Original air date: 11/27/2002
After Cartman's latest bout of possession by Kenny's spirit, Chef takes the boys to a taping of purported spirit medium John Edward's TV show in New York City, but Edward merely gives useless platitudes about Kenny, and instead delivers a message from Kyle's grandmother that seriously freaks Kyle out and causes him to believe he's supposed to stay in NYC and attend a Jewish boarding school. Cartman is taken to Scotland in order to get an exorcism from Chef's parents, while Stan remains in NYC to try and expose Edward as a fraud, and as the "Biggest Douche in the Universe."
Examples:
- An Aesop: Psychics like John Edward are fraudulent, manipulative douches who are best ignored.
- Armour-Piercing Question: Stan finally manages to get through to his audience that neither he or Edwards is psychic by asking them up if they really want the afterlife to just be floating around talking to guys like Edwards.
- Believing Their Own Lies: Edward asks Stan, who just called him a douche, what Edward is if he actually believes he’s a psychic. Stan replies “a stupid douche.” Whether Edward actually believes his own lies is left ambiguous, however.
- Berserk Button: Edward instantly becomes offended and defensive when Stan calls him a "douche".
- Brick Joke: Rob Schneider comes across the pot roast with Kenny's soul and gets possessed when he eats it, which becomes yet another movie trailer.
- Broken Pedestal: Chef loses faith in John Edward quickly after seeing his unedited show in person.
- Call-Back: Chef's mother offers the disembodied spirit of Kenny "tree-fiddy" ($3.50) in order to leave their house, a reference to the Running Gag from the episode where Chef's parents were introduced. Interestingly, both episodes also make heavy use of the word 'derp', with Chef's replacement in the older episode, repeating the word in a fake trailer in this one.
- Censored Title: Most cable guides and TV listings shorten the title to "The Biggest..." to avoid the word "Douche".
- Character Catchphrase: John Edward's is "Doesn't work that way", whenever anyone asks him to get in touch with a specific person; the first clue that his act is just an elaborate confidence scam.
- Cold Reading: Stan found books at John Edward's place detailing this approach and realized this is how he does his show. Reading up on cold readings himself, he tries to prove to Kyle that Edward is a fraud by doing this with a random woman passing by. He speaks very vaguely and lets her fill in all the gaps, all the while explaining exactly what he's doing. Everyone instead believes this proves Stan is psychic, and he ends up getting his own show. The audience hangs on his every word, despite his frustrated efforts to point out how he is tricking them.
- Continuity Nod: Kyle's dead grandmother is brought up again, this time because of John Edward's Cold Reading and scares Kyle into attending Jewleeard.
- Epic Fail: John Edward getting the title of Biggest Douche in the Universe, considering that one of his rivals for that title is an actual human-sized douche.
- Fate Worse than Death: Stan says that the only thing more terrifying than the thought of dying and there being no afterlife is an afterlife where the only means of communicating with the living world is via John Edward.
- Gone Horribly Wrong: Stan tries to demonstrate Edward's scam to Kyle by demonstrating it on some passers-by outside the Jewleeard school. Unfortunately, all that this succeeds in doing is convincing the passers-by that Stan is a psychic as well, getting him his own TV show. He accepts the offer in an attempt to use it as a platform to expose Edward to a wider audience, but just ends up further convincing his own studio audience of his own "gift".
- Here We Go Again!: After Kenny's spirit is finally removed from Cartman's body, it ends up being stuck in an inanimate object which is consumed by someone else — Rob Schneider this time — causing him to be possessed by Kenny.
- I Just Want to Be Special: Despite his Phony Psychic act being so simple that a nine-year-old boy can emulate it, John Edward is convinced that he's special and destined for greatness. Eventually, he does get recognition... by being awarded the title of Biggest Douche in the Universe.
- Medal of Dishonor: The titular award. Stan angrily calls John Edward the "Biggest Douche in the Universe" on several occasions, and later on we find out that not only is there an actual award with this name, Edward ends up being nominated for and winning it (against a literal big douche, no less).
- Never Say "Die": Parodied in the beginning, when the doctor explains to Liane that Cartman's "time is running out" and recommends the boy gets a "time transplant" to save his life.
- Oh, Crap!: The reaction of Chef's parents on realizing that he didn't bring a child to sacrifice in order to use as a receptacle for Kenny's spirit after it's removed from Cartman's body. Later, Chef himself has this reaction on realizing they forgot to collect the pot roast containing Kenny's spirit from the airport.
- Only One Finds It Fun: Kenny is the only one of the four boys to find any amusement in the Rob Schneider comedies advertised throughout the episode. He ends up possessing Schneider at the end of the episode.
- Pet the Dog: When Stan addresses the studio audience, he doesn't call them out. He apologizes for thinking they were idiots, but understands they were just scared of the unknown of death and were comforted by the idea that their relatives spirits were trying to talk to them.
- Phony Psychic: Edward apparently started out as one of these — Stan says that the audience waiting room is wired, and later demonstrates Edward's techniques on some passers-by — but seems to have deluded himself into thinking that he genuinely does have psychic powers.
- Shout-Out: The name of the school that Kyle attends, Jewleeard, is a shout-out to the real-life Juilliard school, albeit the latter is a performing arts school rather than a private Jewish school. Matt Stone was reportedly entered into the running for a scholarship to Juilliard during his youth, though by his own admission was never in with any real chance of winning it.
- Speaking Simlish: A trailer for a fake Rob Schneider movie is delivered in this. Despite the narration being complete gibberish, the trailer is so formulaic (and stupid) that anyone who's seen any of Schneider's then-recent movies can quickly work out what's meant to be going on. It appears to be a story about a man who used to live a relatively normal life (doing things like going clubbing and being Distracted by the Sexy), until one day he drank liquid nitrogen (thinking it was just ordinary water) and lost complete control of himself."Rob Schneider derp de derp. Derp de derpity derpa derp. Until one day, a derpa derpa derpa derp! Derp de derp, da teetly tum. From the creators of Der and Tum Ta Titally Tum Ta Too, Rob Schneider is Da Derp De Derp Da Teetly Derpee Derpee Dumb. Rated PG-13."
- Take That!:
- An episode-long one is aimed at John Edward, with the main story dedicated to exposing his fraudulent claims of being a spiritual medium, and the techniques he uses to portray himself as such.
- Another one is delivered to the Schneider comedies The Animal and The Hot Chick (the latter of which came out right after this episode, on December 13) with some fake trailers where he gets turned into a carrot, a stapler, whatever the hell this
is, and finally Kenny.
- They Killed Kenny Again: In a call-back to Kenny's death from "Weight Gain 4000", the Kenny-possessed Rob Schneider is shot, sent flying and impaled on the South Park flag.
- "The Villain Sucks" Song: One gets sung for Edward — albeit in a congratulatory tone — after he's awarded the title of Biggest Douche in the Universe.
- Two Lines, No Waiting: The episode begins with the singular plot thread of finding a way to exorcist Kenny's spirit from Cartman, with the boys joining at Chef's insistence. The thread diverge when their first avenue, John Edward, turns out to be a fraud and causes Chef and the Cartmans to travel to Scotland to exorcist Kenny. Meanwhile, Kyle falls for John Edward's sham and stays in New York to attend a Jewish boarding school, believing that his deceased Grandma wanted that, and Stan tries to expose the psychic for the fraud that he is.
- Word Purée Title: Da Derp Dee Derp Da Teetley Derpee Derpee Dumb, with a trailer almost entirely narrated in similar gibberish.
