There’s Zero Evidence That ‘South Park’ Was Going to Bring Back Cartman’s Charlie Kirk Persona
As most of us are aware by now, this week’s episode of South Park has been delayed for a week, allegedly because Trey Parker and Matt Stone didn’t make their production deadline for the second time in 28 years.
But clearly a lot of fans aren’t buying the explanation provided in the statement written by Parker and Stone — or someone claiming to be Parker and Stone — and they’ve been responding to this news with a slew of conspiracy theories.
The most prominent unproven theory seems to be that Cartman was supposed to “reappear” as a Charlie Kirk-esque figure again, but these plans were upended by the assassination of Kirk, and ultimately scrapped by Paramount.
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Cartman/Kirk popped up in the second episode of Season 27, “Got a Nut,” which aired back in early August. But the parody was retroactively criticized by conservatives following Kirk’s death, prompting Comedy Central to pull the episode from broadcast circulation. Now, some fans are calling on the cable channel to “release the Kirk Cut” of Episode Five, seemingly convinced that this is the real reason for the abrupt postponement.
But it’s important to note that there’s absolutely no evidence that Cartman-as-Kirk was going to return. In fact, there are a few signs that the show wasn’t planning on going to go back to that well, regardless of real-world events.
For one thing, Cartman’s “Got a Nut” storyline had seemingly wrapped up, after playing out in much the same fashion as other one-and-done Cartman arcs. Cartman makes a big life change for shitty reasons (becoming a “master debater” purely to spite Clyde), and it ultimately blows up in his face (he loses out to Clyde at the “Charlie Kirk Awards” and has to be hauled away by his mom while throwing a tantrum).
We shouldn’t expect to see this version of Cartman for the same reason that we didn’t expect to see him continue being a Christian rock musician or pretending to be A.W.E.S.O.M.-O the robot.
More importantly, Cartman was in the last episode, “Wok Is Dead.” It was very brief, but he’s in the school hallway during Nelly’s fight with Betsy. And he’s clearly ditched his “Got a Nut” look and has gone back to dressing like himself, signalling that the storyline is over.
Of course, we won’t know exactly what Parker and Stone are planning on until the next episode drops next week — or maybe the week after? Who knows anymore?
