South Park: Season 22 Episode 1 "Dead Kids" Review

"No!  You shot the wrong one!"
-Mr. Mackey



Season 22's premiere episode didn't pull any punches with one of the single darkest episodes of South Park.  The school is plagued by frequent shootings, but no one besides Sharon Marsh seems to care.  The rest of the town just thinks she's being hormonal.  Meanwhile, Token is refusing to let Cartman cheat off him, so Cartman is forced to dig up some dirt on Token involving the movie Black Panther.


What Works:
I had been wondering for awhile if South Park was ever going to do an episode on school shootings and I've had a few ideas on how they could do it, but they surprised me in a brilliant way by putting the shootings in the background of the episode.  It's a genius move and some pretty damning criticism of our society and left us with something absurdly dark, yet hysterically funny.  The best parts being Cartman and Token dodging bullets while Butters covered them as well as Mr. Mackey running around in the background dealing with an active shooter.  Most of characters being utterly unperturbed by the horrific events is simply classic South Park and a brilliant way to deal with the subject matter.

The Sharon storyline sure was an emotional one and I wasn't trying to be funny there.  I'm sure most of us have felt like Sharon and how upset she was, but I'm sure a lot of us, myself included, have felt like the rest of the town; numb, due the frequency of these horrific events.  I always enjoy episodes that focus on Sharon and Randy's relationship and this episode does that well, even if the ending is super WTF!  I'm curious to see if Stan being shot will be addressed at all in the next episode.

I have some issues with the Cartman/Token storyline, but I'll start with what I liked about it.  The initial joke about Black Panther was funny as was the aforementioned action scene.  It was also a decent foil for the dark background storyline as it was a much more lighthearted story about Cartman's antics.


What Sucks:

I do think the jokes about Sharon's period got a bit stale, especially the second time Randy tries to play charades.  It was funny the first time, but the second time fell flat.

Finally, the Black Panther storyline got pretty old.  The whole Cartman/Token plot was like a lesser version of season 17's "World War Zimmerman".  It had some similar story beats and didn't really add anything new to the Cartman/Token dynamic.


Verdict:

"Dead Kids" was certainly a memorable start for season 22.  The decision to have the shootings take place in the background was brilliant, the action scene with Cartman, Token, and Butters was awesome as was Mr. Mackey running around in the backgroud, and there were plenty of funny and poignant moments.  Some of the jokes felt repetitive and stale, but this episode has still got it going on.

 8/10: Really Good   

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