'South Park' Sounds Alarm on A.I. Deepfake Tech After Trey Parker and Matt Stone Invested in It

Tonight’s new episode of South Park, “Sora Not Sorry,” demonstrated exactly why generative artificial intelligence tools like Sora 2 are so dangerous – A.I. isn't just for making Santa Claus pee on Red.

Back in early 2020, South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone put together a team of A.I. engineers and founded Deep Voodoo LLC, an entertainment startup and production studio powered by rapidly evolving deepfake technology. At the time, Parker and Stone publicly did little more with their investment beyond keeping themselves occupied during the COVID-19 pandemic with a web series called Sassy Justice, which featured the exploits of a local Wyoming journalist who bore stunning resemblance to the once-and-future president.

Then, tonight, Parker and Stone expressed their feelings about the future of deepfake technology and the perils it will hold for the unwitting public in a South Park storyline satirizing the recent release of Sora 2. However, anyone who has been following the duo's business ventures as closely as Parker and Stone follow the deepfake revolution knows that this one’s been cooking for longer than Totoro’s been touching kids.

In “Sora Not Sorry,” South Park Elementary faces a technological crisis when the kids begin to settle scores with each other by generating deepfaked A.I. videos of one another getting urinated upon, defecated into and molested by otherwise child-friendly characters from Studio Ghibli and Hanna-Barbera. Unable to distinguish deepfakes from reality, the South Park police department goes on a manhunt for these animated figures who appear to be abusing children, only to end up apprehending billionaire antichrist expert Peter Thiel.

In real life, this is not the first time that Parker and Stone have tackled the issue of generative A.I. eroding the public's trust in their own eyeballs – in fact, through Deep Voodoo, they've been on the cutting edge of deepfake technology for half a decade. So far, Deep Voodoo has been playing its cards close to the chest as it generated over $20 million in funding and collaborated with superstar rapper Kendrick Lamar for a music video, but “Sora Not Sorry” may be Parker and Stone's way of warning us about what is to come from the company.

During the final episode of Sassy Justice, Trump/Sassy issued an ominous warning to viewers about the future of truth in media, saying, “Things aren’t always what they seem. You have to use your own noodle – you can’t let anyone sell you on anything, not an idea, not a product.” Sassy added, “We’re all going to have to trust our gut, our inner voice. That’s all we have now.”

Well, now, we have our gut, and we have a video of Droopy Dog shitting in Kyle's mouth.