South Park Casualty Count: 'F*ck Facebook, Seriously'

Last week on South Park, Cartman and the gang ridiculed child obesity and the legalization of marijuana by snorting fried chicken skin and contracting cancer from lewd uses of the microwave. And this week, the gang returned to skewer the hell out of social networking with a plot involving the gross overuse of Facebook and Chatroulette. After the jump, Movieline tallies the figures slayed in last night's episode, "You Have 0 Friends" and explains why all of your Facebook friends are suddenly talking about a fictional character named Kip Drordy today.

The episode begins with Stan reluctantly creating a Facebook page at the insistence of Kyle and Cartman, and then watching as the website slowly destroys his life: Stan's family torments him about friend confirmations ("Your grandma's in the hospital and you won't even be friends with her?!"), his girlfriend harasses him about his relationship status, and strangers on the street spit on him for not accepting their Friend Requests.

Fed up, Stan tries to quit Facebook and is literally sucked into the program, where Stan and other South Park characters walk around in circuit-board apparel in a Tron-like environment, talking about profile notifications and engaging in spontaneous games of Yahtzee.

Meanwhile, Kyle pity-adds Kip Drordy, an elementary school student with no Facebook friends. Unfortunately for Kyle, this causes his Facebook stock to go down. Cartman parodies Jim Cramer's Mad Money with a podcast where he speedily doles out Facebook advice as a ticker at the bottom of the page broadcasts Facebook updates ("Nathaniel posted something"). In one broadcast, Cartman suggests: "Looking around Facebook today, we see that since adding loser Kip Drordy as a friend, Kyle Broflovski's stock is plummeting...Run to your Facebook account and delete him because he is poison, and I don't see him making a comeback anytime soon."

Despite sabotaging his Facebook cred, Cartman helps Kyle find more friends on Chatroulette, a website that Cartman describes as "seriously an amazing gathering place where people from all over the world can share their thoughts and ideas. [Clicks into program] OK, that's a dude jacking off...[Clicks]..another dude jacking off."

Stan defeats his Facebook profile in an epic game of Yahtzee and is returned to real life, where he is satisfied letting his Facebook profile go rogue. Meanwhile, Kip ends up with over 800,000 friends by letting his own profile go rogue in the Tron-like world.

Movieline only counted one popular figure referenced in last night's episode:

· Jim Cramer (Who Cartman parodied with his podcast)

Kenny's Cause of Death: N/A. Again, Kenny was spared this week while his friends committed violent Facebook suicide.

Other targets:

· Hurt Locker (Kip to his parents: "Mom, Dad! My best friend Kyle, he went to the dentist today and got two fillings. And today, he's wondering if Hurt Locker really deserved the Oscar.")

· Farmville ("I think I'll add some more pigs. Maybe some more corn. There we go.")

Missed Opportunities: Why didn't South Park address Twitter, which has become possibly the most obnoxious of the social networking devices, or Merton, the Chatroulette

improv piano player?

Movieline Rating: 5/10



Comments