“South Park,” or, per recent rebranding, “South America,” kicks off its 29th season Wednesday night. The name change, according to the show’s creators, was “inspired by the bravery and patriotism of Apple and Google,” tech giants who valiantly obeyed President Donald Trump’s decree that we henceforth refer to Lake Ontario as Lake America.
If “South America” stays true to “South Park” form, I predict three things will transpire in the new season. First, Trump, his administration and his enablers are going to be ceaselessly, mercilessly skewered. Second, the skewering is going to be of the oh my God I can’t believe they just joked about that! variety. And third, the mockery will be so relentlessly vulgar that we will all wonder if “South Park” is daring this government to retaliate.
What makes me nervous is that this government just might.
The mockery will be so relentlessly vulgar that we will all wonder if “South Park” is daring this government to retaliate.
I’m a little less concerned (but concerned nonetheless) about the effects that such relentless partisan sniping may have on the quality of the comedy itself. Then again, it would likely be even more troubling if the animated series suddenly stopped dropkicking its target in the White House; that would be an example of the same “capitulation,” in the words of the show’s creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, that they see in their parent company Paramount’s engagement with the Trump administration.
So, roast or retreat? If the series keeps up its pace of lampooning Trump, it risks falling into an obsessive rut of comedic predictability. If it backs off, it’s a dereliction of artistic duty. In the Trump era, this has become every satirist’s dilemma.
In the 27th and 28th seasons of “South Park,” which ran from July to December 2025, the show gleefully aimed its comedic butane directly at the blaze of insanity that is the MAGA movement. Trump’s Cabinet officials were frequent targets. Former Attorney General Pam Bondi was depicted as a sniveling sycophant; former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem became a dog murderer with a melting face; Pete Hegseth cosplayed a tough guy while holding a selfie stick; the Federal Communications Commission chair, Brendan Carr, wore a cast that locked him into a Nazi salute; Vice President JD Vance inhabited the body of the character Tattoo from the ’70s-era ABC drama “Fantasy Island.”
Then there’s Trump, who is mocked endlessly for the size of his genitals (including one particularly unsettling scene where a real non-animated actor is used to depict him nude in a sequence which intentionally resists and subverts obvious comedic coding) and whose lover, Satan, frets that he’s trapped in a dead-end relationship with a toxic man-boy.
Was “South Park” being brave in serving up these irreverent caricatures? Considering how many anti-Trump comics the president has harangued or flat-out punished, the answer is yes. He has threatened to revoke Rosie O’Donnell’s citizenship and to sue Trevor Noah. He has repeatedly set the FCC upon Jimmy Kimmel. Many think that MAGA was behind CBS’ premature sunsetting of “The Late Show” with Stephen Colbert. To this list of Trump targets we could add Kathy Griffin, Alec Baldwin, Seth Meyers, Jimmy Fallon and more.
The country is lurching toward disaster, and in terms of comedic ethics, blasting away at Trump’s GOP seems like a sound deployment of humor.
Which brings us to the question of who and what the show should lambaste in Season 29. In one sense the answer is clear: “South America” should punch up. Republicans control the presidency, the Supreme Court, the House, the Senate and most of the statehouses in America. The country is lurching toward disaster, and in terms of comedic ethics, blasting away at Trump’s GOP seems like a sound deployment of humor.
Then again, placing art in the service of politics is always a risky endeavor. Seasons 27 and 28 clearly lacked some of the nuance, cleverness and unpredictability of the previous years. The “South Park” of old was less partisan … and funnier. Think of episodes in which Al Gore warned the world about “ManBearPig,” Barack Obama hosted Caitlyn Jenner at the White House, or a robotic Hillary Clinton botched her debate prep. (This last clip in particular shows “South Park” at its coarse bipartisan best.)
We’ll see which decision the Emmy Award-winning show makes. But either option — roast or retreat — is a response to Trump who, once again, deforms, distorts and degrades everything he touches.
To its credit, the show is aware of the bind that Trump places on comedians. As one of its characters exclaimed in Season 28, Episode 2: “South Park sucks now and it’s because of all this political s–––.”
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