10 Most Controversial South Park Moments

Some of the targets chosen by South Park are worthwhile: bloated or nefarious organisations, or pompous celebrities. On other occasions, though, their swipes are directed at more benign personalities. It can seem a little arbitrary and even mean, never more so than their far too soon mockery of the late Steve Irwin.

Season 10 episode Hell On Earth 2006 is for the most part a fairly tame episode about a party thrown by Satan. The edgiest material involves depictions of various serial killers, with some cartoon gore thrown in for good measure.

Then, Steve Irwin appears with a stingray stuck through his chest. Airing under two months after the crocodile hunter’s death, this unsurprisingly was met with substantial backlash, including a statement on behalf of Irwin’s widow.

With the show’s famously short turnaround time they’re able to spoof recent moments faster than any other comedy, so it seems that they simply couldn’t resist the shock gag. In the grand scheme of things they’ve done far worse, but a tasteless joke about a well liked and decent man just for the sake of doing it did not sit well with some viewers.