South Park has certainly been in the news over the last week.
The animated series took aim at President Trump in its Season 27 opener, in particular focusing on the Commander-in-Chief’s small manhood, and it has clearly paid off.
The opening episode, which premiered on Comedy Central and aired on Paramount+, thanks to a massive new deal between the company soon-to-be-owned by Skydance and South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker, was watched by nearly 6M viewers across these two platforms, per the company.
It noted that it also scored its biggest season premiere share on the cable network since 1999 – two years after its debut – and up 68% on last season. Per Nielsen, it landed a 9.2, compared to the 5.48 scored by the Season 26 opener.
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It was also the best season premiere rating in three years with nearly 1M viewers (996,000) compared to 866,000 last year and was the number one telecast across all cable last Wednesday.
None of this should be a surprise given the outrage and excitement that the episode drew from people on both sides of the political aisle.
The episode featured the president complaining about the size of his manhood in an official painting, then crawling into bed with and trying to be amorous with Satan, who rejects him and complains about the size of Trump’s privates. There were also multiple paintings scattered throughout the fictional White House that poke fun at Trump’s military bravado as well as an image that seems to involve Trump and a sheep engaged in an activity not meant for polite company, not to mention that deepfake.
Stone and Parker knew exactly what they were doing – titling the episode Sermon on the ‘Mount – after their parent company had been in the crossfire for bending the knee to the President over his frivolous lawsuit involving 60 Minutes as well as the appearance of bending further by canceling The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (purely for “financial reasons”, per CBS).
One administration official told Deadline that the President was “seething over the childish attack by South Park” and The White House even put out an official statement.
“This show hasn’t been relevant for over 20 years and is hanging on by a thread with uninspired ideas in a desperate attempt for attention,” White House Assistant Press Secretary Taylor Rogers said.
The fact that earlier in the week, Parker and Stone had struck a new, five-year overall deal with Paramount Global as well as a five-year streaming license deal reportedly worth around $1.5B as streamers such as HBO Max clamored for the opportunity to stream the 300+ episodes of the long-running animated show, highlights a few errors in the administration’s response.
President Trump and The White House will be able to sleep slightly easier this week as South Park doesn’t air its second episode of the season until August 6, although there will be a rerun of the opener airing tonight.