Kenny McCormick

Template:TV-in-universe Template:South Park character Kenneth "Kenny" McCormick is a fictional character in the animated series South Park. Created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, he first appeared in the short films both entitled The Spirit of Christmas in 1992 and 1995. Kenny is one of four central characters in the show, all of whom are young boys growing up in the small town of South Park. Kenny is most famous for dying nearly every episode in the first five seasons of South Park. He is voiced by Matt Stone, although Mike Judge provided his voice in the feature film South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.

Characterization

Kenny is the most knowledgeable of the group when it comes to sex, and he is usually portrayed as the most perverted. Often when an unknown sexual term is introduced to Stan, Kyle and Cartman, Kenny will be called upon by his friends to clarify, although sometimes Kenny doesn't know the meaning of the sexual term. His muffled responses are often met with laughter or further confusion. He has a passion for breasts as shown in the episode "Lil Crime Stoppers." His knowledge may be gleaned from his parents or from the pornography which Kenny is shown to possess (e.g. "Osama Bin Laden Has Farty Pants"). He is usually the first to perform disgusting acts (drinking from Jimbo's gas tank, giving Howard Stern a hummer for money). Stan and Kyle noticed this behavior in "Fat Camp" and created the The Krazy Kenny Show which starred Kenny doing undesirable acts for money (such as eating mice, pretending to kill newborn babies in front of their mothers, and washing his hair in battery acid).

Despite his sexual perversion, Kenny actually appears as the kindest and most laid-back of the group, always prepared to help his friends. When Butters was still an official friend in early Season 6 episodes, and showed reluctance to perform a task for the other three, they would always softly remark how Kenny would help them out. Indeed, several of his deaths are acts of self-sacrifice on behalf of others. One example of his sacrificial deaths is depicted in the episode "Jewbilee."

In The Biggest Douche in the Universe, Kenny is shown to be a fan of Rob Schneider. When Cartman refuses to watch Rob Schneider's films, Kenny's soul keeps trying to get him to change the channel back.

Kenny's birthday is on March 22nd.

Kenny is shown to have a large mastery of strategic videogaming in "Best Friends Forever", reaching Level 60 in the PSP Game "Heaven vs Hell", and was known by the angels as the heaven's equivalent of Keanu Reeves (Neo or Constantine). In "Make Love, Not Warcraft" he is a human hunter in the game World of Warcraft (a race/class combination not actually possible in the game). In Towelie, he plays the 2001 Okama Gamesphere with the other boys until his death, at which time Towelie takes his place.

Appearance and voice

File:Kennyrevealed02.jpg

Kenny with his jacket hood removed in South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.

Kenny almost always wears an orange hooded parka with brown gloves. Most of the time, Kenny has his hood on so that you can only see his eyes. Underneath his hood he has messy blonde hair. He also is shown to have almost nothing on underneath his parka. In the season 8 episode, "Good Times With Weapons", his anime self is shown to have blue eyes. Kenny is also shown to have blue eyes in the episode "Starvin' Marvin," in which a mutant turkey pulls out his eye in close-up, and a blue iris is momentarily visible.

A photorealistic version of Kenny's appearance was produced as a police artist sketch for the episode Free Willzyx.

Kenny's parka covers his mouth, which muffles his voice, therefore, Kenny uses much more profanity that would normally be censored. In the opening song during seasons 1&2, he sings; "I love girls with big fat titties. I love girls with deep vaginas." In seasons 3-5, he sings; "I have got a 10-inch penis. Use your mouth if you want to clean it." (both of these are referenced at South Park Studios FAQ [1]} From season 7 to 7th episode of season 10, Kenny sings "Someday I'll be old enough to stick my dick in Brittney's butt." (also referenced at South Park Studios FAQ) The verse from 8th episode of season 10 through 7th episode of season 11 has not been officially revealed, but fans enjoy guessing what the lines could be.

Kenny speaks rarely, and he usually says only a few lines. He speaks clearly in South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, The Jeffersons, and Lice Capades with proper, unmuffled lines. He says "yippee" in The Losing Edge and groans in The Tooth Fairy Tats 2000.

Kenny's unmuffled voice sounds like a slightly higher-pitched version of Stan Marsh's. In the film South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, Kenny's voice is performed by Mike Judge, creator of Beavis and Butt-head and King of the Hill. In the Season 8 episode "The Jeffersons", Kenny's voice was performed by Matt Stone.

Family

Kenny's parents are Stuart and Carol McCormick. Stuart is an alcoholic, and the family is extremely poor because of this, subsisting on welfare (although a drug dealer in "Lil' Crime Stoppers" says the McCormicks run a meth lab), something for which his friends (especially Eric Cartman) often tease him. Kenny has two siblings: Kevin McCormick, and a little girl who seemingly has no name and apparently did not exist until the episode "Best Friends Forever." Because Kenny's family is so poor, they eat frozen waffles with no side dishes for dinner and bread sandwiches for breakfast. In Starvin' Marvin, Kenny won a can of green beans for his family, though they could not afford a can opener. Cartman frequently exploits his poverty by offering him money for performing strange or dangerous tasks. Kenny's poverty appears to be somewhat of a paradox at times, as he always manages to stay current with trends in toys and video games, such as maintaining a World of Warcraft subscription (and a computer to play it on), being the first kid to get a PSP in South Park, or buying the Chinpokomon dolls, and being the only child in the town to have a Go Go Action Bronco, a battery-powered miniature car. Of course, Kenny's family also won a lawsuit against Cartman in Cartmanland, gaining at least $500,000.

Relationships

Cartman generally seems to tolerate Kenny, although he regards him as being lesser than him because he is poor, and can even at times be seen to treat Kenny as sort of a general laborer/servant. However, Cartman does appear to consider Kenny as his best friend out of the other three boys, although he is not above exaggerating the depth of their friendship in order to achieve or obtain something he wants, usually after Kenny dies or is incapacitated, such as in the episode "Best Friends Forever". In the same episode, Kenny described his general attitude toward his friendship with Cartman as his feeling sorry for him, because everyone else hates him. However, it is also shown that the two share a "best friends forever" necklace (hence the title of the episode), and in the episode "Kenny Dies", Kenny seems to agree with Cartman's assessment that the two are best friends, as Kyle and Stan are.

Kenny will go along with Cartman if he talks about something he agrees on, or Kyle and Stan if he gets really annoyed by Cartman's attitude, such as the time he giggled uncontrollably when Cartman farted in Kyle's face in "Cancelled". On occasion, he is known to punch Cartman, an act which subdues him.

Kenny briefly had a girlfriend named Kelly in "Rainforest Schmainforest" (she was first to admit her feelings for him), who came to his aid during one of his famous "death" scenes. In the next episode, "Spontaneous Combustion", he spends a lot of time at a new girlfriend's house but the viewer never sees her. Because Kenny had started dating Kelly in the previous episode, it is safe to assume that they are one and the same. Kelly hasn't been heard of since (although she was seen at the dance in Hooked on Monkey Phonics, possibly having arranged to meet up with Kenny, but not being able to as he is dead at that point).

Music

Kenny has shown a talent on the drums. For Rush's Snakes and Arrows tour, there is a video of the South Park boys attempting to play Tom Sawyer and Kenny is seen on the drums.

Death

Main articles: Kenny's deaths and List of Kenny's deaths

Kenny is best known in the show for his recurring death in nearly every episode of the first five seasons, often followed by some variant of "Oh my God, they've killed Kenny! You bastards!" from his friends Stan and Kyle, respectively. However, in the episode Cartoon Wars, Stan and Kyle say "you killed Kenny, hope you're happy". In the first few episodes, Kyle said the entire phrase. Later on, it varied, depending on who killed Kenny.

Kenny has died and come back 94 times in the South Park franchise (78 in the series, to date, two in the early animated shorts, six in other authorized TV parodies, four times in the video game, and twice in the movie (He burned to death, was brought back to life, then died when the baked potato used as his heart exploded). He is also killed two different ways in the opening sequence.

Kenny died in almost all the episodes until the writers killed him off permanently in the fifth season, but he returned in the sixth season — although they dispensed with the practice of killing him in every episode, as they got bored with the joke. The reason why Kenny died continuously was given in an interview with Matt Stone and Trey Parker, who stated vaguely that it was because Kenny is poor. In the episode Cripple Fight, Timmy gives Jimmy an orange parka greatly resembling Kenny's. When Jimmy puts the parka on, he is bombarded with many dangers but is never hit or notices them. Kenny would always be back for the next episode, although the explanations for his reappearance varied. One episode explained that his soul returns to his Mother, and takes to another body, is reborn, and then grows to be 8 or 9 years old in record time, while another simply had Kenny magically reappearing out of thin air in the second part of a two-part episode after he was run over by a train in the first. None of the other characters seem to find this at all unusual — Stan merely greeted Kenny when he materialized, and no one else even blinked. Kenny himself is aware of the fact that he is constantly killed, expressing resentment over the fact that Stan was worried about Kyle's impending death while never mourning Kenny and also opting to take home economics classes over wood shop, partly because he was afraid of getting killed by the dangerous power tools in the shop class. However, it would seem that, unlike Stan and Kyle, Cartman is vaguely aware of Kenny's deaths, as he referred to them in "Cartmanland". Kenny dies in Cartman's theme park, and when lawyers suing him mention "that boy who died", Cartman replies with "Who, Kenny? He dies all the time". Stan and Kyle also express annoyance and displeasure at Kenny's repeated gory demise, with Stan frequently exclaiming "Oh my God, they killed Kenny!" and Kyle answering with "You bastards!" It would seem that the others are also aware of Kenny's deaths, but are quite nonchalant about them since they know he will re-appear. Also, in the episode "The Succubus," Cartman, who was blinded due to a failed Laser Eye Surgery procedure, asked if Kenny was okay after a Succubus rampaged, although this may be coincidence. Previously in the episode, the boys are seen waiting for Chef at the bus stop. The first scene shows the boys waiting. The next scene is at night, with the boys still waiting, but Kenny is dead, and being gnawed upon by rats. The third and final scene shows the boys still waiting, and Kenny is perfectly fine. Even Stan mentioned that Kenny died all the time in the episode "Gnomes", in which the gnomes accidentally crush Kenny, and mourn over this tragedy, but are confused as to why the kids don't seem to care. In another episode, Kenny eats antacid tablets, thinking they're mints, and drinks a lot of water afterward. When Kenny explodes, the main characters and Kyle's dad find it funny, and Stan says, "That was a good one."

Kenny survives four episodes in the first five seasons, the first being the Christmas special, where he's instructed to do a number of dangerous things. These include unplugging a number of electrical cords whilst standing in a large puddle and climbing a tall rickety ladder over a shark tank to fetch a star in the rafters of a theater. Secondly he also survives the 10th episode of season 4 when he's run over by a bus and is presumed dead. When the bus stops in Mexico, he is pulled from underneath the bus by a Mexican man and put on the sidewalk.The third time is in the episode Rainforest Shmainforest he is struck by lightning and then revived with CPR by his new girlfriend Kelly, to which Kyle remarks- 'Wow dude'. The fourth time Kenny escapes death is in the Fat Camp episode. Kenny begins a career as a stuntman and is going to undertake a stunt involving spending 6 hours in Ms. Crabtree's uterus. He didn't show up because he was arrested in New York for prostitution after giving Howard Stern a hummer for money. Instead, a kid posing as Cartman is dressed in the orange parka and stuffed into Ms. Crabtree's uterus. He's then squeezed back out later dead, which is followed by Stan exclaming, "They killed Kenny!...sort of." and an unknown kid being squeezed out as well.

Kenny's usual death in every episode ceased following the start of the fifth season. The reason given by Trey Parker and Matt Stone was that it was becoming too hard to find a unique way of killing Kenny.

According to his mother in Cartman Joins NAMBLA, every time Kenny dies she simply gives birth to him again. In the episode she says this is about the 52nd time this has happened, probably having some relation of it being the 53rd episode in the series.

The gag has many precedents, going back at least as far as the regular cry "You rotten swine! You've deaded me!" by Bluebottle voiced by Peter Sellers in The Goon Show in 1951.

External links

• Kenny McCormick on SouthParkStudios.com
• Repository of translated Kenny-isms
• Kenny McCormick Biography ASK.com
• Kenny sings Opening Song in slow speed