Fun Stuff > ENJOY
So what do you think of south park?
ALoveSupreme:
--- Quote from: tommydski on 20 Nov 2007, 23:37 ---It does make me uncomfortable that their targets now seem to be left-leaning and I can't help wonder whether their merciless lampooning of anti-war celebrities isn't insidious.
--- End quote ---
I usually just assume the idea is that everyone always goes after conservatives because it's a fairly easy target, especially in youth culture, so they go the other way. And, realistically, how often do you see decent satire of the left outside of the occasional Daily Show bit? Remember that "Republican Version of the Daily Show" Fox News tried to peddle that weakly tried to mock liberalism? No one does, likely because it was pathetic. I don't think South Park writing can be beaten outside of Colbert and sometimes Stewart in the political arena.
(not to revive a near dead thread or anything)
captain zoe:
I don't watch it very much, but occasionally when I'm bored I'll switch it on and have a laugh or two. Mostly because I am from Colorado, and it seems the jokes (about Colorado) are really funny to me, so that's why I enjoy it. Usually though if it gets too political or whatever I'll change the channel, not because I'm offended by it, but because if I want to see that kind of commentary I'll go watch Jon Stewart.
Storm Rider:
I'm surprised I didn't see this thread before, but I dislike South Park a lot. Mostly because as a political science student, it frustrates me to no end seeing people call South Park 'social commentary' when none of the political or social statements made on that show have been anything other than blindingly obvious. Like in the Katrina episode, where they said that people should stop shifting blame and just help the people who were affected. Really? That's your big revelation on the subject? Way to go out on a limb there, guys. Not to mention that they frequently don't even bother with a message and just turn one of the parties involved into gay alien crabs or something idiotic like that. It really pisses me off that they're so smugly certain that people need to hear their opinion and then they say absolutely nothing of merit or value.
Then of course there's the fact that due to the show's popularity the media has to bend over backwards to talk about how great it is. The thing that really convinced me was the World of Warcraft episode winning an Emmy. There was nothing remotely original about that episode, they just spouted the same cliche about MMO players ad nauseum, and then at one point Cartman sprays his mother with shit. Fantastic. The fact that South Park has ever been considered for any award of any kind is just proof of how fucking far the standards for television have fallen.
And then of course, there's the fact that they spend the large part of every episode detailing this overarching and often extremely simplistic metaphor for whatever issue is the subject at that point and then 9 times out of 10 come out and explain that metaphor in excruciating detail because they apparently feel that their audience is too stupid to understand their hamfisted attempts at subtlety. Sorry, but I have better things to do with my time than be condescended to by a couple of arrogant jackasses acting behind a troupe of cartoon fourth graders.
I feel better now.
ALoveSupreme:
The WoW episode, to me, was a great genre parody. I think what they proved they could do in that episode is take tired cultural cliches and turn them around. They've proven they love montage sequences in the series, but in that episode in particular, it struck me as creative to take the typically perceived lethargic act of playing video games/MMOs and turn it into the equivalent of a Rocky training sequence. The rest of the episode struck me in a similar way.
Also, I believe the seemingly obtuse recapitulation of the "moral" or subtext to the episode is a parody or joke in it of itself. Of course, I could be dead wrong there, because this technique was also used in the earlier episodes when the writing was genuinely complete shit.
Ital1Stall1:
@Storm Rider: I believe you're mistaking labels incorrectly placed by viewers for the intentions of the writers. I haven't ever thought that their desire was to subtley comment on politics. Yes, they deal with very obvious topics and pick very obvious opinions about those topics to portray, but the fact that they can do that and invent such a convoluted plot is what makes the show interesting for me. Consider the episode about the "Hare Club for Men" - they took the simple question of "why do we dye eggs for Easter?" and wrote a plot with such a ridiculous amount of humorous puns and references I don't see how one isn't impressed by that. I think the show is just plain well-written.
Obviously not all of the episodes are good, though. The Guitar Hero episode had a few decent jokes, but was otherwise terrible.
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