South Park: Fatbeard

fatbeard

One of the great things about South Park is how quickly the production team can put together a new episode. It's the only scripted show on TV that can be topical within a week of a current event. In a sort of bizarro-world version of television production, these hastily slapped-together episodes are often the tightest, most entertaining of the series.

"Fatbeard" addresses the recent scad of pirate assaults off the coast of Somalia. While in the real world the reasons for all of this elevated crime and violence are complex and rooted in decades of geopolitical atrocity, in the South Park world it all centers around Cartman. This has actually been a very Cartman-centric season and I'm not entirely sure how much I like that. I miss the old ensemble days most weeks. Still, this episode was one of the best of the season, not quite reaching the heights of "Margaritaville" but coming pretty close.

With all the pirate business in the news, Cartman's fantasism goes into overdrive. It occurred to me tonight how many great episodes start out with somebody breathlessly shouting, "You guys! You guys!" Cartman creates a pirate club and actually convinces a few of his classmates to join him on an expedition to Mogadishu so they can live the lives of classic swashbucklers. Because this is South Park, they actually manage to do it.

With toy swords (and one lightsaber) in hand, Cartman and his crew consisting of Butters, Clyde, Ike and some kid I don't recall ever seeing before show up on a beach in Somalia and demand to know where to find the pirates. Naturally, they get taken hostage almost immediately. But because none of the boys speak Somali or Arabic they go along with it so they can finally do some plundering. Their lives exchanged for a sack full of Euros, the boys manage to take over a French ship and impress the hell out of the real-life pirates back on shore.

Say what you will about Cartman's loose grip on reality, he's proven time and again that he's a frighteningly capable leader. In short order he's the boss of the pirates and the source of newly heightened political tensions. He gets to screw with Kyle for a little bit before the US government ruins the party by sniping his entire (non-white) pirate crew.

I have to admit, the speech by the conflicted pirate to Butters and Ike was actually pretty moving. South Park is often too snarky for its own good, so it was refreshing for Parker and Stone to use this moment for a non-ironic window into reality. The pirate tells a heartbreaking but entirely plausible story that, while it doesn't dismiss modern piracy, at least sheds a humanitarian light on its origins.

Best Moment: I'm handing it to the above speech. We never see that on South Park, ever.

Biggest Laugh: Aside from the painfully poignant political commentary, this was actually a really funny episode. The French crew folding after the boys bring out the toy lightsaber was pretty awesome.

Episode Rating: 4.9/5- I want to give this one a perfect 5, but any time a character on any given show spends at least half the time affecting a goofy accent, it's just too annoying.