''South Park'' is an American
animated sitcom
An animated sitcom is a subgenre of the sitcom that is animation, animated instead of live action and is generally made or created for adult animation, adult audiences in most cases. ''SpongeBob SquarePants'', ''The Simpsons'', ''South Park'', and ...
created by
Trey Parker
Randolph Severn "Trey" Parker III (born October 19, 1969) is an American actor, animator, filmmaker, and composer. He is known for co-creating ''South Park'' (since 1997) and ''The Book of Mormon'' (2011) with his creative partner Matt Stone. P ...
and
Matt Stone
Matthew Richard Stone (born May 26, 1971) is an American actor, animator, filmmaker, and composer. He is known for co-creating ''South Park'' (since 1997) and ''The Book of Mormon'' (2011) with his creative partner Trey Parker. Stone was interes ...
and developed by
Brian Graden
Brian Graden (born March 23, 1963) is an American television executive and founder and CEO of Emmy-winning Brian Graden Media, founded in 2013. Its series include ''Create Together'' (Emmy winner), ''Escape the Night, HitRECord on TV'' (Emmy winne ...
for
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American basic cable channel owned by Paramount Global through its network division's MTV Entertainment Group unit, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared towards young adults aged 18–34 and carries comedy programming ...
. The series revolves around four boys
Stan Marsh
Stanley Randell William Marsh is a fictional character in the adult animated television series '' South Park''. He is voiced by and loosely based on series co-creator Trey Parker. Stan is one of the series' four central characters, along with ...
,
Kyle Broflovski
Kyle Matthew Broflovski is a fictional character in the adult animated television series ''South Park''. He is voiced by and loosely based on co-creator Matt Stone. Kyle is one of the series' four central characters, along with his friends Stan ...
,
Eric Cartman
Eric Theodore Cartman, commonly referred to by his surname Cartman, is a fictional character in the adult animated sitcom '' South Park'', created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. He is voiced by Parker, and is one of the series' four main chara ...
, and
Kenny McCormick
Kenneth "Kenny" McCormick is a fictional character and one of the four main characters in the adult animated television series ''South Park'' along with Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, and Eric Cartman. His often muffled and incomprehensible speec ...
and their exploits in and around the titular
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...
town. ''South Park'' became infamous for its
profanity
Profanity, also known as cursing, cussing, swearing, bad language, foul language, obscenities, expletives or vulgarism, is a socially offensive use of language. Accordingly, profanity is language use that is sometimes deemed impolite, rud ...
and
dark
Darkness, the direct opposite of lightness, is defined as a lack of illumination, an absence of visible light, or a surface that absorbs light, such as black or brown.
Human vision is unable to distinguish colors in conditions of very low lum ...
,
surreal humor
Surreal humour (also called surreal comedy, absurdist humour, or absurdist comedy) is a form of humour predicated on deliberate violations of causality, causal reasoning, thus producing events and behaviours that are obviously illogical. Portrayal ...
that
satirizes a
wide range of topics toward an
adult
An adult is a human or other animal that has reached full growth. In human context, the term ''adult'' has meanings associated with social and legal concepts. In contrast to a " minor", a legal adult is a person who has attained the age of major ...
audience.
Parker and Stone developed ''South Park'' from two animated short films both titled ''
The Spirit of Christmas''. The second short became one of the first Internet
viral video
A viral video is a video that becomes popular through a viral process of Internet sharing, typically through video sharing websites such as YouTube as well as social media and email.Lu Jiang, Yajie Miao, Yi Yang, ZhenZhong Lan, Alexander Haupt ...
s, leading to ''South Park''s production. The
pilot episode
A television pilot (also known as a pilot or a pilot episode and sometimes marketed as a tele-movie), in United States television, is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell a show to a television network or other distri ...
was produced using
cutout animation
Cutout animation is a form of stop-motion animation using flat characters, props and backgrounds cut from materials such as paper, card, stiff fabric or photographs. The props would be cut out and used as puppets for stop motion. The world's ea ...
; subsequent episodes have since used
computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for digitally generating animations. The more general term computer-generated imagery (CGI) encompasses both static scenes (still images) and dynamic images (moving images), while computer animation refe ...
recalling the cutout technique. ''South Park'' features a large
ensemble cast
In a dramatic production, an ensemble cast is one that is composed of multiple principal actors and performers who are typically assigned roughly equal amounts of screen time.Random House: ensemble acting Linked 2013-07-17
Structure
In contrast to ...
of recurring characters.
Since its debut on August 13, 1997,
episodes (including television films) of ''South Park'' have been broadcast. It debuted with great success, consistently earning the highest ratings of any basic cable program. Subsequent ratings have varied, but it remains one of Comedy Central's highest-rated programs. In August 2021, the series was renewed through 2027, and a series of films was announced for the streaming service
Paramount+
Paramount (from the word ''paramount'' meaning "above all others") may refer to:
Entertainment and music companies
* Paramount Global, also known simply as Paramount, an American mass media company formerly known as ViacomCBS. The following busin ...
, the first two of which were released later that year.
''South Park'' has received critical acclaim, and is included in various publications' lists of greatest television shows. It has received numerous accolades, including five
Primetime Emmy Award
The Primetime Emmy Awards, or Primetime Emmys, are part of the extensive range of Emmy Awards for artistic and technical merit for the American television industry. Bestowed by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), the Primetime ...
s and a
Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Peabody, honor the most powerful, enlightening, and invigorating stories in television, radio, and ...
. A theatrical film, ''
South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut'', was released in June 1999 to commercial and critical success, garnering an
Academy Award
The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
nomination. In 2013, ''
TV Guide
TV Guide is an American digital media company that provides television program
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or t ...
'' ranked ''South Park'' the tenth Greatest TV Cartoon of All Time.
Premise
Setting and characters
''South Park'' centers around four boys:
Stan Marsh
Stanley Randell William Marsh is a fictional character in the adult animated television series '' South Park''. He is voiced by and loosely based on series co-creator Trey Parker. Stan is one of the series' four central characters, along with ...
,
Kyle Broflovski
Kyle Matthew Broflovski is a fictional character in the adult animated television series ''South Park''. He is voiced by and loosely based on co-creator Matt Stone. Kyle is one of the series' four central characters, along with his friends Stan ...
,
Eric Cartman
Eric Theodore Cartman, commonly referred to by his surname Cartman, is a fictional character in the adult animated sitcom '' South Park'', created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. He is voiced by Parker, and is one of the series' four main chara ...
and
Kenny McCormick
Kenneth "Kenny" McCormick is a fictional character and one of the four main characters in the adult animated television series ''South Park'' along with Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, and Eric Cartman. His often muffled and incomprehensible speec ...
. The boys live in the
fictional small town of South Park, located within the real-life
South Park basin in the
Rocky Mountains
The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico in ...
of central
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...
,
approximately a one-hour drive from
Denver
Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...
. The town is also home to an assortment of other characters, including
students
A student is a person enrolled in a school or other educational institution.
In the United Kingdom and most commonwealth countries, a "student" attends a secondary school or higher (e.g., college or university); those in primary or elementary ...
,
families
Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Ideall ...
,
elementary school staff, and other
various residents.
Prominent settings include South Park Elementary, various neighborhoods and the surrounding mountain range, actual Colorado landmarks, and the businesses along the town's main street, all of which are based on the appearance of similar locations in
Fairplay, Colorado
The historic Town of Fairplay is the Statutory Town that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Park County, Colorado, United States. The town population was 724 at the 2020 United States Census. Fairplay is located in Sout ...
.
As one of the few television programs set in the
Mountain West
The Mountain West Conference (MW) is one of the collegiate athletic conferences affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) (formerly I-A). The MW officially began operations o ...
region that takes place outside the urban core of Denver, ''South Park'' frequently features the unique culture of the region, including cattle ranchers, Old West theme parks, snowy climates, mountaineering,
Mormons
Mormons are a religious and cultural group related to Mormonism, the principal branch of the Latter Day Saint movement started by Joseph Smith in upstate New York during the 1820s. After Smith's death in 1844, the movement split into several ...
, real-life Colorado locations such as
Casa Bonita
Casa Bonita (Spanish for "pretty house") is a Mexican restaurant in Lakewood, Colorado, at the JCRS (Jewish Consumptives' Relief Society) Shopping Center, now known as the Lamar Station Plaza. It was originally part of a chain of Mexican-themed en ...
and
Cave of the Winds, and many other regionally specific characteristics.
Stan is portrayed as the
everyman
The everyman is a stock character of fiction. An ordinary and humble character, the everyman is generally a protagonist whose benign conduct fosters the audience's identification with them.
Origin
The term ''everyman'' was used as early as ...
of the group,
described in official media as an "average, American 4th grader." Kyle is
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
, and his portrayal as one of the few such people in South Park is often dealt with satirically.
Stan is modeled after Parker, while Kyle is modeled after Stone. They are best friends, and their friendship, symbolically intended to reflect Parker and Stone's friendship,
is a common topic throughout the series. Cartman (as he is commonly referred to) is amoral and increasingly
psychopathic
Psychopathy, sometimes considered synonymous with sociopathy, is characterized by persistent antisocial behavior, impaired empathy and remorse, and bold, disinhibited, and egotistical traits. Different conceptions of psychopathy have been ...
, and is commonly portrayed as an
antagonist
An antagonist is a character in a story who is presented as the chief foe of the protagonist.
Etymology
The English word antagonist comes from the Greek ἀνταγωνιστής – ''antagonistēs'', "opponent, competitor, villain, enemy, riv ...
. His staunch
antisemitism
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
has resulted in a progressive rivalry with Kyle.
Kenny, who comes from a poor family, tightly wears his
parka
A parka or anorak is a type of coat with a hood, often lined with fur or faux fur. This kind of garment is a staple of Inuit clothing, traditionally made from caribou or seal skin, for hunting and kayaking in the frigid Arctic. Some Inuit ano ...
hood to the point where it obscures most of his face and muffles his speech. During the first five seasons, Kenny died in almost every episode before reappearing in the next with no definite explanation. He was killed off in the
fifth season episode "
Kenny Dies
"Kenny Dies" is the thirteenth and penultimate episode of the fifth season of the animated television series '' South Park'', and the 78th episode of the series overall. "Kenny Dies" originally aired in the United States on December 5, 2001 on Com ...
", being reintroduced in the
sixth season finale. Since then, Kenny is depicted as dying sporadically. During the first 58 episodes, the children were in the
third grade
Third grade (also called grade three, equivalent to Year 4 in England) is a year of primary education in many countries. It is the third school year of primary school. Students are usually 8–9 years old.
Examples of the American syllabus
*In ...
. During the
fourth season, they entered the
fourth grade
Fourth grade (also called grade four, equivalent to Year 5 in England and Wales, and Year 4 in Australia) is a year of Elementary education in some countries. In North America, the fourth grade is the fifth school year of elementary school. Stud ...
, where they have remained ever since.
Plots are often set in motion by events, ranging from the fairly typical to the supernatural and extraordinary, which frequently happen in the town.
The boys often act as the voice of reason when these events cause panic or incongruous behavior among the adult populace, who are customarily depicted as irrational, gullible, and prone to overreaction.
They are frequently confused by the contradictory and hypocritical behavior of their parents and other adults, and often perceive them as having distorted views on morality and society.
Themes and style
Each episode opens with a
tongue-in-cheek
The idiom tongue-in-cheek refers to a humorous or sarcastic statement expressed in a serious manner.
History
The phrase originally expressed contempt, but by 1842 had acquired its modern meaning. Early users of the phrase include Sir Walter Scott ...
all persons fictitious disclaimer
An "all persons fictitious" disclaimer in a work of media states that the persons portrayed in it are not based on real people. This is done mostly on realistic films and television programs to reduce the possibility of legal action for libel fr ...
: "All characters and events in this show—even those based on real people—are entirely fictional. All celebrity voices are impersonated.....poorly. The following program contains coarse language and due to its content it should not be viewed by anyone."
''South Park'' was the first weekly program to be rated
TV-MA
The TV Parental Guidelines are a television content rating system in the United States that was first proposed on December 19, 1996, by the United States Congress, the television industry and the federal communication commission (FCC), and went ...
,
and is generally intended for adult audiences.
The boys and most other child characters use strong profanity, with only the most taboo words being
bleeped
A bleep censor is the replacement of a profanity or classified information with a beep (sound), beep sound (usually a ) in television and radio. It is mainly used in the United Kingdom, Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong ...
during a typical broadcast.
Parker and Stone perceive this as the manner in which real-life small boys speak when they are alone.
''South Park'' commonly makes use of
carnivalesque
Carnivalesque is a literary mode that subverts and liberates the assumptions of the dominant style or atmosphere through humor and chaos. It originated as "carnival" in Mikhail Bakhtin's ''Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics'' and was further develope ...
and
absurdist techniques,
numerous
running gag
A running gag, or running joke, is a literary device that takes the form of an amusing joke or a comical reference and appears repeatedly throughout a work of literature or other form of storytelling. Though they are similar, catchphrases are not ...
s,
violence
Violence is the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy. Other definitions are also used, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or Power (social and p ...
,
sexual content
In media discourse, sexual content is material depicting sexual behavior. The sexual behavior involved may be explicit, implicit sexual behavior such as flirting, or include sexual language and euphemisms.
Sexual content is a large factor in most ...
, offhand pop-cultural references, and satirical portrayal of celebrities.
Early episodes tended to be
shock value
Shock value is the potential of an image, text, action, or other form of communication, such as a public execution, to provoke a reaction of sharp disgust, shock, anger, fear, or similar negative emotions.
In advertising
Shock advertising or Sho ...
-oriented and featured more slapstick-style humor.
While social
satire
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming ...
had been used on the show occasionally earlier on, it became more prevalent as the series progressed, with the show retaining some of its focus on the boys' fondness of
scatological humor
Toilet humour, or potty or scatological humour (compare scatology), is a type of off-colour humour dealing with defecation, diarrhea, constipation, urination and flatulence, and to a lesser extent vomiting and other bodily functions. It sees su ...
in an attempt to remind adult viewers "what it was like to be eight years old."
Parker and Stone also began further developing other characters by giving them larger roles in certain storylines,
and began writing plots as parables based on religion, politics, and numerous other topics.
This provided the opportunity for the show to spoof both extreme sides of contentious issues,
while lampooning both
liberal
Liberal or liberalism may refer to:
Politics
* a supporter of liberalism
** Liberalism by country
* an adherent of a Liberal Party
* Liberalism (international relations)
* Sexually liberal feminism
* Social liberalism
Arts, entertainment and m ...
and
conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
points of view.
Parker and Stone describe themselves as "equal opportunity offenders",
whose main purpose is to "be funny" and "make people laugh",
while stating that no particular topic or group of people be exempt from mockery and satire.
Parker and Stone insist that the show is still more about "kids being kids" and "what it's like to be in
lementary schoolin America",
stating that the introduction of a more satirical element to the series was the result of the two adding more of a "moral center" to the show so that it would rely less on simply being crude and shocking in an attempt to maintain an audience.
While profane, Parker notes that there is still an "underlying sweetness" aspect to the child characters,
and ''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' described the boys as "sometimes cruel but with a core of innocence."
Usually, the boys or other characters pondered over what transpired during an episode and conveyed the important lesson taken from it with a short monologue. During earlier seasons, this speech commonly began with a variation of the phrase "You know, I've learned something today...".
[Arp and Jacoby, p. 58]
Development
![Trey Parker and Matt Stone by Gage Skidmore](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/14/Trey_Parker_and_Matt_Stone_by_Gage_Skidmore.jpg)
Parker and Stone met in film class at the
University of Colorado
The University of Colorado (CU) is a system of public universities in Colorado. It consists of four institutions: University of Colorado Boulder, University of Colorado Colorado Springs, University of Colorado Denver, and the University of Co ...
in 1992 and discovered a shared love of
Monty Python
Monty Python (also collectively known as the Pythons) were a British comedy troupe who created the sketch comedy television show '' Monty Python's Flying Circus'', which first aired on the BBC in 1969. Forty-five episodes were made over four ...
, which they often cite as one of their primary inspirations.
They created an
animated short
Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most anima ...
entitled ''
The Spirit of Christmas''.
The film was created by animating construction paper cutouts with
stop motion
Stop motion is an animated filmmaking technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exhibit independent motion or change when the series of frames i ...
, and features
prototype
A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototyp ...
s of the main characters of ''South Park'', including a character resembling Cartman but named "Kenny", an unnamed character resembling what is today Kenny, and two near-identical unnamed characters who resemble Stan and Kyle.
Fox Broadcasting Company
The Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly known simply as Fox and stylized in all caps as FOX, is an American commercial broadcast television network owned by Fox Corporation and headquartered in New York City, with master control operations an ...
executive and mutual friend
Brian Graden
Brian Graden (born March 23, 1963) is an American television executive and founder and CEO of Emmy-winning Brian Graden Media, founded in 2013. Its series include ''Create Together'' (Emmy winner), ''Escape the Night, HitRECord on TV'' (Emmy winne ...
commissioned Parker and Stone to create a second short film as a video Christmas card. Created in 1995, the second ''The Spirit of Christmas'' short resembled the style of the later series more closely. To differentiate between the two homonymous shorts, the first short is often referred to as ''Jesus vs. Frosty'', and the second short as ''Jesus vs. Santa''. Graden sent copies of the video to several of his friends, and from there it was copied and distributed, including on the internet, where it became one of the first
viral video
A viral video is a video that becomes popular through a viral process of Internet sharing, typically through video sharing websites such as YouTube as well as social media and email.Lu Jiang, Yajie Miao, Yi Yang, ZhenZhong Lan, Alexander Haupt ...
s.
As ''Jesus vs. Santa'' became more popular, Parker and Stone began talks of developing the short into a television series about four children residing in the fictional
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...
town of South Park. Fox eagerly agreed to meet with the duo about the show's premise, having prided itself on edgier products such as
''Cops'', ''
The Simpsons
''The Simpsons'' is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical depiction of American life, epitomized by the Simpson family, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, ...
'', and ''
The X-Files
''The X-Files'' is an American science fiction on television, science fiction drama (film and television), drama television series created by Chris Carter (screenwriter), Chris Carter. The series revolves around Federal Bureau of Investigation ...
''. However, during the meeting at the Fox office in
Century City
Century City is a 176-acre (71.2 ha) neighborhood and business district in Los Angeles, California. Located on the Westside to the south of Santa Monica Boulevard around 10 miles (16 km) west of Downtown Los Angeles, Century City is one of ...
, disagreements between the two creators and the network began to arise, mainly over the latter's refusal to air a show that included a supporting talking stool character named
Mr. Hankey. Some executives at
20th Century Fox Television
20th Television (formerly 20th Century Fox Television, 20th Century-Fox Television, and TCF Television Productions, Inc.) is an American television production company that is a division of Disney Television Studios, part of The Walt Disney Compa ...
(which was to produce the series) agreed with its then-sister network's stance on Mr. Hankey and repeatedly requested Parker and Stone to remove the character in order for the show to proceed. Refusing to meet their demands, the duo cut ties with Fox and its sister companies all together and began shopping the series somewhere else.
The two then entered negotiations with both
MTV
MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...
and
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American basic cable channel owned by Paramount Global through its network division's MTV Entertainment Group unit, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared towards young adults aged 18–34 and carries comedy programming ...
. Parker preferred the show be produced by Comedy Central, fearing that MTV would turn it into a kids show.
When Comedy Central executive
Doug Herzog
Doug Herzog (born July 16, 1959) is an American television executive. He was formerly the president of Viacom Music and Entertainment Group, he oversaw MTV, VH1, Logo, Comedy Central, Palladia, TVLand and Spike, Herzog has been credited with ...
watched the short, he commissioned for it to be developed into a series.
Parker and Stone assembled a small staff and spent three months creating the
pilot
An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its directional flight controls. Some other aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are also considered aviators, because they a ...
episode "
Cartman Gets an Anal Probe
"Cartman Gets an Anal Probe" is the series premiere of the American animated television series ''South Park''. It first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on August 13, 1997. The episode introduces child protagonists Eric Cartman, Kyle B ...
".
''South Park'' was in danger of being canceled before it even aired when the show fared poorly with test audiences, particularly with women. However, the shorts were still gaining more popularity over the Internet, and Comedy Central ordered a run of six episodes.
''South Park'' debuted with "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe" on August 13, 1997.
Production
Except for the pilot episode, which was produced using
cutout animation
Cutout animation is a form of stop-motion animation using flat characters, props and backgrounds cut from materials such as paper, card, stiff fabric or photographs. The props would be cut out and used as puppets for stop motion. The world's ea ...
, all episodes of ''South Park'' are created with the use of software, primarily
Autodesk Maya
Autodesk Maya, commonly shortened to just Maya ( ), is a 3D computer graphics application that runs on Windows, macOS and Linux, originally developed by Alias and currently owned and developed by Autodesk. It is used to create assets for interact ...
. As opposed to the pilot, which took three months to complete,
and other animated sitcoms, which are traditionally
hand-drawn by companies in
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
in a process that takes roughly eight to nine months,
individual episodes of ''South Park'' take significantly less time to produce. Using computers as an animation method, the show's production staff were able to generate an episode in about three weeks during the first seasons.
Now, with a staff of about 70 people, episodes are typically completed in one week,
with some in as little as three to four days.
Nearly the entire production of an episode is accomplished within one set of offices, which were originally at a complex in
Westwood, Los Angeles, California
Westwood is a commercial and residential neighborhood in the northern central portion of the Westside region of Los Angeles, California. It is the home of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Bordering the campus on the south ...
and are now part of South Park Studios in
Culver City, California
Culver City is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 40,779. Founded in 1917 as a "whites only" sundown town, it is now an ethnically diverse city with what was called the "third-most d ...
.
Parker and Stone have been the show's executive producers throughout its entire history.
Debbie Liebling
Deborah Liebling is an American entertainment executive and film producer. She was formally President of Production of Universal Pictures. Previously, she was a Senior Production Executive at 20th Century Fox.
Before her tenure at 20th Centur ...
, who was Senior Vice President of original programming and development for Comedy Central, also served as an executive producer during the show's first five seasons, coordinating the show's production efforts between South Park Studios and Comedy Central's headquarters in New York City. During its early stages, finished episodes of ''South Park'' were hastily recorded to
D-2 to be sent to
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American basic cable channel owned by Paramount Global through its network division's MTV Entertainment Group unit, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared towards young adults aged 18–34 and carries comedy programming ...
for airing in just a few days' time. Each episode used to cost $250,000.
Writing
Scripts are not written before a season begins.
Production of an episode begins on a Thursday, with the show's writing consultants
brainstorming
Brainstorming is a group creativity technique by which efforts are made to find a conclusion for a specific problem by gathering a list of ideas spontaneously contributed by its members.
In other words, brainstorming is a situation where a grou ...
with Parker and Stone. Former staff writers include
Pam Brady
Pam Brady is an American writer and television producer, best known for her work with ''South Park'' creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
Career
Pam Brady first met Parker, Stone and Jason McHugh while working under Brian Graden at the Fox Br ...
, who has since written scripts for the films ''
Hot Rod
Hot rods are typically American cars that might be old, classic, or modern and that have been rebuilt or modified with large engines optimised for speed and acceleration. One definition is: "a car that's been stripped down, souped up and made ...
'', ''
Hamlet 2
''Hamlet 2 '' is a 2008 American comedy film directed by Andrew Fleming, written by Fleming and Pam Brady, and starring Steve Coogan, Catherine Keener, Amy Poehler, and David Arquette. It was produced by Eric Eisner (producer), Eric Eisner, Leonid ...
'' and ''
Team America: World Police'' (with Parker and Stone), and
Nancy Pimental
Nancy Marie Pimental (born May 31, 1965) is an American actress and film and television writer.
Early life and education
Born in Boston, Massachusetts, and of Portuguese descent, Pimental graduated from Somerset High School in 1983 and Worcest ...
, who served as co-host of ''
Win Ben Stein's Money
''Win Ben Stein's Money'' is an American television game show created by Al Burton and Donnie Brainard that aired first-run episodes from July 28, 1997, to January 31, 2003, on Comedy Central. The show featured three contestants who competed to an ...
'' and wrote the film ''
The Sweetest Thing
''The Sweetest Thing'' is a 2002 American comedy film directed by Roger Kumble and written by Nancy Pimental, who based the characters on herself and friend Kate Walsh. It stars Cameron Diaz, Christina Applegate, and Selma Blair.
Plot
A group ...
'' after her tenure with the show during its first three seasons. Television producer and writer
Norman Lear
Norman Milton Lear (born July 27, 1922) is an American producer and screenwriter, who has produced, written, created, or developed over 100 shows. Lear is known for many popular 1970s sitcoms, including the multi-award winning ''All in the Famil ...
, an alleged idol of both Parker and Stone, served as a guest writing consultant for the
season seven (2003) episodes "
Cancelled" and "
I'm a Little Bit Country
"I'm a Little Bit Country" is the fourth episode of the South Park (season 7), seventh season of the American cartoon series, animated television series ''South Park'', and the 100th episode of the series overall. Going by production order, this is ...
".
During the 12th and 13th seasons, ''
Saturday Night Live
''Saturday Night Live'' (often abbreviated to ''SNL'') is an American late-night live television sketch comedy and variety show created by Lorne Michaels and developed by Dick Ebersol that airs on NBC and Peacock. Michaels currently serves a ...
'' actor and writer
Bill Hader
William Thomas Hader Jr.''Finding Your Roots'', January 26, 2016, PBS. (born June 7, 1978) is an American actor, comedian, writer, and producer. He is the creator, producer, writer, director, and star of the HBO dark comedy series ''Barry'' (2018 ...
served as a
creative consultant and co-producer.
After exchanging ideas, Parker will write a script, and from there the entire team of animators, editors, technicians, and sound engineers will each typically work 100–120 hours in the ensuing week.
Since the show's
fourth season (2000), Parker has assumed most of the show's directorial duties, while Stone relinquished his share of the directing to focus on handling the coordination and business aspects of the production.
On Wednesday, a completed episode is sent to Comedy Central's headquarters via satellite uplink, sometimes just a few hours before its air time of 10 PM
Eastern Time
The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico, Panama, Colombia, mainland Ecuador, Peru, and a small port ...
.
Parker and Stone state that subjecting themselves to a one-week deadline creates more spontaneity amongst themselves in the creative process, which they feel results in a funnier show.
The schedule also allows ''South Park'' to both stay more topical and respond more quickly to specific current events than other satiric animated shows.
One of the earliest examples of this was in the
season four
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pola ...
(2000) episode "
Quintuplets 2000", which references the
United States Border Patrol
The United States Border Patrol (USBP) is a Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement agency under the United States' U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Customs and Border Protection and is responsible for securing ...
's raid of a house during the
Elián González affair Elian or Elián (Spanish) or Élian (French) can refer to:
People
*Saint Elian (Syria) (died 284)
**Church of Saint Elian (Arabic: كنيسة مار اليان, Kaneesat Mar Elian) is a church in Homs, Syria
** Monastery of St. Elian a Syriac Catho ...
, an event which occurred only four days before the episode originally aired. The
season nine
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...
(2005) episode "
Best Friends Forever
"Best friends forever" is a phrase that describes a close friendship. It is sometimes written as an initialism, "BFF".
Definition
A BFF is a term for someone's best friend or close friend and is characterized by trust and permanence, irrespectiv ...
" references the
Terri Schiavo case
The Terri Schiavo case was a series of court and legislative actions in the United States from 1998 to 2005, regarding the care of Theresa Marie Schiavo (née Schindler) (; December 3, 1963 – March 31, 2005), a woman in an irreversible ...
,
and originally aired in the midst of the controversy and less than 12 hours before she died.
A scene in the
season seven (2003) finale "
It's Christmas in Canada
"It's Christmas in Canada" (sometimes called "Christmas in Canada") is the fifteenth and final episode of the seventh season of the American animated series '' South Park'' and the 111th episode of the series. The episode originally aired on Decem ...
" references the discovery of dictator
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein ( ; ar, صدام حسين, Ṣaddām Ḥusayn; 28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003. A leading member of the revolution ...
in a "spider hole" and his subsequent
capture
Capture may refer to:
*Asteroid capture, a phenomenon in which an asteroid enters a stable orbit around another body
*Capture, a software for lighting design, documentation and visualisation
*"Capture" a song by Simon Townshend
*Capture (band), an ...
, which happened a mere three days prior to the episode airing.
The
season 12 (2008) episode "
About Last Night..." revolves around
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
's victory in the
2008 presidential election, and aired less than 24 hours after Obama was declared the winner, using segments of dialogue from Obama's real victory speech.
On October 16, 2013, the show failed to meet their production deadline for the first time ever, after a power outage on October 15 at the production studio prevented the episode, season 17's "
Goth Kids 3: Dawn of the Posers", from being finished in time. The episode was rescheduled to air a week later on October 23, 2013.
On August 6, 2021, ''South Park'' was renewed all the way up to season 30 and 14 additional movies, enough to carry the show to at least 2027.
Animation
The show's style of animation is inspired by the paper cut-out cartoons made by
Terry Gilliam
Terrence Vance Gilliam (; born 22 November 1940) is an American-born British filmmaker, comedian, animator, actor and former member of the Monty Python comedy troupe.
Gilliam has directed 13 feature films, including ''Time Bandits'' (1981), ''B ...
for ''
Monty Python's Flying Circus
''Monty Python's Flying Circus'' (also known as simply ''Monty Python'') is a British surreal sketch comedy series created by and starring Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin and Terry Gilliam, who became known ...
'', of which Parker and Stone have been lifelong fans.
Construction paper
Construction paper, also known as sugar paper, is coloured cardstock paper. The texture is slightly rough, and the surface is unfinished. Due to the source material, mainly wood pulp, small particles are visible on the paper's surface. It is used f ...
and traditional
stop motion
Stop motion is an animated filmmaking technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exhibit independent motion or change when the series of frames i ...
cutout animation
Cutout animation is a form of stop-motion animation using flat characters, props and backgrounds cut from materials such as paper, card, stiff fabric or photographs. The props would be cut out and used as puppets for stop motion. The world's ea ...
techniques were used in the original animated shorts and in the pilot episode. Subsequent episodes have been produced by
computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for digitally generating animations. The more general term computer-generated imagery (CGI) encompasses both static scenes (still images) and dynamic images (moving images), while computer animation refe ...
, providing a similar look to the originals while requiring a fraction of the time to produce. Before computer artists begin animating an episode, a series of
animatics
A storyboard is a graphic organizer that consists of illustrations or images displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence. The storyboarding process, i ...
drawn in
Toon Boom
Toon Boom Animation Inc. is a Canadian software company that specializes in animation production and storyboarding software. Founded in 1994 and based in Montreal, Quebec, Toon Boom develops animation and storyboarding software for film, televi ...
are provided by the show's storyboard artists.
The characters and objects are composed of simple geometrical shapes and
primary
Primary or primaries may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels
* Primary (band), from Australia
* Primary (musician), hip hop musician and record producer from South Korea
* Primary Music, Israeli record label
Works
* ...
and
secondary color
A secondary color is a color made by mixing of two primary colors in a given color space.
Additive secondaries
Light (RGB)
For the human eye, good primary colors of light are red, green, and blue. Combining lights of these colors produces a ...
s. Most child characters are the same size and shape, and are distinguished by their clothing, hair and skin colors, and headwear.
Characters are mostly presented two-dimensionally and from only one angle. Their movements are animated in an intentionally jerky fashion, as they are purposely not offered the same free range of motion associated with hand-drawn characters.
Occasionally, some non-fictional characters are depicted with photographic cutouts of their actual head and face in lieu of a face reminiscent of the show's traditional style. Canadians on the show are often portrayed in an even more minimalist fashion; they have simple beady eyes, and the top halves of their heads simply flap up and down when the characters speak.
When the show began using computers, the cardboard cutouts were scanned and re-drawn with
CorelDRAW
CorelDRAW is a vector graphics editor developed and marketed by Corel Corporation. It is also the name of the Corel graphics suite, which includes the bitmap-image editor Corel Photo-Paint as well as other graphics-related programs (see below). T ...
, then imported into
PowerAnimator
PowerAnimator and Animator, also referred to simply as "Alias", the precursor to what is now Maya and StudioTools, is a highly integrated industrial 3D modeling, animation, and visual effects suite. It had a relatively long track record, starting w ...
, which was used with
SGI SGI may refer to:
Companies
*Saskatchewan Government Insurance
*Scientific Games International, a gambling company
*Silicon Graphics, Inc., a former manufacturer of high-performance computing products
*Silicon Graphics International, formerly Rac ...
workstations to animate the characters.
The workstations were linked to a 54-processor
render farm
A render farm is a high-performance computer system, e.g. a computer cluster, built to render computer-generated imagery (CGI), typically for film and television visual effects.
Origin of the term
The term ''render farm'' was born during the ...
that could render 10 to 15
shots an hour.
Beginning with
season five
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pola ...
, the animators began using
Maya
Maya may refer to:
Civilizations
* Maya peoples, of southern Mexico and northern Central America
** Maya civilization, the historical civilization of the Maya peoples
** Maya language, the languages of the Maya peoples
* Maya (Ethiopia), a populat ...
instead of PowerAnimator.
As of 2012, the studio ran a 120-processor render farm that can produce 30 or more shots an hour.
PowerAnimator and Maya are high-end programs mainly used for
3D computer graphics
3D computer graphics, or “3D graphics,” sometimes called CGI, 3D-CGI or three-dimensional computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data (often Cartesian) that is stored in the computer for th ...
, while co-producer and former animation director
Eric Stough
Eric "Butters" Stough (born July 31, 1972) is an American animator and producer. He is best known as the animation director and a producer on the television series ''South Park''. Born in Evergreen, Colorado, Stough attended the University of Co ...
notes that PowerAnimator was initially chosen because its features helped animators retain the show's "homemade" look.
PowerAnimator was also used for making some of the show's visual effects,
which are now created using
Motion
In physics, motion is the phenomenon in which an object changes its position with respect to time. Motion is mathematically described in terms of displacement, distance, velocity, acceleration, speed and frame of reference to an observer and mea ...
,
a newer graphics program created by
Apple, Inc.
Apple Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Apple is the largest technology company by revenue (totaling in 2021) and, as of June 2022, is the world's biggest company b ...
for their
Mac OS X
macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...
operating system
An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware, software resources, and provides common services for computer programs.
Time-sharing operating systems schedule tasks for efficient use of the system and may also in ...
. The show's visual quality has improved in recent seasons,
though several other techniques are used to intentionally preserve the cheap cutout animation look.
A few episodes feature sections of
live-action
Live action (or live-action) is a form of cinematography or videography that uses photography instead of animation. Some works combine live-action with animation to create a live-action animated film. Live-action is used to define film, video ga ...
footage, while others have incorporated other styles of animation. Portions of the
season eight (2004) premiere "
Good Times with Weapons
"Good Times with Weapons" is episode 112 of ''South Park''. The first episode of season 8, it originally aired on March 17, 2004. In the episode, the boys are transformed into Japanese warriors after they buy martial arts weapons at a local marke ...
" are done in
anime
is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...
style, while the
season 10 episode "
Make Love, Not Warcraft
"Make Love, Not Warcraft" is the eighth episode in the tenth season of the American animated television series '' South Park''. The 147th episode overall, it first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on October 4, 2006. In the episode, na ...
" is done partly in
machinima
Machinima, originally machinema () is the use of real-time computer graphics engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation. The word "machinima" is a portmanteau of the words ''ma ...
. The
season 12 episode "
Major Boobage
Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...
", a homage to the 1981 animated film ''
Heavy Metal'', implements scenes accomplished with
rotoscoping
Rotoscoping is an animation technique that animators use to trace over motion picture footage, frame by frame, to produce realistic action. Originally, animators projected photographed live-action movie images onto a glass panel and traced ov ...
.
Voice cast
Parker and Stone voice most of the male ''South Park'' characters.
Mary Kay Bergman
Mary Kay Bergman (June 5, 1961 – November 11, 1999), also credited as Shannen Cassidy, was an American voice actress and voice-over teacher. She was the lead female voice actress on ''South Park'' from the show's 1997 debut until her death. Thr ...
voiced the majority of the female characters until her death in November 1999.
Mona Marshall
Mona Marshall is an American voice actress, known for her work in a number of cartoons, anime shows, films and video games. Her major credits include ''South Park'', where she voices many of the female characters on the show; '' Fraggle Rock: The ...
and
Eliza Schneider
Eliza Jane Schneider is an American actress, voice actress, singer, playwright, dialect coach and dialectologist. She has appeared on television and as a voice over actress on video games and animations. She also performs various musical and ...
succeeded Bergman, with Schneider leaving the show after its
seventh season (2003). She was replaced by
April Stewart
April Stewart (born April 1, 1969) is an American voice actress.
Career
Stewart is best known for providing the voices of several female characters in the animated comedy series ''South Park'' alongside fellow voice actress Mona Marshall. She i ...
, who, along with Marshall, continues to voice most of the female characters. Bergman was originally listed in the credits under the alias Shannen Cassidy to protect her reputation as the voice of several
Disney
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
and other kid-friendly characters.
Stewart was originally credited under the name Gracie Lazar, while Schneider was sometimes credited under her
rock opera
A rock opera is a collection of rock music songs with lyrics that relate to a common story. Rock operas are typically released as concept albums and are not scripted for acting, which distinguishes them from operas, although several have been ad ...
performance
pseudonym
A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person or group assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true name (orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individua ...
Blue Girl.
Other voice actors and members of ''South Park''
's production staff have voiced minor characters for various episodes, while a few staff members voice recurring characters. Supervising producer
Jennifer Howell Jennifer Howell is a Canadian senior level Film and Television Executive and Producer. She is also the voice of Bebe Stevens on the animated cartoon TV series ''South Park'' and was the show's Supervising Producer from 1997 through 2006. Howell won ...
voices student
Bebe Stevens
''South Park'' is an American animated series, animated television series created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central cable television, television network. The ongoing narrative revolves around five children, Stan Marsh, Eric Ca ...
;
co-producer and storyboard artist Adrien Beard voices
Token Black
Tolkien Black (originally known as Token Williams and Token Black) is a fictional character in the adult animated television series ''South Park''. He was originally voiced by Trey Parker, later changed to series art director, storyboard artist ...
,
who was the school's only
African-American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...
student until the introduction of Nichole in "
Cartman Finds Love
"Cartman Finds Love" is the seventh episode of the sixteenth season of the American animated sitcom ''South Park'', and the 230th episode of the series overall. It premiered on Comedy Central in the United States on April 25, 2012 and is rated TV- ...
"; writing consultant
Vernon Chatman
Vernon Chatman (born October 31, 1972) is an American television producer, writer, voice actor, stand-up comedian, musician and a member of PFFR, an art collective based in Brooklyn, New York City. He created the television series ''Wonder Showz ...
voices an
anthropomorphic
Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities. It is considered to be an innate tendency of human psychology.
Personification is the related attribution of human form and characteristics t ...
towel named
Towelie
"Towelie" is the eighth episode of the fifth season of the American animated sitcom ''South Park'', and the 73rd episode of the series overall. It originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on August 8, 2001. In the episode, the boys ...
;
and production supervisor
John Hansen voices
Mr. Slave, the former gay lover of
Mr. Garrison
Herbert Garrison, formerly known as Janet Garrison, Ethan F Garrison, and the President, is a fictional character and occasional antagonist on the American animated television series ''South Park''. The character is voiced by cocreator Trey Pa ...
.
Throughout the show's run, the voices for toddler and kindergarten characters have been provided by various small children of the show's production staff.
When voicing child characters, the voice actors speak within their normal vocal range while adding a childlike inflection. The recorded audio is then edited with
Pro Tools
Pro Tools is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed and released by Avid Technology (formerly Digidesign) for Microsoft Windows and macOS. It is used for music creation and production, sound for picture (sound design, audio post-productio ...
, and the pitch is altered to make the voice sound more like that of a fourth grader.
Isaac Hayes
Isaac Lee Hayes Jr. (August 20, 1942 – August 10, 2008) was an American singer, actor, songwriter, and composer. He was one of the creative forces behind the Southern soul music label Stax Records, where he served both as an in-house songwri ...
voiced the character of
Chef
A chef is a trained professional cook and tradesman who is proficient in all aspects of food preparation, often focusing on a particular cuisine. The word "chef" is derived from the term ''chef de cuisine'' (), the director or head of a kitche ...
, an African-American,
soul-singing cafeteria worker who was one of the few adults the boys consistently trusted.
Hayes agreed to voice the character after being among Parker and Stone's ideal candidates, which also included
Lou Rawls
Louis Allen Rawls (December 1, 1933 – January 6, 2006) was an American record producer, singer, composer and actor. Rawls released more than 60 albums, sold more than 40 million records, and had numerous charting singles, most notably his s ...
and
Barry White
Barry Eugene Carter (September 12, 1944 – July 4, 2003), better known by his stage name Barry White, was an American singer and songwriter. A two-time Grammy Award winner known for his bass voice and romantic image, his greatest success came ...
.
Hayes, who lived and hosted a radio show in New York during his tenure with ''South Park'', recorded his dialogue on a digital audio tape while a director gave directions over the phone, after which the tape would be shipped to the show's production studio in California.
After Hayes left the show in early 2006, the character of Chef was
killed off
The killing off of a character is a device in fiction, whereby a character dies, but the story continues. The term, frequently applied to television, film, video game, anime, manga and chronological series, often denotes an untimely or unexpect ...
in the
season 10 (2006) premiere "
The Return of Chef
"The Return of Chef" is the first episode in the tenth season of the American animated television series '' South Park''. The 140th episode of the series overall, it first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on March 22, 2006. The episo ...
".
Guest stars
Celebrities who are depicted on the show are usually impersonated, though some celebrities do their own voices for the show. Celebrities who have voiced themselves include
Michael Buffer
Michael Buffer (born November 2, 1944) is an American ring announcer (or " MC") for boxing, professional wrestling, and National Football League matches. He is known for his trademarked catchphrase: "Let's get ready to rumble!"
Early life
Bu ...
,
Brent Musburger
Brent Woody Musburger (born May 26, 1939) is an American sportscaster, currently the lead broadcaster and managing editor at Vegas Stats and Information Network (VSiN).
With CBS Sports from 1973 until 1990, he was one of the original members ...
,
Jay Leno
James Douglas Muir Leno (; born April 28, 1950) is an American television host, comedian, writer, and actor. After doing stand-up comedy for years, he became the host of NBC's ''The Tonight Show'' from 1992 to 2009. Beginning in September 2009 ...
,
Robert Smith,
and the bands
Radiohead
Radiohead are an English rock band formed in Abingdon, Oxfordshire, in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke (vocals, guitar, piano, keyboards); brothers Jonny Greenwood (lead guitar, keyboards, other instruments) and Colin Greenwood (bass) ...
and
Korn
Korn (stylized as KoЯn, or occasionally KoRn) is an American nu metal band from Bakersfield, California, formed in 1993. The band is notable for pioneering the nu metal genre and bringing it into the mainstream.
Originally formed in 1993 ...
.
Comedy team
Cheech & Chong
Cheech & Chong are a comedy duo consisting of Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong. The duo found commercial and cultural success in the 1970s and 1980s with their stand-up routines, studio recordings, and feature films, which were based on the hippie a ...
voiced characters representing their likenesses for the
season four
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pola ...
(2000) episode "
Cherokee Hair Tampons
"Cherokee Hair Tampons" is the sixth episode of the fourth season of the animated television series '' South Park'', and the 54th episode of the series overall. This is the season's seventh episode in production order. "Cherokee Hair Tampons" orig ...
", which was the duo's first collaborative effort in 20 years.
Malcolm McDowell
Malcolm McDowell (born Malcolm John Taylor; 13 June 1943) is a British actor, producer, and television presenter. He is best known for portraying Alex DeLarge in ''A Clockwork Orange.'' He was born in the Horsforth suburb of Leeds and raised in ...
appears in live-action sequences as the narrator of the
season four
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pola ...
episode "
Pip".
Jennifer Aniston
Jennifer Joanna Aniston (born February 11, 1969) is an American actress and film producer. She is the recipient of various accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award and two Screen Actors Guild Awards. Since her career ...
,
Richard Belzer
Richard Jay Belzer (born August 4, 1944) is a retired American actor, stand-up comedian, and author. He is best known for his role as BPD Detective, NYPD Detective/Sergeant, and DA Investigator John Munch, whom he has portrayed as a regular cast ...
,
Natasha Henstridge
Natasha Tonya Henstridge (born August 15, 1974) is a Canadian actress and model. In 1995, she came to prominence with her debut role in the science-fiction thriller ''Species'', followed by performances in ''Species II'' and ''Species III''. She ...
,
Norman Lear
Norman Milton Lear (born July 27, 1922) is an American producer and screenwriter, who has produced, written, created, or developed over 100 shows. Lear is known for many popular 1970s sitcoms, including the multi-award winning ''All in the Famil ...
, and
Peter Serafinowicz
Peter Szymon Serafinowicz ( ; born 10 July 1972) is an English actor, comedian, director and screenwriter, best known for his roles as the title character in the 2016 live-action series of ''The Tick'', Pete in ''Shaun of the Dead'' (2004) and ...
have guest starred as other speaking characters. During ''South Park''
's earliest seasons, several high-profile celebrities inquired about guest-starring on the show. As a joke, Parker and Stone responded by offering low-profile, non-speaking roles, most of which were accepted;
George Clooney
George Timothy Clooney (born May 6, 1961) is an American actor and filmmaker. He is the recipient of List of awards and nominations received by George Clooney, numerous accolades, including a British Academy Film Awards, British Academy Film A ...
provided the barks for Stan's dog Sparky in the
season one Season One may refer to:
Albums
* ''Season One'' (Suburban Legends album), 2004
* ''Season One'' (All Sons & Daughters album), 2012
* ''Season One'' (Saukrates album), 2012
See also
*
*
* Season 2 (disambiguation)
* Season 4 (disambiguat ...
(1997) episode "
Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride
"Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride" is the fourth episode of the first season of the American animated television series ''South Park''. It first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on September 3, 1997. The episode was written by series co- ...
",
Leno provided the meows for Cartman's cat in the season one finale "
Cartman's Mom Is a Dirty Slut
"Cartman's Mom Is a Dirty Slut" is the thirteenth and final episode of the first season of the American animated television series ''South Park''. It originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on February 25, 1998. The episode is the ...
",
and
Henry Winkler
Henry Franklin Winkler, OBE (born October 30, 1945), is an American actor, comedian, author, executive producer, and director. After rising to fame as Arthur "Fonzie" Fonzarelli on the American television series ''Happy Days'', Winkler has ...
voiced the various growls and grunts of a kid-eating monster in the
season two Season 2 may refer to:
* ''Season 2'' (Infinite album)
* ''2econd Season
''2econd Season'' is the second and most recent album by Atlanta-based rapper Unk.
Release
It was released on November 4, 2008.
Guest Performers
The album features gu ...
(1998) episode "
City on the Edge of Forever".
Jerry Seinfeld
Jerome Allen Seinfeld ( ; born April 29, 1954) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and producer. He is best known for playing a Jerry Seinfeld (character), semi-fictionalized version of himself in the sitcom ''Seinfeld'', which he ...
offered to lend his voice for the
Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving is a national holiday celebrated on various dates in the United States, Canada, Grenada, Saint Lucia, Liberia, and unofficially in countries like Brazil and Philippines. It is also observed in the Netherlander town of Leiden and ...
episode "
Starvin' Marvin", but declined to appear when he was only offered a role as "Turkey #2".
Music
Parker says that the varying uses of music is of utmost importance to ''South Park''.
[Arp and Broman, pp. 236–49] Several characters often play or sing songs in order to change or influence a group's behavior, or to educate, motivate, or indoctrinate others. The show also frequently features scenes in which its characters have disapproving reactions to the performances of certain popular musicians.
Adam Berry
Adam Barrett Berry (born December 3, 1966) is a two-time Emmy-winning television and film composer and a Grammy Award-winning producer and member of the new age band White Sun. He is originally from Los Angeles. Some of his credits include ''S ...
, the show's original score composer, used
sound synthesis
A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and f ...
to simulate a small orchestra, and frequently alluded to existing famous pieces of music. Berry also used signature acoustic guitar and mandolin cues as
leitmotif
A leitmotif or leitmotiv () is a "short, recurring musical phrase" associated with a particular person, place, or idea. It is closely related to the musical concepts of ''idée fixe'' or ''motto-theme''. The spelling ''leitmotif'' is an anglici ...
s for the show's establishing shots.
After Berry left in 2001, Jamie Dunlap and Scott Nickoley of the Los Angeles-based Mad City Production Studios provided the show's original music for the next seven seasons.
Since 2008, Dunlap has been credited as the show's sole score composer.
Dunlap's contributions to the show are one of the few that are not achieved at the show's own production offices. Dunlap reads a script, creates a score using digital audio software, and then e-mails the audio file to South Park Studios, where it is edited to fit with the completed episode.
In addition to singing in an effort to explain something to the children, Chef would also sing about things relevant to what had transpired in the plot. These songs were original compositions written by Parker, and they were performed by Hayes in the same sexually suggestive
R&B style he had used during his own music career. The band DVDA, which consists of Parker and Stone, along with show staff members Bruce Howell and D.A. Young, performed the music for these compositions and, until the character's death on the show, were listed as "Chef's Band" in the closing credits.
Rick James
James Ambrose Johnson Jr. (February 1, 1948 – August 6, 2004), better known by his stage name Rick James, was an American singer-songwriter, musician and record producer. Born and raised in Buffalo, New York, James began his musical career in ...
,
Elton John
Sir Elton Hercules John (born Reginald Kenneth Dwight; 25 March 1947) is a British singer, pianist and composer. Commonly nicknamed the "Rocket Man" after his 1972 hit single of the same name, John has led a commercially successful career a ...
,
Meat Loaf
Michael Lee Aday (born Marvin Lee Aday; September 27, 1947 – January 20, 2022), known professionally as Meat Loaf, was an American rock singer and actor. He was noted for his powerful, wide-ranging voice and theatrical live shows. He is on t ...
,
Joe Strummer
John Graham Mellor (21 August 1952 – 22 December 2002), known professionally as Joe Strummer, was a British singer, musician and songwriter. He was the co-founder, lyricist, rhythm guitarist and co-lead vocalist of punk rock band the Clash, ...
,
Ozzy Osbourne
John Michael "Ozzy" Osbourne (born 3 December 1948) is an English singer, songwriter, and television personality. He rose to prominence during the 1970s as the lead vocalist of the heavy metal band Black Sabbath, during which period he adop ...
,
Primus,
Rancid, and
Ween
Ween is an American rock band from New Hope, Pennsylvania, formed in 1984 by Aaron Freeman and Mickey Melchiondo, better known by their respective stage names, Gene and Dean Ween. Generally categorized as an alternative rock band, the band are ...
all guest starred and briefly performed in the
season two Season 2 may refer to:
* ''Season 2'' (Infinite album)
* ''2econd Season
''2econd Season'' is the second and most recent album by Atlanta-based rapper Unk.
Release
It was released on November 4, 2008.
Guest Performers
The album features gu ...
(1998) episode "
Chef Aid
"Chef Aid" is the fourteenth episode of the second season of the American animated television series '' South Park''. The 27th episode of the series overall, it originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on October 7, 1998. The episo ...
". Korn debuted their single "
Falling Away from Me
"Falling Away from Me" is a song by American band Korn. It was released as the first single from their fourth album '' Issues'', debuting in an episode of Comedy Central's animated series '' South Park'', entitled "Korn's Groovy Pirate Ghost My ...
" as guest stars on the
season three
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pola ...
(1999) episode "
Korn's Groovy Pirate Ghost Mystery
"Korn's Groovy Pirate Ghost Mystery" is the 10th-aired and the 12th-produced episode of the third season of the animated television series ''South Park''. It originally aired on October 27, 1999. The episode is themed around Halloween and includes ...
".
Main theme
The show's
theme song
Theme music is a musical composition that is often written specifically for radio programming, television shows, video games, or films and is usually played during the title sequence, opening credits, closing credits, and in some instances at so ...
was a musical score performed by the band
Primus, with the lyrics alternately sung by the band's lead singer,
Les Claypool
Leslie Edward Claypool (born September 29, 1963) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, filmmaker, and author. He is best known as the founder, lead singer, bassist, primary songwriter, and only continuous member of the ro ...
, and the show's four central characters during the opening title sequence. Kenny's muffled lines are altered after every few seasons. His lines are usually
sexually explicit in nature, such as his original lines, "I like girls with big fat titties, I like girls with deep vaginas".
The original unaired opening composition was originally slower and had a length of 40 seconds. It was deemed too long for the opening sequence. So Parker and Stone sped it up for the show's opening, having Claypool re-record his vocals. The
instrumental
An instrumental is a recording normally without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through semantic widening, a broader sense of the word song may refer to instru ...
version of the original composition is often played during the show's closing credits.
The opening song played in the first four seasons (and the end credits in all seasons) has a
folk rock
Folk rock is a hybrid music genre that combines the elements of folk and rock music, which arose in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom in the mid-1960s. In the U.S., folk rock emerged from the folk music revival. Performers suc ...
instrumentation with
bass guitar
The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...
,
trumpet
The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...
s and rhythmic drums. Its
beat
Beat, beats or beating may refer to:
Common uses
* Patrol, or beat, a group of personnel assigned to monitor a specific area
** Beat (police), the territory that a police officer patrols
** Gay beat, an area frequented by gay men
* Battery ( ...
is fast in the opening and leisurely in the closing credits. It is in the
minor key
In Western music, the adjectives major and minor may describe a chord, scale, or key. As such, composition, movement, section, or phrase may be referred to by its key, including whether that key is major or minor.
Intervals
Some intervals may ...
and it features a
tritone
In music theory, the tritone is defined as a musical interval composed of three adjacent whole tones (six semitones). For instance, the interval from F up to the B above it (in short, F–B) is a tritone as it can be decomposed into the three a ...
or a diminished fifth, creating a melodic
dissonance, which captures the show's surrealistic nature. In the latter parts of season 4 and season 5, the opening tune has an
arrangement with
pop qualities. Seasons 6–9 have a sprightly
bluegrass instrumentation with a usage of
banjo
The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...
and is set in the
major key
In music theory, the key of a piece is the group of pitches, or scale, that forms the basis of a musical composition in classical, Western art, and Western pop music.
The group features a '' tonic note'' and its corresponding ''chords'', al ...
. For the later seasons, the arrangement is
electro rock
Electronic rock is a music genre that involves a combination of rock music and electronic music, featuring instruments typically found within both genres. It originates from the late 1960s, when rock bands began incorporating electronic instrume ...
with a
breakbeat
Breakbeat is a broad type of electronic music that tends to use drum breaks sampled from early recordings of funk, jazz, and R&B. Breakbeats have been used in styles such as hip hop, jungle, drum and bass, big beat, breakbeat hardcore, and UK ...
influence, which feature
electric guitars
An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gui ...
backed up by
synthesized,
groovy
''Groovy'' (or, less commonly, ''groovie'' or ''groovey'') is a slang colloquialism popular during the 1950s, '60s and '70s. It is roughly synonymous with words such as "excellent", "fashionable", or "amazing", depending on context.
History
The ...
drumbeats.
The opening theme song has been remixed three times during the course of the series, including a remix performed by
Paul Robb
Paul Jason Robb is a synthesizer player, producer, songwriter and one of the founding members of the band Information Society.
Biography
Robb was a member of Information Society from its inception in the early 1980s until 1992 (after its thir ...
.
In 2006, the theme music was remixed with the song "Whamola" by
Colonel Les Claypool's Fearless Flying Frog Brigade
Colonel Les Claypool's Fearless Flying Frog Brigade (also known as The Les Claypool Frog Brigade) is a musical project with rotating personnel, led by American singer/bassist Les Claypool. The Frog Brigade was formed during a hiatus from Claypool ...
, from the album ''
Purple Onion''.
Episodes
Distribution
International
Internationally, ''South Park'' is broadcast in India, New Zealand, and several countries throughout Europe and Latin America on channels that are subsidiaries of Comedy Central and
Paramount Media Networks
Paramount Media Networks (formerly known as Warner Cable Communications, Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment, MTV Networks, Viacom Media Networks, and ViacomCBS Domestic Media Networks) is an American mass media division of Paramount Global tha ...
, both subsidiaries of Paramount.
In distribution deals with Comedy Central, other independent networks also broadcast the series in other international markets. In Australia, the show is broadcast on
The Comedy Channel
The Comedy Channel (promoted on air as comedy) is a defunct Australian subscription television channel available on Foxtel, and Optus Television. The channel ceased broadcasting on 1 September 2020.
History
A joint venture between Artist Servi ...
,
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American basic cable channel owned by Paramount Global through its network division's MTV Entertainment Group unit, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared towards young adults aged 18–34 and carries comedy programming ...
and
free-to-air
Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the FTA Receiver, appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring ...
channel
SBS Viceland
SBS Viceland (stylised as SBS VICELAND) is an Australian free-to-air television channel owned by the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS). It began as SBS TWO on 1 June 2009, and was branded as SBS 2 between 2013 and 2016. On 8 April 2017, SBS ...
(before 2009), while new episodes aired on
SBS. The program also airs free-to-air in Australia on
10 Shake
10 Shake is an Australian free-to-air digital television multichannel owned by Network 10. It launched on 27 September 2020 at 6am.
The channel includes a mix of shows for people aged forty and under. It broadcasts programming for children fro ...
, a sister network to Comedy Central through Paramount. The series is broadcast uncensored in Canada in English on
The Comedy Network
CTV Comedy Channel (often shortened to CTV Comedy and formerly known as The Comedy Network) is a Canadian English-language specialty channel owned by Bell Media which focuses primarily on comedy programming. The channel first launched on Octo ...
and, later,
Much. The series was formerly broadcast on
Global
Global means of or referring to a globe and may also refer to:
Entertainment
* ''Global'' (Paul van Dyk album), 2003
* ''Global'' (Bunji Garlin album), 2007
* ''Global'' (Humanoid album), 1989
* ''Global'' (Todd Rundgren album), 2015
* Bruno ...
. ''South Park'' also airs in Irish on
TG4
TG4 ( ga, TG Ceathair, ) is an Irish free-to-air public service television network. The channel launched on 31 October 1996 and is available online and through its on demand service TG4 Player in Ireland and beyond.
TG4 was formerly known ...
in Ireland,
STV in Scotland,
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American basic cable channel owned by Paramount Global through its network division's MTV Entertainment Group unit, based in Manhattan. The channel is geared towards young adults aged 18–34 and carries comedy programming ...
and
MTV
MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...
in the UK (previously on
Sky One
Sky One was a British pay television channel operated and owned by Sky Group (a division of Comcast). Originally launched on 26 April 1982 as Satellite Television, it was Europe's first satellite and non-terrestrial channel. From 31 July 1989, ...
,
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...
,
VIVA
Viva may refer to:
Companies and organisations
* Viva (network operator), a Dominican mobile network operator
* Viva Air, a Spanish airline taken over by flag carrier Iberia
* Viva Air Dominicana
* VIVA Bahrain, a telecommunication company
* ...
and
5Star
5Star (stylized as 5STAR) is a British free-to-air television channel owned by Paramount Networks UK & Australia and a sister channel of Channel 5. It originally launched as the female-orientated Five Life on 15 October 2006, and was relaunch ...
),
B92
RTV B92, or simply B92 (stylized as b92, formerly BΞ92 and B 92), is a Serbian news station and broadcaster with national coverage headquartered in Belgrade.
Founded in 1989 as radio station, it was a rare outlet for Western news and informat ...
in
Serbia
Serbia (, ; Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe, Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Bas ...
, and on
Game One
Game One is a French television channel owned by Paramount Networks EMEAA. The channel shows several programs based on video gaming. It also airs Japanese anime on a regular basis, such as ''Fairy Tail'', ''Naruto'', '' Naruto: Shippuden'', ''D ...
and
NRJ 12
NRJ 12 is a French private public-state general-interest television channel belonging to the NRJ Group, created on 31 March 2005 on DTT. The channel is available on DTT, cable, satellite and ADSL.
History of the channel
Originally called NRJ TV ...
in
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
. In September 2020, SBS, which aired South Park in Australia since 1997, removed South Park from its television line-up, though reruns could air on SBS Viceland.
Syndication
Broadcast syndication
Broadcast syndication is the practice of leasing the right to broadcasting television shows and radio programs to multiple television stations and radio stations, without going through a broadcast network. It is common in the United States where ...
rights to ''South Park'' were acquired by
Debmar-Mercury
Debmar-Mercury is a television syndication company. A wholly-owned subsidiary of Lionsgate, it was formed from a merger of Debmar Studios and Mercury Entertainment in 2006.
History Debmar Studios
Debmar-Mercury's history begins on October 31, ...
and
Tribune Entertainment
Tribune Entertainment (formerly Mid-America Video Tape Productions, WGN Continental Productions, Tribune Productions and Tribune Entertainment Company) was a television production and broadcast syndication company owned and operated by Tribune Br ...
in 2003 and 2004 respectively.
Episodes further edited for content began running in syndication on September 19, 2005, and are aired in the United States with the
TV-14
The TV Parental Guidelines are a television content rating system in the United States that was first proposed on December 19, 1996, by the United States Congress, the television industry and the federal communication commission (FCC), and went ...
rating.
20th Television
20th Television (formerly 20th Century Fox Television, 20th Century-Fox Television, and TCF Television Productions, Inc.) is an American television production company that is a division of Disney Television Studios, part of The Walt Disney Compa ...
replaced Tribune as co-distributor in early 2008. The series is currently aired in syndication in 90 percent of the television markets across the U.S. and Canada, where it generates an estimated US$25 million a year in advertising revenue. In 2019,
CBS Television Distribution
CBS Media Ventures, Inc. (formerly CBS Television Distribution, Inc. and CBS Paramount Domestic Television, Inc.) is an American television distribution company owned by CBS Studios, part of CBS Entertainment Group, a division of Paramount Glob ...
(the syndication arm of ViacomCBS, now known as
Paramount Global
Paramount Global (doing business as Paramount) is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate owned and operated by National Amusements (79.4%) and headquartered at One Astor Plaza in Midtown Manhattan, New York. I ...
), took over the full distribution rights following the acquisition of
21st Century Fox
Twenty-First Century Fox, Inc., doing business as 21st Century Fox (21CF), was an American multinational mass media corporation that was based in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It was one of the two companies formed on June 28, 2013, f ...
(parent of 20th Television) by
The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
(who had employed Debmar-Mercury founder Mort Marcus as the head of their
syndication division), distributing the show in syndication.
Home media
Complete seasons of ''South Park'' have been regularly released in their entirety on DVD since 2002, with
season twenty-three being the most recently released. Several other themed DVD compilations have been released by
Rhino Entertainment
Rhino Entertainment Company is an American specialty record label and production company founded in 1978. It is currently the catalog division for Warner Music Group. Its current CEO is Mark Pinkus.
History
Founded in 1978, Rhino was original ...
and Comedy Central, while the three-episode ''
Imaginationland''
story arc
A story arc (also narrative arc) is the chronological construction of plot in a novel or story. It can also mean an extended or continuing storyline in episodic storytelling media such as television, comic books, comic strips, board games, vide ...
was reissued
straight-to-DVD
Direct-to-video or straight-to-video refers to the release of a film, TV series, short or special to the public immediately on home video formats rather than an initial theatrical release or television premiere. This distribution strategy was p ...
as a full-length feature in 2008.
Blu-ray
The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of sto ...
releases started in 2008 with the release of
season twelve. Subsequent seasons have been released in this format alongside the longer-running DVD releases. The first eleven seasons were released on Blu-ray for the first time in December 2017.
Streaming
In March 2008, Comedy Central made every episode of ''South Park'' available for free full-length
on-demand legal streaming on the official South Park Studios website.
From March 2008 until December 2013 new episodes were added to the site the day following their debut, and an uncensored version was posted the following day. The episode stayed up for the remainder of the week, then taken down, and added to the site three weeks later.
Within a week, the site served more than a million streams of full episodes,
and the number grew to 55 million by October 2008. Legal issues prevent the U.S. content from being accessible outside the U.S., so local servers have been set up in other countries. In September 2009, a South Park Studios website with streaming episodes was launched in the UK and Ireland. In Canada, episodes were available for streaming from The Comedy Network's website, though due to digital rights restrictions, they are no longer available.
In July 2014 it was announced that
Hulu
Hulu () is an American subscription streaming service majority-owned by The Walt Disney Company, with Comcast's NBCUniversal holding a minority stake. It was launched on October 29, 2007 and it offers a library of films and television serie ...
had signed a three-year deal purchasing exclusive online streaming rights to the ''South Park'' for a reported $80 million. Following the announcement every episode remained available for free on the South Park Studios website, using the Hulu
player
Player may refer to:
Role or adjective
* Player (game), a participant in a game or sport
** Gamer, a player in video and tabletop games
** Athlete, a player in sports
** Player character, a character in a video game or role playing game who is ...
. As of September 2014, following the premiere of the eighteenth season, only 30 select episodes would be featured for free viewing at a time on a rotating basis on the website, with new episodes being available for an entire month starting the day following their original airings. The entire series was available on Hulu by this point.
In April 2010, the season five episode "
Super Best Friends
"Super Best Friends" is the third episode of the fifth season of the American animated television series '' South Park'' and the 68th episode of the series overall. Going by production order, it is the 4th episode of Season 5 instead of the 3rd. ...
" and the season fourteen episodes "
200
__NOTOC__
Year 200 ( CC) was a leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Severus and Victorinus (or, less frequently, year 953 '' Ab ur ...
" and "
201
Year 201 ( CCI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Fabianus and Arrius (or, less frequently, year 954 '' Ab urbe condi ...
" were removed from the site; additionally, these episodes no longer air in reruns and are only available exclusively on DVD and Blu-ray. These episodes remain unavailable following the 2014 purchase by Hulu.
As of July 1, 2015, all episodes of ''South Park'' are available for streaming in Canada on the service
CraveTV
Crave (initially named CraveTV) is a Canadian subscription video on demand service owned by Bell Media. The service competes directly with other subscription-based over-the-top streaming services operating in Canada, primarily American-based se ...
, which first consisted of seasons 1–18. Subsequent seasons were released the following July.
In early October 2019, industry rumors suggested that the streaming rights for ''South Park'' were being offered to various services, creating an intense bidding war that was estimated to be as high as . HBO and South Park Digital Studios announced that HBO had secured a multi-year deal for the exclusive streaming rights for ''South Park'' on their
HBO Max
HBO Max is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in the United States on May 27, 2020, the service is built around the libraries of HBO, Warner Bros., Cartoon Netw ...
service starting June 24, 2020. While the terms of the deal were not disclosed, ''Variety'' reported the deal fell between and . Beginning with season 25 in 2022, HBO Max posts new episodes next day after their Comedy Central airing. Once that deal expires in 2025,
Paramount+
Paramount (from the word ''paramount'' meaning "above all others") may refer to:
Entertainment and music companies
* Paramount Global, also known simply as Paramount, an American mass media company formerly known as ViacomCBS. The following busin ...
will become the exclusive streaming home. In addition, the season 27 episodes in 2024 would stream first on Paramount+ before hitting HBO Max.
Re-rendered episodes
From its debut in 1997 to the
season twelve finale in 2008 the series had been originally produced in
standard definition
Standard-definition television (SDTV, SD, often shortened to standard definition) is a television system which uses a resolution that is not considered to be either high or enhanced definition. "Standard" refers to it being the prevailing sp ...
, with a
4:3 aspect ratio. In 2009, the series switched to being produced in
16:9 high definition 1080p
1080p (1920×1080 progressively displayed pixels; also known as Full HD or FHD, and BT.709) is a set of HDTV high-definition video modes characterized by 1,920 pixels displayed across the screen horizontally and 1,080 pixels down the screen vert ...
with the beginning of the
thirteenth season.
Since this, all twelve seasons originally produced in standard definition have been
remaster
Remaster refers to changing the quality of the sound or of the image, or both, of previously created recordings, either audiophonic, cinematic, or videographic. The terms digital remastering and digitally remastered are also used.
Mastering
A ...
ed by South Park Studios, being fully
re-rendered in high definition. The aspect ratio of these episodes were also converted from 4:3 to 16:9 as well.
The re-rendered versions were also released on Blu-ray. Several of the re-rendered episodes from the earlier seasons have their original uncensored audio tracks; they had previously been released in censored form.
The fifth-season episode "
Super Best Friends
"Super Best Friends" is the third episode of the fifth season of the American animated television series '' South Park'' and the 68th episode of the series overall. Going by production order, it is the 4th episode of Season 5 instead of the 3rd. ...
", which was pulled from syndication and online streams following the
controversy surrounding episode "201", was not released alongside the rest of the season when it was released in HD on iTunes in 2011. The episode was later re-rendered and made available for the Blu-ray release of the season that was released on December 5, 2017. The episode is presented in its original presentation, without Muhammad's image being obscured as in later episodes of the series.
Reception
Ratings
When ''South Park'' debuted, it was a huge ratings success for Comedy Central and is seen as being largely responsible for the success of the channel, with Herzog crediting it for putting the network "on the map".
The show's first episode, "
Cartman Gets an Anal Probe
"Cartman Gets an Anal Probe" is the series premiere of the American animated television series ''South Park''. It first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on August 13, 1997. The episode introduces child protagonists Eric Cartman, Kyle B ...
", earned a
Nielsen rating of 1.3 (980,000 viewers), at the time considered high for a
cable program.
The show instantly generated buzz among television viewers, and mass viewing parties began assembling on college campuses.
By the time the eighth episode, "
Starvin' Marvin", aired — three months after the show debuted — ratings and viewership had tripled, and ''South Park'' was already the most successful show in Comedy Central's history.
When the tenth episode "
Damien
Damien is a given name and less frequently a surname.
The name is a variation of Damian (given name), Damian which comes from the Greek ''Damianos''. This form originates from the Greek derived from the Greek word δαμάζω (damazō), "(I) con ...
" aired the following February, viewership increased another 33 percent. The episode earned a 6.4 rating, which at the time was over 10 times the average rating earned by a cable show aired in
prime time
Prime time or the peak time is the block of broadcast programming taking place during the middle of the evening for a television show. It is mostly targeted towards adults (and sometimes families). It is used by the major television networks to ...
.
The ratings peaked with the second episode of
season two Season 2 may refer to:
* ''Season 2'' (Infinite album)
* ''2econd Season
''2econd Season'' is the second and most recent album by Atlanta-based rapper Unk.
Release
It was released on November 4, 2008.
Guest Performers
The album features gu ...
, "
Cartman's Mom Is Still a Dirty Slut
"Cartman's Mom Is Still a Dirty Slut" is the second episode of the second season of the American animated television series ''South Park''. The 15th episode of the series overall, it premiered on Comedy Central in the United States on April 22, 1 ...
", which aired on April 22, 1998. The episode earned an 8.2 rating (6.2 million viewers) and, at the time, set a record as the highest-rated non-sports show in basic cable history.
During the spring of 1998, eight of the ten highest-rated shows on basic cable were ''South Park'' episodes.
''South Park's'' second season would average an 5.8 rating (12.5 million viewers) which was a lower rating due to Comedy Central's households being much higher.
The success of ''South Park'' prompted more cable companies to carry Comedy Central and led it to its becoming one of the fastest-growing cable channels. The number of households that had Comedy Central jumped from 9.1 million in 1997 to 50 million in June 1998.
When the show debuted, the most Comedy Central had earned for a 30-second commercial was US$7,500.
Within a year, advertisers were paying an average of US$40,000 for 30 seconds of advertising time during airings of ''South Park'' in its second season, while some paid as much as US$80,000.
By the third season (1999), the series' ratings began to decrease. The third-season premiere episode drew 3.4 million viewers, a dramatic drop from the 5.5 million of the previous season's premiere.
Stone and Parker attributed this drop in the show's ratings to the media hype that surrounded the show in the previous year, adding that the third season ratings reflected the show's "true" fan base.
Regardless the viewership stayed consistent with an average rating being between 3.0 (8 million viewers) to a 5.5 (17.5 million viewers). The show's ratings dropped further in its fourth season (2000), with episodes averaging just above 1.5 million viewers (though the season premiere would get 22.1 million viewers due to the hype caused by the movie). The ratings eventually increased, and seasons five through nine consistently averaged about 3 million viewers per episode.
Season 8's episode Goobacks would have South Park's viewership peak at 30 million viewers. Seasons 10 to 12 would average 5 million viewers. Though its viewership is lower than it was at the height of its popularity in its earliest seasons, ''South Park'' remains one of the highest-rated series on Comedy Central. The
season 14 (2010) premiere gained 3.7 million viewers, the show's highest-rated season premiere since 1998. In 2016, a ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' study of the 50 TV shows with the most
Facebook Like
The like button on the social networking website Facebook was first enabled on February 9, 2009. The like button enables users to easily interact with status updates, comments, photos and videos, links shared by friends, and advertisements. Onc ...
s found that "perhaps unsurprisingly, South Park ... is most popular in Colorado".
More recent seasons have seen substantially lower ratings, with Season 25 averaging 0.65 million viewers an episode.
Recognitions and awards
In 2004,
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...
voted ''South Park'' the third-greatest cartoon of all time.
In 2007, ''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' magazine included the show on its list of the "100 Best TV Shows of All Time", proclaiming it as "America's best source of rapid-fire satire for
he past
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
decade". The same year, ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
'' declared it to be the funniest show on television since its debut 10 years prior. In 2008, ''South Park'' was named the 12th-greatest TV show of the past 25 years by ''
Entertainment Weekly
''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cul ...
'', while
AOL
AOL (stylized as Aol., formerly a company known as AOL Inc. and originally known as America Online) is an American web portal and online service provider based in New York City. It is a brand marketed by the current incarnation of Yahoo (2017 ...
declared it as having the "most astute" characters of any show in history when naming it the 16th-best television comedy series of all time. In 2011, ''South Park'' was voted number one in the ''25 Greatest Animated TV Series'' poll by ''Entertainment Weekly''. The character of Cartman ranked 10th on
TV Guide
TV Guide is an American digital media company that provides television program
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or t ...
's 2002 list of the "Top 50 Greatest Cartoon Characters",
198th on
VH1
VH1 (originally an initialism of Video Hits One) is an American basic cable television network based in New York City and owned by Paramount Global. It was created by Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment, at the time a division of Warner Commun ...
's "200 Greatest Pop Culture Icons",
19th on
Bravo
Bravo(s) or The Bravo(s) may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Music Groups and labels
*Bravo (band), a Russian rock band
* Bravo (Spanish group), represented Spain at Eurovision 1984
*Bravo Music, an American concert band music publishing company ...
's "100 Greatest TV Characters" television special in 2004, and second on
MSNBC
MSNBC (originally the Microsoft National Broadcasting Company) is an American news-based pay television cable channel. It is owned by NBCUniversala subsidiary of Comcast. Headquartered in New York City, it provides news coverage and political ...
's 2005 list of TV's scariest characters behind
Mr. Burns
Charles Montgomery Plantagenet Schicklgruber "Monty" Burns, usually referred to as Mr. Burns, Monty, or C. Montgomery Burns, is a recurring character and the main antagonist of the animated television series ''The Simpsons'', voiced initially by ...
from ''The Simpsons''.
In 2006, Comedy Central received a
Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Peabody, honor the most powerful, enlightening, and invigorating stories in television, radio, and ...
for ''South Park''
's "stringent social commentary" and "undeniably fearless lampooning of all that is self-important and hypocritical in American life".
In 2013, the
Writers Guild of America
The Writers Guild of America is the joint efforts of two different US labor unions representing TV and film writers:
* The Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE), headquartered in New York City and affiliated with the AFL–CIO
* The Writers Guil ...
ranked ''South Park'' at number 63 among the "101 Best-Written Shows Ever". Also in 2013, TV Guide listed the show at number 10 among the "60 Greatest Cartoons of All Time". In 2019, the series was ranked 42nd on ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' newspaper's list of the 100 best TV shows of the 21st century.
''South Park'' won the CableACE Award for Best Animated Series in 1997, the last year the awards were given out. In 1998, ''South Park'' was nominated for the Annie Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Primetime or Late Night Television Program. It was also nominated for the 1998 GLAAD Media Awards, GLAAD Award for Outstanding TV – Individual Episode for "
Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride
"Big Gay Al's Big Gay Boat Ride" is the fourth episode of the first season of the American animated television series ''South Park''. It first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on September 3, 1997. The episode was written by series co- ...
".
''South Park'' has been nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour), Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program sixteen times (1998, 2000, 2002, 2004–2011, and 2013–2017). The show has won the award for Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming Less Than One Hour) four times, for the 2005 episode "
Best Friends Forever
"Best friends forever" is a phrase that describes a close friendship. It is sometimes written as an initialism, "BFF".
Definition
A BFF is a term for someone's best friend or close friend and is characterized by trust and permanence, irrespectiv ...
",
the 2006 episode "
Make Love, Not Warcraft
"Make Love, Not Warcraft" is the eighth episode in the tenth season of the American animated television series '' South Park''. The 147th episode overall, it first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on October 4, 2006. In the episode, na ...
", the 2009 episode "Margaritaville (South Park), Margaritaville", and the 2012 episode "Raising the Bar (South Park), Raising the Bar". The "Imaginationland Episode I, Imaginationland" trilogy of episodes won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming One Hour or More) in 2008.
Criticism
The show's frequent depiction of taboo subject matter, general toilet humor, accessibility to younger viewers, disregard for conservative sensibilities, negative depiction of Modern liberalism in the United States, liberal causes, and portrayal of religion for comic effect have generated controversy and debate over the course of its run.
As the series became popular, students in two schools were barred from wearing ''South Park''-related T-shirts,
and the headmaster of a Public school (United Kingdom), UK public school asked parents not to let their children watch the programme after eight- and nine-year-old children voted the ''South Park'' character Cartman as their favorite personality in a 1999 poll.
Parker and Stone assert that the show is not meant to be viewed by young children, and the show is certified with TV ratings that indicate its intention for mature audiences.
Parents Television Council founder L. Brent Bozell III and Action for Children's Television founder Peggy Charren have both condemned the show, with the latter claiming it is "dangerous to the democracy".
Several other activist groups have protested the show's parodies of Christianity and portrayal of Jesus, Jesus Christ.
Stone has stated that parents who disapprove of ''South Park'' for its portrayal of how kids behave are upset because they "have an idyllic vision of what kids are like", adding "[kids] don't have any kind of social tact or etiquette, they're just complete little raging bastards".
Controversies
The show further lampooned the controversy surrounding its use of profanity, as well as the media attention surrounding the network show ''Chicago Hope''
's singular use of the word ''shit'', with the
season five
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pola ...
premiere "It Hits the Fan",
in which the word ''shit'' is said 162 times without being bleeped for censorship purposes, while also appearing uncensored in written form.
In the days following the show's original airing, 5,000 disapproving e-mails were sent to Comedy Central.
Despite its 43 uncensored uses of the racial slur ''nigger'', the South Park (season 11), season 11 episode "With Apologies to Jesse Jackson" generated relatively little controversy, as most in the black community and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, NAACP praised the episode for its context and its comedic way of conveying other races' perceptions of how black people feel when hearing the word.
Specific controversies regarding the show have included an April Fools' Day prank played on its viewers in 1998, its depiction of the Mary (mother of Jesus), Virgin Mary in the
season nine
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...
(2005) finale "Bloody Mary (South Park), Bloody Mary" that angered several Catholicism, Catholics,
its depiction of Steve Irwin with a stingray barb stuck in his chest in the episode "Hell on Earth 2006", which originally aired less than two months after Irwin was killed in the same fashion,
Comedy Central's censorship of the depiction of Muhammad in the
season 10 episode "Cartoon Wars Part II" in the wake of the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy, ''Jyllands-Posten'' Muhammad cartoons controversy
and consistent mockery of the concept of climate change by using climate change denialist talking points.
The
season nine
A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...
(2005) episode "Trapped in the Closet (South Park), Trapped in the Closet" denounces Scientology as nothing more than "a big fat global scam",
while freely divulging church information that Scientology normally only reveals to members who make significant monetary contributions to the church. The episode also ambiguously parodies the rumors involving the sexual orientation of Scientologist Tom Cruise, who allegedly demanded any further reruns of the episode be canceled.
Isaac Hayes
Isaac Lee Hayes Jr. (August 20, 1942 – August 10, 2008) was an American singer, actor, songwriter, and composer. He was one of the creative forces behind the Southern soul music label Stax Records, where he served both as an in-house songwri ...
, a Scientologist, later quit ''South Park'' because of his objection to the episode.
The season fourteen episodes "
200
__NOTOC__
Year 200 ( CC) was a leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Severus and Victorinus (or, less frequently, year 953 '' Ab ur ...
" and "
201
Year 201 ( CCI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Fabianus and Arrius (or, less frequently, year 954 '' Ab urbe condi ...
" were mired in controversy for satirizing issues surrounding the depiction of the Islamic prophet, Muhammad. The website for the organization Revolution Muslim, a New York-based radical Muslim organization, posted an entry that included a warning to creators Parker and Stone that they risk violent retribution for their depictions of Muhammad. It said that they "will probably wind up like Theo van Gogh (film director), Theo van Gogh for airing this show". The posting provided the addresses to Comedy Central in New York and the production company in Los Angeles. The author of the post, Zachary Adam Chesser (whose alias is Abu Talhah al-Amrikee), said it was meant to serve as a warning to Parker and Stone, not a threat, and that providing the addresses was meant to give people the opportunity to protest.
Despite Chesser's claims that the website entry was a warning, several media outlets and observers interpreted it as a threat.
Support for the episode has come in the form of Everybody Draw Mohammed Day, a movement started on Facebook that encourages people to draw Muhammad on May 20. The "200" episode, which also depicted Gautama Buddha, the Buddha snorting cocaine, prompted the government of Sri Lanka to ban the series outright.
Due to many taboo topics in China, such as 14th Dalai Lama, Dalai Lama, Winnie-the-Pooh#Censorship in China, Winnie the Pooh, summary execution, cannabis culture, and Organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China, organ harvesting being involved in the South Park (season 23), season 23 (2019) episode "Band in China," ''South Park'' was entirely banned in China after the episode's broadcast. The series' Baidu Baike article, Baidu Tieba forum, Douban page, Zhihu page and Bilibili videos have been deleted or inaccessible to the public, all related keywords and topics have been prohibited from being searched and discussed on China-based search engines and social media sites including Baidu, Tencent QQ, QQ, Sina Weibo and on WeChat public platforms.
Parker and Stone issued a sarcastic apology in response.
Influence and legacy
Cultural
Commentary made in episodes has been interpreted as statements Parker and Stone are attempting to make to the viewing public,
and these opinions have been subject to much critical analysis in the media and literary world within the framework of popular philosophical, theological, social, and political concepts.
Since ''South Park'' debuted, college students have written term papers and doctoral theses analyzing the show,
while Brooklyn College offers a course called "''South Park'' and Political Correctness".
Soon after one of Kenny's trademark deaths on the show, other characters would typically shout "Oh my God, they killed Kenny!", followed by another yelling out "You bastard(s)!"—these lines were usually said by the characters Stan and Kyle, respectively. The exclamation quickly became a popular catchphrase,
while the running gag of Kenny's recurring deaths is one of the more recognized hallmarks among viewers of modern television.
Cartman's exclamations of "Respect my authori-tah!" and "Screw you guys ...I'm going home!" became catchphrases as well, and during the show's earlier seasons, were highly popular in the lexicon of viewers.
Cartman's eccentric intonation of "Hey!" was included in the 2002 edition of ''The Oxford Dictionary of Catchphrases''.
In the
season two Season 2 may refer to:
* ''Season 2'' (Infinite album)
* ''2econd Season
''2econd Season'' is the second and most recent album by Atlanta-based rapper Unk.
Release
It was released on November 4, 2008.
Guest Performers
The album features gu ...
episode "
Chef Aid
"Chef Aid" is the fourteenth episode of the second season of the American animated television series '' South Park''. The 27th episode of the series overall, it originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on October 7, 1998. The episo ...
", attorney Johnnie Cochran uses what's called in the show the Chewbacca defense, which is a legal strategy that involves addressing plot holes related to Chewbacca in the film ''Return of the Jedi'' rather than discussing the trial at hand during a closing argument in a deliberate attempt to confuse jurors into thinking there is reasonable doubt. The term "Chewbacca defense" has been documented as being used by criminologists, forensic scientists, and political commentators in their various discussions of similar methods used in legal cases and public forums.
Another season two episode, "Gnomes (South Park), Gnomes", revolves around a group of "underpants gnomes" who, as their name suggests, run a corporation stealing people's underpants. When asked about their business model, various gnomes reply that theirs is a three-step process: Phase 1 is "collect underpants". Phase 3 is "profit". However, the gnomes are unable to explain what is to occur between the first and final steps, and "Phase 2" is accompanied by a large question mark on their corporate flow chart. Using "????" and "PROFIT!" as the last two steps in a process (usually jokingly) has become a widely popular Internet meme because of this. Especially in the context of politics and economics, "underpants gnomes" has been used by some commentators to characterize a conspicuous gap of logic or planning.
When Sophie Rutschmann of the University of Strasbourg discovered a mutated gene that causes an adult Drosophila melanogaster, fruit fly to die within two days after it is infected with certain bacteria, she named the gene ''kep1'' in honor of Kenny.
Political
While some Conservatism in the United States, conservatives have condemned ''South Park'' for its vulgarity, a growing population of people who hold Centre-right politics, center-right political beliefs, including teenagers and young adults, have embraced the show for its tendency to mock Modern liberalism in the United States, liberal viewpoints and lampoon liberal celebrities and icons.
Pundit, Political commentator Andrew Sullivan dubbed the group South Park Republican, ''South Park'' Republicans, or ''South Park'' conservatives.
Sullivan averred that members of the group are "extremely skeptical of political correctness but also are socially liberal on many issues", though he says the phrase applied to them is meant to be more of a casual indication of beliefs than a strong partisan label.
Brian C. Anderson describes the group as "generally characterized by holding strong Libertarianism in the United States, libertarian beliefs and rejecting more conservative social policy", and notes that although the show makes "wicked fun of conservatives", it is "at the forefront of a conservative revolt against liberal media" and Hollywood's "liberal hegemony."
[
Parker and Stone reject the idea that the show has any underlying political position, and deny having a political agenda when creating an episode.][Matt Stone & Trey Parker Are Not Your Political Allies (No Matter What You Believe)](_blank)
by Alex Leo, ''HuffPost'', February 25, 2010. Retrieved February 21, 2022
The two claim the show's higher proportion of instances lampooning liberal rather than conservative orthodoxies stems simply from their preference for making fun of liberals. While Stone has been quoted saying, "I hate conservatives, but I really fucking hate liberals", Stone and Parker have explained that their drive to lampoon a given target comes first from the target's insistence on telling other people how to behave. The duo explain that they regard liberals as having both delusions of entitlement to remain free from satire, and a propensity to enforce political correctness while patronizing the citizens of Middle America (United States), Middle America. Parker and Stone are uncomfortable with the idea of themselves or ''South Park'' being assigned any kind of Partisan (politics), partisan classification. Parker said he rejects the "''South Park'' Republican" and "''South Park'' conservative" labels, feeling that either tag implies that one only adheres to strictly conservative or liberal viewpoints. The duo has in the past reluctantly labeled themselves libertarians and fans of Gridlock (politics), government gridlock. In 2006, they said that they were "rooting for Hillary Clinton in 2008 simply because it would be weird to have her as president."
Franchise
References
Further Reading
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Nye, Sean
"From Punk to the Musical: South Park, Music, and the Cartoon Format,"
in Music in Television: Channels of Listening, ed. James Deaville (London: Routledge, 2011): 143–64.
*
External links
*
*
*
''South Park''
on Metacritic
''South Park''
on Rotten Tomatoes
*
''South Park''
at Don Markstein's Toonopedia.
{{Authority control
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