Well here we are, kids, three chapters into the seventy-twelfth season of South Park and weâve got ourselves the first big âmessageâ episode. Iâve said before that I kind of love the topical SPs, the formula of which goes something like: story ripped from headlines + Randy standing in for the American people and acting like a fucking moron x Stan playing the voice of reason â anything entertaining for Cartman to do = Kyle sums up a complex issue with a tidy little speech. Itâs a tried-and-truism, but darn it, it gets results. Er⌠most of the time.
Tonight Iâm not so sure, but thatâs probably because making fun of the economyâwhich you may have heard mentioned in a Jay Leno monologue recently, followed by a humorous exaggeration about someone doing something desperate for moneyâis about as scattershot as talking seriously about the economy. Bailout and bread line jokes arenât exactly knee-slappers anyway (just ask your author, who uses them way too often in Friday Buzzkills), but it usually helps to have a specific target of your derision. As âMargaritavilleâ demonstrated tonight, those targets could be anyone from those clowns at the Treasury to those fat cats on Wall Street to idiots just like you who canât stop buying every Snuggie and Snuggie accessory in sight (and come to think of it, whereâs our South Park Snuggie episode?), and thus itâs not always easy finding a mocking finger to point. (And besides, finger-pointing gets us nowhere, Steve!)
Anyway, they certainly didnât suffer for lack of trying: Turning the economic crisis into a full-blown Jesus parody is something I really didnât see coming, and yet when it arrived it made perfect sense. After all, as Kyle points out in one of his many âsermons,â the economy is built on faith, like religion, yet some people do look at it like an omnipotent being that came in the night, snatched our homes, andâin the words of everybodyâs favorite rednecksââtuk er jeeeerbs!â In typical South Park fashion, Trey and Mattâs answer seems to be that everyone should calm down and stop acting like such an asshole and then everything will be fine again, and while I canât exactly agree with thatâat least until I get my 401(k) matching funds back and I can laugh about that stuffâI would have been disappointed if we got anything else.
For those of you who like rereading the specifics while youâre waiting around to get laid off from your own jeeerb, âMargaritavilleâ started off with a pretty funny sequence involving Stan trying to deposit some birthday money (is it me, or do these kids get birthday money unusually frequently?) only to have the bank tell him itâs already been lost mere seconds after deposit. Back home, things have gotten so grim that the Marshes are forced to dine on hot dogs and tomato slices (or as the Germans call it, "wurst und wolf peaches;" look it up!) as Randy rails about all the âidiots out there who bought a bunch of stupid crap they didnât needâ while blithely using his totally unnecessary but still awesome-looking Margaritaville mixer. On TV and in the streets, even more theories are flying around: Itâs the interest rates, says one. Itâs the brokers, says another. Itâs the âcovetous Jews who hid all the cash in some secret Jew cave,â says Cartman. Finally, as almost always happens when crisis hits, Randy overreacts and becomes the instigator of a full-scale panic, urging everyone to abandon their possessions, start wearing sheets instead of clothes, watch clouds instead of cable, ride llamas instead of driving cars, and make their children play with squirrels instead of video games.
Naturally itâs up to Kyle to play the skeptic, which ironically means he begins preaching that people need to have faith, and urging them to start spending money again because thatâs what makes the economy work in the first place. As his followers begin to grow, he becomes the leader of his own movement, producing âmiraclesâ like getting a platinum American Express card with no spending limit, and stopping others from âhucking squirrelsâ at Mr. Garrison, just because he couldnât keep himself from buying something stupid at Bed Bath & Beyond. Eventually, word reaches Randyâs âcouncilâ about the âyoung Jew speaking heresy,â and plans are made to capture him. Enter Cartman, who offers to turn Kyle over in exchange for a copy of the new Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (which really did come out last weekâtopical!) and is thus set up to be the Judas at Kyleâs Last Supper at Whistlinâ Willyâs. But of course, Kyle is smart enough to figure out that Cartman will betray him, so he sets himself up to make the ultimate sacrifice: Paying off everyoneâs debts with his AmEx âso that we may spend again.â
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While all this silliness is going on, Stan is out digging up the real satire by trying desperately to return his dadâs totally unnecessary but still awesome-looking Margaritaville, only to find that Sur La Table canât give him a refund because part of it was financed. Then Stan meets with a Carmex-abusing douche at the financing company, and he says the money was leveraged into investments, so heâll need to talk to Wall Street. Then, on the floor of the NYSE, Stan is told that the government already bought up all the bad debt, so heâll need to meet with the Treasury. Finally he finds a few government officials who say they can help him, but first they say theyâll need to âconsult the chart,â which turns out to be the funniest gag of the episode: They chop a chickenâs head off and let its blood-spurting body run wild across a huge âjump to conclusions matâ-type thing, until it collapses on one of dozens of choices like âPrint Moneyâ or âTax The Rich.â At this point, Stan just gives up and goes homeâwhich is probably what everybody who has anything to do with this whole financial mess would like to do at this point.
Back in South Park, things are once more slowly returning to normal, as now that Kyle is shouldering the debt of the world, people are able to buy the things they need againâlike a new, totally unnecessary but even more awesome-looking Margaritaville, now updated with a salsa dispenser. And of course, everybody has one person to which they owe their undying gratitude: Barack Obama. Boom! Roasted.
Anyhoo⌠Despite the trappings of its formula, this wasnât actually much of a âmessageâ episode, since there wasnât really much of a âmessageâ to impartânope, not even an obvious one about chilling the fuck out. Yes, the economy is built on consumer confidence, which in a way is just like faith, but without an actual Kyle-like savior to come along and pay for everybodyâs mortgages, the âspend more and everything will be fineâ is definitely an âeasy for you to sayâ solution from two guys who obviously have plenty of money. But whatever; weâre not looking for South Park to show us the way to salvation. At this point the best we can hope for is some gallows humor, and âMargaritavilleâ managed to make me laugh about the economy in a new and unexpected wayâand even the expected ways, such as illustrating just how needlessly complex our financial system has become, to the point where weâre basically throwing money at problems because we donât understand whatâs going on? Well, that was funny tooâbut then, Iâm a sucker for the old headless-chicken-running-around-to-kazoo-music gag. Which is a good thing, because before you know it, itâll be the only entertainment I can afford! Yamiritefolks? Thankyougoodnight!
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Grade: B+
Stray observations:
â˘Â Other options on the chart: Telethon, Bad Bank, Indian Casinos, Nationalize!!!, Sell China! Go To War, Raise Fed, Let Fail, Coup DâĂŠtat, Go To Congress, Mortgages!, Socialize, Cut Education, Press Conference.
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â˘Â Not to sound like Josh, but that Godfather II game looks pretty badass. Too bad my wife wonât let me have video games in the house.
â˘Â Does the AmEx Platinum let you carry a balance? Because if not, that could⌠Ah, fuck it.
â˘Â âWe have to learn to live with only the essentials: Water, bread, and margaritas.â
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