Original air date: 9/26/2018
Sharon is overreacting to everything these days and Randy can’t cope. Randy is desperate to help Sharon get her emotions under control and Cartman unexpectedly fails his math test.
Tropes:
- An Aesop: If major incidents involving people getting harmed (such as school shootings) are becoming a common occurrence, you should try to find a way to stop it or at least fight against it, rather than just allowing it to continue.
- Adults Are Useless: Deconstructed. Everyone's dismissal of the shootings is treated seriously by Sharon.
- All Periods Are PMS: Randy sincerely believes that Sharon's hormones are the only reason that she's getting so worked up over school shootings.
- Apathetic Citizens: Except for Sharon, nobody is concerned about the school shootings in South Park Elementary.
- A-Team Firing: No one except for one of the women bringing Sharon to the school gets hit in the hail of bullets when Randy's singing to her. Even then, she's only lightly wounded, with a bandaged-up arm, and is nonchalant about it.
- Bait-and-Switch: When Randy is complaining about Sharon’s supposedly being on her period and acting irrationally, Stephen sternly asks if Randy had ever considered if what’s going on is more serious than a period... menopause.
- Bittersweet Ending: The end of the episode sees Sharon apologize to Randy and become just as desensitized to the horror of school shootings as everyone else has, leading them to reconcile with each other. Cue her getting a call that Stan has been shot, much to the indifference of her and Randy.
- Call-Back:
- The kids having access to guns could be a reference to the Season 19 episode "PC Principal Final Justice".
- Cartman asking Nichole why she broke up with Tolkien could also be a reference to the girls' school-wide breakup in Season 20's episode "Skank Hunt".
- Can't Take Criticism: When Sharon calls out Randy for being insensitive towards the school shootings, he pathetically bursts into tears and starts Playing the Victim Card.
- Cliffhanger: Stan gets shot at the end. Fortunately, the next episode reveals that he is alive, having only been shot in the arm.
- Conditioned to Accept Horror: School shootings have become so commonplace that everyone except Sharon barely acknowledges them. Even Sharon ends up just as desensitized to the point that Stan getting shot gets little to no reaction from her.
- Continuity Nod: It is revealed that the Gender War is largely over since skankhunt42 went silent, and the couples are slowly but surely realizing the whole thing was stupid and getting back together.
- A Day in the Limelight: This is the first episode in a while where Sharon is a main focus.
- Dissonant Serenity: With the exception of Sharon, everyone seems to be indifferent to the common school shootings.
- Dramatically Missing the Point: Sharon tells the townsfolk she wants them to be sad or angry, as in she wants them to care about the school shootings. Of course, being the complete idiots they are, they misinterpret it as Sharon trying to be a killjoy.
- Enraged by Idiocy: Sharon becomes outraged over the townsfolk ignoring the school shootings.
- Foreshadowing: Sharon mentions that she's deep down just anxiously waiting for the day she gets a call that Stan or Shelly has been shot. She gets that call at the end of the episode.
- Gaslighting: The entire town ends up successfully (if unknowingly) doing this to Sharon, convincing her that her very reasonable reaction (that is to say, reacting at all) to multiple incidents of gun violence at South Park Elementary are unhinged and crazy.
- Given Name Reveal: Mrs. Biggle's (Henrietta and Bradley's mother) name is revealed to be Harriet.
- The Ghost: Despite the school shootings being the focus of the episode, we never actually see the school shooters themselves, only the bullets that are being fired.
- Hard Truth Aesop: No matter how much you try to preach something, it still may not be able to change anything. It's sometimes better to just accept it.
- Hypocrite: The residents of South Park, in spades (albeit from of a lack of self-awareness due to their idiocy):
- They claim Sharon is making a big deal out of everything, while they all make a big deal out of her allegedly experiencing her period or menopausenote .
- They feel No Sympathy for Sharon being anxious over the school shootings, yet they urge her to feel sympathy for Randy when he's being pathetic.
- They vilify Sharon for "believing they all should be sad", even though they were completely unsympathetic towards her being sad over the school shootings.
- Insane Troll Logic:
- Randy and the others believe the actual reason Sharon is so anxious about the school shootings is because she is experiencing her period or, even worse, menopause.
- Cartman believes Tolkien not letting him cheat off his math test has something to do with Tolkien apparently disliking Black Panther (2018).
- It's All About Me: Randy doesn't want to stop Sharon's outbursts because he's concerned for her well-being, but so he can stop getting yelled at.
- Jerkass: Randy, who treats Sharon like crap and manipulates the townspeople into siding with him.
- Laborious Laziness: Cartman goes to a lot of trouble to blackmail Tolkien into letting him cheat off him in the math test rather than simply studying for it himself. Tolkien lampshades this at one point.
- Made Out to Be a Jerkass: When Sharon furiously chews out Randy for not taking the school shootings seriously, the townsfolk get on her case for it and take Randy's side, and then storm off.
- Moral Myopia: Randy is utterly callous to Sharon's feelings, but when she starts yelling at him for it, he acts as if he deserves pity.
- No Sympathy: The townspeople behave this way towards Sharon, instead demanding her to feel bad for Randy.
- Only Sane Woman: Sharon is the only one of the parents who has not become desensitized to school shootings and wants to do something to prevent them in the future.
- Playing the Victim Card: Randy acts as if he's the victim of Sharon's emotional outbursts, ignoring Sharon's concerns that their children could get shot up in school. The entire town agrees with him.
- Refuge in Audacity: There are multiple shootings at South Park Elementary within a week, none of which anyone bats an eye.
- Serious Business: Sharon's "period" is this to the South Park residents (Randy in particular). Apparently to them, the only thing that can be even worse than having a period is... menopause.
- Shamed by a Mob: The townsfolk walk off on Sharon when she furiously calls out Randy for his insensitivity.
- Shout-Out: Cartman's leather jacket ensemble and Private Detective work is one to Jessica Jones.
- Skewed Priorities: Because of the frequency of school shootings, both Stan and Randy care more about Stan failing his math test than the fact that someone shot up the school. To what little credit that can be given, Randy at least checks to make sure Stan wasn't shot, or was the shooter.
- Swapped Roles: Subverted. While Sharon is the more unhinged one and Randy the calmer one this time around, Sharon's extreme reactions come from the multiple school shootings occurring within a short period of time, while nobody else cares.
- Take That!
- While not referred to by name, the main plot of the episode calls out the "thoughts and prayers" mentality of people who don't react accordingly to mass shootings and simply wait for those who do to get over it, allowing the situation to repeat itself.
- Cartman makes numerous stabs towards the Black Panther movie and tries to decide on whether or not Tolkien saw it.
- They Killed Kenny Again: Subverted. Despite the school having numerous shooters and his notoriously bad luck, Kenny is not a victim at any point. It's Stan that gets shot (albeit only in the arm).
- Too Dumb to Live: The townspeople decide to head to South Park Elementary while a shooting is going on there, not to help their kids but so Randy could sing to Sharon. Luckily for them, no one is hurt nor killed, though one of them does get shot in the arm.
- Troubling Unchildlike Behavior: There are three school shootings in South Park in this episode. According to Butters, the entire Glee club is behind the third one.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: The students and faculty of South Park Elementary barely even notice or care when their school gets shot up on three separate occasions. Most of the parents besides Sharon don't think it's a big deal either. In fact, everyone treats school shootings as a minor inconvenience like it were rain.
- Wham Line: "Stan's been shot."
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Heidi Turner is not seen or mentioned throughout the episode.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Sharon repeatedly calls out Randy for not taking the school shootings seriously. Of course, Randy never listens.
- Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Randy acts as if he's emotionally hurt by Sharon to make the townspeople side with him.
