16x05 Butterballs

[7.2/10] This episode is a real mixed bag, with the good outweighing the bad, which comes through in both parts of the episode.

The Butters portions are mostly quite well done. I love the sideways premise that Butters’s bully -- the one who’s making his life a living hell -- turns out to be his ostensibly sweet grandmother. The idea of a kindly old lady acting like a mean fifth grader to her grandson is one of those oddball South Park scenarios that generates humor from the situation alone.

But to be honest, Butters’s grandmother was so cruel that it became uncomfortable at times, particular the fork-stabbing stuff. Far be it from me to criticize South Park for getting too real, but I’d have preferred it if Butters’s grandmother stuck to absurd bullying tactics like dressing up in a Prof. Chaos-style outfit of her own and giving Butters “gummy bears” than things that feel closer to real life abuse.

That said, I thought Butters’s moment of clarity and speech to his grandmother at the end was really well done and effective. Bullying is a complicated issue, and the way the show brushes some of it off is a little eh, but I really like Butters’s realization that it won’t last forever, and that the best revenge is living well. It’s heartening, even inspiring stuff from a not very sentimental show.

Stan’s portion of the episode is a lot more of a mixed bag. Some of the individual gags are great. Even though the anti-bullying video the show was parodying at the time has faded into obscurity, the visual creativity of the lip dub still wins the day (especially with the setup and payoff of Cartman’s complaints about modern pop), and the irony of a song entitled “Let’s Make Bullying Kill Itself” is very funny.

But the story itself spins out pretty quickly. For one thing, the “Kony 2012” parody stuff feels super dated just a few years later, and it feels too specific and tied to that particular event to be a more general satire of people taking up causes for personal aggrandizement. The bits with anti-bullying people bullying others about anti-bullying is a funny bit of recursive comedy, and the escalating series of gags of people confronting one another in the bathroom is a good gag, but the episode runs both into the ground. (Though I got a kick out of the idea that hell is a form of bullying.)

The stuff with Stan didn’t really go anywhere, mostly serving as a kind of amorphous support system for the disconnected gags. That said, I just die laughing every time at the fake San Diego tourism video, which works entirely divorced from its original context as just a silly piece of absurdism. Damn if that tune doesn't get caught in your head and dredged up every time someone mentions San Diego.

Overalll, there’s a lot of good stuff in this one, it’s just not as tight or well-built as some other South Park episodes.