South Park Takes Major Shots at Streaming Services - Especially Disney+
by Renaldo MatadeenWARNING: The following contains major spoilers for South Park's Season 23 episode, "Basic Cable."
South Park has been on a rampage in its 23rd season, going after Disney for its business practices, as well as the likes of China for its politics. Not to mention, just in the last few weeks, it poked fun at the concept of all-boys clubs and the Dune franchise.
Now, creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker have taken aim at something that's very popular right now, streaming services, with the incredibly popular Disney+ bearing the brunt of the shots.
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This week's episode, "Basic Cable," revolves around young Scott Malkinson trying to get Disney+ so he can stream The Mandalorian and have the perfect date with a girl from school, Sophie. However, before he met her, his dad, Clark, was having none of it as he's a cable guy and will live and die by the doctrine that all his family needs is basic cable. Scott tries to sell him on the millennial vision and the benefits of streaming services but Clark doesn't believe in archives and what he thinks are exorbitant prices, not to mention the complexities of customizing.
Of course, Clark's biased but he does make some sense when he points out how the streaming service industry is manipulating folks to purchase from a few select providers, which adds up to bills on par or higher than your regular cable bill. Scott struggles with the math but his dad warns him the services rip you off by giving users tons of content they don't want or need, referencing the likes of Netflix or Amazon Prime Video. Clark just doesn't believe that Scott should be exposed to other content providers such as Hulu, Apple TV or HBO Max and is resolute in his stance.
Scott, though, goes rogue and tries to buy a login from Nathan, the school's drug dealer who's now peddling passwords. He eventually attains a Disney+ credential, not caring if streaming services are secretly stealing people's money and making them lump in a bunch of them to get their best experience. It helps that Scott's trading insulin and not cash for the login, but it's when Clark gets together with his crew from Park County Cable, the war is taken to the next level. The fraternity, who are admittedly slow on the job when it comes to fixing people's cable (a real-life dilemma we all know too well), try to educate customers on why switching to streaming services is a bad thing. Still, because they're so inefficient and incompetent at their jobs, people don't take them seriously which leads to the squad moving to take down the streaming services. They know the cable system they laid down forms part of the internet infrastructure of the town and they sabotage everything so no one can stream content.
The cable guys believe they're curing South Park of disease but in Scott's case, his dad hurt him big time as he's no longer able to stream The Mandalorian and get the perfect date as planned. No one can air the show and while Clark basks in the victory, his son's left suffering. Still, the cable crew doesn't care because to them, things like Disney+ are the devil. They don't believe in its content, with the show even poking fun at how simple concepts like Baby Yoda lead to mass merchandising later on, and clearly believe South Park's citizens are being duped. It's perfectly summed up by Canada+ on the series, which has just two TV shows from South Park icons Terrance and Phillip.
Nonetheless, the cable guys succeed this time around but once the network is back up and running, Clark and Co. will be fighting a losing battle. They refuse to accept streaming as evolution, but who knows, maybe they have some other long-term plan up their sleeve. Given how lazy they are, though, they might not have the drive to execute it this season.
Starring Trey Parker and Matt Stone, South Park Season 23 airs Wednesdays at 10 pm ET/PT on Comedy Central.
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