South Park Will Entirely Skip 2024 Election Commentary: ‘We Just Have Less Fun,’ Creators Say
The 2024 presidential election just threw us another curveball: South Park, known for its commentary on current events, will sit out satirizing this year’s presidential race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.
In a new interview with Vanity Fair, South Park co-creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone revealed the show won’t return for Season 27 until 2025. The delay can partially be chalked up to behind-the-scenes corporate reasons (Parker says they’re “waiting for Paramount to figure all their s—t out”), but Stone added that the show is also bypassing the November election “on purpose.”
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“We’ve tried to do South Park through four or five presidential elections, and it is such a hard thing to—it’s such a mind scramble, and it seems like it takes outsized importance,” Stone said. “Obviously, it’s f—king important, but it kind of takes over everything and we just have less fun.”
“I don’t know what more we could possibly say about Trump,” Parker added.
South Park has worked real-life elections into its storylines before, namely in the 2016 episode “Oh, Jeez,” which aired the night after Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in the presidential race. Similarly, the 2008 installment “About Last Night…,” which depicted Barack Obama’s victory in South Park‘s version of the election, aired one night after Obama triumphed over John McCain in the actual election.
Even though South Park won’t be back for a regular season until next year, there are no plans for the animated series to end anytime soon: Comedy Central previously renewed the show through at least Season 30 back in 2021, at which point Parker and Stone also signed on to produce 14 South Park specials exclusively for Paramount+. Thus far, the streamer has released seven of those, including South Park: Post COVID, South Park: Post COVID: The Return of COVID, South Park The Streaming Wars, South Park The Streaming Wars Part 2, South Park: Joining the Panderverse, South Park (Not Suitable for Children) and South Park: The End of Obesity.
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