The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast · Mark Linsenmayer, Wes Alwan, Seth Paskin, Dylan Casey

PEL Presents PMP#214: South Park Resurgence

·54 min·3 clips

Pretty Much Pop spends the conversation on South Park as it just finished its 28th season. Mark Linton Meyer, Al Baker, Sarah Lynn Bruck, and Lawrence Ware start with playful banter about lowbrow humor and highbrow intellectual analysis. The tone is jokey, but the point stays serious. They keep circling back to the show's earliest forms, including the self-distributed shorts and the very first episode, which the panel calls stupid, silly, and still worth revisiting. Lawrence Ware suggests the strongest version of the show may be the earliest one. The others do not really leave it there. Sarah Lynn Bruck argues that there is a lot to admire about a show that can be both crass and smart at once. The discussion lands on why the children matter so much. Because the kids are innocent, they can ask the obvious question while the adults spin out the absurd answer. Stan can stare blank-faced into the camera, and Randy can explain a wild scheme as if it all makes perfect sense. That setup gives the show a clean satirical engine. Once that is in place, South Park can work as a set of reusable roles for whatever the writers want to take on that year. The panel also treats the show's seasonal changes as part of its identity. It shifts sharply from season to season depending on what Matt Stone and Trey Parker want to do. Lawrence Ware says he fell out with the show when it moved into season-long story arcs, though he still finds that turn interesting and worthwhile. The conversation opens up again around the one-off specials made during the show's break, which change the setting so much that Cartman can end up living in a hot dog van. No one tries to pin the show to one fixed premise after that. The talk keeps returning to the idea that this is the Matt Stone and Trey Parker show, and that the brutal schedule and the need to take time off shape how it gets made. The closing stretch folds in the ad-free feed pitch and the usual podcast gripes about ads, keeping the whole thing in the same cranky, conversational lane.

As heard by us

A smart, cranky look at South Park's strange persistence after 28 seasons.

Pretty Much Pop treats South Park as a study in staying power, tracing how Trey Parker and Matt Stone built a show that started with self-distributed shorts and still seems willing to shift from year to year by season 28.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

A dry, lively take on why South Park keeps reinventing its own chaos.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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