20 Mind-Blowing Facts You Didn't Know About South Park
19. The Game Of Thrones Writers Were Influenced By The South Park Parody
The episode Black Friday is a hilarious parody of Game of Thrones, and one of the funniest gags is the sheer number of conversations that take place while waking through a garden. Yeah, have you ever noticed how many damn Game of Thrones scenes involve characters scheming while on garden walks? Well, the Game of Thrones writers saw this spoof, and it actually influenced the way they wrote their show in the future.
In an audio commentary on the Season 4 blu-ray set, Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss mentioned that they stopped writing these garden scenes as often, and it was a direct reaction to seeing this South Park episode. In fact, a character in Game of Thrones comes close to making a reference to this. In one scene from Season 4, as Olenna Tyrell is walking through a garden with Margaery, she says, "If I have to take one more leisurely stroll through the gardens, I'll fling myself from the cliffs."
Not many spoofs can say they changed their subject matter by parodying it, but that's the power of South Park right there.