South Park Recap: Bullying the Bully

Episode Commentary: Butterballs

Only Butters could get bullied by his grandmother, but only Butters can make us laugh the way he does. Innocent to a fault, Leopold Stotch is such an easy victim; it makes sense that Trey Parker and Matt Stone use him as their guinea pig.

Or in this case, the duo’s anonymous Andy.

And that’s quite possibly the scariest part of the show. It’s never as far a stretch as we think it is. The episode works because Parker and Stone are able to take culturally relevant issues and make us laugh about it.

Right now, it doesn’t get much more culturally relevant than bullying. Is it funny that there is no answer to bullying, but bullying itself? Yes, but to see it right in front of your face is just as enlightening as it is hilarious.

And sure, there are random asides- comments that are fun, but don’t fully connect to the story, but just work. For instance, Cartman’s opening monologue about the female industry is completely true. Gone forever are the days of Carol King and Aretha Franklin, robbed by the insanity that is Nicki Minaj and Lady Gaga. The chuckle every time “America” was said and the “Naked and jacking it” comment were more akin to “Family Guy,” but they worked too.

As always, the music in the show was awesome. Cartman’s drag performance in the middle of it all was an extra laugh. But the highlight of the entire episode was the deviousness of Butters’ grandma. All the things she did to the poor kid and everything she said. Pure evil. To see Butters rise above the hate and eventually prove to himself and his grandmother that she was wrong is exactly how a bully should be taken care of. Not by laws or more awareness, but by people being honest with each other and standing up for themselves.

Once again, South Park proves the answer to our most intriguing and relevant questions are solved by common sense.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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