South Park is an [in]famous Animated Series by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, entering its fifteenth season on Comedy Central, and covering the misadventures of four grade school kids in the titular town of South Park, Colorado: Stan Marsh, the Straight Man of the group; Kyle Broflovski, a morally fixated Jew; Eric Cartman, a fat, sarcastic sociopath; and Kenny McCormick, a young pervert who is usually rendered unintelligible by his tightly drawn orange hoodie and has a tendency to die horribly Once an Episode (at least in the first five seasons). These four boys and their friends and neighbors find themselves embroiled in all sorts of weirdness, ranging from cults, aliens, and monsters to exaggerated-for-comic-effect versions of Ripped from the Headlines problems.South Park became highly controversial by being offensive in about as many ways possible — bad language, violence, nudity and perverse sexual references, and witheringly sarcastic, highly irreverent, and downright obscene approaches to race, religion, celebrities, politics, homosexuality, obesity, the mentally challenged and just about everything that's possible for people to get riled up over. To add fuel to the fire, all the main characters were children, and the animation was done in a deliberately crude, brightly colored style that made it look like it was made for or by pre-schoolers.It initially relied on Toilet Humour (especially in the first season) but became more intelligent and satirical as time wore on, and even won a Peabody Award in 2006. Some of the show's early fanbase have long abandoned the show, shown by the fact that after its second season the show dropped from 9.1 million viewers to about 3 million viewers, a number which the show has hovered around ever since. Still, despite not being as popular as it was, it remains one of Comedy Central's highest-rated shows.The subjects they mock usually target Liberals, Fundamentalists and actively hostile atheists, Industrialists and Hippies, etc. Usually both sides of a debate are mocked, but quite often it is a deliberate far right conservative Author Tract.An astonishingly short turn-around time helps keep the show topical with current events. The show is produced using the same graphics engine that helped create the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. It has been compared to building a sandcastle with a bulldozer. In some cases an episode can be produced a matter of days before it airs, allowing for current events to be parodied almost as soon as they happen. One example includes an episode about the capture of Saddam Hussein airing on December 17, 2003, a few days after his capture took place on December 14.The movie based on the series had a short (for Hollywood) turn-around time as well. Just two years after the show premiered on TV, the world beheld the theatrical release of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.Be sure to check out the characters page and vote for your favorite episode.Most episodes of the show are available for free viewing at the official website.
Absentee Actor: None of the main boys appear at all in "Not Without My Anus", "The Great Expectations", and "A Million Little Fibers". There have also been a few episodes were one or some of the boys are absent throughout.
Abuse Is Okay When It's Female On Male: Revolves around Stan being beaten and everyone being sympathetic toward him over it... until they find out that the one beating him up is his sister. Then they mock him and call him a pussy. This is despite the fact that Stan's sister is older and bigger than he is, and is also a violent sociopath.
Butters's parents, who will ground him for anything, including looking like a jackass in his school pictures, even though he wasn't doing anything wrong. His father also beats him when he gets punished.
Subverted with Mr. Garrison in "World Wide Recorder Concert": he's shown to have issues with his father for reasons of sexual molestation, but it turns out that he's upset because his father didn't abuse him.
The McCormick kids' agnostic foster parents in "The Poor Kid". But the good news is that Kenny, as Mysterion, sets them up to get drunk on Pabst Blue Ribbon and get arrested.
Achievements in Ignorance: In "The Wacky Molestation Adventure", Kyle's mother tells him he can only go to the Raging Pussies concert if he takes out the trash, shovels the driveway, and brings democracy to Cuba. Taking it literally, Kyle writes a heartfelt letter to Fidel Castro (complete with song), and Castro is so touched he ends the communist dictatorship. Kyle gets pissed when his parents still forbid him to go to the concert because they deliberately gave him a task that they thought was impossible.
Acronym Confusion: "Cartman Joins NAMBLA" involves confusion between the North American Man/Boy Love Association and North American Marlon Brando Look-Alikes.
Act Break: There are four acts to each episode, though the fourth one is usually The Tag. The TV pilot has a weird case, with five acts (the additional break occurring during the forest scene, right before Chef appears).
However, ever since "The Death Camp of Tolerance", it had reverted to going on to only three acts ala like most TV shows.
Action Girlfriend: Based on her fight with Cartman in season 12, Wendy might grow up into one.
Activist Fundamentalist Antics: One episode ended with a ban on secular Christmas as well as religious Christmas, all thanks to Kyle's mother. The only song left for the kids to sing for Christmas was "Kyle's Mom is a Big Fat Bitch" (in D minor, no less).
Added Alliterative Appeal: "Allied Atheist Alliance. That way it has three aes! That is the logical choice!"
Adults Are Useless: Pretty much every adult in South Park and then some is a moron, even when they're not subject to Plot-Induced Stupidity. This clip pretty well sums it up. (You can skip the first minute of the clip.)
An Aesop: Spoofed, many times over, and used straight just as much! Always at the end of an episode, too.
One notable subversion: in "All About the Mormons", Stan delivers what appears to be an Aesop about blind religious faith and gullibility, only for the episode's true Aesop to be delivered shortly after, stating that it doesn't matter that a religion makes no sense if it still inspires its members to lead good lives, and that people who can't look past one's religious affiliation are idiotic bigots.
Although this is doubly subverted overall, as EVERY religion that gets the Southpark treatment comes off equally badly.
Another subversion is the episode where Kyle's stereotypically Jewish cousin, also named Kyle, comes to visit. In the end, the kids try to pull their usual "I've learned something today..." Aesop speech, only for it to die out several times when they realize that, no, they actually haven't learned anything this time.
The Osama bin Laden episode is a paean to the classic Wartime Cartoons, especially Bugs Bunny's.
In the Coon and Friends trilogy, this is done twice between Cartman and Cthulhu: one, a tribute to My Neighbor Totoro, and the other is a nod to the Chuck Jones cartoon "Feed the Kitty".
The ninja episode. Someone had to have been an anime fan to be able to mock Gratuitous English.
Age Inappropriate Dress: Mocked in a few episodes, "Stupid Spoiled Whore Video Playset" in particular.
All Asians are Alike: In City Sushi, the City Wok guy tries to get revenge of the owner of City Sushi due to this trope.
Allergic to Love: Stan vomits every time Wendy talks to him. Though when they started dating as the show progressed (basically after The Movie), Stan stopped vomiting completely around her. However, in "The List", when they discover feelings for each other again (after having been broken up for some time), Stan vomits in front of her once more before they can kiss.
All CGI Cartoon: Switched to this format after the first episode. It, Beast Wars (released around the same time) and ReBoot were the only major ones of note that aired in America during the 90s.
All Elections Are Serious Business: Shown in how serious the kindergarten elections are taken in "Trapper Keeper" and taken to the extreme in "Douche vs. Turd" over the school mascot election.
Parodied viciously in "Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow", where it seems that Cartman and Kyle are going to die, and Cartman demands Kyle's "Jew Gold". Kyle, appalled, tries to convince him that this is a Jew stereotype, but Cartman doesn't relent, and Kyle pulls out a small sack of gold that had been tied around his neck. Cartman proceeds to insist that all Jews carry a spare sack of Jew Gold, which is really fake, and demands that Kyle hands over an identical sack also tied around his neck. Kyle didn't hand over the real Jew gold either, he threw it into a fire rather than let Cartman have it.
Truth in Television, but not specifically Jewish. Many European families of all ethnicities will have a stash of jewels for emergency purpose such as bribes to escape a country. This is very common in Genteel Interbellum Settings.
Subverted in "Night of the Living Homeless" when Kyle gives a homeless man $20. Because of that, all of the homeless invade South Park. But it turns out that it wasn't Kyle's fault, but the fault of the neighboring town of Evergreen, who evicted the homeless.
And then subverted majorly in "Margaritaville" when he uses his American Express credit card (with no spending limit) to pay off the debtsof all of South Park, much to the dismay of his mother Sheila, who say he's ruining himself. This is all to make a point of the nature of the economy.
In "Good Times with Weapons" Cartman mocks the fact that Kyle can't throw away his weapons because he paid money for them.
All Just a Dream: Sometimes played straight, but often subverted.
All Men Are Perverts: The plot of "Sexual Healing." More specifically, the extreme lengths men will go to to prevent women from finding this out.
All of the Other Reindeer: While Butters is the most obvious victim, more recent seasons claim that not very many people beyond their clique like Stan, Kyle, Kenny or Cartman.
All Take and No Give: Cartman to everyone, especially his mom. In Season One, you had to give him rather expensive toys to attend his party (who everyone only comes to because Cartman's Mom cooks damn good).
He's also engaged in sexual acts with men several times, thinking NAMBLA is an innocent organization. He presumably gave Ben Affleck a hand job as part of a bizarre plot to convince Kyle that his hand was a sentient con man named Mitch Connor who was impersonating a woman named Jennifer Lopez (much to the chagrin of the "real" Jennifer Lopez). Frighteningly, given the odd interactions between Mitch, Cartman, and Mr. Hat in episodes 200 and 201 Mitch might actually be REAL. What that says about the fact that he decided to possess Cartman's hand for the purposes of this stunt, nobody can say.
Jimbo and Ned. They're unrelated, live together, evidently have hospital visitation rights worked out. And then, Jimbo can say "fag" without getting bleeped, which according to Mr(s). Garrison means that he is one. All the other guys at the bar are bleeped when they say fag. Make of that what you will.
Butters. He has been shown crossdressing, he's feminine, innocent, submissive, polite, and fits The Twink status. While he has shown affection toward girls, it's mostly blocked by his naivety.
And That's Terrible: The antagonists in "Super Fun Time" robbed a Burger King.
Animal Athlete Loophole: the parody of You Got Served (and similar movies), had Stan's Ragtag Bunch of Misfits dancing team include a dancing duck. The duck gets injured, forcing Butters to finally join the crew, with disastrous results.
Anti-Hero: All main characters verge on anti-heroism on occasion, though Cartman often verges on Villain Protagonist. Usually they learn their lesson at the end, however, and often are shown to be morally superior to the adults in town.
Are You Pondering What I'm Pondering??: In "Worldwide Recorder Concert", Stan and Kyle are thinking of a way to get back at the New Yorkers, when Cartman announces that he found the "brown noise" and demonstrates it on Kenny and a deliveryman.
Stan:(to Kyle) Dude, are you thinking what I'm thinking? Cartman: That they should bring back Chicago Hope for another season? Totally.
Cartman in the episode "Scott Tenorman Must Die", where he has Scott's parents killed, grinds their corpses into chili which he then feeds to Scott and causes Scott to cry in front of his favorite band.Who then call him a "crybaby".
From The Movie: "Fuck, shit, cock, ass, titties, boner, bitch, muff, pussy, cunt, butthole, Barbra Streisand!!"
In The Death of Eric Cartman: "What awaits each person in heaven is eternal bliss, divine rest, and $10,000 cash."
Art Evolution: The difference between first season episodes and recent episodes is like night and day, even though they have kept the simplistic cutout style. Early on, the show had incredibly crude character and background designs and the animation was very shaky and choppy, while today the animation can be very sophisticated, the backgrounds are rich in detail (actually having perspective and shading), the characters are much more detailed, and animals being realistic (compared to, say, the game in the first season episode "Volcano").
Early on, the show tried to imitate some side effects of using construction paper, such as the aformentioned shaky animation and shadows under objects, later on it was dropped.
Ashes To Crashes: Cartman drinks Kenny's ashes, believing them to be chocolate milk mix. As a result of this, Kenny's soul becomes trapped inside Cartman, providing a story arc for the next few episodes.
Ash Face: "Summer Sucks" ends with the town covered in ash. Chef arrives from vacation to find everyone in Blackface and orders everyone to get in line for a butt kicking.
Asian Speekee Engrish: Basically every single Asian character. Honourable mention goes to "fucking Mongoriansh!" Funnily enough, both creators are fluent in Japanese.
Taken to extremes in one episode where a Japanese man and Chinese man argue with each other with the nearly the exact same accent and can't understand each other.
Parodied in "How to Eat With Your Butt", in which Cartman does it literally after writing an apparent suicide note (after nothing, not even Jimmy's stand-up comedy, could get him to laugh), then adds a request for more chocolate guns to the note (ones with marshmallow filling, not peanut butter).
When a line of pedophiles find out they've been lining up to see Chris Hansen, they blow themselves away, one after another.
Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Played for laughs with Scott the Dick in "Royal Pudding." At first, it appears to be played straight, but a change in the camera angle reveals that he's actually seven feet tall.
Author Avatar: Stan and Kyle were originally Author Avatars for Trey and Matt, but they slowly grew out of it as the show progressed. In one interview, they said something along the lines of "He's supposed to be Stan, and I'm supposed to be Kyle... but really we're both Cartman."
Terrance and Phillip also occasionally serve as author avatars for the duo, reflecting the reactions Trey and Matt expected their show to get from parents, most notably in The Movie. Terrance has black hair, as does Matt, while Phillip has blond hair, as does Trey - likely deliberate.
Bad Boss: Cartman in many episodes. Craig, too, in "South Park is Gay!".
Bad Future: In "Trapper Keeper," "Goobacks," and the "Go God Go" arc.
Bait and Switch: If there is an episode where the preview involves anything that will get a large portion of the fanbase going "Ha ha, they're making fun of X" the actual episode will likely portray X in a much more endearing manner, while those that see it as a cheap, acceptable target will be the ones on the receiving end of a Take That. These episodes typically center around Cartman The most recent notable example being Poor and Stupid with regard to NASCAR and its fanbase.
Barrier Maiden: Terrence and Philip in the movie. Although theoretically any Canadian living south of the 49th parallel.
Beard of Evil: Inverted with Cartman in Spookyfish since he was already evil, his alternate universe counterpart was the good one. Played straight with everyone else.
Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: Slash is really a mythological character based on the legend of Vunter Slaush. It was just one of their parents that actually played at Cartman's party.
Berserk Button: In "Conjoined Fetus Lady", Pip is one of the players on the dodgeball team. When he's called "French", he beats the world's best dodgeball team (who, of course, are Chinese) singlehandedly.
Scott Tenorman doomed himself the moment he burned Cartman's money.
Never call Bono #2, no matter how true it is. Literally.
Cartman also does not like to be compared to Family Guy.
or make fun of him being Jewish, or cross the line with Ike, or call his mum a bitch, or say something stupid within earshot. Kyle is pretty much built on this trope.
Cartman is quite possibly the ultimate Berserk Button for Kyle.
Tom Cruise goes crazy when anyone says that he's packing fudge, even if he is literally packing fudge at the time, wearing a fudge packing uniform in a fudge packing factory.
Kenny (as Mysterion) gets one when he tries to tell the rest of the kids that he can't die, and Kyle says it'd be pretty cool to be immortal. Kenny, who knows better, flips out just a little bit.
He gets another one in "The Poor Kid". Don't mess with his little sister.
If you don't want to piss off Mr. Mackey, don't take a dump in the urinal. Or ruin the tooth decay play he worked on for six years.
As proven in Season 1 - Don't fuck with Wendy Testaburger!
Subverted with Butters, who adopts a secret evil identity and attempts to plunge the world into chaos by switching restaurant orders, hiding chalkboard erasers at school, running the water hose in his front yard non-stop, and using ineffective spray cans to destroy the ozone layer.
In "Fishsticks", Cartman has a series of Self-Serving Memoryflashbacks where he remembers how it was that the "fish sticks" joke was written. Eventually, the flashbacks extend to having him slay a dragon in Jimmy's house... and that's not the end of it.
Cartman is so evil that he actually tricks Cthulhu into joining him to get rid of his friends!
Big Brother Instinct: Most prominent in the relationship of Kyle and Ike as demonstrated repeatedly.
You DO NOT want to fuck with Karen McCormick. You will invoke Kenny's wrath.
Let it be understood that only Shelley has the right to torture little brother Stan.
Big OMG: Generally used whenever Kenny died Once per Episode. A notable example outside of that context (when Stan's parents accidentally send a porno to Butters's house):
Sharon: Wow, the production values are really good in this porno. Randy: Yeah, it almost looks like... the Lord of the... OH MY GOD!
Bilingual Bonus: Largely due to the fact co-creator Trey Parker is fluent in Japanese.
The Japanese part of the song "Let's Fighting Love" is grammatically correct and translates into something befitting South Park.
The Blank: During woodworking class, Clyde informs Mr. Adler that some kid named Tommy got his face stuck to a belt-sander, and Tommy shows up with no face.
Blessed with Suck: Mysterion's (Kenny's) power. He reveals to Captain Hindsight that he has the power to never die, even if he sees Heaven or Hell. Every time he does die, he later just wakes up in bed, in his regular clothes. The worst part is that no one has any recollection of his deaths. They always think he ran away or something, despite the fact that they saw him die with their own eyes.
Captain Hindsight. He knows instantly how a bad situation could've been prevented.
Bloody Hilarious: South Park arguably wouldn't be half as funny without all the gratuitous gore - I mean, really gratuitous gore.
Boomerang Bigot: In "The Entity", Kyle exclaims in horror that the presence of his cousin Kyle Schwartz has turned him into a self-hating Jew.
Kyle: Kenny?... Kenny! Don't worry, Kenny. You didn't die for nothing. We're gonna get Wing back as our client and and make a ton of money, I swear it to you! (returns to the other boys) They killed Kenny! Stan: You bastards!
Bowel Existence Failure: Brought up in "Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes" and also occurs in "The Return of Chef."
Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick: The stuff Trent Boyett had on his person when he first arrived in juvenile hall: a pack of crayons, safety scissors, a marble, and a knife.
In "Jared Has Aides", Cartman pretends to be Butters and gets his parents angry by swearing at them over the phone. Later at the end of the episode, Butters' parents come to beat the stuffing out of him.
In "The Poor Kid", the Agnostic foster parents make an offhand mention of a giant reptilian bird. It shows up at the end of the episode to deliver some Karmic(In)Justice.
In "The biggest Douche in the Universe" Stan insults John Edwards, telling him he nominates him biggest douche in the universe.
Bridal Carry: Jimmy and the prostitute in Erection Day.
"World Wide Recorder Concert" involves Cartman trying to discover the actual Brown Note.
The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs makes people throw up if they read just two seconds of it.
The porno "Back Door Sluts 9" from The Return of the Fellowship of the Ring to the Two Towers.
Buried Alive: Cartman in Go God Go, necktie variant.
But Thou Must: In the episode Woodland Critter Christmas, after Stan kills the mountain lion and finds out that the animals he had helped to build a manger are actually Satan worshipers he repeatedly refuses to take her now-orphaned cubs to learn how to perform abortions. With a forceful "YES. HE. DID!" the scene jump-cuts to an abortion doctor, with Stan and the mountain lion cubs there. Stan is not amused.
Earlier than that, Stan attempted to stay home after learning the Critters' true nature.
He tried to forget all about it by watching TV, but his conscience caught up with him and to the forest he did flee. (Stan stays put.) He thought he could hide from his problems - not true! He knew in his heart the thing he had to do! (Stan is getting annoyed by the persistent narration.) He knew that only by going to the forest could he— (Stan finally gives in and leaves the house.)
In a strange variation, Cartman attempts to train a pony to bite his enemy's penis off. He builds an effigy of his enemy, and attaches a hotdog to represent the pe—well, you can picture it. Cartman is dismayed when, instead of biting the hotdog, the horse fellates it. It becomes a Funny Background Event while Cartman has a conversation with Jimbo and Ned.
Butt Monkey: Kenny filled the role due to his constant deaths. Pip was the other buttmonkey who is constantly humiliated until his spot was taken by Butters.
Clyde in some episodes.
C-D
Cain and Abel: Lemmiwinks and Wikileaks in Bass to Mouth
Call Back: In the first Halloween episode, Wendy wins the school costume contest with a Chewbacca mask. In the third, Kenny enters the contest with an insanely elaborate Humongous Mecha costume and seems a shoo-in to win...only for Wendy to win again with the exact same mask. They might even have relooped Mr. Garrison's announcing her winner for that one.
In the season 3 episode Starvin' Marvin' in Space, Cartman blames Kyle for a turd in the urinal. Season 10 makes an entire episode *
the Mystery of the Urinal Deuce
out of finding out who took a crap in the urinal. Cartman blames Kyle.
Came Back Strong: Parodied when Cartman throws himself off a roof and wakes up from a coma in the hospital, and the cops who have the Idiot Ball believe he has precognition. Kyle later does the same thing at the end of the episode so people will believe him about the serial killer and Cartman. Eerily, the lights flicker violently when he gets frustrated.
Came Back Wrong: When Butters fakes his death, his dad buries the mutilated pig remains he thinks is Butters in an Indian burial ground - when Butters goes back home his parents assume this is what's happened, and chain him up in the basement.
Canada, Eh?: Canadians are usually portrayed as having floppy pac-man esque heads and black beady eyes.
All Canadian anatomy and technology is shown to be rather, uh, odd. Terrance and Phillip seem to have square testicles—yes we've seen them on screen. Canadian automobiles are shown to have square wheels.
Captain Ersatz: The Movie featured an assortment of original songs that were obvious tributes to numbers from classic American musicals. Oklahoma! got quoted quite a bit ("Mountain Town"/"O What a Beautiful Morning"; "Uncle Fucka"/the title song; and even "It's Easy, Mmmkay?"/"The Farmer and the Cowman"), but there were others. "Kyle's Mom's a Big Fat Bitch" was a pretty generic tribute to early 1900s musicals in general, complete with a "showstopper" climax followed by a "Good evening, friends!" finale.
In terms of characters, the Secret Society of Cynics from "Ass Burgers" is heavily based on Morpheus's gang from The Matrix.
Captain Obvious: Captain Hindsight is a hop and a skip away from this.
Captivity Harmonica: In The Movie, by Ike. Also in "Whale Whores" by Eric Cartman and in the season three episode "Jakovasaurous".
Car Meets House: Played with in the episode that covered the dangers of elderly drivers. Said old people chase the boys through the house serial-killer style, using their cars.
The Cast Showoff: Trey Parker. So very much. Pick an episode and it will usually have him singing or it will have something spoken or written in Japanese (for those who don't know, Trey Parker is the lead singer of the band, DVDA, and majored in Japanese in college)
They also toyed with the "They killed Kenny" line a lot; one of the best was when it became a version of "Marco! Polo!" to let Stan find Kyle in "Super Best Friends". Then there was the "I found a penny!" bit from "Chef's Chocolate Salty Balls".
Cats Are Mean: Subverted with the cougar mom and averted with her kittens in "Woodland Critter Christmas"
Caught with Your Pants Down: In "Overlogging", Stan's dad Randy has gone for weeks without masturbating to internet porn, eventually near the end he sneaks into the camp's computer room, looks at a bunch of perverted things, and eventually ejaculates all over the room, everyone comes in thinking he was grunting in pain and with his pants down, he tells them that he was doing that because "a ghost was attacking him and left his ectoplasm everywhere".
Censored Title: The episode "Chicken Lover" — the name of the villain is actually "Chicken Fucker", but the name of the episode was changed.
The term "Chicken Lover" was used in the episode, to be fair — three times by Officer Barbrady and once by Cartman.
Officer Barbrady: Uh, Mayor, please. When we're around children we prefer to call him the "Chicken Lover".
The episode "You Got Fucked in the Ass" as well, usually switched to "You Got F'd in the A" or just "You Got...".
Also, in the newspaper's TV sections, "Make Love, Not Warcraft" became just "World of Warcraft", and "Miss Teacher Bangs a Boy" had the word "Bangs" removed, making the title just "Miss Teacher ... a Boy".
Cephalothorax: The "girl born without a midsection" on the Maury Povich show.
Cerebus Retcon: Kenny's recurring deaths and the explanation behind the subsequent Snap Backs given in "Cartman Joins NAMBLA" are given a dark twist in "Mysterion Rises".
And it's not about Kenny's dad getting raped by the 30 or so middle aged men either.
You know all those wacky activities that Randy hilariously takes as Serious Business? Well, it turns out.... that Randy was trying to distract himself from the fact that he's unhappy with his life.
Cerebus Syndrome: While the show is still very much a comedy, its tone has changed significantly over its run. Early seasons were silly and sitcom-like, with a sense of humor reminiscent of Monty Python's Flying Circus and The Simpsons; later seasons became increasingly topical, with most episodes featuring recent political or social issues, while the Black Comedy became even blacker to the point of becoming a Dramedy with a Downer Ending or two and increasingly common and graphicviolence.
Character as Himself: In the movie, the end credits read, "And Saddam Hussein as Himself" in the "Cast" section, though the voice was actually done by Matt Stone.
Character Development: In "Coon 2: Hindsight", Liane actually puts her foot down and disciplines Eric. Borders on an Out-of-Character Moment. This development continues in season 15, though.
Pretty much every character has undergone this throughout the show, but the most notable ones are probably Cartman, Butters, and Mr. Garrison.
Characterization Marches On: The children characters were generally more childish and bratty early on. Stan and Kyle were generally lower scale bullies (compare their treatment of Butters in early and later episodes) while Cartman was less calculating and sociopathic and more just a Jerkass. That said, they can still be immature at times in later seasons.
Stan went from your run-of-the-mill kid and low-grade bully to a cross between the Only Sane Man and The Knight.
And that change may be justified as him trying to live his life to the fullest, because he dies all the time, and really has no reason to avoid potentially life-threatening activities. Could also be considered Fridge Brilliance.
Randy underwent a huge change. Compare his very first scene—where he casually sips coffee after learning of a volcanic eruption—to his main character trait later on, i.e. freaking out over every little thing, including non-existent threats.
Chekhov's Boomerang: In the episode "200," just about every celebrity/ famous figure that has been on South Park is back in this episode. Tom Cruise, Barbara/Mecha Streisand, Mel Gibson, Bono, Paris Hilton, R. Kelly, Sally Struthers, you get the point.. They're ALL back to sue the town..
Chekhov's Gag: In "You're Getting Old", there's a joke where Stan can't tell the difference between a turd in a microwave and an ad for Kevin James's Zookeeper. In the following episode, at the very end, Stan's friends ask him to come watch a movie together. Guess which one it is a sequel of.
Cartman:The Zookeeper 2: Zookeepier!
Chekhov's Gun: The "goo" that came out of the Rob Reiner at the end of "Butt Out" has become a plot point in the episode "200".
"The Death of Eric Cartman" establishes that the boys love KFC. KFC only serves as part of the Lead In for the episode. The plot of "Medicinal Fried Chicken" revolves all around KFC.
The V-Chip implanted in Cartman's head near the end of The Movie.
The "Kenny born for the 52nd time" gag at the end of "Cartman Joins NAMBLA" becomes a major plot point in the "Coon and Friends" trilogy.
In "Margaritaville", Kyle holds a Sermon about the economy, saying he applied for an American Express Platinum card to prove a point, and holds it up to show his audience. Near the end of the episode, he uses that same credit card to pay off the town's debts.
Chekhov's Gunman: In the Coon and Friends saga: who'd have thunk that Mint-Berry Crunch, who basically came out of nowhere, had no real significance to the plot, and was a noticeably lame superhero, would wind up being the one to fix everything? Even Cartman's surprised.
Of note, this was done in such a way that many fans of Kenny/Mysterion were seriously pissed off, as the show completely swerved the viewers. Instead of giving us the actual backstory behind how the hell Kenny is apparently somehow One of the Old Ones, we got a rip-off of Superman's origin with Mint-Berry Crunch. In the episode itself Kenny was basically going what the fuck the entire time he's hearing this. It was actually a bit of a heartbreaking moment for Kenny, who goes through all that crap over the course of the series, creates a superhero alter ego who became something of an Ensemble Darkhorse, and the creators screw him over instead of actually resolving how he gets his powers and why they work the way they do seemingly for the sake of a complete Screw You to him, his fans, and the entire concept of Mysterion. At the end of the show, he was so upset with the whole mess he shoots himself in the head because he feels tired. Then resurrects at home and just sleeps the night away. Poor guy.
On a more relevant note, many other fans realize the above was an example of the show's tradition of making something stupid become a major plot point and subverting the expectations of those taking the story too seriously, and are just fine with it, thanks. Compare with the Imagination Song.
Actually, it is revealed that Kenny got his "powers" because his parents went to the Cthulhu cult meeting that was mentioned earlier in the trilogy...
Chekhov's Skill: Parodied in the episode "You Have 0 Friends" with Stan's ability to... roll Yahtzee?
Kyle: Cartman, what are you doing? Cartman: I'm killing you. Unfortunately I could only afford a wiffle bat, so it's gonna take a while.
Children Are Innocent: Usually subverted, most often with the murderous Cartman and the sex-crazed, glue-sniffing Kenny. It's also often played straight. Butters is most usually portrayed as innocent, while other children are sometimes shown to be uncorrupted by various stupid or disgusting aspects of adult culture.
Played straight in some episodes even by Cartman, like the one where the kids simply cannot fathom that people kill each other for having different-colored skin, or when they use "fag" without implying gay (for obnoxious Harley riders).
Christian Rock: Parodied in "Christian Rock Hard" as taking pop love songs and substituting "Jesus" for one's lover.
Cartman: "I want to get down on my knees and start pleasing Jesus, I want to feel his salvation all over my face..."
Major character Pip went from featuring heavily and even getting his own solo episode, to vanishing permanently and never being mentioned again until 201where he was promptly killed by Mecha-Streisand.
A lot of early season characters on South Park haven't been seen much (or at all) in later episodes, such as:
Officer Barbrady: Effectively replaced by a full police force around season 7, though he is still brought back for small appearances every now and again.
Kenny's brother, Kevin (the dirty kid who speaks like a hick, when he speaks at all). He was only seen on "Starvin' Marvin" (from season one), "Chickenlover" (from season two), and "Chickenpox" (also from season two). His most recent appearance (I think) was at the end of season 12 where he's at the dinner table and Kenny gets shot by a stray bullet (with no one in the family doing the "Oh my God! They killed Kenny!" bit).
Lampshaded in "Cartman's Incredible Gift" when Mrs. Crabtree is murdered by a serial killer.
Lou: I owe it to that victim over there! I know she hadn't been in any recent episodes, but DAMMIT, she deserved better than this!
Damien hasn't reappeared in years despite his father making numerous reappearances.
Nurse Goodly (the nurse with no arms from "Cartman's Mom Is Still a Dirty Slut") hasn't made a reappearance in scenes taking place in Hell's Pass Hospital.
Church of Happyology: Quite notably averted. Even ended the episode by daring them to sue.
Circumcision Angst: Subverted: Kyle thinks they're going to cut off his brother's penis!
Cliché Storm: Invoked in "About Last Night..." is intentionally full of Heist Film cliches.
Clip Show: Spoofed in "City On the Edge of Forever", in which all the flashbacks are incorrect and all inexplicably end with the characters involved eating ice cream.
Cloudcuckoolander: Anyone from Canada of course. Butters and Cartman seem to be shifting more towards this trope as of recently too.
Also, Randy Marsh (Stan's father).
President Bush. Apparently he thinks Saddam Hussein is Satan's gay boyfriend and that he is somehow building chemical weapons plants in Heaven. Subverted in that he is completely right about everything.
Hell, Parker and Stone are Cloudcuckoolanders themselves. Seriously, many of the plots to these episodes simply have to be seen to be believed.
Also contains a Cluster F Bomb of a different sort, in regards to Mr. Garrison.
Cluster B Bomb in the "Kyle's Mom is a Bitch" song
Cluster N Bomb in "With Apologies to Jessie Jackson."
Color Me Black: One episode has the boys making Cartman think he's... a ginger. Freckles and hair dye. The episode then turns this trope on its head - rather than making Cartman rethink his horrible attitude, he actually starts a ginger supremacist movement.
Come to Gawk: Someone's about to get beaten up! Let's call the entire town, so that everybody can watch!
CRIPPLE FIGHT!!
This is also what happens in "Breast Cancer Show Ever."
Comic Book Time: The boys started out as 8-year-olds in 3rd grade. In season 4, they moved onto 4th grade and are now 9-year-old boys. They have remained 9-years-old and in 4th grade ever since (though occasional recent episodes make reference to them being either 8 or 9).
In "Crack Baby Athletic Association", Stan says that everyone present (Cartman, Kyle, Butters, Clyde, and Craig) is ten years old. Later in "You're Getting Old" Stan himself turns ten, so this is probably the default age for all the kids now.
Comically Missing the Point: Cartman tends to exemplify this one, the "Major Boobage" episode in particular. Mainly due to the sub-plot of his rescuing the cats from being put into the pound (eventually taking in around 100). When asked by Kyle (a Jew) why the cats are in his attic, he replies with "They're innocent victims in this! They have to hide or they'll be put to death. Something you just can't understand." By the end, we have this exchange between Cartman and Kyle:
Cartman: But ya know, we've all learned something, you guys. We can never persecute living beings and force them into hiding. It's wrong. Kyle: And you don't see any parallel between that and anything else in history? Cartman: Hmmm, nope. I have no idea what you're talking about, Kyle.
Although, since it IS Cartman, this could just be him being a Jerkass.
In episode 201: Scott Tenorman's father was Cartman's father. Cartman killed his own father and fed him to his half-brother. Cartman has a Heroic—well, a BSOD of some other character alignment over the fact that this means he is latently ginger.
In "Death", the earlier airings feature the following exchange:
Liane: Eric, dear? I just got a call from your friend Kyle's mother. She said that this show is naughty, and might make you a potty mouth. Cartman: That's a bunch of crap! Kyle's mom is a dirty Jew! Liane: Ohhh, okay, hon.
Later airings censor the word "dirty", making the joke seem less like Cartman's mother is ignorant of her son's racism, and more like she's just plain stupid.
Contemplate Our Navels: in 'The Tooth Fairy Tats' has Kyle start to doubt his own existence after discovering the tooth fairy isn't real. He spends the rest of the episode reading various philosophy books and talking about the nature of reality, even when the conversation around him is something totally different. He finally has an out-of-body, one-with-the-universe experience, and comments that it was weird. It's never, ever spoken of again.
Continuity Nod: There's a Whale and a Tom Cruise on the Moon in Coon 2.
Then we finally have Mysterion's identity and actual power explained. Mysterion is Kenny, who is literally unable to die. On top of that, the conclusion to the Coon/Mysterion saga showed Kenny's mother giving birth again, sans pregnancy, and regretting going to any of the Cult's meetings. This is a direct nod to the episode when she gave birth to a Kenny look-alike, after Kenny had died trying to prevent the new kid from being born.
In "1%" an Okama Game Sphere can be seen in Token's room.
Contractual Purity: invoked Parodied in Britney's New Look. The climax reveals that the public intentionally set up celebrities like Britney Spears (and later Miley Cyrus) on a high pedestal just to see them fall. All so they can have a good harvest.
Cooking Duel: When Stan battles his Facebook profile in a game of Yahtzee.
And, to tease Disney and mock its legalistic ways that result in lawsuits, Mickey Mouse turns into a giant monster that breathes fire all over South Park.
Other Corrupt Corporate Executives included several Native Americans owning a large casino who threatened to tear down South Park to make way for a highway, and the CEO of Wal-Mart in another episode.
Chef-Aid. "I am above the law!"
Counterpoint Duet: Between Randy and Skeeter in "I'm A Little Bit Country". The song was reprised at the episode to show that they had reconciled.
Country Matters: The only swear word that isn't thrown around with gleeful abandon. There are a few times they sneak it in though.
Stan tries to get Wendy back by having Jimmy tell her she's a "continuing source of inspiration" to him and his stutter makes it sound like... that.
And in Wendy's audition song for Fingerbang: "Balzac was a writer/ He lived with Allen Funt/ Mrs. Roberts didn't like him/ But that's 'cause she's a/ Contaminated water can really make you sick..."
That song uses subverted rhymes on several curse words, and even outright uses the word "fuck" (bleeped on TV, of course, though in such a way that it's obvious what it was, as always with South Park). Yet, the title of the song (never mentioned on TV) focuses on just one of the words so subverted - guess which one. [1]
Crapsack World: In the first 4 seasons, it made Springfield look boring by comparison. But once season 5 rolled around, whoo boy, did it ever become Crapsack.
Unanimously hits its peak with "You're Getting Old"/"Ass Burgers": Poor Stan watches his life fall apart around him; and after it all, right as he finally regains his enthusiasm in life, he's dragged back into the status quo against his will, turning to alcoholism just to go on living normally.
Creator Breakdown: "You're Getting Old" seems to suggest that Parker and Stone have or are undergoing one. The two themselves, however, have stated that fans "took the episode too seriously" and deny being unhappy with the show.
Crisis of Faith: Kyle has one when Cartman gets his own theme park and he gets... haemorrhoids.
Crush Parade: Kenny's first ever death on South Park sees him blasted onto a road by an alien raygun, trampled by a herd of stampeding cows, and the killing blow comes when he's run over by Officer Barbrady's police cruiser. After that, his body is eaten by rats.
Cultural Translation: Sega Dreamcast is changed into Playstation in the Polish translation simply because no one there knew what a Dreamcast was.
Cutting the Knot: When Stan and Kyle try to destroy the Wall Mart by destroying its core, they see that the core is a mirror. The Wall Mart CEO goes on about the symbolism about how it is the citizens of the town that are fueling the Wall Mart, etc. Stan shrugs and says the guy told them to destroy the core, so Kyle shatters the mirror which destroys the Wall Mart.
Darker and Edgier: Pre-Season 5, the show was really silly and amusing. But once we get to the season of uncensored cursing, Cartman killing two people and grinding them up into chili, brainwashing Earth Day cults, life-threatening hemorrhoids, genetically-engineered towels, and butt-faced people, sooner or later, you'll realize that the show has gotten a near-complete overhaul.
"Bigger, Longer & Uncut". Whenever it airs on T.V., it's always uncensored. On Comedy Central, it airs very late in the evening.
The "Coon and Friends" episode trilogy takes Darker and Edgier and runs with it. Kenny turns out to have experienced every single death consciously, waking up in his bed the next morning unharmed, and having to live with the fact that no one who witnessed his death has any memory of it. When he realizes he has a legitimate super power, he develops a secret super hero identity as "Mysterion". At first, he only uses the secret identity to thwart Cartman's plans and to scare his crack-addicted parents into actually taking care of him. ... and then he gets sucked into R'Lyeh, realizes it looks all too familiar, and kills himself to be transported back to his bed the next morning so he can save his friends who are stuck in a Lovecraftian nightmare. And then it's revealed that he's the spawn of Cthulhu, used as an infact in Lovecraftian cult rituals, as depicted in the Necronomicon.
Also in the "Coon and Friends" trilogy, Kenny as Mysterion finally decides to speak to his friends about the matter without the muffle, and completely seriously. It turns out that no one has the ability to remember the deaths, and Kenny reappears in his bed, or occasionally somewhere else.
Demoted to Extra: Most of the characters from the early seasons, particularly Officer Barbrady and Dr. Mephisto, who were major characters in many episodes, and often had whole shows featuring them (both later vanished, and South Park even got a real police force). The Mayor appeared far less as time went on, and even Chef was showing up less and less (after being more or less the fourth most important character on the show) before he was killed off. Most of the one-off characters, too.
Hell, the boys themselves. More and more episodes seem to follow the formula of "Randy does something stupid, while Stan & Kyle get maybe one or two lines in the beginning".
Tweek, Pip, Wendy, Ike, Jimbo & Ned, Fr Maxi, Kenny, Mrs Cartman, Kyle's parents and Mr Garrison have scarcely appeared in later seasons.
Though, as Chef once noted, "there is a BIG difference between gay people and Mr. Garrison." Liking men is the least weird thing about his sexual preferences.
Cartman. We can safely say "Imaginationland" clinched this one.
Determinator: Cartman may be a gigantic prick, but when he wants something he'll go to almost ridiculous lengths to get it.
Sometimes?
Kyle at times too. Both can be pushed easily if it's at the other's expense actually.
Butters in "Super Fun Time".
Butters: "Teacher, my partner is back on the bus."
Jimmy in "Erection Day".
Deus ex Machina: Mintberry Crunch, full-stop. Also, the ending of the film.
Devil in Plain Sight: Averted, in that many characters know that Cartman is a Jerk Ass. However, authority figures like Mr. Garrison, Principal Victoria, and Mr. Mackey oftentimes treat Stan and Kyle as if they're just as bad (or, in "Toilet Paper," worse!) despite this being far, far from the case.
The Devil Is a Loser: Originally a headstrong rebel and pretty badass his first appearance, his later appearances he's a whiny little bitch. God calls him out on this. He's also gay for some reason.
South Park was actually fairly progressive in this area. He's gay because he happens to be attracted to males. It wasn't done for a quick gag or gay plot, it's just a personality trait.
Diabolus ex Machina: Quite common in the show, especially in later seasons, most notably in Stanley's Cup.
Did Not Do the Research: In the episode "Pinewood Derby," the Australian Prime Minister is shown to be John Howard. While John Howard was the Prime Minister for quite a while, their PM at the time of the episode was Kevin Rudd. It was still nice to be included anyway.
Think of it this way: you could have been Finland.
In "Chef Aid", Alanis Morissette, who is also Canadian, was also shown with a normal-looking head. Celebrities might just be exempt.
There is a definite pattern of showing Canadian celebrities with 'Canadian' heads only when they're in Canada, particularly in episodes based around Canada, like Royal Pudding and Not Without My Anus. When shown outside the context of the home country, Canadian celebrities do not have Canadian heads. This is probably to aid with recognition more than not doing the research. (When in Canada, the celebrities are referred to by name whenever they appear. This aids in recognition, but would be hard to do at all times in all places.)
In Poor and Stupid Danica Patrick was shown racing at Sprint Cup level despite being primarily an IRL driver and having only recently gotten into NASCAR in the Nationwide Series, probably because she's one of the most well known NASCAR drivers.
Matt and Trey have admitted to basing their Inception -based parody, Insheeption, on a College Humor parody video because they could not obtain a screener copy of the actual movie, *
Though why they couldn't just, say, watch it in the theater well before the episode aired, it's difficult to say.
They explain their story better here. Basically, Matt had seen the movie, Trey had not seen the movie, Matt messes up and utters a false confirmation to Trey when viewing the parody.
Cartman's anti-hippy strategy is to drive them away with the sound of Death Metal. Instead he puts on "Raining Blood," by Slayer, which is Thrash Metal.
"Sixty. That's the number of episodes they made of Punky Brewster before it was cancelled." Actually, there's eighty-eight.
Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Mintberry Crunch did it using the power of berries and mint before dragging him back to whence he came (then he flipped off his fat sister).
Dinky Drivers: Occurs with Stan and Kenny in the episode "Towelie".
How about a non-Scott-Tenorman example? In the beginning of "Tsst!", Cartman is in trouble for chaining a boy to the school flagpole, telling him he poisoned his milk (and the only way to stop it is to cut off his leg), and (of course) supplying the poor boy with a hacksaw (it is implied the boy used it). This is a punishment for... calling Cartman chubby. Especially bad if you consider that Stan, Kyle, and Kenny regularly call Cartman MUCH worse names for "chubby".
Well, it could be that he doesn't punish them because they're his friends. My friends and I insult each other all the time, but when someone at my school called me a retard, I punched him in the nose.
Or, I just thought of this, maybe he puts up with it because he wants Stan, Kyle, and Kenny to keep hanging around him so he can feel like he had friends.
Consider The Death of Eric Cartman. The boys pull one on Cartman just because he ate all the chicken skins on the chicken they decide to ignore him. He's done worse things than that.
A more meta-example would be the sex-change episode. Okay, we understand that Trey and Matt think that it's wrong but...did they have to have Mr. Garrison as the primary example? It's the equivalent of having Satan pop out of the ground and say how much he loves a political party!
How about the one involving the OTHER Scott, Scott the Dick, of the Terrance and Philip fame? Scott, disliking fart jokes is completely reasonable, but is it really enough to validate wishing cancer upon someone, letting Saddam Hussein and his army into Canada in hopes that they'd repeatedly shoot and then decapitate Terrance and Phillip, and then trying to get the people you hate to sacrifice themselves in a suicide bomb attack to fix something you screwed up?
In Douche & Turd, the slogan "Vote or Die"; meaning if you don't vote, P.Diddy will KILL YOU. In the same episode, the town banishes Stan for not voting. They tear off his clothes bit by bit, spitting on him, then tie him to a horse and put a bucket on his head, sending him off into the wilderness. "Isn't this a little extreme?"
"Pandemic". The Department of Homeland Security takes every Peruvian flute band they can find and takes them away to Miami where they plan to make them spend the rest of their lives. Why? For the sole reason that they find them annoying. That is what it seems like, until Part 2, when we find out that the Peruvian flute bands were the key to keeping some monstrous guinea pigs from causing massive destruction. The DMS did that knowing full well what would happen.
In "T.M.I.," a psychiatrist tries to purposely antagonize Cartman by hurling fat jokes and insults at him to test how he deals with anger. Cartman does not respond with the usual emotional reaction one might expect. Rather, he uses an iPhone to produce fake evidence that the psychiatrist was involved with a teenager online. The psychiatrist's wife calls the psychiatrist and kills herself over the phone.
In "1%," Cartman responds to being teased about "crying to his stuffed animals" every time he is persecuted by trashing all of his stuffed animals one by one and blaming it on his friends. Also known as, Cartman's interpretation of "growing up".
The Dog Was the Mastermind: In the episode "About Last Night...", Kyle's toddler brother Ike was the key player in Obama and McCain's Ocean's Eleven-style heist.
Double Aesop: "Simpsons Already Did It" tells us "Nobody cares if It's Been Done". It also tells us, literally in its last seconds, "War is the natural order of life".
Most recent example: It's not okay to show Mohammed even if he's just standing there looking normal, yet it's okay to show Buddha snorting coke and Jesus watching Internet porn.
After the censorship debacle, Matt and Trey said they'd "come back next week with something completely different and see what'll happen". That "something" was showing a shark raping a mentally handicapped child. Uncensored. Twice.
Downer Ending: "Stanley's Cup", "Toilet Paper", and "The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs."
The latest episode "You're Getting Old" ended on a surprisingly depressing note.
Ass Burgers too.
The Drag Along: The characters generally take turns with this. Craig spends two whole episodes lampshading this. But after years of improbable adventures it was about time somebody called them on it.
The Dragon: Kenny or Butters usually act as this to Cartman.
Cthulhu has more or less become this to Cartman in "Mysterion Rises".
General Disarray to Professor Chaos.
Drama Bomb: As soon as Season 5, the show starts to have these, beginning with "Kenny Dies". Other episodes include "Fun with Veal", "The Death Camp of Tolerance", "Toilet Paper", "Red Man's Greed", "Raisins", "Preschool", "The Return of Chef", and "You're Getting Old."
And in the case of Stan and Kyle's friendship, "Follow That Egg" was the first of several episodes to have these dropped on it in contrast to earlier, sillier episodes such as "Prehistoric Ice Man".
Pip in the episode "201" gets stepped on by Barbara Streisand for no reason.
Driven to Suicide: In "Coon Vs Coon and Friends", Kenny/Mysterion attempts to goad Cthulhu into either removing his curse of immortality or simply killing him once and for all.
In "Pinewood Derby", Emmett Hollis' father shoots himself with a gun after feeling ashamed to have lost to Randy in the derby-in front of Emmett-much to his horror. Emmett than says, "He's okay, he's okay, he's okay..." quickly before the scene changes.
Dying Like Animals: The people of South Park are really prone to mass stupid behavior, regardless of age or gender. One of them even dies simply because he thought global warming was chasing him and he lagged behind too much. Then he checks to make sure.
E-G
Early Installment Weirdness: In episodes two to six in the first season, Kyle was the one who says, "Oh my God, they killed Kenny!", rather than Stan. The seventh episode, the first Halloween Episode, had the line said by Stan as normal at the beginning, but the ending features a variant said by Kyle. Subsequent episodes have Stan as the primary deliverer of the line. On another note, "You bastards!" wasn't said in the Volcano episode.*
Easy Road To Hell: A definite example in the movie. Kenny has been killed (again) and his soul drifts up towards heaven. However, as soon as he touches it, he gets an "Access Denied" message and tumbles straight down to Hell, which has a "Population" sign showing a huge and ever-increasing number, whilst the equivalent sign for Heaven revealed a tiny population. And it's not as if Kenny has exactly had time to sin much. All Played for Laughs of course.
In the the tv series, the only people who can get into heaven are Mormons. Everybody else goes to hell.
Cartman himself seems to go to this level in the parts of "Tsst!" with the nannies, at least fitting the criteria of causing people to lose their sanity.
Coon 2: Hindsight has Cthulhu himself. And KENNY(!!!)
Even Evil Has Standards: Cartman, for all his atrocities, draws the line at shooting people in the dick. He also loves cats, going to a lot of trouble to protect them in one episode. And he adored the Jakovasaurs, though everyone else hated them.
Even Al freaking Qaeda suicide bombs the "armies" of New Jersey to help America before the idiocy can spread to Afghanistan.
Satan does this often. In addition to hating his Jerkass boyfriend Saddam Hussein, he also despises rich, spoiled 16 year old girls (he fears that he might become one, but one of his minions tells him "you're not that bad") and thinks that someone dressing up as Steve Irwin with a sting ray through their chest at his Halloween party is offensive. Turns out that it actually is Steve Irwin, so Satan kicks him out for not wearing a costume.
Everyone is Bi: Every guy's masturbated with another guy before. But not in a hot tub at a party.
Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: In one episode, Cartman simply cannot wrap his mind around why Stan and Kyle feel bad that Butters is going to be punished for something they did. "Is it because you think you'll get in trouble later?"
Evil Versus Evil: Eric Cartman vs Saddam Hussein. Eric Cartman vs. Scott Tenorman. Eric Cartman vs Osama bin Laden. The Coon vs Professor Chaos. Celebrities vs. ginger kids in "200/201" (and they eventually team up).
Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Some of the news reporters are people like "a Hispanic Man with Some Gravy Stains on his Lapel", or "Midget Wearing Bikini".
There was also a reporter who was introduced by the anchor as "a normal-looking guy with a funny name" (his name is shown as "Creamy Goodness").
Excuse Question: The town once held a quiz show filled with these for the benefit of Jakovasaurs in an attempt to get rid of them. Unfortunately, they didn't get the correct answers, and Officer Barbarry forgot that he was supposed to be throwing the competition.
Expy: All of the children at the handicapped summer camp in Crippled Summer save for Jimmy and Timmy, are expies of classic Looney Tunes and Tex Avery characters.
Eye Scream: In the first episode of season 8, Butters gets a shuriken stuck in his eye. He screams.
In an instance from the very first season, Kenny winds up having an eye torn from his skull as he's mauled to death by turkeys.
The Faceless: Kenny, though his face has been seen at least five times: In The Movie, "Super Best Friends," "Good Times With Weapons," "The Losing Edge," and "Major Boobage." This, is of course combined with You All Look Familiar: If you know he has blonde hair, there's no mystery.
Fail O'Suckyname: Sea Man from the episode "Super Best Friends". Not only do the superhero religions call him by a pun on "semen", but it doesn't help that he can communicate with fish, one of which is a sidekick named Swallow:
Narrator: Meanwhile, in the ocean depths, Seaman seeks out water to mix with the concrete. Sea Man: Sea Man! Look, Swallow, we should be able to divert the water with that pipe. Narrator: And so, Seaman and Swallow get to... get to work. *laughs*
The boys' school football team are the Cows.
Butters' real name, fitting for his Woobie status, is Leopold Stotch.
Farts on Fire: Cartman in the first episode. In the pilot version, it was caused by eating extra spicy tamales that Chef gave to the boys to help give them an excuse to leave school. In the actual premire, his anal probe was causing this.
Fat Camp: Cartman was sent to a fat camp, and came back skinny but it was really another kid he paid to show up.
Fire and Brimstone Hell: Played straight sometimes, but more often subverted. Sure, there's plenty of flame, but as often as not it seems to be a pleasant and fun place, and just about everyone winds up there regardless of their goodness or badness.
The Big Guy: Cartman (possibly subverted in the fact that although he can enact more damage (either directly or indirectly) on someone (via manipulation et al.) he's fairly weak and whiny physically)
The Smart Guy: Kyle (or Kenny... particularly considering that in the earlier seasons Kenny was the only one who really understood things)
Flanderization: Numerous characters, but especially Cartman, who started out as merely an obnoxious brat and is now evil incarnate.
As well as Butters' parents. At first, they grounded Butters on occasion. You could defend that his punishment in "How to Eat with Your Butt" was because the school thought he was making crude face. Now, they'd punish Butters for dropping a penny.
Liane had a reverse Flanderization. At first she was a clueless slut who would do anything to make Cartman happy, even if it wasn't really good for him. In recent seasons, she has realized that she needs to be his mother and not his friend, and acts like a much more normal person.
Flatline: Present in some episodes where characters happen to be in hospital for various reasons.
Cartman also does it in "Crack Baby Athletic Association" when Kyle proposes using 30% of the company's profits to build an orphanage for the crack babies.
Stan is quite prone to these when something immensely strange, stupid or unexpected happens. Sometimes he upgrades it to a deadpan "Dude, what the fuck?".
Flaw Exploitation: Cartman's revenge plot against Scott Tenorman relies heavily on this. If Stan and Kyle didn't rat him out to Scott, or Scott himself had reacted differently, the whole plan could have fallen apart.
Fluffy Cloud Heaven: Limited only to Mormons. It's extremely dull as a result.
Foe Yay: Involving Cartman/Kyle, Cartman/Butters, Cartman/Wendy and Craig/Tweek.
The Cartman/Kyle foe yay is perhaps most evident in the Imaginationland storyline. The lengths Cartman goes to in order to make Kyle live up to their contract are phenomenal. The contract? If Cartman can prove the existence of leprechauns, Kyle has to suck his balls.
Food Porn: Taken to disturbingly literal territory with Randy's short-lived obsession with Food Network in the episode, "Crčme Fraiche".
Foreshadowing: In South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, when Kenny wants to go see the Terrance and Philip movie instead of going to church, his mom says, "Well, fine, you go ahead and miss church. And then, when you die and go to hell, you can answer to Satan!"
The Freelance Shame Squad: When Stan shows up to the class Halloween party dressed up as Raggedy Andy (and Wendy doesn't go through with dressing as Raggedy Ann), Mr. Garrison actually says "Let's all laugh and point at Stan, everyone", and they do.
Free-Range Children: Very possibly the most overt use of this trope in the history of Western media.
In The Coon/Cthulhu/Mysterion Saga, Cthulhu is animated with advanced computer animation in contrast to everyone else, who look like shitty little construction paper. While at first this may appear to just be another parody of the show's animation like the way Mecha Streishand and the remade aliens were animated in "201" and "Free Hat" respectively, it can also be interpreted as illustrating how otherworldly Cthulhu is. The original stories of H.P. Lovecraft like "Call of Cthulhu" would go into great detail about how hideous Cthulhu was in his appearance, being so alien he drives men mad when they look at him. Having three dimensions and a more detailed body may just be the way his appearance manifests in the South Park universe.
After the reveal of Kenny's immortality, Kenny's screams of horror in The Movie when he first arrives in Hell can be interpreted as him freaking out that this time around, he's not resurrecting.
Fridge Horror: In "Mysterion Rises" Kenny reveals that his superpower is immortality and that, no matter how many times he dies and catches glimpses of the afterlife, he'll always wake up in his bed the next morning. Not only that, but everyone who witnesses him dying gets their memory wiped the moment he comes back, leaving him as the only one who remembers the experience. Considering his dozens of deaths over the course of the series, you really have to wonder what kind of mental strain that would leave on a nine year old.
Imagine getting your limbs chopped off by psychotic Earth Day head honchos. Kenny's whimpering takes on a whole new level of horrifying with above knowledge of his condition.
Kenny himself sums up the true horror of what it is to be immortal:
Kenny: Pretty cool? Do you know what it feels like to be stabbed? To be shot? Decapitated? Torn apart? Burned? Run over? It's not pretty cool, Kyle! It fucking hurts!
From the Mouths of Babes: The kids are usually a lot more worldly than one would expect from their age, but other times they are quite innocent.
Fully Automatic Clip Show: When Cartman is not invited to Kyle's birthday party, the latter mentions the times Cartman teased him for being Jewish.
Fur and Loathing: Spoofed to hell. Don't throw paint on a gangsta rapper's clothes.
Gainax Ending: The end of the Coon and Friends arc. That is all.
Garage Band: The Lords of the Underworld. They only become popular when they become Timmy and the Lords of the Underworld.
Genius Ditz: Randy Marsh is a brilliant scientist, but otherwise a complete idiot.
Genre Savvy: Subverted. The children (especially Stan and Kyle) seem to be at least partially aware of the insanity of their world and its other inhabitants, but are unable to change anything.
In "Stanley's Cup" the characters correctly realize that they are in a typical sports movie and thus are bound to win against all odds. They also understand that to achieve that, they need to invite a really good player to their team for the final match, which they also do. This is subverted when they turn out to be Wrong Genre Savvy and are beaten brutally: the opposing team were the real protagonists all along. Similarly, in "The Losing Edge" the team remarks that at this point of the movie, they should include a new, special player in the team to achieve their goals. Only their goal in to lose and the player is absolutely terrible.
Also, Kenny as Mysterion is sort of Genre Savvy, treating his inability to die as a "super power".
Kenny in general is occasionally very genre savvy about his dying. In "Tweek vs Clyde" he avoids shop class knowing exactly what will happen (and does happen) the moment he gets around those dangerous power tools. In "Christmas in Canada" he's wary about getting on a plane because, saying (muffled) "dude, I'll fucking die." In "Cherokee Hair Tampons," when Stan is distraught about Kyle nearly dying he points out with increasing irritation that nobody gives this much of a crap when he dies, before leaving in frustration (and instantly dying).
In fact, Kenny tends to be something of a genre-savvy straight man in general: the gag being that the audience can't generally understand what he's saying even though it's a lampshade or something savvy.
Genre Shift: South Park initially started out as a simple surrealist comedy, but the creators later shifted it to a commentary of the real world, from everything such as politics to celebrities. The creators intentionally wrote Mr Hat out of the show as a symbol of the transition.
In-universe; in "Sexual Healing", the video game franchise Tiger Woods PGA Tour turned into a pastiche of fighting games based on Woods' marital infidelity. Cartman, Stan, and Kenny loved the game. Once Woods got over his sexual addiction at the end of the episode, the next PGA Tour game went back to the status quo, upsetting Cartman and Stan (Kenny, meanwhile, had died. Again).
Getting Crap Past the Radar: Despite the TV-MA rating, the show seems to have its limits as to what gets shown or heard on TV. Of course since it's South Park we're talking about, they find loopholes...
According to an interview featured in This Film Is Not Yet Rated, The Movie's subtitle was supposed to be "All Hell Breaks Loose", but the use of the word "hell" was resisted. By the time that resistance figured out what else "Bigger, Longer & Uncut" can refer to, the authors could get away with saying they'd already ordered the posters and it'd cost too much to make new ones with a different title.
Kenny's dialogue is not nonsensical mumbling, but just Stone speaking into his sleeve. If you're able to decipher it Kenny easily has the most raunchy dialogue. Especially in the opening.
The Chinese man who owns the City Wok. Whenever he says "City Wok" his accent makes it sound like "Shitty Wok", much to the kids' amusement.
Most recently, DP-oil. Though they didn't simply get the crap past the radar, but sneaked in the control room and, well, DP-d the operator.
Muhammad was in the opening crowd shot for 27 episodes (from "Smug Alert!" to "The List").
On at least one occasion in "The Coon 2" saga, Cartman refers to Kyle as "The Human Kike".
The bowling place in "You're Getting Old" has an arcade cabinet of Custer's Revenge.
About halfway through Season 15, the original broadcast version of episodes have now become able to say "shit" without it censored by a Sound Effect Beep, although other episodes occasionally broke it.
Gilligan Cut: "Asspen" opens with all the boys' parents having drinks together, and the Stotches saying how glad they are that Butters finally seems to have finally made some close friends. Cut to the kids watching TV, and Cartman urinating on Butters while he's asleep.
From "Tsst":
Cartman:(who is residing beside a trash bin in the rain) This is bullcrap. Mom'll break soon. I can outlast her. (cut to his house where Liane is making a painting and he arrives) Cartman: Alright, I'm back.
Also played with in "The Death of Eric Cartman", when Butters asks Cartman if he's ever done anything really bad. Cartman thinks briefly, says, "Not really", then cut to Butters' room where he is going over the worst things he's done.
From "Butt Out":
Kyle: What we really should do is go to our parents right now and take responsibility for smoking ourselves, even if it means getting grounded. Stan: Why? Kyle: Because, if we go to the tobacco company, I know exactly what'll happen. They'll take us in, and then Rob Reiner will show up with all the townspeople, holding torches or something, and there'll be a big showdown until we talk about what we learned, and change everyone's minds — this is all following a formula! Stan: So it's either deal with all that, or be grounded for three weeks. (The boys think...) (Cut to the boys at the tobacco company, with Rob Reiner and the townspeople approaching with torches.) Kyle:God damn it!
The Gods Must Be Lazy: In The Movie, Satan and Saddam Hussein rise up from hell and take over earth. Only the fact that Saddam is such a Jerkass and Satan is a Jerk with a Heart of Gold saved Earth from being plunged into a 1000 years of darkness, and yet God does not seem to be doing anything to stop him. It's especially jarring considering that Jesus and God are both recurring characters, and you can actually briefly see Jesus in the background of one of the shots in the movie (when the soldiers are marching in front of Kyle's house). Also, in the newest episode, "Mysterion Rises", God and Jesus don't seem to care that Cartman and the evil god Cthulhu are taking over the world.
Good Girls Avoid Abortion: During the Stand and Deliver episode, one of the students is pregnant but refuses to have an abortion. Cartman convinces her otherwise (since it's "cheating").
There was also an episode where Cartman's mom wants to abort Cartman and slept with many politicians in order to allow abortions in the 40th trimester. It turns out, however, that she confused "abortion" with "adoption".
Good Angel, Bad Angel/Power Trio: Nowadays there is a tendency for Kyle to act as the superego (good angel), Cartman act as the Id (devil), and Stan be the ego. Of course, like all things on Southpark, this is played with immensely.
Good Is Not Nice: Kyle. Seeing some of the conflicts between him and Cartman out of context wouldn't make all that clear that Kyle's supposed to be the good guy.
This only happens in "Le Petit Tourette", though, in the perspective of the adults. Cartman fakes Tourette's Syndrome to get what he wants, and Kyle, who's known Cartman all his life, gets annoyed and says that he doesn't have Tourette's, and an authority figure that hears it accuses Kyle of being a bully and he is taken to observe various kids with Tourette's (with lack of swearing). He is then forced to apologize to Cartman. However, when Cartman plans to bad-mouth Jews, it's the straw that breaks the camel's back, so Kyle devises an elaborate plan that actually saves Cartman from going in too deep.
In earlier episodes, Stan and Kyle were essentially lower scale Jerkasses that actually joined Cartman in bullying or manipulating others when they weren't the target (usually Butters, Pip or Kenny). It was only around Cartman that they looked moralistic (though admittedly they are far more toned down and sympathetic in later episodes).
Good Ol' Boy: Many locals, particularly the "I'm A Little Bit Country" guy.
Good Thing You Can Heal: In the Coon trilogy, it's revealed that Kenny coming Back from the Dead isn't just a gag, but an actual superpower. That he's had to use his power hundreds of times by the time he's turned ten is apparently a coincidence.
Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Usually, Butters. Aversions are notable, such as the end of "Imaginationland," and the entirety of "Butters' Bottom Bitch".
An example that could be considered subtle in the episode "All About Mormons?" is that Butters refers to Gary, the new kid, as a peckerface, but it's quiet and in the background.
The Grays: The aliens in the first episode who put satellites in people's butts are this. This later turns out to be a plot point in a later episode they re-appear in. They are also seen in the background in nearly every episode.
When the series started, that part of Colorado ranked very high in UFO-related claims. Trey Parker claimed to have been abducted and probed in his first Tonight Show interview.
Played with heavily. Gerald Broflovski is a lawyer and has invoked this from time to time, most notably in "Sexual Harrassment Panda". It's also implied that Kyle's family is a little better off than much of the town (but nowhere near the Blacks). Kyle himself usually averts this trope despite Cartman's (hands down the most greedy character) constant ripping on Jewish sterotypes.
Green Aesop: Sometimes spoofed, but more often subverted in that the Aesops are anti-environmentalist. Going as far as to flat-out say that rainforrests are evil, and there's no evidence of global warming.
One of the creators of the show actually visited Costa Rica and...well, during the commentary for the Rainforest Schmainforest episode, they said that Cartman's view of the place was about the reaction they'd had to seeing the rainforest and Costa Rica
Half-Arc Season: Season 6 had most of the episodes deal with Butters and Tweek as Kenny's replacements, and later Cartman being possessed by Kenny's spirit.
While they have different plots, most of the "non-issue" episodes in Season 4 tended to revolve around Cartman's various attempts at getting $10 million. In Season 12 it's the boys' gradual discovery of their unpopularity.
Handicapped Badass: Timmy and Jimmy. In "Cripple Fight" they manage to beat each other up despite being unable to walk, and Timmy is perfectly capable of... well, doing whatever it's funny for a retarded kid in a motorised wheelchair to do.
"And they all lived Happily Ever After, except for Pocket who died of hepatitis B." "And they all lived Happily Ever After, except for Kyle who died of AIDS two weeks later." ("Goddamnit, Cartman!")
Have a Gay Old Time: "The F Word" argues and advocates the notion that "fag" is no longer a derogatory term for homosexuals, but for loud, annoying douchebags. Like Harley riders.
Head Desk: In "Hooked on Monkey Fonics" Kyle falls in love with the Homeschooled Kid Rebecca, who is unfamiliar with the public school system. When he asks her to come to the dance, she says she might see him there. Kyle explains that he meant going to the dance with him, but Rebecca explains there is no need for that since her father will drive her there. Once she leaves the room, Kyle bangs his head against her chair.
Headless Horseman: In "Imaginationland", the Horseman is one of the "evil" characters that resides in Imaginationland.
Heart Is an Awesome Power: Parodied with Captain Hindsight, whose only superpower, besides flight, is to tell people what they should've done before an accident happened. This somehow counts as saving the day.
Mintberry Crunch uses his abilities to defeat Cthulhu.
Heavy Voice: In the second episode, when Cartman gains a lot of weight, his voice gets deeper (and thicker). The same happens to all the boys in "Make Love, Not Warcraft."
Hermaphrodite: Liane Cartman is revealed to be one at the end of the Eric Cartman's Father Two-Parter. Though recent events suggest this may have been a fabrication.
Heel Face Revolving Door: Cartman has gone from being one of the team to actually being the villain of the episode and back again so many times over the years, he may as well be labeled the poster boy for this trope.
Cartman will generally do whatever will benefit him at the moment, but there a few episodes where he does something good even when he won't get anything out of it.
Hell of a Heaven: Heaven is full of Mormons. This was used to punish Sadam Hussein, actually.
Heroic Sociopath: In "Scott Tenorman Must Die", Cartman starts as this, going up against Scott Tenorman, who is portrayed as even worse than Cartman. But then the ending comes and subverts it, showing that Cartman is actually much, MUCH more sinister.
Heterosexual Life Partners: Stan and Kyle, though both Randy and Cartman have questioned the 'heterosexual' part.
He Who Fights Monsters: although it's never explicitly shown or mentioned in the show, this trope has been very gradually wearing away at Kyle since the beginning of the series, owing to Cartman's constant verbal, emotional, and psychological abuse. As of now, Kyle has only reached Determinator status, but his obsession breaks through rather...darkly on occasion (eg. Ginger Kids, Fatbeard). Of course, Your Mileage May Vary.
Abiding by some circumstances, Cartman himself. While often depicted as a sociopath and a Jerkass it is made clear the other boys enjoy picking on him whether he provokes it or not, this perhaps becomes most coherent in Cartman's Silly Hate Crime where after Cartman's departure, Stan and Kyle label Clyde the new fat kid and pick on him excessively for no reason until he gradually gains the same obnoxious temperament as Cartman. Indeed a lot of Cartman's treatment may come off as rather cruel and sympathetic if not for the rather extreme manners of revenge he commits.
An interesting pattern is given in both characters' behaviour as a result of their abuse, Kyle is tortured by Cartman and thus bullies fat people, Cartman is tortured by Kyle and thus is anti-semetic.
Hey You: Shelley hasn't called Stan by his given name since Season One, generally preferring "Turd" or, on special occasions, "Stupid Turd."
Hidden Depths: Lots of characters but Ike in particular. He is a conservative, intellectual, jewel thief, pirate, adopted, Canadian/American, Jew in Kindergarten.
Homage: Lots of them, many of very high detail. Some notable ones:
Cripple Fight (contains an elaborate shot-for-shot remake of the protracted fight from They Live!)
"Proper Condom Use" casts Butters as Humungus telling the girls to "Just walk away."
Imaginationland: Episode II (Kyle's Disney Death is a sequence taken from The Abyss)
The Imagination Doorway in the same episode is also an homage to Stargate. They even include Kurt Russel (who played one of the lead roles in the movie) in the team that gets sent through the doorway, saying that he was "in that movie that was kinda like this."
Major Boobage (hallucinations with the rotoscoped animation, hypersexualized scenarios, and music from Heavy Metal)
Super Fun Time (Butters holding Cartman's hand in the same scenarios as Wai Lin when handcuffed to James Bond in Tomorrow Never Dies)
Wendy fighting Cartman in Breat Cancer Show Ever is pretty much shot-for-shot the final fight from Snatch.
You Have 0 Friends (Stan getting "sucked into" Facebook shares many scenes directly with TRON)
The opening of "The Coon" has a shot taken directly from Watchmen.
Coon 2: Hindsight (Contains a remake of a scene from A Clockwork Orange where Alex puts his minions in their place.)
"In Mysterion Rises" Cartman tries to manipulate the evil god Cthulhu, resulting in a relationship similar to Satsuki and Totoro from Miyazaki's "My Neighbor Totoro". Seriously.
And more specifically, exactly like (as in frame for frame), Feed the Kitty.
(A longer list is available on the Shout Out page.)
Horrible Judge of Character: Played in "Free Hat" for laughs. The episode's titular character, Hat McCollough, is a serial murderer of twenty-three babies, but a protest group wants him freed from jail, claiming he killed the babies in self-defense.
Cartman's mom seems to think he's a "little angel" to the point where she doesn't even question his story about why he has a picture of him with Butter's penis in his mouth in Cartman Sucks. She also lets him get away with hell on earth, and always takes his side. However this is played with in the episode Tsst (like all things Southparkian).
Humans Are Morons: The 100th episode, "Cancelled," reveals Earth to be a giant Reality TV show for the rest of The Universe's silly amusement.
Humble Goal: Many episode plots involve the kids wanting something relatively mundane — say, getting the latest gaming system, or returning a rented video on time — but continually getting waylaid by assorted weirdness.
Hypocritical Heartwarming: The only time Shelley shows any affection towards Stan is when it looks like someone else might have the privilege of beating him up.
Hypocritical Humor: In the Spanish dub of The Movie, since there isn't a word for "bitch" in Spanish, Cartman sings "la mama de Kyle is una puta" (Kyle's mom is a whore). And we all know about Cartman's mom...
From "My Future Self 'n Me":
Sharon: Stan, what did I tell you about watching The Osbournes? Stan: Aw, come on, Mom. Sharon:It's going to make you retarded! Stan: It's just a show! It doesn't have any fucking effect on me, for fuck's sake!
In the episode "Free Hat," the boys attempt to get George Lucas and Steven Spielberg to stop releasing updated and altered versions of their movies. Midway through the episode, there is an advertisement for a fictional updated rerelease of "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe" that includes things such as CGI, Star Wars characters, and other things Parker and Stone didn't have the budget for when they initially created the series.
In "I'm A Little Bit Country", Sheila is holding a picket sign reading "War Is Not My Voice" at the anti-war protest. Strange considering the fact that she once started one!
In 201 Jesus says that people get upset when Muhammad is made un of because he's a religious figure, immediately followed by Buddha doing crack in front of kids.
Icarus Allusion: In "Cartman's Incredible Gift", Cartman tries to fly from his roof with cardboard wings and ends up in the hospital recovering from head trauma. The cops believe that he now has psychic abilities because they have heard of similar cases; they take his advice and dismiss Kyle's. Kyle concludes he has to be as stupid as Cartman to be acknowledged. Before he does so, Butters tells him not to fly too close to the sun.
I Got Better: Happens a lot, but one particular spoof on the concept: Cartman responds with this when Kyle taunts him by saying that he was a stillborn.
Immortality: Kenny has revealed himself to possess type IV as of "Mysterion Rises"; which, interestingly, gives him the same superpower as Jesus in the show.
Jesus can come back immediately (as long as it's on Easter), and wherever he wants , so it isn't precisely the same.
Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: happens often with automatic weapons. Particular examples include "Wing," where multiple Chinese thugs fire at the boys and miss completely from mere feet away and "Medicinal Fried Chicken," when a bunch of heavily-armed gangsters are taken down slowly and one by one, in a close-range gunfight with South Park's incompetent police force, who are wielding only pistols.
Incurable Cough of Death: The episode "Kenny Dies" first shows Kenny coughing a bit, and it being commented that he's had the cough for a while. The titular death is the result of "a muscular disease."
Informed Attractiveness: In "Pre-School" the Fifth Graders say Stan's mom has the hottest "bewbs" in South Park.
Informed Deformity: Played for laughs with Ugly Bob from "Not Without My Anus".
Informed Obscenity: In the episode "It Hits The Fan", The Knights of Standards and Practices each represent a different bad word. One of these: Mee Krob, the name of a really nasty Thai dish.
Infant Immortality: Subverted and played straight: While one of the recurring gags of the show is the death of Kenny, he keeps coming back at the next episode. Eventually is revealed that Kenny is indeed inmortal Played straight with Cartman, Stan and Kyle, that despite being put constantly on situations that normally would kill somebody (Like for example, being in the middle of the war) they manage to survive.
Insane Troll Logic: How else can you get from buttsex (which wasn't even mentioned) to binary code?
Pretty much all adults (and often the children too though less frequently) use Insane Troll Logic most of the time. And that's all of them, in the world.
Inspirationally Disadvantaged: Cheerfully subverted with Timmy and Jimmy, who in addition to having plenty of achievements that have nothing to do with their disabilities also have dynamic personalities, with character strengths and flaws.
Internal Retcon: The 200th episode revealed this to be the case with the early story arc concerning Cartman's father.
Invisible Streaker: Subverted in "Good Times With Weapons", wherein Cartman attempts this during the fairgrounds auction at the climax in the episode, but he was only imagining things — he ends up nude on stage and causing bigger controversy than the sight of Butters with a ninja star impaled in his eye.
Mr. Garrison: You see the damage you've caused, Eric Cartman? What were you thinking?! Cartman: I told you it was a Wardrobe Malfunction!
Irony: In "Cartman Joins NAMBLA," Kenny spends the whole episode trying to stop his father from impregnating his mother, then when that doesn't work, he tries to get rid of the unborn baby anyway. In the end, Kenny dies (again) before the baby is born, and the baby becomes him.
That doubles as Fridge Logic/Horror, considering Kenny's immortality. This might have been his attempt to stop the cycle.
It Got Worse: BP first drills into the ocean and creates another Oil spill. Then they dig again and release monsters from another dimension. They dig into the moon now, can't get worse right? They release Cthulhu.
Oh cmon, that's total bullshit...everyone knows Cthulu is sealed somewhere in the Atlantic near Antarctica!
It Is Always Winter: It is almost always winter in this show, even during times of the year when it shouldn't be. A rare exception is in "Summer Sucks", where humor comes from how quickly everyone gets bored with the lack of snow, which was probably a response to TV Guide claiming during season one that Trey Parker was too stupid to animate the Characters' legs.
Cartman makes a joke in one episode about having only two seasons in South Park: winter and July.
Semi-justified by the fact that South Park is a mountain town.
Sergeant Yates: Muhammad showed up and there was no violence at all? Stan: Well, this giant John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln...*
In "The Super Best Friends", while the Blainetologists are trying to commit mass suicide, David Blaine brought the Lincoln statue at the Lincoln Memorial to life in order to attack the Super Best Friends. The Super Best Friends, in turn, create a statue of Booth to assassinate the Lincoln statue.
In-universe example from the episode "Cartoon Wars Part 2."
Cartman: Excuse me, Kyle, but I have some idea balls to remove from a manatee tank.
(turns and leaves) Kyle: What!?
"Chef's Chocolate Salty Balls," which are actually balls made of chocolate which taste salty, not Chef's testicles.
Jerkass: Cartman is one of television's most infamous examples, making Homer Simpson post-season nine look like Ned Flanders pre-"Alone Again, Natura-Diddly" (or pre-"Hurricane Neddy").
All of the adults have had their moments, as well. In particular, Sheila because she's overbearing, the school staff because they're incompetent morons, Butters' parents because they treat him badly, Officer Yates because of his Lawful Stupid nature, and Randy because he's Randy.
Jesus Was Way Cool: Jesus is just a friendly guy living in suburbia and hosting his public access TV show.
Until he went and sacrificed himself... to save Santa Claus from kidnappers in Iraq on Christmas Day, thus forever marking Christmas as a day to remember Jesus... for saving Santa Claus in Iraq.
He came back near the end of Holy Saturday (which is close to Easter Sunday), to help put down the extensive corruption in the Catholic Church (with the help of its friendly, but somewhat impotent, pope).
"I'm pretty sure that killing Jesus is not very Christian."
Jumping Out of a Cake: "Butters' Bottom Bitch" has an undercover cop posing as a hooker in one of these.
Jurisdiction Friction: Mocked. In "Lil' Crime Stoppers" the boys are playing city cops, and the kids playing FBI keep showing up to take their cases away.
Chef: Children, playing football is like making love to a really beautiful woman. You can't always score, but when you can, it makes all the trying worthwhile.
Karma Houdini: Cartman does this a lot, usually when he does truly evil things. Examples include Scott Tenorman, the "Ginger Kids" episode, trying to kill his own mother, infecting Kyle with HIV, and the hospital incident. Even when he doesn't pull a Karma Houdini in the immediate sense, he rarely suffers for longer than the duration of the episode in which he gets his comuppance.
The Ginger and Scott incidents come back to haunt him in episode 201 when it turns out that he's half Ginger and he unknowingly killed his own father for revenge on his half-brother Scott; the being half ginger part really got to him.
All four boys do this in "Preschool" when they unintentionally cause further damage to their already-burned preschool teacher and let Trent take the blame...just as they were about to confess that the first burning was their fault. The implication is that the boys will pay dearly for what they've done once they turn fourteen; however, thanks to Comic Book Time, this will never happen.
Stan, Kyle, and Kenny pull this at the end of "Good Times With Weapons," leaving Cartman to the mercy of the outraged townspeople as they escape any punishment for what they did to Butters.
The Wacky Molestation Adventure episode in season 4 has pretty much the entire youth population get this after getting their parents arrested. When they get out of prison they are so confinced they were all perverts that they wouldn't even listen to their kids admitting their false accusation.
Kansas City Shuffle: Cartman pulls this off at the end of "Scott Tenorman Must Die" episode, after several failed attempts to get back at Scott who initially conned him.
Character Development tones down this aspect with at least Stan and Kyle after the first few seasons. Of course then you still have Cartman who takes this trope to its logical end.
Matt and Trey seem to have a habit of killing off characters they no longer have a use for, such as Ms. Choksondik (the fourth grade teacher with the hideous, sagging breasts and the lazy eye), Ms. Crabtree in "Cartman's Incredible Gift", Pip Pirrup in "201" and now all of Cartman's dolls in "1%".
Killer Rabbit: During the "Pandemic" two-parter, the world rounds up Peruvian flute bands to avoid their music... only to discover they were keeping giant killer live-action guinea pigs in cute costumes away. Also the Woodland Critters.
One-Winged Angel: The leader of the guniea pigs turns out to be the Director of Homeland Secruity, whose true form is... a Guinea Pirate. What would happen if he he met a Guinea Ninja is not discussed.
Knight Templar: Rob Reiner is portrayed as an arrogant wealthy liberal who eats vast and unhealthy amounts of junk food, yet still harasses people who smoke in "Butt Out". The tobacco company he attacks is shown to have a nice executive and happy workers, and in contrast, Rob Reiner is a terrorist with creepy followers who tried to kill Cartman.
Kyle himself is gradually leaning towards this trope in his rivalry with Cartman, some of their conflicts have shown his willingness to outright kill him (in FatBeard for example, he attempts to convince Cartman to travel to Somalia in his ill-defined plan to become a pirate, he is later seen gloating about assisting in Cartman's supposed death, unfazed by the fact that Butters, Clyde and Kevin went along with him, Ike joining, however, is enough to change his mind.
And we shouldn't go without mentioning Cartman himself. He's ground up Scott Tenorman's parents into chili, broke Kyle's faith TWICE, the latter following into finishing what Hitler started to impress Mel Gibson, and recently, enslaved Cthulu into doing his dirty work. Doesn't all of this question to how Kyle and Cartman hated each other in the first place and why?
The Knights of Standards and Practises in "It Hits the Fan", who are only slightly more heroic than the dragon summoned by using cursewords. Helps that they look like classical knights.
Kung-Fu Jesus: In "Red Sleigh Down" and "Fantastic Easter Special."
Lack of Empathy: Done very frequently, perhaps the most notable involving Kenny's deaths, which, aside from the standard shocked exclamation, are rarely treated with much weight at all and forgotten about quickly. Subverted with Kenny Dies when the boys actually treat Kenny's supposedly permanent death with much more sorrow. It doesn't last long, however, and by A Ladder To Heaven it's obvious they've all but forgotten about him.
In "Underpants Gnomes" in particular, Kyle and Stan are not shocked by Kenny's death at all, and say their usual Phrase Catcher lines in a flat, Motor Mouth fashion.
The famous "They killed Kenny!" exchange was played with more than once during the show, before it fell into disuse after Kenny was Killed Off for Real. And then came back.
The episode "Crazy Cripples" focused on Jimmy and Timmy for the A-story and Christopher Reeve and Gene Hackman for the B-story. Stan, Kyle, Cartman, and Kenny become Genre Savvy enough to just walk away from the craziness of both stories.
In "Butt Out", Kyle realizes that a lot of South Park's episodes feature a climatic battle between two large groups and always end with the kids spouting what they learned so the fight can end, and tries to avert it, pointing out that before Rob Reiner attacks the tobacco company, they could simply tell the adults they smoked out of their own free will and simply get grounded for three weeks instead of having to preach to an entire town that's about to attack them. It doesn't work out.
Craig in the two-part "Pandemic" lampshades how everyone else in town has started to notice how the four main characters keep getting into trouble.
In "The Spirit of Christmas" when the storyline reached its most absurd point, Stan notes "This is pretty fucked up right here." This became a tradition in any Christmas story South Park did from then on. The exception being, ironically enough, Woodland Critters Christmas; which was, truly, really fucked up right here.
Kenny's many deaths are acknowledged by the character in "Mysterion Rises".
Laser-Guided Karma: Cartman receives this on a semi-regular basis. He also dishes it out to people like Osama bin Laden and Scott Tenorman. Scott thinks he can dish it back to Cartman in "201" but it doesn't quite go off as he intended.
Late Arrival Spoiler: The DVD cover for Season 14 reveals that Kenny is Mysterion.
Laxative Prank: "Bass To Mouth" has Cartman give Jenny Simon a laxative-laced cupcake, to distract the school from Peter Melman's recent Potty Failure, as they do not want him to commit suicide, as a former student did when this happened to him. Cartman's plan backfires when the obvious occurs - Jenny ends up attempting suicide. So nobody gets singled out, the staff and Cartman attempt to give the entire student body laced Pizza Hut pizza, so everyone will crap themselves. At the end of the episode, Cartman gets thrown in front of a school bus by the school school staff and was declared that he committed suicide. Cartman gets back at the staff with certain cupcakes...
Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The beginning of the 200th episode had Kyle and Cartman exchanging insults. Stan tells them to stop, saying "all you're doing is rehashing a bunch of old stuff!"
Also, 100 episodes before that (actually, 103):
Stan: Look, we just want to talk to you about the show [Earth]. Kyle: Please don't cancel us. Please. Joozian 1: Oh I'm sorry, Earthlings, but you have to realize the universe is a business. Joozian 2: You've made it to a hundred episodes, you should be proud! Joozian 1: Yeah, a show should never go past a hundred episodes, or else it starts to get stale with ridiculously stupid plotlines and settings.
In Cartman's anti-Family Guy rant he explicitly compares himself as a character in a comedy show to the writing of Family Guy, much to Kyle's confusion.
Also from that episode, when Stan and Kyle are dragged outside while everyone's panicking:
Stan: "Kyle! What the hell's going on this time?!" Kyle: "I have no idea!"
Made more humorous in that Tim Burton had never been mentioned or made an appearance in South Park before.
In "Cartman Joins NAMBLA" (episode #53), when the new baby Kenny shows up:
Mr. McCormick: God, this must be the fiftieth time this has happened. Mrs. McCormick: Fifty-second.
"I'm unhappy too. We both are, obviously. How much longer can we keep doing this? It's like the same shit just happens over and over and then in a week it just all resets until it happens again. Every week it's kind of the same story in a different way but it just keeps getting more and more ridiculous." Tell us how you really feel, Trey.
Left It In: In "Volcano", while the mayor's speech is being recorded live:
Mayor: All we know right now is that some of our children are camping on that mountain and... Oh, I'm sorry, can I start over? Newscaster: Huh? Mayor: You can edit this, right?
Little Professor Dialog: Everyone, though it's most notable with Stan, Kyle, and Cartman, for obvious reasons. In fact, fanfiction writers have used this trope to justify writing so much High School AU fic, seeing as how aging the characters requires virtually no change in personality.
Liz Lemon Job: Stan, for all the adults, especially his dad. Kyle as well on occasion, as long as it has something to do with Cartman.
Loud of War: In "Two Guys Naked in a Hot Tub", the ATF try to force people out of the house where a "comet party" is being held by playing an obnoxious pop song that's a thinly disguised parody of "Believe" by Cher. It went unnoticed because the same song was playing on the stereo inside.
Lowered Recruiting Standards: "Best Friends Forever": Kenny dies and ascends to Heaven in order to command Heaven's army against the forces of Hell. He is told by the angels that they used to only let Mormons into Heaven, but they started to let others in order to increase their army's size.
Low Speed Chase: Kenny gets into a huge police chase in a battery-powered toy car.
Magic Feather: In the episode "Bloody Mary", when the news reports that the Virgin Mary statue is bleeding out of its ass, Randy — convinced that his drinking problem is a disease — goes to the church and gets sprayed in blood by the statue. This apparently cures him. A later news report reveals that the statue was actually bleeding out of its vagina ("A chick bleeding out her vagina is no miracle. Chicks bleed out their vaginas all the time."), and Randy briefly lapses until Stan tells him the truth about what happened to him.
Malignant Plot Tumor: The first episode of a trilogy of episodes in Season 14 was about Cartman trying to get Captain Hindsight to join his superhero team, with BP's recurring drilling accidents being the B-plot. Then BP unleashes Cthulhu and the last two episodes focus mostly on him, tying up Captain Hindsight's story in the second.
Manufacturing Victims: In one episode Stan's Dad drank too much as was forced into the AA movement. He quickly got hooked on it, thus making his life miserable AND making his alcohol problem worse. It's implied that the other members of the "support-group" had equally dysfunctional relationships to the whole thing.
McLeaned: "The Return of Chef," where Chef gets quite possibly the biggest bridge dropped on any character ever.
Almost all one-episode characters who die have this happen to them. Hell, almost every death is this. Most of the time, characters die and it will never be mentioned again.
In "Cripple Fight", Timmy exploits the camp's intolerance of gays and gets Jimmy kicked out. They are later good friends and never bring this up again.
Medium Awareness: In "It Hits The Fan", Mr. Garrison says, "On television they usually don't allow 'fag,' but because I'm gay, it's alright." Later, when South Park adults are lamenting that HBC needs to find a new swear word, Mr. Garrison again argues that the word "fag" is a case of N-Word Privileges. Randy says the word and gets censored for it, causing Mr. Garrison to say, "See, you got beeped." After a random character also says it, Jimbo says it himself in a rant, but doesn't get censored. Randy remarks, "Hey, you didn't get beeped."
Messianic Archetype: Kyle plays to this more times than you'd think. The most obvious example is Margaritaville (where this is played very literally), but it's underpinned subtly in a few episodes. And, in direct opposition Cartman tends to play to the more Dark Messiah or Anti Christ side of things (how far he goes down this road... YMMV).
Milestone Celebration: "Cancelled" was intended to be the 100th episode, but aired as the 97th (the actual 100th episode had a tacked-on Milestone Celebration ending anyway). "200" plays it completely straight.
Misplaced Accent: In the "Crack Baby Athletic Association", Slash is revealed to be "Vunter Slaush", a parody on the Dutch Sinterklaas, complete with parody song. The problem? The name and song are in German, not Dutch...
Actually, no. They're not in german. Most likely they're just vaguely dutch/german sounding gibberish.
Misplaced Sorrow: After Kenny is Killed Off for Real, the boys discover that he has the winning ticket to a candy store shopping spree, so they decide to build a ladder to heaven in order for him to give it to them. But when adults ask what they're doing they don't mention the candy part, they just say they want to see Kenny again,
Mistaken for Gay: Happens to Kyle and Cartman in "Tonsil Trouble" and Butters and Cartman in "Super Fun Time."
Mistaken for Racist: Inverted in Here Comes The Neighbourhood where they are trying to get rid of all the rich people in town (who are all black). Mr. Garrison proposes burning a "lower-case t" on their lawn as in "time to leave". The victims take it as exactly this.
Mood Whiplash: "You're Getting Old", which ends with Fleetwood Mac's Landslide without irony. Trey and Matt said on The Daily Show that after the airing of the episode, a lot of people came up to them asking if anything was wrong, but denied that they're tired of the show.
Moral Dissonance: In "Toilet Paper" the boys feel guilty about letting Butters take the blame for what they did. They have no such qualms in "The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs" when they attempt to blame Butters for writing the book when they think it'll get them in trouble and when they blame Sarah Jessica Parker's death on him.
Actually the former example actually runs in contrast to the boy's treatment of Butters in earlier seasons, they frequently abused him or left him for dead in episodes such as "Jared Has Aides" and "Freak Strike". Much akin to other Butt Monkeys such as Kenny and Pip, it is mostly a case of Depending on the Writer whether the boys are sympathetic towards Butters or vent an outright Comedic Sociopathy towards him (though at least in "The Tale Of Scrotie McBoogerballs" they felt slight empathy for what he's been through).
More than Mind Control: Arguably, Cartman when he's trying to stop his friends from destroying the Wall-Mart.
Stan: You know, somebody once said, "Don't try to be a great man, just be a man." Jesus: Who said that? Stan: You did, Jesus. Jesus: ...You're right, Stan. Thank you, boys! (resumes his fight against Satan) Kyle: Wow, did he say that in the Bible? Stan: Nah, I saw it on Star Trek.
Cartman: Okay. Last night, all four of us were at the bowling alley until about 7:30, at which time we noticed Ally Sheedy, the Goth chick from the Breakfast Club, was bowling in the lane next to us, and we asked her for her autograph, but she didn't have a pen, so we followed her out to her car, but on the way we were accosted by five Scientologists who wanted to give us all personality tests, which were administered at the Scientology Center in Denver until 10:45, at which time we accidentally boarded the wrong bus home and ended up in Rancho de Burritos Rojos, south of Castle Rock, and finally got a ride home with a man who was missing his left index finger, named Gary Bushwell, arriving home at 11:46.
Murder the Hypotenuse : Wendy sends Ms. Ellen into the sun by taking control of the Iraqi guard and framing her as an Iraqi traitor. DON'T. FUCK. WITH. HER.
Mutually Fictional: A ridiculous example in the first season finale and second season premiere; the characters see a promo for the movie "Not Without My Anus" and say they will watch it, and in the second season premiere, which turned out to be "Not Without My Anus" itself, Terrence and Philip flip channels and watch part of the first season finale of South Park (where you can at least hear Cartman's name).
My Name Is Not Durwood: One of the teenage skiers in the "Asspen" episode kept referring to Stan Marsh as "Stan Darsh". Even his friends eventually found it annoying.
One of the rare occasion where the german dub is better - it's Stan Arsch.
Native American Casino: Evil Native American casino owners are planning to pave over South Park in order to build a freeway directly to their casino.
Negated Moment of Awesome: In "Pee", one drop of urine manages to flood the water park that the boys spend time at. Since Kyle can hold his breath the longest, the others suggest for him to swim down to the submerged maintenance room to release the emergency valve, but Kyle is very disgusted by all the urine, and objects to the park owner's suggestion of drinking 24 oz. of pee to make the mission easier (don't question it too much). Kyle attempts to do it anyway, but unfortunately, Randy gets to save the day instead, and Kyle gets to play Audience Surrogate.
Negative Continuity: Kenny's frequent deaths in the early seasons, and the town of South Park's penchant for being destroyed.
As of "Mysterion Rises," it seems Kenny's deaths aren't Negative Continuity after all
That just causes more Negative Continuity, as it was already established earlier that Kenny's parents just keep having more kids and naming them Kenny. The boys also once said "Who wasn't expecting that?" in response to one of his deaths, implying that they were in fact aware of his previous deaths.
"Coon vs. Coon and Friends" shows that whenever Kenny dies, Kenny's mom gives birth to a new baby that she puts in Kenny's parka and lays in bed at night. However, this still conflicts with some earlier episodes.
Never Bareheaded: The four main kids almost never take off their hats. In Kyle's case, it's to hide a really embarrasing Jewfro. Kenny never took off his hood, so no one knew what he looked like until he finally took it off in the movie.
Never Say "Die": Parodied in "The Biggest Douche In The Universe", where it was repeatedly said that Cartman is "running out of time", and near the beginning it is suggested that he needed a "time transplant" (without explaining how it's done). Subverted when Kyle and Stan go tell Chef about it and Stan says, "Cartman is in the hospital. They think he might die."
Never Trust a Trailer: The preview for 200 was shown to be a simple class-action lawsuit by most of the celebrities who appeared on South Park. It turned out to be much more epic than that.
Nice Jewish Boy: Despite Kyle's intense hatred and resentment towards Cartman, he can be a darn nice fella.
No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: The fight between Wendy and Cartman at the end of "Breast Cancer Show Ever". Cartman never stood a freaking chance.
No Man Should Have This Power: After Butters successfully infiltrates a girls' slumber party and steals a fortune teller, the boys decide that the power to tell the future is to great and dangerous to possess, and destroy it with a spectacular explosion.
"Not Making This Up" Disclaimer: their version of the story of Xenu was captioned "THIS IS WHAT SCIENTOLOGISTS ACTUALLY BELIEVE" because people would think they were taking the piss (as the show isn't averse to doing) otherwise.
Somewhat parodied in the episode "The Return Of Chef", where Chef joins a club of child molesters, and the captions were "THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER ADVENTURE CLUB ACTUALLY BELIEVES". Of course it still was a not-so-thinly veiled reference to Scientology, since Isaac Hayes was a member of it.
Not so Different: Cartman and Kyle. In earlier episodes especially, Kyle was essentially a lower-scale bully with a much more fickle approach to his ethics and morals. He becomes more genuine in his moral code later on, but his rivalry with Cartman also takes an occasional ''extreme'' approach at times.
This becomes most apparent in Season 12: in "Breast Cancer Show Ever," Stan and Kyle tell Cartman that they've always hated him, only to have him refuse to believe them; then, one episode later in "Pandemic," Stan and Kyle refuse to believe Craig when he tells them that all their classmates think they're assholes.
Obfuscating Stupidity: Ike of all people if you skipped a few seasons. It is most obvious in "About Last Night...", but by "Fatbeard" it has either become canon or Only Sane Man territory with nobody noticing.
Also from "About Last Night...": Sarah Palin, who has a highly technical role in the heist, and a Faux British accent.
Oblivious To His Own Description: In the first episode, Cartman is watching a news report on Crop Circles and the camera pulls back to show that the circles form an exact portrait of him.
Hey! That looks like... Tom Selleck.
Odd Name Out: "Who built the pyramids? Was it the Babylonians? Barbrady? Samaritans?"
Off On a Technicality: To avoid being arrested for illegal hunting, Jimbo always claimed his game was about to attack him. When a new law made it impossible to use that excuse, Jimbo started claiming he was reducing the animal population to save the whole bunch from starving to death.
When he was around, Chef was usually one of the very few adults with any kind of common sense.
Though as Craig pointed out in Pandemic, Stan has a tendency to mire himself in insanity and exacerbate an already absurd situation into a Zany Scheme of pure destruction, so he's not entirely a victim.
President Bush, especially when compared to his cabinet and the press.
By this point, it appears that Kenny is the only one that has showcased routine common sense throughout the series.
Apparently, Father Maxi is the 'only' catholic priest who doesn't rape boys.
Only Six Faces: The kids are defined almost entirely by their wardrobe, while the adults are only marginally more varied. In the episode "Super Best Friends," when the cast ends up in the same outfits and shaved heads, Stan and Kyle lose track of which of them is which and have to put on their hats to figure it out.
This trope is important in the episode "The Coon". Though Mysterion reveals his face at the end, the face cannot be identified. The characters appear to know who the unmasked hero is, but the viewers do not. Cartman mentions that he guessed Mysterion's identity, but he had guessed several different secret identities for Mysterion earlier, and the viewer is not told which guess was correct. The sequel, "Coon 2: Hindsight" does nothing to fix this, but in the next episode, "Mysterion Rising," he is revealed to be Kenny.
Opinion Changing Dream: In "I'm A Little Bit Country" Cartman specifically says: "I'm uninterested in American history" before hitting himself unconscious so that he can have a dream taking place during the American War of Independence (1776). During the dream he gains the information he wants and when he wakes up he manages the changing the entire town's opinion's about the war in Iraq.
The Other Darrin: Pretty much all the major female characters in the show went through this. Originally Mary Kay Bergman did all the women voices, but after her death in 1999 their voices was taken over by Mona Marshall and Eliza Schneider. In turn, Schneider left the show in 2003 and she was replaced by April Stewart.
In South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut, Mike Judge (of King of the Hill, Beavis and Butt-Head, Office Space, and Idiocracy fame) voiced Kenny when he's finally seen not wearing his parka. Outside of The Movie, Matt Stone voices Kenny (Stone covers his mouth with his sleeve to achieve Kenny's muffled speech). While his voice is the movie is clean, cute, and soft, his voice in in the series is nasal (more so then Craig possibly — justified in that Matt Stone also voices Craig). It makes perfect sense why he can voice such a low, nasal voiced, super hero like Mysterion.
Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions: In both parts to the "Go God Go" episode, Cartman finds himself in a future where everyone was inspired by Richard Dawkins to give up their religious beliefs, thus making everyone but him an atheist.
Out of Focus: Kenny, and indeed most of the original supporting characters.
Overly-Long Gag: Used on occasion, such as when Cartman had to smuggle cigarettes and other items into prison up his anus, they made his grunting when... taking them out offscreen quite a bit longer than necessary.
Painting the Fourth Wall: In "201", when Tom Cruise steals Muhammad's goo, a Censor Box appears over him just like Muhammad. When Stan makes a joke at his expense during the final battle, the box disappears.
Also in 201, there were two main plots; one was a political plot about censorship, the other was about finding Cartman's true father. Cartman and Kyle argue with each other about which is more important, then look straight at the camera.
The "Coon & Friends" arc initially got bad reviews after the first episode, in part because the boys (playing superheroes in silly outfits) couldn't be recognized due to the Only Six Faces art style. And then it turns out to be done on purpose, deconstructing the secret identity aspect of superhero stories, and the characters' identities are very slowly revealed throughout the episode trilogy. And then the story takes a few very dark turns and everything goes to hell.
Pals With Jesus: His show isn't named Jesus and Pals for nothing, you know.
Possibly the best is Towelie using a hat and mustache to pass for human. No one notices this until Oprah's "minge" conspires to expose him.
Parallel Porn Titles: Inverted, as they copied the title "Bigger, Longer, & Uncut" from John Bobbit's (Yes, THAT one's) porn movie.
Parental Obliviousness: On the rare occasions when their parents know what they're doing, they either punish them for all the wrong reasons (for example: "Butt Out," in which the boys get grounded for smoking as opposed to burning their school down) or fail to realize that they're doing anything all that bad (like in "Pandemic," when Sharon and Sheila claim that Craig is a bad influence on Stan and Kyle; according to Craig, it's the other way around, since Stan and Kyle tend to suck everyone around them into the insanity they get swept up in).
Physical God: Apparently, Mickey Mouse is a powerful godlike entity limited only by his need to slumber in Valhalla after his destructive, fire-breathing rampages. Who knew?
Cthulu also makes an appearance.
Pick On Someone Your Own Size: Rather than an adult opposing a teenager, we instead get a little kid opposing a teenager. It's also inverted, in that Kid Hero Cartman is the one who's determined to get even with the teenage villain Scott Tenorman.
This is inverted again when at the end of the episode everyone realizes that Cartman, embodying the Not So Harmless trope, is not a Jerkass with occasional cruel moments like everyone thought but a psychopath.
Pig Latin: In "Cartman's Silly Hate Crime 2000", Kyle brings a cake as a gift to Cartman when visiting him in juvenile hall, mentioning that there's an "ailnay ilefay" baked inside of it, which will enable Cartman to "eakbray out of isonpray". When Cartman informs him that they're not allowed to accept gifts, Kyle goes into a lengthy rant while still speaking Pig Latin. Stan on the other hand just calls Cartman "umbass day".
Ping Pong Naďveté: Very. They swear like sailors, but they don't know that you don't have to wear a condom if you don't have sex.
In one episode, Jimmy remarks that he and his girlfriend took ecstasy and stayed up all night having sex. In a later episode, he gets his first erection and doesn't have a clue what he's supposed to do with it.
Plot Coupon: One draft of The Movie's script had Saddam Hussein sending Kenny out to find some Snacky S'mores proofs-of-purchase so he can get a wish granted. This is really a Snipe Hunt, however, as there are no proofs-of-purchases in Hell. When Terrance and Philip's blood is spilled on American soil and the Legions of Hell emerge on the Earth's surface, Kenny takes the opportunity to get the proofs-of-purchase and presents them to Saddam, only to be told, "I Lied." After Satan gets rid of Saddam, he accepts the proofs-of-purchase and grants Kenny's wish as in the final movie.
When Chef attempted to inform Principal Victoria about Garrison's inappropriate in-class demonstration of what to do with a gerbil, Chef is the one who gets punished for being "intolerant".
Victoria: I believe the word you used to describe him was... "Sick Queer." Chef:He IS a sick queer!!
Mr. Garrison: Yeah!!!
Chef has stated on multiple occasions that there is a BIIIIIIIG difference between gay people and Mr. Garrison, and even Randy Marsh knows that he is seriously fucked up.
Pooled Funds: Cartman once proves Kyle wrong and wins money in the process, so he turns it into change and makes a swimming pool out of it so Kyle can see him swim in it.
Potty Failure: On the worldwide level in "Worldwide Recorder Concert."
Precision F-Strike: There are, believe it or not, a couple of characters who don't swear very often, and they tend to drop these in extreme circumstances.
Premature Encapsulation: "Red Hot Catholic Love" is the episode where people learn how to eat with their butt, and not the earlier episode entitled "How To Eat With Your Butt" where Kenny poses for his school picture in his parka upside-down.
Pride Parade: In the episode "South Park is Gay", all the males in town have turned metrosexual. Once the women of the town start getting fed up, the men put on a Metrosexual Pride Parade, which includes the chant, "We're here, we're not queer, but we're close, get used to it!"
Their parade float eventually crashes into a building, and the men panic over the resulting fire, yet are too concerned over their personal looks to put it out.
Product Placement: The show uses real brand names just as often as Bland Name Products, but given the tone of the show, it's probably not because they're getting paid.
The Prophet Muhammad: He's a member of a team of superheroes. Jesus and Buddha are on the same team. Portrayal Problem #1 is redefined into a superpower. In one episode, Tom Cruise is trying to steal this superpower, so that he can be immune from getting depicted by the tabloids.
Race Against the Clock: "Sorry, boys. No ticket stub, no candy shopping spree. If you find it, you can come back, but you only have one week to claim the prize. That's called 'The Ticking Clock.' Works great in the movies."
Raging Stiffie: Jimmy had that for practically all of "Erection Day". It got even worse in his dream, where his boner just kept growing. Not surprisingly, the audience chortled at it.
Rape as Comedy: The Indiana Jones episode, "Worldwide Recorder Concert," arguably a lot of episodes.
The Christmas Critters also gang-rape a platoon of US soldiers to death in "Imaginationland". (Which was arguably horrifying.)
The idea that Chef thought the boys took turns raping Ms. Choksondik and then murdering her afterward is played for laughs.
Rape Is Love: A view held by Mr. Garrison in "Worldwide Recorder Concert", where he thinks his father doesn't love him because he was never molested by him as a child. Oddly, his mother feels the same way.
"Th-that's not true! Your father loved you! Often!"
Stan's whole final speech in "Ass Burgers". The previous episode, "You're Getting Old" had looked like it might change the show dramatically, and fans (mirroring Stan in-universe) were worried that the change would be bad for the show. So in-universe, Stan gets over his emo phase, gives a whole Aesop about how things can change for the better with the entire speech Leaning on the Fourth Wall...only to play Status Quo is God, hit the Reset Button, and return the show to exactly where it was.
And note that it's note the original status quo but, the last episode where Stan was depressed. Meaning that Stan is still, even if more so, depressed while everything else is the same. Meaning, Kyle, Cartman, and Kenny still hang out with Stan, he lives in the same house, goes to the same school, his parents still live together and all this with the added bonus that Stan turned to alcohol to try and be happy.
At least he isn't hearing any shit from Big Harry and Mike in the Morning anymore...
Reasonable Authority Figure: Chef and Principal Victoria. Also, President Bush, as he was the only one in "Cartoon Wars Part 2" who defended the Family Guy writers rights to free speech instead of having them arrested like many people were recommending.
Recycled IN SPACE!: Played completely straight. There was an episode Starvin' Marvin, followed two seasons later with Starvin' Marvin IN SPACE.
It turned out, in the episode "201", that Cartman got half his genes from Scott Tenorman's father. He is very upset over being half-ginger, though he calmed down when told he is also half Denver Bronco.
Red Oni, Blue Oni: At first, Stan and Kyle had pretty similar personalities, but later on, as the series progressed, they were differenced. Stan was deadpan, impassive, more introvert and sensible, while Kyle was impulsive, outward-looking, sociable and rash, especially when he wanted to stop Cartman.
This is available for Craig(Blue) and Tweek(Red), too.
Refuge in Audacity: As a prime example, the episode "It Hits the Fan". Matt and Trey couldn't get the network to agree on letting them say "shit" uncensored normally, however, when Trey said, "What if we said it like...200 times in a single episode?", the network exec in charge of censorship responded, "That's... an interesting idea."
Inverted in a sense in 201 when Comedy Central wouldn't allow them to air Muhammad's image. Censoring the image? Ok whatever. Censoring EVERY SINGLE TIME they mentioned his name, at least 100 or more bleeps, as well as the entire "I learned something today..." speech at the end? They actually crossed the line twice in the OPPOSITE direction.
This may unfortunately be due to the death threat by a radical Islamic group, who were offended by the previous episode's depiction of Muhammad in a bear costume (Turns out that was actually Santa Claus in the costume. Ahem.).
A death threat posted on a website owned, run, and completely managed by people in New York, something that Jon Stewartdid notlet slip by.
The episode "Medicinal Fried Chicken." Many of the men get testicular cancer, causing their testicles to swell to enormous size. They then start running around town, bouncing on their grotesquely swollen balls as though they were hippity-hops. And getting a ridiculous little melody playing whenever they pass.
A particularly complicated example in which Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, John McCain, and Sarah Palin are all jewel thieves trying to steal the Hope Diamond from the White House. Boom, baby.
Remember the New Guy: In Red Man's Greed, there's a random kid acting like a regular. He wears a sweatshirt that says "Alex" so we'll know who he is. (Of course, at the end of the episode Stan asks who he is and we find out that he got to come on and do the guest voice thing.)
Replacement Scrappy: In-universe example, both Butters and Tweek get this treatment from the boys themselves in attempts to replace Kenny as the token fourth friend — Butters for his innocence and lack of backbone (to the point where an entire episode revolved around the boys kicking Butters out and running a contest for a new replacement), Tweek for his paranoia. Ironically, for all their guilt trips and manipulation involving Kenny's death, the boys had in fact nearly completely got over it and all but forgotten about "that asshole". The sixth season was generally one giant Kick the Dog for the three main boys.
Right Place, Right Time, Wrong Reason: Cartman decides in prejudiced irrationality that the new Arab student is a terrorist and pulls out all the stops to save Hillary Clinton, who, coincidentally, is in South Park that very same day. Even though Cartman's theory is completely unfounded, it turns out that there are terrorists plotting to kill Hillary Clinton (Russians secretly working for the British)—but the only reason we found out about them is thanks to Cartman's prejudice. This is lampshaded heavily at the end, when they deliver the story's moral about tolerance only for Cartman to point this out.
Ripped from the Headlines: Because of the short time to animate episodes, they can be far more topical than nearly any show on TV.
Risky Business Dance: Kyle does this when his parents are arrested for child molestation, leaving him to take care of himself.
Roger Rabbit Effect: Said guinea pigs. This was an interesting example, as they were giant.
Rule of Cute: According to the commentary, the logic behind "The Losing Edge" was "Wouldn't the boys look cute in baseball outfits?"
There was a similar reasoning behind "Pre-school."
Rule of Funny: This show is probably the ultimate litmus test for it. If they can't make it funny, no one can.
"You know what this means? AIDS is funny now!"
Run For The Border: Inverted in "Last Of The Meheecans". Butters inspires a resurgence of nostalgia, homesickness, and nationalism that causes Mexican emigrants to the United States to cross the border back into Mexico. Border patrol guards eventually have to guard the border on the U.S. side instead to prevent the loss of menial labourers to the American economy.
Running Gag: Other than the obvious ones, such as Kenny dying, there are other, smaller ones such as Cartman's almost unvarying goal to get "ten million dollars". It's never explained why he wants exactly ten million dollars, and the closest they get to it is when another character reveals their own plan to get ten million dollars, they say "that's how scams work."
In "Cartmanland", it is revealed Cartman always wanted one million dollars to buy a theme park. Why he wants the other nine is never shown.
During the earlier seasons at least, there is at least the outline of one of the aliens from the first episode's heads once per episode. EVERY. SINGLE. EPISODE.
On the DVD release of the first season, Matt and Trey have "Fireside chats" between the episodes, in which they have a dog named "Old Scratch" who changes breed (and even changes into stuffed animals) each time he is seen.
There was also more than one mention of Cartman wanting to give Kyle AIDS. Until he does.
Scott is a dick.
Running Gagged: Kenny's deaths. They were about once an episode before the end of season 5, where they killed Kenny in the most dramatic way possible in an episode called "Kenny Dies". After staying dead for about a season, he came back and only dies approximately once a season, if not at all.
Safety Worst: In "Broadway Bro Down," Larry is a little boy with very overprotective parents; his parents always have him wearing a life vest to prevent drowning. During the episode, Shelley convinces him that he doesn't need to wear the vest all the time. Ironically, (Death by Irony) Larry drowns at the end of the episode, and the news reporter comments that he might have survived if he was wearing a life vest.
Sanctuary of Solitude: In "Cartmanland" after Kyle gets a hemorrhoid, he goes to the church to contemplate by himself. He yells at God and wonders how this could have happened to him.
Sanity Slippage: It is subtle but the episode "%1" ends with the implication that Cartman's sociopathic tendencies are growing into a full blown psychosis.
Even without any greater implications, you can see his sanity suffer with each stuffed animal destroyed.
Satan: Portrayed as half of a homosexual pairing with Saddam Hussein. The submissive half.
Scam Religion: Has portrayed both Scientology and Mormonism is this way. (And the AA movement, too.) Ironically, other episodes have shown that Mormons are the only people who get into Heaven, so it's not taking itself that seriously.
Nearly every religion spotlighted in the show is depicted as having corrupt or hypocritical undertones. That said it is often balanced with a redeeming view of it's followers (Mormon Gary for example views that even if his religion is a scam his family have happy satisfying lives as a result of the ethics it teaches). This extra complexity is interestingly left out during the show's jab at Scientology (when it seems this moral is about to given the Scientologist members all throw tantrums and threaten to sue anyone that mocks their religion).
The voice actor for Chef (A CLOSE personal friend of the creators) left the show over Scientology, so they're probably, quite understandably a little bitter about that (They also think Scientology contributed to his eventual death, which...well, Your Milage May Vary on has to if its true or not, but suffice to say, there are a few reasons they act like that)
Second Place Is For Winners: "The Losing Edge", where the boys try to lose at baseball because they don't want to play. Everyone else has the same idea.
Selective Enforcement: With all the terrible things Cartman has done, the one thing that got the other kids to give him the silent treatment was his eating the skin off the KFC.
Self-Deprecation: In "A Very Crappy Christmas", after the boys created The Spirit of Christmas and showed it to the town:
Mayor: Kids, that cartoon was fabulous. How would you like to have your own show and make 100 more of them? Stan: Are you kidding? I think we'd rather stab ourselves in the head.
''Terrance and Philip" mocks their potty humor and jokes.
Self Fanservice: Well, fan art usually portrays South Park characters rather differently.
Randy (a geologist) is mentioned as the only scientist in town, but later Token's mother is said to be a chemist, and Clyde's father a geologist.
And later Clyde's father is not a geologist but a shoe store owner.
Kenny is revealed to have a younger sister in "Best Friends Forever", when previously the McCormicks were stated to have two children. Unsurprisingly, she hasn't appeared since and Matt Stone admitted that she was an oversight.
Apparently, they decided to roll with it after all and actually featured her in the episode "The Poor Kid".
Sometimes Kyle's family are the only Jews in South Park, sometimes there are more.
They're particularly bad with names:
Jimbo Kern/Kerns
Also, Jimbo was supposed to be Sharon's brother, but then they gave her the maiden name "Kimble", so he was RetConned as Randy's half-brother.
Jimmy Swanson/Vulmer
Stephen/Chris Stotch
Token Black/Williams
Bob/Steve Black/Williams
Alphonse/Alfonz Mephesto/Mephisto
Clyde Donovan/Harris
Casey/Sky/Kevin. Fans tried to reconcile the first and the third by changing "Casey" to "KC" (with "C" being an initial for his surname). It worked well enough until his surname was revealed to be "Stoley".
"Broflovski" is often misspelled.
"McCormick" was spelled "McKormick" in both the season 5 opening and in "Kenny Dies"
Sheila Broflovski and Sharon Marsh were both called Carol in the episode "Death".
Butters was referred to as "Swanson" in season 2's "Conjoined Fetus Lady", while a female classmate Annie was called "Jordan".
Ethan/Herbert/Janet Garrison.
Serious Business: At this point making a list of episodes that DON'T feature this trope would be much shorter. Whatever form it takes, Randy Marsh usually gets involved in a big way.
Sex as a Rite-of-Passage: Butters getting his first kiss in "Butters' Bottom Bitch" is an obvious metaphor for this trope.
And yet again in "You're Getting Old", in which Stan and his friends watch the trailer for Jack And Jill. The actual trailer hadn't even came out yet at the time the episode aired, so all Matt and Trey had to go by were the title and the fact that Adam Sandler stars as both characters.
Shaped Like Itself: The episode "Cartoon Wars Part 1" gave us the quote, "If we're still alive in the morning, then we'll know we're not dead."
In the beginning of "Ass Burgers", Kyle, Kenny, and Cartman leave the bus stop moments before the bus arrives to ask Gerald if Aspergers Syndrome is real. At class, Officer Barbrady shows up with them, saying they were caught playing hooky.
Liane: I mean, what right do I have bringing another child into this overpopulated world? Then again, I should have thought of that before having sex...
Skewed Priorities: At the end of "Death Camp of Tolerance," the boys are pulled from the Tolerance Camp after a huge misunderstanding. "You have no idea how much we've suffered!" said Sheila Broflovski to the emaciated Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Butters, in full Heroic BSOD mode.
Skyward Scream: Cartman doesn't react well to Scott burning his money.
Smoking Is Glamorous: Actually, not smoking is stupid and dorky, based on an assembly hall presentation.
Snap Back: Kenny's deaths, destruction of the town.
Subverted hard in "Mysterion Rises". After 14 seasons, it turns out that Kenny is completely aware of every single death.
And going right into a Crowning Moment of Funny, when Kenny gets fed up with the gang and decides to just go to bed and get a good night's sleep. ... By shooting himself in the head.
Something Completely Different: Many, many times, including "Butters' Very Own Episode", devoted to side character Butters Stotch; several musical episodes; "It Hits The Fan", which set out to break the world record for the number of inclusions of the word "shit" (162 in total); "Good Times With Weapons", an Affectionate Parody of Shonen fighting anime that spent half its running time as anime; "Pip", which was devoted entirely to spoofing the Charles Dickens story Great Expectations, etc. One of the most notable is probably The Movie, which is both deliberately cruder than the TV series (it has an anti-censorship theme), and a full-fledged musical.
First seen in "Not Without My Anus", which was a complete Terrance and Phillip half-hour TV special. It might have been more popular if it hadn't aired on the night when viewers were expecting to see the second part of a Cliff Hanger.
Son of a Whore: Cartman. In the first season finale, he learned that his mom had slept with the entire named adult population of South Park.
...including Jesus.
...and the entire roster of the 1989 Denver Broncos.
Stan: It's wrong to eat veal because the animals are so horribly mistreated, but if you don't eat meat at all you break out in vaginas.
Spell My Name with an S: Kyle's surname is usually Broflovski, but it has appeared as Brovlofski, Broflofski and Broflowski.
Many fans tend to leave out the second "e" in Shelley's name.
Sphere Eyes: The entire cast, of course, excluding the Canadians and Saddam Hussein.
Split Personality: In City Sushi, it is revealed that the City Wok guy is actually a white man named Doctor Janus, who has at least 10 different personalities. The cops decide to let him live as the city wok owner, as it is the strongest developed.
Spoonerism: The boys make one on occasion. For example, in "Spontaneous Combustion", the boys confuse the word "resurrection" with "erection", and in "Timmy 2000", when the boys learn about Attention Deficit Disorder, Kyle says, "Wait, I think maybe I have Attention Diffunction Disorder."
Springtime for Hitler: In "The Losing Edge", despite trying to get themselves eliminated from the baseball playoffs because they hate it and are pressured into playing it by their parents, the boys make it all the way to the finals because every other team is trying to do exactly the same.
Standard Police Motto: Parodied; the side of Officer Barbrady's patrol car has "To Patronize and Annoy" on it.
Star-Crossed Lovers: Parodied in "Miss Teacher Bangs a Boy" with Ms. Stevenson and Ike.
The first time, in the episode "Mecha Streisand", a reporter appears, saying that the town had managed to rebuild itself "just weeks after the devastating attack of mutant genetic creatures, zombies, and Thanksgiving turkeys". Then Mecha Streisand shows up and begins to wreck the town, prompting a "not again" comment from the reporter.
The second time, in "201", after the main events of the plot is resolved, the mayor announces, "Alright, people, let's start rebuilding our town!...for the 39th time."
In "You're Getting Old":
Sharon: "It’s like the same shit just happens over and over, then in a week it just all resets until it happens again. Every week it’s kind of the same story in a different way, but it just keeps getting more and more ridiculous."
And its sequel, "Ass Burgers", has Stan accepting the change in his life, only to have everything change back to the way it was against his will. Sharon even remarks at how sometimes it's just best to stick with what you know.
A straight example happens when it is discovered that the City Wok owner is the psychotic, murderous Caucasian Dr. Janus. Since he's the only Asian restaurant owner left in town after the Japanese sushi chef whom he harassed killed himself after this reveal, the police lets him go away.
In "Royal Pudding," the various Canadian wedding "traditions" that get increasingly bizarre and disgusting are being acted out by The Aristocrats who are getting married.
The one consistent political message in South Park is that too many people pay way, way too much attention to politics. Anyone with a pet political cause of any kind almost always will be portrayed as a troublesome fool — when not a villain.
Stuck on Band-Aid Brand: The Sega Dreamcast and Nintendo Wii have both appeared on episodes. Each console was mentioned repeatedly with its manufacturer's name, where a normal person would just say "Dreamcast" or "Wii".
Suicide As Comedy: Shows up with disturbing frequency. One has to wonder how this reflects on the mental health of the creators...
Superhero: Each of the boys has one, plus a few of their friends. Together they are...Coon and Friends!
Suicide Is Painless: Averted. In "Night of the Living Homeless", a scientist tries several times to kill himself before the homeless get to him, but each shot just leaves him bloodier and more in pain until he finally, mercifully dies.
Though not technically a suicide, Jesus' death in "Fantastic Easter Special" is lengthy and bloody.
In "Coon Vs Coon and Friends", Kenny kills himself several times. Once, in a desperate attempt to get his friends to remember his many deaths; another time, to escape from an alternate dimension; and yet another because he was just tired. And as he reminds us in case we forgot after 100+ deaths through the shows history:
Kenny: [Immortality] is not cool, Kyle. It fucking hurts!
Suspiciously Specific Denial: From "An Elephant Makes Love To A Pig" when Eric is trying to sound like he wouldn't as easily let a girl beat him up as Stan does.
Eric: If some girl tried to kick my ass, I'd be like "AY, why don't you stop dressing me up like a mailman, and making me dance for you, while you go and smoke crack in your bedroom, and have sex with some guy I don't even know, on my dad's bed?" Stan: ... Cartman, what the hell are you talking about? Eric: I'm just saying you're just a little wuss.
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Take a Number: In the episode when the town loses all internet, Stan, his sister, and his dad have to take a number to get rationed web access at a refugee camp. Features both versions of the trope: the fighting and the closing.
Take That: Almost every episode. One of the most elaborate ones they did was a slam against Family Guy and the "manatee gags" they always do. In the same two episodes, with just as much importance to the plot, they made fun against the overreaction to a cartoon with Mohammad.
Hell, in that very episode, they provide a Take That against themselves, as Kyle, the head of the CBC, and a passerby all express the idea that they like Family Guy because it's easy to watch, makes them laugh and doesn't get "preachy and up its own ass with messages".
They're generally pretty free with the Self-Deprecation in general. Another notable Take That, Us from "Passion of the Jew": "This is just like when we got our money back for BASEketball."
The fishsticks (aka fishdicks or gayfish) episode was run repeatedly back-to-back on Comedy Central the Wednesday after Kanye's outburst at the VMAs.
The captain from Whale Wars got raked across the coals thoroughly.
The entire episode "How To Eat With Your Butt" is just a twenty-minute buildup to a lame pun about Ben Affleck.
The Tale Of Scrotie McBoogerballs has an obvious Take That against banning books early in the episode when the boys are assigned to read the un-banned Catcher In The Rye and find it boring. It's also a more subtle Take That against all the fans that read too deeply into what they bash or not, and claim South Park is one thing or another.
"Insheeption" is twenty minutes of "people who find Inception cool because they think it is complex are dumb, because it's actually pretty simple"
Unless, of course, it was a Take That against Inception for substituting convoluted, jargon-laden exposition for story and character development.
The episode straddles the line so it can be interpreted both ways. They didn't know whether to say it was good or bad, because they didn't watch the movie.
Canada on Strike was a massive Take That towards all those involved in the 2007/2008 Writer's Strike.
"Mystery of the Urinal Deuce" aired during the height of very public allegations that 9/11 was a False Flag Operation, saying those people are "retarded."
"Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow" ridicules both the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (specifically those that were more content to place blame than to help people) and those that believe in global warming.
"Make Love, Not Warcraft" is practically an episode-long Take That towards people who are obsessed with Warcraft. With people often refering to players as "Ones with No Life".
The use of a real fraternity house (Alpha Tau Omega) in "Butters' Bottom Bitch" makes it pretty obvious who Matt and Trey had beef with when they were at Boulder.
Then in Broadway Bro Down, Randy attempts to stop Shelley and her new boyfriends from seeing "Wicked" to protect her from "subliminal subtext." He crys "It's time to put an end to Broadway!" Then he dresses in a Spider-Man costume...
The Movie was basically a big Take That at Moral Guardians and scrapegoating. The last lines to the song "Blame Canada" pretty much spell it out.
We must blame them and cause a fuss. Before somebody thinks of blaming us.
Yeah, these guys have pretty much made Take That an art in and of itself.
Take That, Us: South Park is known for mocking its Anviliciousness, more prominently in later seasons, especicially during the Cartoon Wars episode: "At least Family Guy doesn't get all preachy up the ass with its own messages."
Terrance and Philip mocks the show's toilet humor.
Stan and Kenny apparently got a refund for BASEketball.
The Talk: The boys are treated to this after their parents mistakenly think that they saw a depraved porn film.
Randy Marsh: "Alright, now, now listen, kids, there's some things we need to put into context for you. You see, a man puts his penis into a woman's vagina for both love and pleasure. But sometimes the woman lays on top of the man facing the other way so that they can put each other's genitals in their mouths. This is called "69ing" and it's normal." Sharon Marsh: "See boys, a woman is sensitive in her vagina and it... feels good to have a man's penis inside of it." Sheila Broflovski: "That's right, but sometimes a woman chooses to use other things - telephones, staplers, magazines. It's because the nerve endings in the vagina are so sensitive, it's like a fun tickle." Gerald Broflovski: "Now, on to double penetration, boys. You see, sometimes when a woman has sex with more than one man, each man makes love to a different orifice." Randy Marsh: "That's right. It's something adults can do with really good friends in a comfortable setting." Sheila Broflovski: "It's also important that you understand why some people choose to urinate on each other." Randy Marsh: "Going #1 or #2 on your lover is something people might do, but you must make sure your partner is okay with it before you start doing it." Gerald Broflovski: "Okay boys. Do you have any questions?" Stan Marsh: "...Wow."
Team Prima Donna: Cartman, when he founded the team "Coon and Friends".
In one episode, Osama bin Laden is shown to have an absurdly microscopic penis.
One episode has the idea of compensating for a small penis as its entire premise. It turns out that all of the angry people in the world are just pissed off because they're below the average length. To fix the problem the "average length" is shortened (although, ironically, Cartman still doesn't make the cut).
In an early Pokémon-centric episode, the Japanese creators keep talking about how small their penises are as opposed the well-endowed Americans. One woman calls them out on this, saying that they're only saying this to distract the male Americans. While this is true, one of the creators proves that he's not lying about the size of his penis, either.
There Is A God: When Cartman lost his dream of owning his own amusement park, it restored Kyle's faith in God.
This Is a Work of Fiction: "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."
In Miss Teacher Bangs a Boy: "You just dealt with the Dawg, bitch!"
This Is My Side: Played straight in "The Wacky Molestation Adventure", where all of the adults are gone from South Park and kids split the town into Smiley Town and Treasure Cove. Parodied in "I'm a Little Bit Country", where the town attempts to split themselves into pro-war and anti-war halves, only to almost immediately find that certain needs of theirs are on the other side of the line they just made, and Skeeter concludes, "What we really should be doing is just beatin' the hell out of each other like we were."
This Trope is [BLEEP]: Used very, very often over the course of the series, but also averted (162 times!) during the "It Hits the Fan" episode.
Also in that episode, Mr. Garrison discusses how he is allowed to say "fag" without being bleeped because he is gay, whereas everybody else in the room is censored...except, as it turns out, for Jimbo.
Toilet Humour: Used in just about every episode. The boys of the show like to watch ''Terrence and Philip'', a series comprised almost entirely of fart jokes. In some episodes, the plot is built around toilet humor: as a couple of examples, in "Spontaneous Combustion," people are urged to stop holding in their farts so they don't combust and "More Crap" revolves around Randy Marsh trying to break the world record for taking the largest dump.
And let's not even start with "You're Getting Old." Hoo boy.
Token Minority: Conveniently named Token Black (although played with in that he's both the token black kid and the token rich kid).
In "Here Comes The Neighborhood", Randy called them the Williamses. Possibly because the creators thought any viewers who didn't know Black was their last name might interpret "Isn't that the Blacks?" as Randy being racist.
... why would they want to avoid giving that impression?
That was the first episode where Token's last name was mentioned. Most likely, they hadn't settled on his last name being Black yet.
Too Hot for TV: Not just all the swearing, but parodied with a Jesus & Pals version.
Took a Level in Badass: Ike goes from "Don't kick the baby!" in season 1 to being part of a plan to steal the Hope Diamond by Barack Obama and John McCain. This is before he runs off to be a pirate having grown bored with middle class life.
Liane Cartman as of "Coon 2: Hindsight." She's actually refusing to be Cartman's personal servant for once, and punishing him for swearing and beating up his friends. It says something that this is a level in badass for her.
She quickly falls before the LeBron James Technique however.
As of "Humancenti Pad", she has apparently stopped putting up with any of Eric's attitude, making her one of the few (if only) competent parents on the show. Of course, now Eric has started screwing her over the same way he does everyone else.
Kenny as of "Mysterion Rises".
Butters definitely took one in "Super Fun Time". He will not let go of Cartman's hand. For anything.
Kyle in "Tonsil Trouble" after Cartman inflicts AIDS on him. "I'm going to break...everything that you own!" And he goes to Cartman's and starts doing just that.
Taken Up to Eleven with Wendy in "Breast Cancer Show Ever" by standing up to Cartman and then beating the snot out of him at the end.
Too Many Halves: According to Al Gore, the ManBearPig is "half man, half bear, half pig."
Too Soon: While the show does this all the time, only in the Halloween episode where Steve Irwin shows up to Satan's costume party does the show call itself out for this.
Lampshaded in the Jarred has Aides episode, where Cartman tries to make a joke about Kenny's recent death and is told it's too soon and that it takes 22.6 years until a tragic event becomes funny...which sets up a Brick Joke at the end of the episode.
In "It's a Jersey Thing" 9/11 gets its turn.
"What about the families of the victims of 9/11? Their feelings matter for another ten months, damn it!"
Six Days To Air: The Making of South Park aired the week of Steve Jobs' death. It described the production of an episode in which Jobs built a human centipede from people who agreed to it in the iTunes EULA.
Tortured Abomination: Stan falls in with a bunch of extreme environmentalists who marry animals. The "child" of such a pair — a man and an ostrich — can only say "kill me."
Trope2000: The first four episodes of Season 4 have "2000" in the title.
Troperiffic: Pick any episode and you'll probably find 5 tropes that haven't been added to this page in it.
True Companion: Lampshaded in "The Biggest Douche in the Universe," when Chef tells Stan and Kyle that Cartman is their friend whether they like him or not. This trope becomes more apparent in later seasons, once their Weirdness Magnet status has begun to wear old; the boys fall victim to All of the Other Reindeer more often, making it evident that, while their classmates may tolerate them, they don't really have any friends outside of one another. As much as they would hate to admit it, they're a textbook example of this trope.
Cartman:(watching the Queef Sisters at his house with his friends) Dude! What the hell is this disgusting crap?! Phillip:(watching the Queef Sisters at CBC with Terrance) What the hell is this disgusting crap?!
Tunnel King: The Mole from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.
Recently epitomized with the entire Aesop of the episode "201". Guesswhy.
Unrobotic Reveal: In "Awesom-O", in which Cartman's robot disguise (consisting of a couple of cardboard boxes) manages to fool everybody (except Stan, Kyle, Kenny, and Butters's parents) until he gives the game away by farting.
Unspoken Plan Guarantee: Cartman is Genre Savvy enough to tell a fake plan to humiliate Scott Tennorman to Stan and Kyle (who of course warned Scott about it), and only revealed the real plan once Scott completely fell for it.
Verbal Tic: Mr. Mackey (based on Trey Parker's actual school counselor) puts "mmkay" at the end of a lot of his sentences. (It even crosses language borders; when speaking Spanish, he consistently ends his sentences with "bien" said with the exact same inflection as his "mmkay.")
Also Mickey Mouse in the episode "The Ring" usually ends his sentences with a "Hah-hah!"
The head vampire (and Butters) in the episode "Ungroundable" ends his sentences with "per se" a lot. Though that's probably more because he thinks it sounds deep.
David Blaine ends a few of his sentences with "twah". The real Blaine doesn't. Trey and Matt, in their commentary for Super Best Friends, said they had no idea why they gave Blaine a Verbal Tic. Blaine even called them and asked why they gave him one.
What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: When it first came out there was no small amount of controversy over how South Park was a cartoon about kids that was undeniably for adults.
What Happened to the Mouse?: At the end of "201" we never found out how they got rid of Mecha Streisand. The Super Best Friends distract her with a Neil Diamond duet and that's the last we see of her.
What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: Mint-Berry Crunch, with the combined powers of Mint and Berry with a tasty crunch! Then subverted when he's the one who saves the day.
What's a Henway?: The Mole asks the boys if they brought along "the butfor" in The Movie. ("For pooping, silly.")
What the Hell, Hero?: In "The China Probrem", after Butters accidentally shoots a hostage in the groin:
Cartman: Aw dude, you shot him in the dick. Butters: Huh? Cartman: That's not cool Butters. You don't shoot a guy in the dick. Butters: But I was just trying to stop him, and you said- Cartman: [faces him] It doesn't matter, Butters! You never shoot a guy in the DICK. Everyone knows that! Shooting a guy in the dick?? That's just, that's just weak. I can't believe you, Butters.
"The F-Word": The adults call the boys out for spray-painting "FAGS GET OUT" on a wall to get the annoying Harley riders out of South Park. Mayor McDaniels does this twice, one of them during the call out.
Wise Beyond Their Years: The four protagonists, despite being only 8 – 9 years old, are usually smarter and act more mature than most adults in the show. They usually see a problem or approaching danger first and come up with the solution for it in the end.
White Dude, Black Dude: Cartman needs to form a band, he gets Token to play bass. Because he's black. When Token protests that he doesn't own one, Cartman tells him to look in the basement. Sure enough, there's one there. When Token further protests that he's never picked up a bass in his life, Cartman tells him that he's black, he can play bass. Sure enough, he can.
Token: "Dammit..."
Who's Laughing Now?: Played and subverted with Butters, his own attempts at revenge as Professor Chaos always fail miserably, though he manages to accompolish amazing acts of retribution for his abuse completely by accident (eg. AWESOME-O, The Tale Of Scrotie McBoogerballs).
Scott Tenorman pulls this on Cartman on 201 when he reveals that they both shared the same father.
Who Wants to Live Forever?: In "Mysterion Rises" Kenny reveals that he is Cursed with Awesome in that no matter how many times he dies, he is always resurrected. He remembers each death vividly, but no-one else ever does.
Police Officer: Well, kid, you made an entire town panic, you lost all your friends, and now you're going to juvinal hall for a week. Was it Worth It? Cartman: ....Totally.
Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Often played straight, but sometimes averted ("Up the Down Steroid" and "Wing").
Would Hit a Girl: Kenny in "The Poor Kid". You don't fuck with Karen McCormick.
Wouldn't Hurt a Child: Subverted in the case of Kenny and Butters quite often, and subverted to a lesser degree with Ike.
Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Cartman is quite fond of these as a method of manipulating his mother. He, Stan, and Kyle also pull this at least Once per Episode in Season Six, using Kenny's death to garner sympathy from their friends and family.
Write Who You Know: Kenny is based on a childhood friend of Parker who was also poor and used a parka which muffled his speech.
Tuckerization: Since Stan=Trey and Kyle=Matt, the parents of the duo (Randy/Sharon and Sheila/Gerald) are named after the creator's as well.
Writer On Board: Cartman's mom, Liane, is named after Trey Parker's ex-fiancee, who cheated on him. On the show, Liane is a promiscuous woman who has banged nearly every man in town (along with at least one woman), who is a terrible mother and an idiot to boot. Parker also named an unfaithful horse Liane in his first film, Cannibal! The Musical.
Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: Shows are written the week before they air, and the episodes are often finished frightening close to their airtime.
Xanatos Gambit: Cartman pulls one off in the season 3 episode "The Red Badge of Gayness" (The one with "S'more-flavored Schnapps") - He makes a bet with the others that he can make it so the south won the civil war, and the agreed stake in the bet is, the loser(s) have to act as the winners' slaves. When he loses the bet, he (successfully) argues that he can't be a slave because the south losing the civil war resulted in the abolition of slavery.
X Must Not Win: Kyle's feud with Cartman is usually justified given the latter's highly malicious intent. However even in petty wars, Kyle takes a sometimes disturbing extra mile to make sure Cartman's plans go up in smoke. eg. In "Douche And Turd" he and Cartman create opposing school mascots, with Kyle using increasingly manipulative methods to get people to vote against Cartman's candidate. Similarly a lot of Cartman's intentions are built around making Kyle lose.
Butters: Whoa, you sure seem with it, Eric. You must have some... ih-inspiration. Cartman: Yes, the tears of Kyle Broflovski when he loses his ten dollars to me.
To add onto the Cartman example, there are plenty of occasions Cartman comes out with amazing success and fame due to a bet with Kyle, but brushes it all off because he didn't win the bet in particular. In "Christian Rock Hard" for example, Cartman bets Kyle he can make a Platinum album before him. Cartman succeeds in making a highly successful Christian rock band, gaining enormous popularity and wealth. However once he finds out that Christian record labels don't give out Platinum albums (thus he can never win his bet with Kyle) he flies into a rage in public, destroying the band's career.
And for more Cartman, in "Fat Butt and Pancake Head," Cartman pretends he (or his hand, at least) is Jennifer Lopez. "Ms. Lopez" creates a hit album, gets affectionate with Ben Affleck, and enjoys the wealth and fame of celebrity life via Xanatos Speed Chess. The reason is to make Kyle admit the possibility that the hand is an independent living being from Cartman and calls the whole thing off when Kyle makes even the tiniest admission. (In the episode "200," the hand is proven to be an actual separate entity.)
Xylophone Gag: Played surprisingly straight, albeit with a ukelele.
Your Head A Splode: Cartman's reaction to KFC's closing down in "Medicinal Fried Chicken", combined with a Big "NO!". Also a Big Lipped Alligator Moment (his head is back to normal the next time he's seen, and the explosion is never mentioned since).
Logical Fallacies: Randy. Continuously. Also a lot of the other adults as well.
Parodied in Creme Fraiche when the boys make a terrible job of impersonating Gordon Ramsay. Stan remarks, "I know my Dad's retarded, but not THAT retarded." Randy proves, that yes, he is that retarded.
You Say Tomato: The planetarium manager in the episode "Cheesy Poofs" has a rare disorder that doesn't allow him to pronounce the t in "planetarium", although he seems to have no problem pronouncing it elsewhere.
In the episode where Mr. Garrison wants to scare all the "rich" people out of town, the "richers" scream when they see their neighbors in ghost sheets and say: "South Park is hainted!"
When Al Gore shows up looking for ManBearPig, a Running Gag has him pronouncing "serious"/"seriously" as "serial".
In South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, the Americans make fun of how Canadians pronounce "about" to sound like "a-boot."
And, Trey Parker majored in Japanese. Translated, there are some jokes in there.
Some of the lines translate to things such as "I have a fantastic penis", "This English is screwed up". If you ever wanted to know the Japanese word for a man's jewels, it's in there as well.
Youtube Poop: Chef's dialogue comprised from his voice in previous episodes gives the impression of one of these.
Zombie Apocalypse: Played straight and parodied. In two different episodes.
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