In its newest 47-minute episode, South Park opted to slam all sides of Disney’s “woke” tradition wars, which have ensnared everybody from Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to legions of followers desirous to complain about political correctness.
Titled “Becoming a member of the Panderverse,” the episode particulars Eric Cartman’s worst nightmare—that he’ll get replaced by a lady of colour. When Eric wakes from the unhealthy dream, he declares, “They had been taking all my favourite individuals and changing them with numerous girls who complain in regards to the patriarchy!” later including, “And Disney inventory retains happening and down!”
Cartman’s goals turn out to be actuality within the type of a multiverse occupied solely by girls of colour is led by South Park Elementary’s “PC Principal,” who accuses the characters of bigotry once they say recasting South Park’s white male characters “doesn’t make any sense.” Says the administrator, “Should you don’t assume Eric Cartman generally is a Black lady, then perhaps the issue is you. You in all probability don’t love that Indiana Jones bought changed by a feminine both, huh? You in all probability have an issue with Black Spider-Man, too“—referencing controversies which have cropped up round current Disney titles like Indiana Jones and the Dial of Future, which notably didn’t substitute Harrison Ford as Indy with Phoebe Waller–Bridge, and Spider-Man: Throughout the Spiderverse. The children do, at the very least, help the latter movie: “No! Miles Morales is good! That’s an entire constructed factor with its personal character and narrative. That is simply taking the identical outdated Cartman and placing a Black lady in it!”
At one level, the episode incorporates a fictionalized model of Disney CEO Bob Iger, who tells his fellow executives to “pander more durable” to pissed off audiences by way of the “panderstone” that the studio makes use of to remake the identical tales again and again. That is the place Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy enters the episode to repeat the identical word again and again: “Put a chick in it! Make her lame and homosexual!”
However earlier than episode’s finish, South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone acknowledge the hatred that may spew from the anti-woke followers and commentators who place Kennedy straight within the crosshairs. Kennedy tells Cartman of the “hate mail” she’s acquired on the job, “ugly letters from racists who couldn’t stand that a number of the panderstone’s rehashes had numerous girls characters within the lead.” She admits that utilizing the panderstone to “struggle all bigotry in our society” was the incorrect technique. “All I ever needed was to make nice leisure, however as as quickly as you begin getting piles of hate mail, infinite messages calling you the c-word, you’ll be able to’t assume straight,” Kennedy says earlier than apologizing to Cartman for being “so reckless with the belongings you love. It was simply lazy.” To this, Cartman replies, “Effectively, I’m sorry I wrote all these letters…I suppose simply railing on woke stuff on a regular basis is fairly lazy, too.”
