South Park: 12 Most Paused Moments
20+ years of pausing for South Park visual gags, celebrity parodies and aliens!
South Park has been brilliant for decades now and it’s so impressive how it’s been able to stay consistently entertaining and engaging with fans for all that time.
It started off as a crudely comical series about four mischievous elementary children and then grew to be more mature in its own right as the humour, themes and characters became smarter and more complex. Aside from being one of the funniest sitcoms ever created, it has also remained topically relevant, often producing satire on recent world events.
Creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone have never been afraid to ‘go there’ when it comes to their content. They have never held back when targeting a public figure or being as explicit as possible with the imagery of the show. And since the episodes are made in less than a week, there’s no telling what the producers can create in such quick time frames.
So much goes on in South Park, from hidden visual jokes to creative world building, that it’s hard to keep track of it all in one viewing. These are just a sample of the show’s most paused moments.
12. Boys As Kindergarteners
South Park tends not to use flashbacks in their episodes unless it's essential to the plot (Cartman's Mom Is A Dirty Slut, for example), meaning we very rarely get to see what the boys looked like when they were younger. Even in the homes of the South Park residents, the family photos on the walls tend to only show the children at their current age.
That's why the season eight episode "Pre-School" is a great insight into the boys younger years. As Stan, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman are terrified to learn that Trent Boyett is being released from juvenile hall, the story jumps back five years showing the children in pre-school. The boys play a game of 'fireman' and ask Trent to start a blaze. Thinking they can take control of it with their own urine, it spreads out of control, causing Ms Claridge to be badly burnt and Trent taking the blame for it.
This entire flashback is pause-worthy for the simple fact that the kids look absolutely adorable and it's a rare instance where we see them as infants.