Liam Hoofe reviews the eighth episode of South Park season 20…
After last week’s episode ‘Oh Jeez’ I praised Matt Parker and Trey Stone’s ability to turn a whole episode around in the space of 24 hours following the election victory of Donald Trump. This week they have taken it one further and with a whole week to put something together it would appear as though they have managed to utilise it to change the direction of the whole series.
With only two episodes to go South Park brought the Member Berries front and centre in this episode, introducing us to a whole society of the dastardly little treats and revealing to us the bigger picture concerning them. What looks to have originally started as a joke about Star Wars: Episode VII not being as good as we all thought was as turned into one of the season’s biggest political statements, one about how we are allowing our inability to let go of the past make us make seemingly crazy decisions. The addition of a phone call from Boris Johnson, warning the US not to eat the member berries because of the dangers they would cause was one of the show’s most revealing, and amusing moments. We were also introduced to the leader of the Member Berries, a Don Corleone inspired figure who is as ruthless and he is amusing.
With a longer time scale to play with Parker and Stone were able this week to really take aim at Trump and the potential dangers America are letting themselves in for this week. At the start of the episode Garrison is merely content with being petty and bullying those who have questioned him during the election, however as the episode progresses the character is faced with increasingly important decisions. As Denmark’s Troll Trace software goes worldwide the world is arming itself for a war and Garrison’s inability to deal with the situation, and inability to comprehend the scale of the impending disaster becomes an amusing, though slightly prophetic dig at Trump’s lack of political experience.
Speaking of Denmark Gerald’s plot continued to tick along nicely, with the desperate dad trying to get his son Ike to take the blame for his trolling activities. The scene where Gerald was dictating insults to Ike over the phone was laugh out loud funny and the resulting confrontation between Sheila and her son was equally as amusing. The episode’s final scene saw Kyle finally realise who was behind the trolling, though it remains to be seen where this will go with only two episodes left and a seemingly late change of direction for the series.
The inconsistency of Cartman and Heidi’s story line continued to plague the season this week though, as the majority of their exchanges this week at the MarsX centre really failed to capture the imagination. The addition of Butters to the story line though shows promise, with the exchange between Heidi and Butters, and Cartman’s subsequent reaction being one of the episode’s funniest moments.
With only two episodes left it feels as though South Park Season 20 took a sharp turn in terms of its overarching narrative this week and where most shows would have stumbled ‘Members Only’ handled the change expertly. South Park Season 20 is yet to have a misstep and with the end in sight this looks as though it could go down as being one of the show’s best seasons of all time. Not bad going after 20 years.
What did you think of ‘Members Only’ let Liam know on Twitter @liamhoofe…
Originally published November 17, 2016. Updated April 15, 2018.
