I ever did was try to be your friend, Stan, but you're so high and mighty you couldn't look past my religion and just be my friend back. You've got a lot of growing up to do, buddy. Suck my balls." (Gary walks off, leaving Stan and his friends stunned)
• Cartman: (after a pause) "Damn, that kid is cool, huh?"

South Park often hints that religious people may be illogical and that antitheists can be overly arrogant. In "Red Hot Catholic Love", Stone and Parker depict the recently converted antitheist townsfolk as literally spewing crap from their mouths, coughing out actual feces as they discuss their dislike for religion and how exposure to religion could harm their kids (Cartman had recently found a way to eat by shoving food up the rectum and defecating out the mouth).

Similarly non-religious cults of personality which cross over into a religious-like structure are caricatured, such as the episode where a cult of "Blaintologists" (named for charismatic illusionist David Blaine) forms, and progresses to ritualistic mass cult suicide unless they obtain their tax-exempt status. According to the show's creators, it is a reference to Scientology.

The show has come under fire from conservative religious groups for its portrayal of Satan, who appears occasionally. After his first appearance, Satan's depiction changed to that of a generally nice, easygoing guy, though plagued by codependency. He hosts luaus in Hell, and is also presented as a homosexual, shown in committed relationships with some of Hell's denizens, including a now-defunct one with Saddam Hussein, who was abusive and dominant in the relationship, leading to the relationship's demise. Satan's follow-up relationship with sensitive '90s guy Chris ended when he realized (after visiting Heaven and asking advice from God) that Chris is "a pussy" to whom he was not sexually attracted. "Hell on Earth 2006" featured Satan throwing a Halloween party that everyone wants to be a part of and many of the Christian clergy have little boys wearing nothing but leashes.

In the tenth season episode "Go God Go", Ms. Garrison begins to date famous biologist Richard Dawkins after he convinces her that there is no god. They make a plan to convert the whole world to atheism, and eventually do. This is shown when Cartman freezes himself because he "can't wait for Nintendo Wii" and is awoken 500 years in the future where the whole world is atheistic. Ironically, this all-atheist world is home to several warring atheist factions in a dispute over what name to use for their organization, parodying an atheist notion that there would be no more war in the world if religion was done away with.

In the episode criticizing Scientology ("Trapped in the Closet"), South Park is adamant in assuring viewers of the factual content in their description of its beliefs by flashing the phrase "THIS IS WHAT SCIENTOLOGISTS ACTUALLY BELIEVE". Similarly, it asserted the accuracy of its descriptions of Mormon beliefs in "All About Mormons." However, in the episode "Go God Go", South Park misrepresents Catholics as opposed to evolution, by showing a Catholic father removing his daughter from school in protest, despite the Roman Catholic Church first declaring its acceptance of evolution as plausible in 1950 and remaining generally supportive of the theory, with Pope John Paul II accepting the principle as a scientific fact in 1996.

Environment

South Park has produced several episodes critical of the environmentalism movement.

In the 1999 episode "Rainforest Schmainforest" an environmental activist, voiced by Jennifer Aniston, makes a harrowing trip to the rain forest of Costa Rica with the children, an experience that leads her to conclude that the rain forest "sucks ass", which may be directed as a criticism of the lack of in-depth knowledge some activists have about the causes they support, and the way in which they appear to "jump on a bandwagon".

The 2001 episode "Terrance and Phillip: Behind the Blow" is about the South Park Earth Day "Brainwashing Festival" where a group of conservationists staging Earth Day in South Park try to brainwash the crowd into caring about the environment. They eventually start mutilating Kenny as punishment for the boys not keeping their promise of Terrence and Philip appearing at the festival.

The 2005 episode "Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow" mocks the connections between recent hurricanes and global warming. The title and several plot elements are a play on the film The Day After Tomorrow.

The 2006 episode "Smug Alert!" mocked the self-satisfaction and "smugness" of some who drive hybrid vehicles (which causes a suffocating form of pollution called "smug" instead of "smog") and featured George Clooney's Academy award acceptance speech as a major contributor to the dangers of "smug". The importance of hybrid cars and the underlying good that they do for the environment is highlighted at the end of the episode, indicating that it is the self-righteousness of some who drive them who are being satirized rather than the cars. Another 2006 episode, "ManBearPig" mocked Al Gore's outspokenness about the danger of global warming, ending with Al Gore going on to "...make a movie... a movie starring me!..." in what is presumably a jab at the film An Inconvenient Truth.

Racism

The 2007 episode "With Apologies to Jesse Jackson" was inspired by the Michael Richards Laugh Factory incident. It was also likely influenced by a recent New York City Council resolution, which symbolically banned the word nigger.[9] They say the word more than 30 times in the episode. In this South Park episode Cartman makes fun of a midget and eventually fights him.

Awards

• South Park has been nominated for the Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program six times (1998, 2000, 2002, 2004, 2005, and 2006). So far the show has only won once, for the 2005 episode Best Friends Forever.
• On April 5, 2006, it was announced that the show had won a Peabody Award. This is the third Comedy Central show to win, following two awarded to The Daily Show for its 2000 and 2004 presidential election coverage and one given to Mystery Science Theater 3000 in 1994.
• South Park was nominated for important awards such as the 1998 Annie Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Primetime or Late Night Television Program. It was also nominated for the 1998 GLAAD Award for Outstanding TV - Individual Episode for Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride. It also received an Image Award nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series (Isaac Hayes) in 1999.
• South Park was nominated for a 2006 Teen Choice Award for "Best Animated Show", but was defeated by the show Family Guy.
• South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut was nominated for an Oscar for "Best Music, Original Song" for the song "Blame Canada". They lost to Phil Collins and made fun of him in two consecutive episodes in season 4 (Cartman's Silly Hate Crime 200 & Timmy 2000). They were fully expecting to lose, just not to him. It was performed by Robin Williams during the televised award show, which was the first to carry a TV-14 parental advisory, in part because of the performance of that song, which contains some adult language.

See also

• List of South Park episodes
• South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut
• South Park Republican
• Cheesy Poofs
• Chewbacca defense
• Chocolate Salty Balls
• Colorado
• Park County, Colorado
• South Park opening sequence

External links

• South Park Studios
• South Park at Comedy Central
• South Park at IMDb
• South Park Wikia
• http://www.answers.com/topic/south-park
• http://www.beliefnet.com/story/152/story_15268_1.html
• http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/south_park_still_sick_still_wrong/page/1