South Park: Super Fun Time Review
Season 12 - Episode 07
Photo courtesy of southparkstudios.com
April 24th, 2008 - The first half of South Park’s twelfth season is officially over, and thankfully, the half-season ended strongly with a solid Butters/Cartman episode. Though Super Fun Time might not be as funny as such legendary episodes as “AWESOM-O” or “Casa Bonita,” last night reminded us how hilarious this show is whenever these two characters are paired up.
The episode begins with Mr. Garrison bringing his class to Old Pioneer Village, and if you’ve ever been to one of these places, you know just how ridiculous they are. Even though the “villagers” are very clearly pretending to be living in 1864, they absolutely refuse to admit that they are only acting, even as their village is shot up by Burger King robbers. You’d think their self-preservation instinct would kick in and help the children find the phone, dial 911, and get the guns to shoot the robbers, but alas, there is a sign reminding them to *never* break character. Kyle gets a great line to the 911 operator when she says that the village employees are annoying, and he replies, “Sister, you don’t know the half of it.”
This premise is preposterous, but it works because of the ridiculous lengths the village people are willing to go to in order to keep up the impression that they are really living in pioneer days, including shooting one employee who was about to break character. The robbers, ripped straight from Die Hard, seem to have only gotten a few bucks and a couple of burgers, but they are quickly driven to kill by their frustrations at how committed the village employees are in their refusal to admit that they understand what is happening around them. The way Stan figures out how to ask them for the mine shaft combination without breaking character was really funny, even though as Wendy pointed it out, it was heroic and lame at the same time.
As great as all that was, nothing beats the Butters and Cartman material. Just as the “villagers” refuse to break character, Butters refuses to let go of Cartman’s hand, even if it means him getting dragged and whacked around as Cartman runs around the Super Phun Thyme arcade. The visuals of Cartman spinning Butters around, their game of air hockey, and especially their 3/4 profiles as they hung from the stop-light were all hysterical. The Super Fun Time song wasn’t one of the show’s best, but the Ferris Bueller inspired “life moves pretty fast” bit, and the way that Butters cries and hits Cartman when they think the cops were called on them was priceless.
The show’s third act wraps up everything up neatly, with Cartman and Butters sneaking back into the village and Butters using Cartman as a weapon to hit the terrorist. The cops come in, the bad guys get shot up, and the ringleader learns an important lesson about the importance of pioneer reenactment villages. The way the village workers immediately return to their normal selves as soon as its quitting time was great, especially Pioneer Paul nonchalantly giving up all the information that would have been infinitely more helpful *during* the hostage crisis. The ending shot, of a bloody Butters passing out after having dragged Cartman’s limp body back onto the school bus, was the perfect way to wrap up this episode.
Overall, this was not the greatest South Park episode ever, and the fact that it was surrounded by some truly unfunny half-hours as of late may have made it appear funnier than it actually was. But I still found myself laughing out loud several times, and that’s the bottom line for me. I don’t care whether the laughs come from a political “point,” some totally random joke, a super current pop culture reference, or a call-back to a movie from the 80’s; I just expect South Park to make me laugh. It didn’t happen as much as I would have liked in the first seven episodes of Season 12, but I am glad that the first half ended on a high note.
Alan’s Score: 7.8 out of 10
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