South Park is an American animated sitcom, notorious for its crude, surreal, and often very dark humor, which satirizes a wide range of topics including religion, politics, violence, abuse, sexuality, and mental illness. Trey Parker and Matt Stone created the show and continue to do most of the writing, directing, and voice acting.

The narrative revolves around four children—Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormick—and their bizarre experiences in the titular mountain town. The show has won acclaim and a plethora of awards, including three Primetime Emmys for Outstanding Animated Program.

Comedy Central has aired a total of 188 episodes since the show's debut in 1997. Doug Herzog, who brought South Park to the network, credits the show's strong ratings in its early years for putting Comedy Central "on the map". The thirteenth season premiered in March 2009. Parker and Stone are under contract to produce 14 new episodes a year through 2011.

Two feature-length movies have also been released; the musical film South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut had a widespread theatrical run in 1999, and the three-episode Imaginationland story arc was reissued straight-to-DVD in 2008.

Premise

South Park's early episodes tended to be shock value-oriented and featured more slapstick-style humor than later episodes. Although satire had been used on the show occasionally earlier on, it became more prevalent in later episodes. Episodes have parodied Michael Jackson ("The Jeffersons"), Paris Hilton ("Stupid Spoiled Whore Video Playset"), and The Passion of the Christ ("The Passion of the Jew"). The show has also addressed serious political issues such as terrorism ("Cartoon Wars"), American immigration policy ("Goobacks"), gay marriage ("Follow That Egg!"), racism ("With Apologies to Jesse Jackson"), and the Terri Schiavo case ("Best Friends Forever").

Controversies over South Park have occurred numerous times. The show depicts what many people find to be taboo subject matter, from its use of vulgarity ("It Hits the Fan") to its satire of subjects such as religion and cults (such as "All About the Mormons?", "Bloody Mary", "Red Hot Catholic Love", "Fantastic Easter Special", and "Trapped in the Closet"), sexuality ("The Death Camp of Tolerance"), drugs ("My Future Self n' Me", "Up the Down Steroid"), and global warming ("Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow"). Stone and Parker are self-described "equal opportunity offenders" and episodes often lampoon all sides of a contentious issue, rather than taking a concrete position. Usually, the boys and/or other characters ponder over what has transpired during an episode and convey the important lesson taken from it with a speech commonly beginning with the phrase "You know what? I've learned something today...".