Comedy Central is marking the show’s anniversary with a special “South Park Day” lineup instead of releasing another episode from season 27.
South Park has been making headlines lately — even when it’s not airing a new episode.
This week, Comedy Central isn’t releasing a fresh episode of the hit animated series, marking the second time since season 27 began just a few weeks ago that the weekly run has been skipped. Unlike the unexpected break after the second week of the season (and the two-week delay of the premiere), this pause was planned in advance.
Instead, the network has declared Aug. 13 “South Park Day,” kicking off a marathon of fan-favorite episodes at 9 a.m. ET. The lineup will lead into a 10 p.m. ET airing of the very first episode, “Cartman Gets an Anal Probe,” in its usual time slot. The celebration will also include interviews with Trey Parker and Matt Stone, behind-the-scenes footage, and rare clips — all marking the anniversary of the show’s 1997 debut.
The break also gives the team a little extra breathing room. South Park is known for its extremely tight turnaround, with Parker and Stone producing full episodes in just six days and often delivering the final cut only hours before Comedy Central’s deadline.
This skipped week comes as the show faces an unusually high — and possibly unprecedented — level of attention and scrutiny, with recent episodes taking aim at the Trump Administration (and, in the season premiere, its own parent company, Paramount Global). The Administration, in turn, has repeatedly fired back.
Earlier this week, the team released a bonus “end credits scene” from last week’s episode that mocked Kristi Noem. The clip (below) showed the Homeland Security Secretary shooting up a pet store. The show’s X account also updated its profile picture to Noem’s “melting face” from the episode after she criticized the show, saying, “It’s so lazy to make fun of women for how they look. Only the liberals and the extremists do that.”
Meanwhile, the show has been breaking ratings records. The season 27 premiere drew 6 million viewers across platforms and achieved the show’s largest share in 25 years. Early Samba estimates for the second episode indicated a 25 percent increase in live viewership compared to the premiere.
Season 27 will feature 10 episodes in total and is expected to resume next week.
Source: THR