South Park - "Pandemic 2: The Startling" - Talkback [10/29]

The moral of the story: setting episodes in Peru = lame episodes. Just look at the Simpsons and South Park.

How I rank the multi-parters:

-Cartoon Wars
-"Who is Cartman's Dad"
-Imaginationland (would be higher if it weren't for the "Kyle sucks Cartman's balls" sub-plot)
-Pandemic
-Go, God, Go
-Do Handicapped Kids Go to Hell?
 
Word has it that Trey Parker and Matt Stone are trying to get the show canceled, because they want to do something new.

They should just show a jar of mayo for half and hour.
 
Yeah, because it's even stupider. But I mean that as a compliment. It's so phenomenally stupid that it works, kind of like old South Park. But also kind of not like old South Park. Things like arguments over whether something is a guinea mouse or guinea rabbit, the reveal of the guinea pirate, and Craig shooting lasers out of his eyes as the guinea pirate rolled around, are the things that separate this from other "action movie parody" episodes. This felt more like "Mecha-Streisand" than... well, the first 25 or so minutes of "Pandemic 1".

Still not one of the better South Park episodes, but it made me laugh. My favorite part was when they showed Randy doing his camera moves in the store. Just randomly running around and shooting his feet and stuff.
 
But some would argue that the shows they worked on prior suffered as a result.

Besides, it's not a matter of multitasking. They want to stop.
But of course it's all a rumor, so who knows?
 
In truth the whole Randy plot though having some nice shots about the video camera (I liked the shot of him actually being shown moving around with the camera as well as the turn around he did on Shelly) wasn't really necessary. Just seemed like a way to show the Gueina pigs dressed up in different costumes (people do buy a lot of costumes for they're pets around now though. I haven't seen gueina bees but I have seen dog bees, dog pirates and even dog dinosaur costumes so it's not that far fetched actually). The ending joke of him not having a tape in it and Sharon attacking him were good but really kind of took away from the whole thing. It seemed like an effort to just parody Cloverfield and include some crazy Randy stuff that the writers really like doing but usually try better intergrating into the plot more.

The main plot was better actually. In addition to more dead pan Craig comments we really get the feeling that it's his episode: he has the opening and ending narration, and in addition to his comments actually changes the plot around. I mean really if it were up to Stan and co we'd probably have a Pandemic Part 3 with more of them exploring inside the cave era but Craig saw that coming and jsut focused on getting to where the cliffhanger is. I guess Chertov's plan didn't need to be explained too much better but I was expecting something more but hey at least him being a guiena pirate made sense with that whole tounge licking thing before (though if he's a pirate with extending power that means he be dipping into gum gum I guess). I did find it funny though how Craig unintentionally saved the day and reacted to just randomly shooting lasers around as well as the guy's comments about him. Hey maybe this is a reason why hate Craig so much: because he realizes just how stupid they're acting with they're schemes and actually bothers telling them that when tagging along with them. Pretty good stuff actually. Not as many government scenes (and the ones that were at least bothered having some jokes like the guy with the hurt feelings and thinking that Chertoff was laughing at a funny joke) and a tighter hold of Craig as the main hero made this an overall better part. There won't be a Pandemic 3 probably but that's a good thing since we already had the big exploring trilogy last season that people felt was a part too long anyway. Let's have a more focused thing here starring someone who probably wishes he'll never get the spotlight again.
 
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