Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s animated series South Park
got its start as a defiantly crude slice of counterculture, with the
shock value of potty-mouthed adolescents and the bashing of various
sacred cows. As it’s aged, though, it’s only gotten smarter and better,
surpassing The Simpsons as the best animated comedy on television several years ago, and holding onto that title with ease.
<br />
In an effort to cheer him up, Kyle and the gang take him to the titular<br />
local chain restaurant known for chicken wings and prepubescent hot<br />
girls. It doesn’t work — Stan instead joins the goth gang and wallows<br />
in despair. Oblivious Butters, however, finds his heart set afire by<br />
the casual touch and chirpy sociability of a waitress, and takes that<br />
as a sign that she’s his girlfriend. Oblivious to the fact that she<br />
only spends time with him at the restaurant, he proceeds to spend all<br />
his allowance wooing her with tips.</p>
<p>DVD extras on this three-disc set — housed, like previous seasonal<br />
releases, in expansive gatefold packaging in a nice cardboard slipcase<br />
— consist of <b>mini-commentaries by Stone and Parker</b>. Running only several<br />
minutes apiece, these introductions contain a few <i>bon mots</i> here<br />
and there, such as when Parker reveals that the Mexican restaurant/fun<br />
park at the center of “Casa Bonita,” where Cartman tricks Butters into<br />
a bomb shelter so he can join Kyle on a birthday trip, is a real place<br />
in Denver. They also acknowledge the razor’s edge dance the series<br />
consistently engages in as far as the “political and religious shows<br />
that some kids don’t find funny.” It’s precisely those episodes, I’d<br />
argue, that make <i>South Park</i> so subversively brilliant. That<br />
said, a bit more behind-the-scenes material on just this very<br />
interesting sort of balancing act would really make this set sing. <b>A (Show) B+ (Discs)</b></p>
<div class=)