Top 10 Times South Park Parodied Pop Culture
Pop culture is rife with parody material! Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for “South Park’s” most memorable pot shots at all things pop culture.
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00:00 "Now of course we only take Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency because, you know, it's the future."
00:05 "We've all decided centralized banking is rigged so we trust more in fly-by-night Ponzi schemes."
00:09 Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for South Park's most memorable potshots at all things pop culture.
00:17 "Luckily I came out of it okay. I got this little miniature donkey with a lit up sombrero."
00:26 "Maybe some people enjoy nostalgia and going back to what feels comfortable."
00:31 Season 20 of South Park was one long serialized story about internet trolling and the 2016 American presidential race.
00:38 It did, however, introduce us to member berries.
00:41 Playing off the word "remember," these little fruit snacks were constantly providing a source of nostalgia for anyone who would listen.
00:48 "Docker?"
00:49 "Yeah, and member addicts?"
00:52 "Member?"
00:53 "Hey, hey, member ghostbusters?"
00:56 The entire concept was essentially a recurring gag poking fun at film and television reboots.
01:02 [All talking at once]
01:07 The show even treats us to J.J. Abrams, who rebooted Star Wars and Star Trek, rebooting the national anthem.
01:14 "For our national anthem, we now ask you all in solidarity to please rise, or sit, or take a knee."
01:23 "In order to honor America."
01:25 Number 9. Facebook.
01:27 Do you remember a time when social media wasn't a thing?
01:31 Prior to the world of Instagram and TikTok, the biggest thing in social media was something called Facebook.
01:36 Sharing photos and status updates with your friends and family seemed like the coolest thing to ever hit the web.
01:42 "Stan, why won't you be friends with grandma?"
01:46 "Uh, dad, I just really don't want to pay attention to this thing."
01:48 "Grandma is in the hospital, and you won't even be friends with her."
01:51 So when the obsession hit South Park, Stan didn't want anything to do with it, and insisted he was...
01:56 "Not getting sucked into that!"
01:58 Well, he did, literally.
02:00 And in doing so, we were given a fantastic ode to the movie Tron,
02:04 and a message about how online friends shouldn't be seen as some kind of status within our society.
02:09 "Friends shouldn't be some kind of commodity for a person's status!"
02:12 Number 8. Internet and media obsessiveness.
02:16 Simply put, South Park's fish sticks episode was clearly made to poke fun at Kanye West.
02:21 "You're a rapper."
02:22 "Yes."
02:23 "An entrepreneur."
02:24 "Yes."
02:25 "And you like fish sticks."
02:27 "Yes."
02:27 "You're a gay fish."
02:29 "No, I am not no gay fish!"
02:31 But that's not the only thing being made fun of here.
02:34 Cartman and Jimmy's joke becomes a national sensation, popping up everywhere.
02:38 "The fish sticks joke crosses all borders, all races, all ages and ethnic groups, and is slowly uniting our country."
02:44 Ye's obsession with dissecting the joke to an extreme degree can also be seen as a reflection of internet culture.
02:51 Online communities often obsess over screen grabs from television and movies,
02:55 and insist that tiny pieces of dialogue hide much bigger truths than what appear on the surface.
03:01 It's a very subtle but effective jab at obsessive culture.
03:04 "Because I am a genius, I have ascertained that fish have gills."
03:10 "Doctor, do I have gills?"
03:14 "He does not have gills."
03:17 Number 7. The Lord of the Rings.
03:20 "Uh, boys, Butters' parents want to borrow the Lord of the Rings video we rented. Could you take it over to them?"
03:24 "You're sending us on a quest? You ask of us to take the one video to the house of Butters?"
03:30 "Yeah, whatever."
03:31 Another great aspect to the show South Park is how it often can both pay tribute to and mock something all in the same episode.
03:38 Such was the case with this memorable season six gem.
03:41 The target? The Lord of the Rings trilogy.
03:44 The four boys set out on a quest to return a videotape to the rental store when things go a little awry.
03:50 Several boys essentially portray the lead characters from the famous saga,
03:54 all while Butters becomes a hilarious version of Gollum.
03:57 "My movie! My awesome cool movie! My... precious."
04:05 Sure, the adult film bit is certainly new, but between the costumes,
04:08 the questing, and Jimmy's Gandalf impression, there's plenty here to see.
04:12 "You shall not...
04:13 [Groaning]
04:17 "You shall not...
04:18 [Groaning]
04:24 "You shall not...
04:25 [Groaning]
04:28 Number 6. Black Friday.
04:30 In season 17, South Park released a trilogy of episodes all focused around the biggest shopping day of the year, Black Friday.
04:38 The storyline involved all the kids in town having been split into two factions
04:42 over whether to buy the new Xbox or PlayStation.
04:44 "Everyone who wants to get PS4 is joined with us."
04:47 "No, we can't divide like this!"
04:49 "Stan, you're on our side, right?"
04:58 "I like the PS4's controller better."
05:02 The entire thing played out while relentlessly mocking all things Game of Thrones and Black Friday.
05:07 "You're doing this to try and get to the front of the line on Black Friday, aren't you?"
05:11 "Nobody else has thought of it, Sharon."
05:15 From the ridiculous need to go on garden walks, obsessions with nudity, and far more,
05:21 the episodes perfectly dialed into everyone's obsession with the era-set drama.
05:25 The episodes even included a fantastic parody of George R.R. Martin himself.
05:30 "It's the Red Wedding, isn't it? You hate how I killed everyone off!"
05:33 Number 5. Disney and the Jonas Brothers.
05:36 "Hello, sir. How was your trip?"
05:38 "What's all this I'm hearing about not wearing the parody rings?"
05:41 If anyone ever had any doubts on what the creators of South Park think of Disney,
05:46 all they had to do was watch this one episode.
05:49 The show pokes fun at the nature of the Jonas Brothers and their relationship with the House of Mouse.
05:53 They take the very G-rated nature of the band and spin it in a very R-friendly manner.
05:58 To push the narrative even further,
06:00 Mickey Mouse is depicted as an angry boss who puts his staff through the ringer.
06:04 This culminates at the end when Mickey becomes a Godzilla-like monster and wreaks havoc.
06:09 "Vengeance is mine! You're all ants and I'm your destroyer!"
06:14 It wouldn't be the last time the show would mock Disney,
06:17 but it was certainly a memorable first outing.
06:20 "Who else wants to go to China and get some of their money?"
06:23 "Oh, for crying out loud."
06:26 Number 4. The media's obsession with celebrities.
06:29 "It's Britney Watch, keeping you up to date with all your Britney Spears news.
06:34 Oh boy, what's she done now?"
06:37 Long before people were obsessed with what the Kardashians were up to,
06:40 the paparazzi were picking apart anything and everything related to Britney Spears.
06:45 At one time, it seemed that everything from who she was dating to what she had for lunch
06:49 was being scrutinized by everyone.
06:51 South Park highlighted the ridiculousness of the media by parodying their addiction to Spears.
06:56 "Britney, over here!"
06:58 Showing how they care far more about her exterior image than her mental health.
07:04 It's the boys who truly sympathize and go to extreme lengths to help her.
07:09 "Excuse me, is this really what you think she should be doing right now?"
07:11 Number 3. Video game addiction.
07:14 While Butter's virtual reality experience in Grounded Vendaloop was a hilarious spoof,
07:19 one of the best episodes in the show's history, Make Love Not Warcraft,
07:22 is a stunning example of how to mock video games while simultaneously embracing them.
07:27 With the help of the folks over at Blizzard,
07:29 South Park seamlessly integrated real game footage of World of Warcraft into the episode.
07:34 "In the outside world, I'm a simple geologist.
07:37 But in here, I am Falcorn, Defender of the Alliance."
07:42 That alone would have been amazing.
07:44 But when you have game makers openly mocking those who play their biggest hit
07:48 all within the episode, you can't help but be impressed.
07:51 "Whoever this person is, he has played World of Warcraft nearly every hour of every day
07:56 for the past year and a half.
07:58 Gentlemen, we are dealing with someone here who has absolutely no life."
08:04 "How do you kill that which has no life?"
08:10 Additionally, we get to see the end result of the boys having played World of Warcraft
08:14 non-stop for months.
08:16 It's a perfect combination of satire and great storytelling.
08:19 "I can't believe it's all over.
08:21 What do we do now?"
08:22 "What do you mean?
08:25 Now we can finally play the game."
08:28 "Oh yeah."
08:29 Number 2 - Streaming Companies
08:31 "We're about to start our very own streaming service."
08:35 There was a time when Netflix was the only player in town when it came to online streaming services.
08:40 Thanks to their large catalog, they faced virtually no competition.
08:44 But that was then and this is now.
08:46 From Amazon Prime to Disney Plus,
08:49 there's now no shortage of streaming services taking a piece of the pie that once belonged to Netflix.
08:54 "What is going on?"
08:55 "Oh nothing, your son and his friends just made exclusive deals for multiple streaming services."
09:00 Playing on the word streaming,
09:03 South Park gave us a story that was a literal battle over a stream of water.
09:07 It mocks the current online video market by the name alone,
09:11 but the streaming war specials were filled with countless jabs and nods to the real thing.
09:15 "Do you know what an exclusive deal is?"
09:18 "Yes, I know what an exclusive deal is."
09:20 "So if you make an exclusive deal with a streaming service,
09:23 you can't make an exclusive deal with another streaming service, can you?"
09:26 "It's not our fault that the streaming wars happened."
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09:44 Number 1 - The Pokemon Fad
09:46 Pokemon has been around for a long time and continues to be quite popular today.
09:51 But early in the show's run, it seemed everywhere you turned,
09:55 you would see something about Pokemon. Kids loved it and parents didn't understand it.
09:59 "Honestly, I don't see what they find so amusing about those things."
10:03 "They're so strange. Where are they from?"
10:05 This is what made it perfect fodder for a show like South Park.
10:08 The episode Shin Pokemon ruthlessly mocked how confusing aspects of the Pokemon world
10:13 were to people who weren't a part of it.
10:14 "This doesn't make sense. Are those stupid things supposed to be animals or robots or what?"
10:18 "I don't know, but I suddenly kind of want to own them all."
10:21 Throw in light-speed spoken dialogue and all together,
10:24 it made for the single best parody South Park may have ever done.
10:28 "Now we're gonna try this again until we get it right. What is 6 times 3?"
10:32 "No, goddammit, it's 18!"
10:37 "18 is 18, Garrison-san."
10:38 "For the last time, my name is not Garrison-san, all right? And this is not Hat-san.
10:43 And you all better start talking in a manner that I can understand."
10:46 Have you ever laughed out loud at one of South Park's parodies?
10:49 Tell us about it in the comments below.
10:51 "It's like a witch pursuit thingy."
10:53 "A witch, uh..."
10:55 "It's a witch chase and shoot 'em up!"
10:57 "Yeah, that's what it is."
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