It's hard to believe that I've been watching South Park for over ten years now. A lot has changed in this epic show during my time, but a lot has remained the same as well. The season 18 opener is not short on its usual satire, raunchiness, gore and shocking timeliness. However it's becoming more evident that Trey Parker and Matt Stone have lost their ability to close episodes. It's also becoming evident that they're literally out of ideas now, and that they are relying on current issues and headlines to write themselves in. But let me stop myself before I go too far.
Here's how I see it: The premise of "Go Fund Yourself" is that the boys want to start their own internet "startup" company to avoid going to school. The name— the Washington Redskins. After we learn about that the snowball of NFL jokes gets bigger and bigger. The football team, led by Kirk Cousins instead of an injured RJ3, and their owner, Daniel Snyder, plead the boys to change their name for the very same reasons they (in real life) refuse to listen to. Here, the boys play the football team and Snyder and the Redskins play the public. The boy's answer to Snyder is, Go "Fund" Yourself. I'm sure we can all figure that joke out. ISIS is also poked at, but their role serves solely so South Park can address their existence. The ending is blood-filled and anti-climatic: an accurate description of many of South Park's recent episodes. Daniel Snyder takes on the Dallas Cowboys and a hilarious cut-out animation of Jerry Jones. Roger Goodell also takes a hit here and it's pretty funny. But in all this is the product of Trey Parker and Matt Stone's six day episode production process. The writing is bad, the jokes are a stretch and I was left disappointed in the end; not because I didn't laugh but because I miss the boys being boys. Hopefully this week's episode will be more of that. I have faith in the creators – I mean the episode before this was the Black Friday trilogy! And that was awesome. They will get on their usual roll in the middle of this episode run.
Here's how I see it: The premise of "Go Fund Yourself" is that the boys want to start their own internet "startup" company to avoid going to school. The name— the Washington Redskins. After we learn about that the snowball of NFL jokes gets bigger and bigger. The football team, led by Kirk Cousins instead of an injured RJ3, and their owner, Daniel Snyder, plead the boys to change their name for the very same reasons they (in real life) refuse to listen to. Here, the boys play the football team and Snyder and the Redskins play the public. The boy's answer to Snyder is, Go "Fund" Yourself. I'm sure we can all figure that joke out. ISIS is also poked at, but their role serves solely so South Park can address their existence. The ending is blood-filled and anti-climatic: an accurate description of many of South Park's recent episodes. Daniel Snyder takes on the Dallas Cowboys and a hilarious cut-out animation of Jerry Jones. Roger Goodell also takes a hit here and it's pretty funny. But in all this is the product of Trey Parker and Matt Stone's six day episode production process. The writing is bad, the jokes are a stretch and I was left disappointed in the end; not because I didn't laugh but because I miss the boys being boys. Hopefully this week's episode will be more of that. I have faith in the creators – I mean the episode before this was the Black Friday trilogy! And that was awesome. They will get on their usual roll in the middle of this episode run.
- jc