The creators of South Park, Matt Stone and Trey Parker, have entered the show’s eighteenth season (their second that runs over one ten week block rather than two seven episode periods over the course of the calendar year) by doing something a little different. Much like, say, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, they’ve made the South Park world one that references other storylines, past adventures and cleverly connects them from one episode to the next. After years of non-sequential episodes with game changing plot lines never to be mentioned again, they have in essence done something almost unthinkable after 18 seasons: they’ve surprised us. Sure, they’ve always been self-referential, but never to this extent, and never with such intent unless it’s a two or a three part series of episodes.
The result has been, in my opinion, some of the series’ best and most talked about episodes in years. It all kicked off with “Gluten Free Ebola”, the second episode of the season, which referenced the first, perplexing the characters themselves “Why does everyone suddenly remember everything everybody says?”. What may have started as a gag (and is potentially leading to its own twist later in the season) ended up becoming useful plot fodder: they could briefly introduce themes to be later developed in future episodes. Case and point being Lorde, who briefly appeared at the end of the same episode, before having last week’s episode devoted almost entirely to the rather ridiculous, hilarious and typically South Park plot line.
This brings us to this week’s episode, “Handicar”, which is the first episode of this season to remove us from our core characters – a tactic you know from the outset will be hit or miss. In this instance, we land somewhere in the middle, finding ourselves a year on from the episode “Crippled Summer” (14.07), with Timmy joining the car share / app driven premium taxi service trend (e.g. Uber), to raise money for their next Summer Camp. Still reeling from being anally raped by a shark at the previous camp, Nathan (who with his lackey Mimsy are a parody of Bugs Bunny gangsters Rocky and Mugsy) sets out to destroy Timmy’s successful business by riling up the local cab drivers and car salesman – as well as Tesla’s Elon Musk. “Lorde” makes an appearance again, as one of Timmy’s passengers, though that serves as the only in-season connection.
However, if the Lorde storyline is anything to go by, they seem to be setting up a potential plot line with Matthew McConaughey who appears throughout in a hilarious parody of his Lincoln commercials, “I was driving a Handicar, before I was paid to drive a Handicar”, before being sucked into a wormhole – which could potentially find its way into a future episode. This happened in the episode’s excellent denouement – a recreation of the classic TV series Wacky Races – which naturally caused the local supermarkets to run out of cereal. I always love when they reference other cartoons in South Park, from Bin Laden’s Elmer Fudd to Major Boobage’s Heavy Metal and of course let’s not forget the Cartoon Wars.
It was a clever episode, and the animation during the Wacky Race segment was fantastic (even an older Dastardly and Muttley were there). But it was by far the weakest episode of the season so far, much as “Crippled Summer” was a few years ago, which followed on rather disappointingly from the excellent 200th and 201st episodes. But it’s to be expected – once you remove our main cast, it’s just not the same show – with perhaps the goths as a personal exception. But even a less-than-hilarious South Park episode remains a must see, and this week is no exception, dealing with just enough popular subject matter and executing it their typical wit to make “Handicar” 22 minutes very well spent indeed.
Review Score: THREE AND A HALF STARS (OUT OF FIVE)
South Park airs in Australia on SBS2 on Sunday Nights, with the new season fast-tracked from the USA. Season Seventeen was released on DVD this week in a two disc set.
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