Recap / South Park: The Pandemic Special

Original air date: 9/30/2020

Randy comes to terms with his role in the COVID-19 outbreak as the on-going pandemic presents continued challenges to the citizens of South Park. The kids happily head back to school but nothing resembles the normal that they once knew; not their teachers, not their homeroom, not even Eric Cartman.

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South Park: The Pandemic Special provides examples of:

• Aardvark Trunks: The pangolin has a short, wide snout, rather than a slightly longer, skinnier snout.
• Abandoned Playground: The opening scene shows deserted places of the town including a playground.
• All for Nothing: When Cartman decides to give the pangolin that started the epidemic back to the scientist, raising hopes for a vaccine that will end the madness, President Garrison comes out of nowhere and destroys the pangolin (and the scientist) with a flamethrower.
• Answer Cut: When Mr. Mackey tells the parents about the group of new teachers, he gets asked "What new teachers?" upon which the scene cuts to the group of police officers.
• Artistic License – Biology:
  • Randy reasons that because he is patient zero and got COVID as an STD, his sperm will work as a cure and a vaccine for COVID. Of course vaccines don't work this way; if any of his bodily fluids were going to work as a cure, it would be his blood since that's where the antibodies are. If COVID spread as an STD, his sperm would have only spread the infection instead of vaccinating against it.
  • Also, the original pangolin shouldn't have been necessary to study COVID when the virus is already everywhere. The scientists should have been able to learn just as much from any infected person.
• Artistic License – Medicine: Jimbo is infected with a highly contagious virus, yet his relatives are still allowed to visit him at the hospital with nothing more than a mask on.
• Bad Cop/Incompetent Cop: The South Park Police Department is being their usual clueless selves while also sadistically tormenting and murdering children For the Evulz.
• Bad Liar: Sharon ended up smoking her husband's sperm-ridden weed and grew a mustache, but she, not knowing the link between the two, lies to Randy when he asks her if she's ever smoked his product. The realization that his wife has been a colossal hypocrite this entire time completely undoes his Jerkass Realization, and he angrily leaves to continue making more marijuana.
• Bathos: The Grim Reaper... riding a tricycle.
• Been There, Shaped History: Double Subverted. It initially appears that Randy caused the COVID-19 Pandemic by having sex with a bat in China, only for it to turn out it was not caused by a bat, but a pangolin... that Randy also had sex with.
• Bestiality Is Depraved: Randy contracted COVID-19 by having sex with animals in China.
• Big Bad Ensemble: Randy Marsh, Mickey Mouse, Harrison Yates, and President Garrison all share the role of main villain for this episode. Randy is responsible for causing the COVID-19 pandemic by having sex with a pangolin and his attempts at creating a cure end up making this worse. But he had sex with the animal at the urging of Mickey Mouse, who is now trying to have Randy killed to hide his own role in the pandemic. Harrison Yates shoots Tolkien Black, leading to everyone in the school getting quarantined, and uses the children's attempt to escape as an excuse to shoot more of them. President Garrison intentionally destroys a potential cure for the COVID-19 virus because it suits his purposes to let it continue.
• Big Damn Heroes: Timmy breaks open the lock, saving all the children.
• Blatant Lies: Yates convinces the townspeople that Tolkien had been sent to the hospital 'due to COVID', when Tolkien was shot by Yates for no reason. They are convinced.
• Bookends: The episode begins and ends with Randy planning to make new specials.
• Bread and Circuses: Stan accuses the government of becoming this way thanks to the COVID-19 lockdown.
• Broken Tears:
  • Parodied when Randy sees an Applebee's restaurant forced to close down.
  • Played straight by Stan at the end.
    Stan: You guys were right, okay!? This hasn't been about Butters. I've been acting like this because I can't take these shutdowns anymore and I'm scared what it's doing to me! I'm looking for who to blame, saying I'm trying to help people to make myself feel better, because the truth is... I just want to have fun again. I wanted to see that I can go out in the world and do things that I used to do, but I can't! I'm not any better and I don't care any more than anyone else. And I did all this because I just want my life back. (starts crying) I just want my life back...
• Bullying a Dragon: Cartman tries to cough and spit on Kyle, who has proven himself capable of knocking out Cartman with a single punch. Cue the No-Holds-Barred Beatdown.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Randy, after being informed that scientists have surmised COVID-19 came from a human coming into contact with a bat in Wuhan, China, panics and calls Mickey Mouse to recollect about that bat when they were in China. Mickey says he's fucked so many bats he can't remember which one Randy is referring to.
• The Bus Came Back:
  • Not counting cameos or video game appearances, this is Death's first appearance since its eponymous episode all the way back in Season 1.
  • This is the first time any hidden visitors are seen since Season 16's "Butterballs."
• Cabin Fever: Tolkien's shooting forces the police to put the entire school in quarantine, driving the students nuts (especially Butters and slowly Stan).
• Call-Back: Gives one towards "Band In China" during Randy and Mickey's time in China, while revealing the shenanigans that weren't previously shown.
• Camera Spoofing: Cartman places a photo of himself before the webcam so it would look like he is attending the class call.
• Cerebus Syndrome: South Park was never a lighthearted show to begin with, but this particular episode ventured into some truly dark territory and had a Downer Ending besides.
• Child Hater: Yates enjoys using COVID-19 as an excuse to hurt and kill children. He even admits it.
• Cliffhanger: The COVID-19 pandemic is still going strong, South Park is now falling into chaos with the fire caused by President Garrison, and Randy was just about to confess to Sharon about his involvement in causing the pandemic and possibly shut down Tegridy Farms, only to see that Sharon ended up smoking her husband's sperm-ridden weed and grew a mustache, leading Randy to change his mind and keep making more Pandemic Specials on his farm.
• Closest Thing We Got: This is the chief officer's answer to why they engaged the police force to act as substitute teachers.
• Content Warnings: Changes from the usual: "The following program contains coarse language and due to COVID-19 it should not be viewed by anyone."
• A Day in the Limelight: Randy Marsh gets to lead an episode for once.
• Department of Redundancy Department: Stephen threatens to ground Butters if he doesn't go back into quarantine.
• Diabolus ex Machina: Right after Cartman decides to give the pangolin back to the scientist, Garrison pops up out of nowhere to incinerate it with a flamethrower.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Cartman throws a tantrum when forced to go back to school. The police use the resulting fight (and Tolkien's subsequent 'COVID-related' hospitalization) as an excuse to quarantine all the children inside the school building.
• Downer Ending: Garrison shows up out of nowhere and kills the pangolin, trying to prevent the discovery of a vaccine because COVID-19 disproportionately affects Mexicans. Cue South Park falling into fiery chaos.
• Dumbass Has a Point: While Randy is ultimately to blame for the pandemic, he does rightfully point out to Mickey that he had urged him to make out with the pangolin in the first place.
• "Eureka!" Moment: When talking to Mickey Mouse on the phone, Randy realizes that he could plant his DNA in his Pandemic Special.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Cartman and Yates are both visually appalled when Garrison immolates the pangolin (and the scientist holding it).
• Eviler than Thou: Garrison proves to be even worse than Cartman by doing the one thing the latter wasn't able to: killing the pangolin and dooming the world to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Eye Recall: Used twice to transition into Randy's flashbacks of his visit to China.
• Fake Static: During a class zoom call, Cartman fakes a bad internet connection in order to be excluded from participation.
• Feedback Rule: There is a feedback sound on his megaphone when Mr. Mackey informs the townfolk about the school quarantine.
• Final Solution: Garrison tells Stan that he is intentionally doing nothing about the pandemic because it disproportionately harms Mexicans. Getting rid of them by genocide is as viable as deportation in his eyes.
• Find the Cure!: The secondary plot involves the origin of COVID-19 and the attempts of various persons to find the pangolin which was Patient Zero — either to use it to create a vaccine or to kill it and prevent the same.
• For Your Own Good: Exploited, Stan claims the lockdowns are this, but questions if they'll ever be ended, using this as their excuse.
• From Bad to Worse: Randy knows Sharon will "be a total bitch about it" if she finds out about his role in COVID-19, but his attempts to hide his involvement only get him in more trouble.
• Girls with Moustaches: Not only do all of Randy's male customers who smoke his "cure" for COVID-19 end up growing the same mustache Randy has, his female customers end up having his mustache too, even Sharon of all people.
• Given Name Reveal: Surname variation. After many years of only being known by her first name, Red's last name is revealed to be McArthur.
• Hate Sink: Sergeant Yates and the rest of the South Park Police Department are at their most detestable here. While filling in as teachers for South Park Elementary School, they openly complain about not being allowed to cause any "unnecessary deaths", abuse the children under their care and force them into confinement, shoot Tolkien for no reason when Kyle and Cartman start fighting, and upon being refunded, use their newly-gained firepower to terrorize and kill the escaped children, simply for their own amusement.
• The Heavy: Randy Marsh is responsible for this whole plot happening by causing the COVID-19 pandemic with his antics at China. Subverted in that he is feeling guilty for causing it.
• The Hedonist: Cartman wants South Park to remain on lockdown — so he doesn't have to go to school. Cue angry pig noises when he's forced to go.
• The Hero: Played straight and then deconstructed by Stan. He takes the role during the special. He intends to find the way for his friends to enjoy life during the COVID-19 pandemic. He also gives the epic speech for his peers to break lockdown, and goes through such great lengths to help his friend, Butters. However at the end, he admits through Broken Tears that he was really doing it all for himself.
• Hope Spot: Shortly after Cartman decides to hand over the pangolin for a vaccine, Garrison shows up out of nowhere to burn it to ashes.
• Hypocritical Humor: Stephen scolds people not wearing masks properly by saying they're not "chin diapers." Later on, he's in the group of people calling it that.
• I'll Kill You!: Mickey sends Randy a death threat due to his involvement in creating the virus and forcing him to close down Disneyland.
• The Immune: Randy can't be infected with COVID because he's patient zero, and had long since recovered from it.
• Implicit Prison: When South Park Elementary is forced to undergo a 2-week quarantine, it is pretty much depicted as a prison. Students go about their schedule wearing masks while social distancing is being enforced under the watch of officers wearing riot armor and helmets while carrying riot shields and nightsticks, students having parent visitation over Zoom in the computer lab while being allocated a strict maximum time 5 minutes, and lunchtime is divided among staggered groups of students. All of which is complete with a theme that belongs in a prison-like environment.
• Insane Troll Logic:
  • You need to wear your mask over your face instead of your chin because then it's a "chin diaper," and who wants to wear a diaper on your face? (It eventually comes to the point where people think that wearing the mask over your face instead of your chin is stupid.)
  • The police tell the public that Tolkien was taken to the hospital because of COVID. When Stan protests that it was actually because the police shot him, Yates responds that the officers wouldn't have been at the school if the outbreak hadn't sent all the teachers home, making Tolkien's injuries "COVID-related".
• Insistent Terminology: Masks are called "chin diapers" by Stephen at the start before it slowly becomes the right terminology.
• Instantly Proven Wrong: Sharon tries to comfort Stan by saying everyone is having a hard time during the pandemic. Cue Randy coming in celebrating his well-running weed business.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Early in the episode, Stephen calls out a few passerbys for not having their masks cover their noses. While Stephen is usually an overly strict, borderline irrational disciplinarian, he makes a valid point that improper mask usage results in them being useless.
• Karma Houdini: Yates and the police force suffer no punishment for their killing spree on the quarantined children. Garrison gets away with killing the pangolin and the scientist carrying it, who could've helped find a cure for the COVID-19 pandemic, just so he can use it as a means to kill off the Mexicans. But...
• Karma Houdini Warranty: Mickey Mouse is finally getting his comeuppance as the pandemic — something he is partially responsible for creating — is driving Disney into bankruptcy.
• Kick the Dog:
  • Randy calling the half-dead Jimbo a fat alcoholic before smacking him and saying that he won't be going to jail because of him or anyone else he's spread COVID to.
  • Yates shooting Tolkien and then callously dismissing it when Stan calls him out on it.
  • Garrison burning the pangolin alongside the scientist holding it.
• Kill It with Fire: Garrison kills both the pangolin and the scientist holding it with a flamethrower.
• Lack of Empathy:
  • Yates shows no remorse for shooting Tolkien. When Stan confronts him on it, he callously dismisses Tolkien's injury as 'COVID-related'.
  • Garrison is okay with letting millions of people die from COVID just so he can get rid of the Mexicans. Later on, he remorselessly burns the pangolin that would have cured COVID alongside the scientist holding it.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: There are multiple mentions of Tegridy Farms' Pandemic Special on weed in this Pandemic Special for South Park.
  Sharon: People are dying, Randy. And all you can think about is making a special about it?
• Let No Crisis Go to Waste: Several characters use the COVID outbreak to their advantage:
  • Cartman uses the lockdown order to stay home and do nothing all day, not even bothering to shower or attend virtual classes.
  • Randy's weed business is one of the few doing well during the pandemic. He even releases a "Pandemic Special" strain of weed for the occasion.
  • President Garrison is doing nothing to stop the pandemic because he hopes it will kill off all the Mexicans in America.
  • When the students at South Park Elementary break quarantine, triggering a panic-induced riot throughout the town, Yates convinces Mayor McDaniels to refund the police department. They use the money to buy everything from assault rifles to tanks and artillery, then go on a killing spree all over South Park.
• Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: Randy caused the pandemic by having sex with a pangolin.
• Misplaced Retribution:
  • Yates breaks up Kyle and Cartman's fight by shooting Tolkien, the sole black kid in school.
  • The kids are held responsible for the pandemic spreading, when it was Randy who spread it with his "cure".
• Mood Whiplash: The scene of Jimbo in the hospital is initially Played for Drama. Then Randy comes in to give Jimbo his "cure".
• More Dakka: The police force riddling a boy with bullets.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Over the course of the special, Randy begins to feel guilty for causing the pandemic.
• Necktie Headband: In Randy's second flashback to China, Mickey Mouse is seen dancing in the hotel room with his tie around his head while Randy is getting it on with the pangolin.
• Never My Fault:
  • When Stan points out that Tolkien was taken to the hospital because Officer Yates shot him, not because of COVID, Yates replies that, since the police were only at the school because the teachers had left due to COVID, the virus is ultimately to blame.
  • The police refuse to acknowledge that their excessive brutality was the reason for their defunding, claiming it was due to events "totally beyond their control". As soon as they get refunded, they go right back to abusing their authority.
  • Mickey blames Randy for causing the pandemic and putting his company in jeopardy, but Randy points out that Mickey was the one who egged him on to have sex with the pangolin in the first place.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Kyle gives one to Cartman when he tries to cough and spit on him...which lasts about seven seconds before the sound of gunfire hitting Tolkien causes the kids' heads to turn.
• No Sympathy: When Sharon reminds Randy that Jimbo is in the hospital with COVID, Randy dismisses his health on the grounds he's a fat alcoholic who'd be in the hospital anyway.
• Nothing Personal: Mickey tells Randy that his reasons for trying to kill him aren't personal, it's just business.
• Oblivious Guilt Slinging: When walking through the town of South Park, a man approaches Randy to thank him for his Pandemic Special because it gave him some sense of normalcy after he lost his wife to COVID-19 and has to care for the kids on his own. Randy doesn't feel comfortable receiving all that praise.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: It shows how hard an anvil hits, and how essential its dropping was, when it got Cartman to show some empathy for others. Heck, it's gotten to the point where Stan and Kyle were speechless at Cartman's surprising lack of sociopathy.
• Pet the Dog: In one of his most selfless acts ever on the show, Cartman decided to spare the pangolin's life after listening to Stan's speech, despite knowing that killing it would have given him the most personal benefit. President Garrison, however...
• Police Are Useless: The police do nothing to help anyone in this episode, blaming their lack of funding. Once they get re-funded, they become active antagonists, slaughtering children all over South Park.
  • They can't even prevent the children from breaking quarantine as they are distracted by their smartphones.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: Yates remorselessly shoots Tolkien, the only minority in the classroom.
  Yates: Got him!
• Porn Stache: Randy's "cure" ends up causing a strange side effect of growing 'staches that look like his on his customers' faces.
• Psychological Projection: Stan, unable to deal with his own feelings of vulnerability in the pandemic, attributes these traits onto other people, mainly Butters, claiming to be worried about how the pandemic is affecting "weaker kids" to cover-up his own uncertainty.
• Quarantine with Extreme Prejudice: Exploited. The police take advantage of the kids breaking quarantine to get refunded and go on a killing spree, despite knowing the kids aren't actually infected with COVID.
• Realistic Species, Cartoony Species: The humans have the usual South Park cartoonish design, while all the animals seen (the bat, the pangolin and the police dogs) are drawn in a quite detailed, realistic way.
• Retcon: Technically averted in the case of Jimbo. The series had never confirmed what Jimbo's relationship was to the Marsh family with fans making different assumptions until Matt Stone claimed in an interview that he was Randy's maternal half-brother (which became the commonly accepted explanation). He has now been confirmed as Sharon's brother.
• Rousing Speech: Stan gives an epic one encouraging everyone to break lockdown.
• Running Gag: Randy seeing Death standing in front of closed-down businesses, even seeing him riding a tricycle a couple of times.
• Sadist Teacher: Officer Yates and his crew when they're assigned to take over for the staff of South Park Elementary.
• Scary Shadow Fakeout: Jimbo sees the Grim Reaper stalking him from the window of his hospital room, but it's actually Randy wearing a hooded tracksuit.
• Sequel Episode: Serves as one for "Band In China" where it's revealed that Randy and Mickey unknowingly created the COVID-19 pandemic with their debacles during their time in China.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: Played with. When Yates claimed that Tolkien was sent to the hospital "due to COVID", Stan stands up to him by saying Tolkien was actually sent there because Yates shot him. Yates flat-out denies this and claims Tolkien's gunshot wound was 'COVID-related'.
• Stealth Pun: Kenny is killed by the cops and even though the kids don't deliver the usual "those bastards!" line, it's a likely nod to the "All Cops Are Bastards" slogan.
• Take That!:
  • Cartman is this towards people who don't care how the lockdown is affecting others, because they themselves are enjoying its benefits.
    • Contrasted well with Cartman and Stan. Cartman seems to relish getting to stay at home in his P Js, playing video games all day, and even ghosting his online classes. For comparison, Stan, who enjoys schoolwork and playing outside with his friends, is becoming more desperate with every day for the lockdowns to end.
  • Garrison is a stand-in for Trump as per usual not listening to the CDC or Anthony Fauci (who also aren’t spared from criticism for their actions).
  • Randy brushing off Jimbo in the hospital for the virus because "he's a fat alcoholic" is this towards people who try to say that anyone with the virus was already having health problems so their deaths shouldn't be counted in the U.S. death toll.
  • Yates and the South Park police force as a whole are a middle finger at the escalating cases of Police Brutality that led to protests over systemic racism during the pandemic in real life. They fail to understand why there’s an enormous lack of trust in them which led to their defunding and still think excessive force is the only way to handle situations. By the time they got their resources back, they waste no time murdering anyone they deem to be breaking the law, with many of them murdering children simply for fun.
    • When Kyle and Cartman start fighting in class, the cops shoot Tolkien Black, and only Tolkien, who had nothing to do with it.
    • The BLM movement isn’t spared, either, with them taking things too far, especially with calling for the defunding of police departments, showing the problems that course of action creates if the police aren’t funded.
  • A subtle one for how schools are underfunded while armed forces are overfunded, since Yates gets his budget increase by claiming that his men aren't making enough as "teachers."
  • To people on both sides of the mask debates, who are shown in this episode to be too focused on feuding with each other rather than focusing on the immediate issue at hand. The fact that the two most prominent debaters Stephen Scotch and Thomas Tucker ended up swapping sides but still were just as argumentative towards each other highlights this.
  • Mayor McDaniels is one towards politicians who pass legislation to defund and sanction the police departments in response to reports of Police Brutality, only to backtrack when the lack of police presence causes more problems.
  • Randy says to Mickey Mouse that he made a "deal with the devil" when he wanted to bring "that Mulan shit" to the Chinese market.
  • Also towards Build-A-Bear Workshop, with it being portrayed as extremely hard to actually build a bear without any assistance from the employees.
  • And lastly, Stan is a sympathetic poke at those who object to masks and lockdowns for high and lofty principles when in reality they just hate that the world has changed and want their lives to go back to normal.
• The Peeping Tom: Tweek's mother was apparently spying on Wendy's mother while the latter was trying on some clothes.
• They Killed Kenny Again: Kenny is riddled with bullets by the overzealous police when he and Annie try to hide amongst the chaos of the riot over the lockdowns.
• This Just In!: The news anchor on TV informs the audience that they just got news about the kids having broken quarantine.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom:
  • Mickey urging Randy to have sex with the pangolin during their trip to China leads to the COVID-19 pandemic.
  • Cartman going nuts in the classroom ends up triggering the police to shoot Tolkien, leading to an even tighter lockdown.
  • Stan convincing the kids to break quarantine leads to chaos erupting in the town, allowing the police to get refunded and go on a killing spree, putting the kids in even greater danger.
• What Happened to the Mouse?:
  • Towelie no longer appears to be living with or working for the Marshes.
  • By the end of the episode, it’s unclear whether Jimbo and Tolkien survived having coronavirus and having been shot, respectively. The next episode/special shows that both of them survived.
• Who Would Be Stupid Enough?: Randy witnesses the group of scientists having a good laugh at the "rhetorical" question as to what animal would have sex with an ugly creature like the pangolin.
• Withholding the Cure: President Garrison derails the attempt to find a COVID-19 vaccine because he believes the Mexicans will be the ones most harmed by it.
• Would Hurt a Child: The police are only too eager to gun down the escaped children under the false pretense of containing the virus.

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