| "Terrance and Phillip in Not Without My Anus" | ||||
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| South Park episode | ||||
 The gas cloud used to defeat Saddam. |
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| Episode no. | Season 2 Episode 1 |
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| Written by | Trisha Nixon Trey Parker Matt Stone |
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| Directed by | Trey Parker | |||
| Production no. | 201 | |||
| Original airdate | April 1, 1998 | |||
| Season 2 episodes | ||||
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| ← Season 1 | Season 3 → | |||
| List of South Park episodes | ||||
"Terrance and Phillip in Not Without My Anus", also known as the April Fool's episode, is the first episode of the second season of Comedy Central's animated series South Park.[1] It originally aired on April 1, 1998.
Contents |
Plot
The episode begins with an announcement that viewers have waited four weeks for the answer to the mystery "Who Is Cartman's Father", but then gleefully points out that the answer will not be revealed in this episode; instead, there would be a presentation of "Not Without My Anus" starring Terrance and Phillip. A caption wishes the viewers a happy April Fools' Day.
The drama itself opens in a courtroom in Canada, with Terrance on trial for the murder of Dr Jeffrey O'Dwyer. Phillip is acting as his lawyer while Terrance and Phillip's sworn nemesis, Scott, is acting as the prosecution lawyer. Scott uses a group of seemingly airtight exhibits such as a hammer, a piece of Terrance's shirt, and an incriminating Haiku to prove Terrance's guilt; while, Terrance's defense consists of nothing but a long string of fart jokes. Ultimately, the jury returns a verdict of not guilty. Angered, Scott promises vengeance.
It is revealed that Scott has a long and obsessive hatred of Terrance and Phillip, specifically due their love of fart humour, which Scott (a television critic) decries as the lowest form of comedy. In fact, Scott has apparently been trying to convict Terrance of frivolous murder charges every week as a form of vengeance for some time, without success. Scott is therefore pleased when he is approached by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, proposing a deal: Saddam would assist in getting Terrance and Phillip out of Canada, in exchange for Scott assisting Saddam and his Iraqi associates into Canada. Scott is apprehensive about trusting Saddam, but agrees to the deal. The pair then conspires to kidnap Sally, daughter to Terrance and Canadian singer Celine Dion, and hold her hostage, as bait to lure Terrance and Phillip to Tehran; Saddam's soldiers would then murder Terrance and Phillip on arrival.
Terrance and Phillip, who have just returned home from court, receive a telegram informing Terrance that Sally has been kidnapped. Phillip enthusiastically supports Terrance as the pair heads to Iran to find her. Quite conveniently, they locate an unguarded Sally within seconds of arriving in Tehran, and head immediately home. Upon return, Terrance and Phillip are shocked find Canada overrun with Iraqi soldiers, and photographs of Saddam Hussein covering Canadian flags. Terrance is also horrified to find that in his absence, his former lover Celine Dion has begun now sleeping with, and has become pregnant by, a hideously ugly friend of Terrance and Phillip named Ugly Bob, who (at Phillip's suggestion) had taken to wearing a paper bag over his head to shield women from his appearance; Celine is horrified when Ugly Bob's face is revealed to her for the first time.
Scott has also become worried about the presence of the Iraqi soldiers in Canada, but becomes infuriated when he finds that Terrance and Phillip have returned to Canada safely. He confronts Saddam about the double-cross, but Saddam's armed guards scare him into backing away. It is revealed that Saddam is trying to take over Canada as the first step in a plan for world domination; however, he needs Celine Dion to sing the Iraqi national anthem at a Canadian football game to finalise the take-over. While Celine and Ugly Bob discuss their relationship, Saddam breaks into their room and kidnaps Celine.
Now unable to negotiate with Saddam, Scott contacts Terrance. In an awkward phone conversation, which is immensely hindered by constant farting and pointless bickering, he arranges a meeting at Karl's Kroff Dinner Restaurant. At this meeting, Scott convinces Terrance and Phillip that they are to blame for Saddam's invasion (arguing that they brought the Iraqis back with them after they rescued Sally), and tells them that to make amends, they must kill Saddam and the Iraqis in a suicide bombing — a devious plan devised by Scott to rid himself of both the Iraqis, and Terrance and Phillip. Terrance and Phillip, both legitimately convinced that they are to blame for the invasion, disconsolately contemplate giving their lives to save Canada. However, an ordinary fart suddenly gives Phillip another idea (at this stage held secret from the viewer).
The scene then cuts to the Canadian football game. Terrance and Phillip wait nervously in the crowd. Saddam, posing as a half-time show, with Celine Dion as a hostage, enters the arena, and announces his take-over of Canada, rechristening it New Baghdad. He changes the national flags, and orders Celine to sing the Iraqi national anthem. As she begins, Terrance and Phillip sound an alert, and the entire crowd dons gas masks (which Terrance and Phillip had secretly instructed them to bring to the game), and begins to fart. Without gas masks, the Iraqis are killed by the noxious fart gas, and order is restored to Canada. Scott arrives, and is annoyed to find not only that Terrance and Phillip are still alive, but "that after all [his] criticism, it was farting that saved Canada". The entire crowd (except Scott) then rejoices with a rendition of O Canada.
Production
"Terrance and Philip in Not Without My Anus" was written by Trisha Nixon and South Park co-creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, and directed by Parker. It was the second season premiere and first episode centered completely around Terrance and Phillip, fictional cartoon characters within the South Park show.[2][3]
The episode, which first aired aired April 1, 1998, was an April Fools' Day prank by Parker and Stone on South Park fans, who were anxiously waiting to learn the identity of Cartman's father after the cliffhanger ending of "Cartman's Mom Is a Dirty Slut", the season one finale. Instead, Parker and Stone presented an episode entirely focused on a Terrance and Phillip cartoon, with nothing in the story about Cartman's father.[4] Upset fans wrote more than 2,000 angry e-mail complaints to Comedy Central within a week of the episode's original broadcast,[5] and media outlets said some fans harbored a grudge against the show more than five years after the episode was broadcast.[6] Matt Stone said to Entertainment Weekly in response to the angry fan response, "If you get that pissed off because you don't know who a little construction paper kid's father is, then there's really something wrong with you."[7] Comedy Central originally planned to air "Cartman's Mom Is Still a Dirty Slut", the episode with the true identity of Cartman's father, on May 20, 1998, but the air-date was moved up to April 22, 1998, in response to the angry feedback from fans.[8][9] Allan Johnson of the Chicago Tribune said Comedy Central was "punking out" with the decision.[9]
Several reviewers noted a significant number of crude and vulgar humor in "Terrance and Philip in Not Without My Anus", even by South Park standards; The Sydney Morning Herald noted the episode contained 29 separate fart jokes in the span of 22 minutes.[3] Global Television Network in Canada reported no complaints about the episode in the weeks after its release; Claire Buckley of the Toronto Sun said this suggested, "that Canadians either have lives or are grateful for any representation on U.S. television, even as gassy animated cable access hosts."[10]
Home video release
"Terrance and Phillip in Not Without My Anus" was released on VHS on June 15, 1999, as a stand-alone episode; at the time, the episode had not been repeated since it first aired on April 1, 1998.[11] It was also among the second season episodes released on "South Park: The Complete Second Season" DVD set released in June 2003.[6]
Cultural references
- Saddam Hussein, the real-life former President of Iraq, was featured predominantly in "Terrance and Phillip in Not Without My Anus". His nationality is intentionally misrepresented as Iranian or Turkish throughout the episode.
- Also featured was the real life Canadian pop singer Celine Dion. A song Dion sings in the episode is an altered parody of the actual Canadian national anthem, "O Canada".
- The football game features the Ottawa Rough Riders and the Vancouver Roughriders: there were indeed two teams in the CFL called the Roughriders, although the Ottawa team had folded in 1996, slightly over a year before this episode made it to air, and the other Roughriders franchise is from Saskatchewan, not Vancouver.[2]
- During one scene, Saddam says to Scott, "I've changed my mind. Pray that I don't change it any further."; in response, Scott walks away while muttering "This deal is getting worse all the time." This exachange was taken almost word for word from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.
Self-Parody
South Park itself has made fun of the "Terrance and Phillip" episode several times:
- In the actual airing of "Cartman's Mom is Still a Dirty Slut," Dr. Mephisto is about to say who Cartman's father is, then suddenly interrupts to ask if anyone saw "that Terrance and Phillip special." Cartman then yells at him and makes him say who his father is.
- The fifth season episode, "Terrance and Phillip: Behind the Blow", refers to "Terrance and Phillip in Not Without My Anus" by featuring a controversy over the airing of the "Not Without My Anus" episode.[12]
- "Not Without My Anus" is advertised as a Terrance and Phillip episode for sale in the window of a store during the opening sequence of the South Park movie, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.[13]
- The episode "Cartoon Wars Part II" seems to begin with a similar spoof, but the Terrance and Phillip opening soon moves into the actual plot.
- In the episode "Eat, Pray, Queef," the first episode since "Not Without My Anus" to premiere on April Fools' Day, the boys in South Park want to see the second part of a Terrance and Phillip episode only to find it replaced with another Show as part of an April Fools' prank, and it even included the same "Feature Presentation" screen used in "Not Without My Anus". Like the real-life South Park fans, they are furious and complain to the network.[14]
Reception
Reviewers were mixed on Parker and Stone's elaborate April Fools' Day prank. Diane Werts of Newsday said of the episode, "Fans rioted. Some jumped ship and never came back. The lesson: Pay off our expectations, or you'll be sorry."[15] Jim Minge of the Omaha World-Herald said South Park fans were "duped" by the episode.[16] Philip Martin of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, who said in May 1998 the South Park phenomenon was "dead", described the April Fools' prank as "lamentable" and part of the reason for the show's apparent decline.[17] Others, however, praised Parker and Stone for making the move at the risk of upsetting fans. Tim Clodfelter of the Winston-Salem Journal said, "It was a funny, clever move (that) quickly separated the fans who truly "got" (Parker and Stone's) humor from those who were just watching for the dirty jokes."[6] Jon Casimir of The Sydney Morning Herald said, "It is gratifying, in an entertainment world dominated by market research and common denominators, to see a program that obviously doesn't care if you like it or not." However, he said the characterization of Terrance and Phillip are too thin to be particularly funny, and added that the novelty of the prank is lost in repeats in later years.[3]
Jakob Von Bayer said the episode continued a long history of South Park Canada-bashing: "South Park has gotten a lot of comic mileage out of Canada over the years. ... This episode portrays a country full of Bob and Doug McKenzies; Toronto is but a highway town en route to Buffalo."[2]
"Terrance and Philip in Not Without My Anus" was among the episodes featured in a 2006 list by the Winnipeg Free Press of the ten most memorable South Park episodes.[18] The Toronto Sun listed the episode as one of the most memorable television moments of 1998, and the single most memorable moment from the month of April.[7]
References
- ^ "Terrance and Phillip in Not Without My Anus". http://www.southparkstudios.com/guide/201/.South Park Studios
- ^ a b c Bayer, Jakob Von (2002-02-09). "Canada, as seen on TV: With The Simpsons coming to Toronto, we revisit some of our other starring roles". National Post. p. SP4.
- ^ a b c Casimir, Jon (1998-08-31). The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 15.
- ^ Idato, Michael (2002-08-19). The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 24.
- ^ Feran, Tom (1998-04-04). ""Tom Jones" big, bawdy, well done". The Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio): p. 1F.
- ^ a b c Clodfelter, Tim (2003-07-04). "Lots of fun some Comedy Central shows make it to DVD". Winston-Salem Journal: p. E4.
- ^ a b Bickley, Claire (1998-12-26). "The television year in months; hello to CablePulse24, Goodbye to Seinfeld and have a good thought for Michael J. Fox". Toronto Sun: p. 137.
- ^ Low, Bob (1998-04-17). "The Net; Web goes toon barmy; Bob Low surfs the Net". Daily Record (Glasgow, Scotland): p. 43.
- ^ a b Johnson, Allan (1998-04-17). "On his first CD, "Raging Bully", Bobby Slayton takes no prionsers". Chicago Tribune: p. 10.
- ^ Bickley, Claire (1998-04-21). "Jerry strikes out pitch to book Skydome for Seinfeld bash nixed". Toronto Sun: p. 62.
- ^ "No Foolin'! Terrance & Phillip Episode, Aired Only Once on Television, Becomes Available on Video June 15". Business Wire (Burbank, California). 1999-06-11.
- ^ Booker, M. Keith (2006). Drawn to Television Prime-time Animation from the Flintstones. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger Publishers. p. 140. ISBN 0275990192.
- ^ South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut. [Film]. New York City: Paramount Pictures. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0158983/. Retrieved 2009-03-29.
- ^ Lynch, Kelvin (2009-04-02). "Laugh of the day: Martha Stewart does a good thing for spring". The Philadelphia Examiner. http://www.examiner.com/x-4107-SF-Gay--Lesbian-Examiner~y2009m4d2-Laugh-of-the-day--Eat-Pray-Queef. Retrieved 2009-04-03.
- ^ Werts, Diane (2000-07-13). "Do viewers need closure after canceled show's cliffhanger?". South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, Florida): p. 3E.
- ^ Minge, Jim (1998-04-09). "One rumor is for real: Foo Fighters will perform at Westfair". Omaha World-Herald: p. 46.
- ^ Martin, Philip (1998-05-10). "On the American trash heap; Like South Park, pop culture wasn't built to last". Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: p. E1.
- ^ "Politically incorrect comedy, heeeeerrre!". Winnipeg Free Press (Canada): p. D5. 2006-11-19.
| Preceded by “Cartman's Mom is a Dirty Slut” |
South Park episodes | Followed by “Cartman's Mom Is Still a Dirty Slut” |
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