08-01-2021, 03:51 PM
(This post was last modified: 08-03-2021, 01:17 PM by Crunk. Edited 1 time in total.)
The last review…and it is over something that I know already! I was secretly hoping this review would be over something like A Silent Voice even despite the tears I would shed watching that movie again, but Glims surprised me with the South Park movie. This was definitely a much more welcome change from the last “comedy” that I watched from zayn and it felt good hearing actual jokes again that made me chuckle throughout the film instead of just at the end. I’d like to go ahead and say that I love South Park. It stands above the other “adult humor aimed at preteens/teens” types of shows in that it has an extremely quick turnaround with its production and it also doesn’t do cutaway humor which is the bane of my existence. I’ve seen just about every episode of the show, but I have tried my best to keep my bias out of this review when I can. For those that have kept through all of my reviews, thank you. Here is my review for South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut.
The Plot
South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut is very similar to one of their episodes that features a topic that was relevant to the time that the episode came out. Most of the time, they use one off stories to parody a certain event or idea that was circulating within the news at the time, but this movie does something different with tackling a movie topic that has been relevant for a long time and even remains pretty relevant today, even if the pop culture references that are made no longer make sense twenty-two years after the movie came out. The movie features Asses of Fire which is a fake movie starring Canadian duo Terrance and Phillip which ends up getting censored when the adults freak out about the language the kids learn from the movie and a trend of expletives washes through the town of South Park. The adults aren’t made about violence being shown or the humor, but strictly the fact that these fourth graders are now using words that they deem inappropriate for a kid to know which is an issue that Trey Stone and Matt Parker at South Park probably have been emailed about ever since the show first aired. That gives the movie a chance to use the material parents freak out about to show how they view the topic and fits right into the classic formula they use all the time and creates a much more genuine and smoother feel to the parody that they are trying. Something some parody shows still haven’t figured out somehow…
Anyway, once the adults of South Park have heard enough, they decide to form “Mothers Against Canada” attempting to put the blame on an entire nation instead of just admitting that they need to talk with their kids about language. They form under the lead of Kyle’s mom, Mrs. Broflovski, and declare war on Canada. None of the violence caused during the attack ever seems to be something that they want to shy the kids away from as long as they aren’t using dirty words and even the arrest of Terrance and Phillip is shown live on Conan with guns flashing around without any censor. However, the word “fuck” is too much for the Conan to sit with. I love this small little exchange that might just be a quick joke but it shows the real heart of this parody and what it’s trying to say. American television is perfectly fine with shoving violence in the face of kids and a live audience but bad language? That’s a big no for some reason. I imagine Trey and Matt thought that would slowly change in the future, but watching this movie in 2021 and we still have that issue, even if we have managed to work down on it to allow one F-bomb per PG-13 movie. Huge leaps in the movie industry requires sacrifice, I guess. So the war with Canada, the boys try and manage to free Terrance and Phillip from a USO show with a couple major stars from 1999 that might make you feel old if you remember a young Winona Ryder, but you’re probably already feeling old when you realize how old this movie is. As the boys are leaving the show with Terrance and Phillip, Mrs. Broflovski still goes through with killing the Canadian comedians and their blood summons Satan and Saddam Hussein to come back and rule over Earth. This is where the movie brings out the famous Cartman scene where a chip installed in his brain to shock him for cursing becomes a powerful weapon he can use. During the battle, it malfunctioned so now it can power up attacks that he uses to defeat Saddam who everyone agrees is the much bigger threat in this situation, another reference that doesn’t remain as relevant in today’s world but isn’t hard to understand. As Saddam gets defeated, the world gets returned back to its place as everyone learns their lesson that maybe cursing isn’t so bad…until the emails keep pouring in at Trey and Matt’s office when the movie got released (I imagine).
The Characters
For those that somehow don’t know, the main characters of South Park are all fourth-grade students that are the viewpoint of Trey and Matt at different angles. They take on topics as if they were kids having to grow up during something like whatever is happening, and in Bigger, Longer & Uncut they view censorship pretty much all the same as something that doesn’t need to exist. Even though all the boys are played by the pair of Trey and Matt, they still do a great job at having characters that actually are believable to what they are and aren’t just vehicles for a call back joke here or there. For example, Cartman has never really had any issues with being told no and becomes the biggest user of his newfound expletives but ends up getting a chip installed in his brain that causes him to get shocked whenever he does curse. The movie then has him show that using his curses can end up helping out even despite the adults trying to stop him. On another side, Kyle has the biggest change from being terrified to let his mom hear him curse to standing up from what he believes in and trying to stop his own mother from censoring what he likes. The movie already had plenty of development from the show for what these characters act like, but it also plays a major role in how Trey and Matt use the main characters even after the show.
The Music
The moment you start the movie, you’ll find out that the method of storytelling used in Bigger, Longer & Uncut is a musical with actually really strong vocal performances. While they wouldn’t have Broadway experience for a while, this movie has amazing ways to bring the story along through music and even has multiple times where they blend different songs together to show off just how varied their writing can be. I felt that none of the songs were ever grating or caused me to want to skip along compared to some musicals that always seem to have one character that just cannot sing and gets a song about three quarters of the way through the movie. Sometimes that gets played for laughs, but it still hurts the overall performance and ruins any story that would be in that song. Plus, hearing good music after the Jack and Jill nightmare is a welcome experience. I will admit that these songs probably aren’t on par with “I would add these to my Spotify” like with other movie songs, but they are definitely classics in the South Park joke history.
Closing Thoughts
So I obviously am a bit biased with South Park and I was actually pretty excited to get to review this movie compared to everything I was getting from others. While The Wire was a really good show, it was uncharted territory so I wasn’t sure how much I would like it compared to something I knew that I already liked. I would definitely rate this movie pretty highly but the age of this movie is making some of the jokes a bit harder to understand if I ever want to recommend this to anyone that A) doesn’t know anything about the 1990s or 2000s or B) is too young to even care about those old jokes. With that, I’d probably give the movie a 8/10 still which feels like a fair grade to give even with my bias.
And with that, I have finished all the charity movie/show reviews! Thank you to Voltaqe, StadiumGambler, zaynzk, and Glims for donating and giving me things to watch for the past few months. It was definitely an experience that was enjoyable even through Jack and Jill so I might try to do this again if there is another charity event in the future. Thank you to the few people that read these as well, I always like knowing that someone is enjoying what I write regardless of how long it takes me to post stuff.
Here is my final rankings for all of the things I reviewed (The Wire broken up by season):
1. The Wire Season 1
2. South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut
3. The Wire Season 4
4. The Wire Season 3
5. The Wire Season 5
6. Justin Bieber: Never Say Never
7. The Wire Season 2
8. Jack and Jill
The Plot
South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut is very similar to one of their episodes that features a topic that was relevant to the time that the episode came out. Most of the time, they use one off stories to parody a certain event or idea that was circulating within the news at the time, but this movie does something different with tackling a movie topic that has been relevant for a long time and even remains pretty relevant today, even if the pop culture references that are made no longer make sense twenty-two years after the movie came out. The movie features Asses of Fire which is a fake movie starring Canadian duo Terrance and Phillip which ends up getting censored when the adults freak out about the language the kids learn from the movie and a trend of expletives washes through the town of South Park. The adults aren’t made about violence being shown or the humor, but strictly the fact that these fourth graders are now using words that they deem inappropriate for a kid to know which is an issue that Trey Stone and Matt Parker at South Park probably have been emailed about ever since the show first aired. That gives the movie a chance to use the material parents freak out about to show how they view the topic and fits right into the classic formula they use all the time and creates a much more genuine and smoother feel to the parody that they are trying. Something some parody shows still haven’t figured out somehow…
Anyway, once the adults of South Park have heard enough, they decide to form “Mothers Against Canada” attempting to put the blame on an entire nation instead of just admitting that they need to talk with their kids about language. They form under the lead of Kyle’s mom, Mrs. Broflovski, and declare war on Canada. None of the violence caused during the attack ever seems to be something that they want to shy the kids away from as long as they aren’t using dirty words and even the arrest of Terrance and Phillip is shown live on Conan with guns flashing around without any censor. However, the word “fuck” is too much for the Conan to sit with. I love this small little exchange that might just be a quick joke but it shows the real heart of this parody and what it’s trying to say. American television is perfectly fine with shoving violence in the face of kids and a live audience but bad language? That’s a big no for some reason. I imagine Trey and Matt thought that would slowly change in the future, but watching this movie in 2021 and we still have that issue, even if we have managed to work down on it to allow one F-bomb per PG-13 movie. Huge leaps in the movie industry requires sacrifice, I guess. So the war with Canada, the boys try and manage to free Terrance and Phillip from a USO show with a couple major stars from 1999 that might make you feel old if you remember a young Winona Ryder, but you’re probably already feeling old when you realize how old this movie is. As the boys are leaving the show with Terrance and Phillip, Mrs. Broflovski still goes through with killing the Canadian comedians and their blood summons Satan and Saddam Hussein to come back and rule over Earth. This is where the movie brings out the famous Cartman scene where a chip installed in his brain to shock him for cursing becomes a powerful weapon he can use. During the battle, it malfunctioned so now it can power up attacks that he uses to defeat Saddam who everyone agrees is the much bigger threat in this situation, another reference that doesn’t remain as relevant in today’s world but isn’t hard to understand. As Saddam gets defeated, the world gets returned back to its place as everyone learns their lesson that maybe cursing isn’t so bad…until the emails keep pouring in at Trey and Matt’s office when the movie got released (I imagine).
The Characters
For those that somehow don’t know, the main characters of South Park are all fourth-grade students that are the viewpoint of Trey and Matt at different angles. They take on topics as if they were kids having to grow up during something like whatever is happening, and in Bigger, Longer & Uncut they view censorship pretty much all the same as something that doesn’t need to exist. Even though all the boys are played by the pair of Trey and Matt, they still do a great job at having characters that actually are believable to what they are and aren’t just vehicles for a call back joke here or there. For example, Cartman has never really had any issues with being told no and becomes the biggest user of his newfound expletives but ends up getting a chip installed in his brain that causes him to get shocked whenever he does curse. The movie then has him show that using his curses can end up helping out even despite the adults trying to stop him. On another side, Kyle has the biggest change from being terrified to let his mom hear him curse to standing up from what he believes in and trying to stop his own mother from censoring what he likes. The movie already had plenty of development from the show for what these characters act like, but it also plays a major role in how Trey and Matt use the main characters even after the show.
The Music
The moment you start the movie, you’ll find out that the method of storytelling used in Bigger, Longer & Uncut is a musical with actually really strong vocal performances. While they wouldn’t have Broadway experience for a while, this movie has amazing ways to bring the story along through music and even has multiple times where they blend different songs together to show off just how varied their writing can be. I felt that none of the songs were ever grating or caused me to want to skip along compared to some musicals that always seem to have one character that just cannot sing and gets a song about three quarters of the way through the movie. Sometimes that gets played for laughs, but it still hurts the overall performance and ruins any story that would be in that song. Plus, hearing good music after the Jack and Jill nightmare is a welcome experience. I will admit that these songs probably aren’t on par with “I would add these to my Spotify” like with other movie songs, but they are definitely classics in the South Park joke history.
Closing Thoughts
So I obviously am a bit biased with South Park and I was actually pretty excited to get to review this movie compared to everything I was getting from others. While The Wire was a really good show, it was uncharted territory so I wasn’t sure how much I would like it compared to something I knew that I already liked. I would definitely rate this movie pretty highly but the age of this movie is making some of the jokes a bit harder to understand if I ever want to recommend this to anyone that A) doesn’t know anything about the 1990s or 2000s or B) is too young to even care about those old jokes. With that, I’d probably give the movie a 8/10 still which feels like a fair grade to give even with my bias.
And with that, I have finished all the charity movie/show reviews! Thank you to Voltaqe, StadiumGambler, zaynzk, and Glims for donating and giving me things to watch for the past few months. It was definitely an experience that was enjoyable even through Jack and Jill so I might try to do this again if there is another charity event in the future. Thank you to the few people that read these as well, I always like knowing that someone is enjoying what I write regardless of how long it takes me to post stuff.
Here is my final rankings for all of the things I reviewed (The Wire broken up by season):
1. The Wire Season 1
2. South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut
3. The Wire Season 4
4. The Wire Season 3
5. The Wire Season 5
6. Justin Bieber: Never Say Never
7. The Wire Season 2
8. Jack and Jill