Recap / South Park S14E9 "It's A Jersey Thing"

Original air date: 10/13/2010

The town is invaded by loud, obnoxious guidos/Jersey Shore wannabes, and Kyle discovers a disturbing secret about his origins.

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"It's a Jersey Thing" contains examples of:

• Accent Slip-Up: Kyle appropriately adopts a Jersey accent when his Jersey side comes out.
  Kyle (as Kyley-B): Get outta here, ya piece of gahbage! You wanna smush, go creepin’ somewheres else! Yer gahbage, you know that? You’re cabbage!
• Angry Fist-Shake: Kyle does one while threatening Cartman, saying that he will smash his teeth in as he continues to say that Kyle is one of them.
• Big Damn Heroes:
  • Al Qaeda saving South Park from a Jersey Folk invasion... by crashing 737s into the invading Jersey folk.
    Randy: It's Al Qaeda!
  • Sheila saving Sharon from being harassed by angry Jersey women.
  • Kyle saving Cartman from being raped by Snooki — Cartman actually thanks him for it.
• Bystander Syndrome: Why Arnold Schwarzenegger refuses to help South Park: budget problems in California and just a general lack of concern, since the states of Utah and Nevada stand between California and Colorado.
• Child of Two Worlds: Kyle, who is half Jerseyite, half Coloradoan.
• Confession Cam: The Jerseyites do this parodying Jersey Shore. Later, Sheila does it while explaining her past in Jersey. Lampshaded by Sharon:
  Sharon: Sheila, who are you taking to?
  Sheila: You wouldn't understand. It's a Jersey thing.
• Enemy Mine: South Park calls upon Al Qaeda to help them with the Jerseyites after it becomes apparent that nobody else wants to help.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Even Al Qaeda sees Jerseyites as a force that must be stopped.
• Everyone Has Standards: South Park's adults (even Randy Marsh) thinks that Jerseyites are too jerkish and stupid even for them (Randy even told that it's impossible to be so dumb which is rich coming from him).
• Excrement Statement: Cartman shits on Kyle’s doorstep every morning to try to get him and his family to move away since he hates Kyle so much. He later says he’ll start crapping on Kyle’s doorstep even more after learning the latter is from New Jersey. None of the actual crapping is shown on screen.
• Forced Transformation: Snooki sexually assaulting the boys and her Jersey influence cause Kyle to transform into Kyley-B, who then fights her to save everyone at Sizzler.
• Former Teen Rebel: Sheila reveals that she was once a notorious teen party-girl known as "S-Woww Tittybang."
• Half-Breed Angst: Kyle deals with this throughout the episode after learning he's half Jersey. See also I Am a Monster below.
• Head-Turning Beauty: Sheila is implied to be this back when she lived in New Jersey, as one of the photos of her past showed her getting groped at a bar by a Jersey guy, while another was staring and wolf whistling at her.
• Hidden Depths: Kyle and Sheila's Jersey side don't come up until they're around other Jerseyites.
  • Also notable they both fall into these states when their friends are harassed by other Jerseyites, showing a deep connection to their South Park home.
• Hybrid All Along: Downplayed with Kyle, since he’s still 100% American/human, but it was after 14 seasons that we learned he has Jersey blood in him.
• Hypocritical Humor: Randy praising Osama Bin Laden and giving a heartwarming speech about how there are no enemies in the world, only people with differences... only to then gleefully proclaim "We got him!" when a soldier drops in through the roof and shoots Bin Laden in the head.
• I Am a Monster: What Kyle essentially thinks of himself upon learning he’s from Jersey. He goes to great lengths to hide it from his friends, until eventually he’s forced to embrace and accept it to save them from Snooki.
  Kyle: (as if about to cry) What am I, Mom?
  Kyle: No! I don’t wanna look like this! ...I can hide it. Nobody ever has to know. I can’t ever let anybody know!
• Instantly Proven Wrong: While Kyle is angsting about his Jersey side, Sheila tells him that it's not so bad and that some people think the Jersey look is cool. At that point, Ike appears, takes one look at his mother and brother, screams in horror and faints.
• It Is Dehumanising: Everyone refers to Snooki using "it." Played for Laughs since Snooki in this episode is physically portrayed as some kind of rat monster.
• Jerkass: All the Jersey people count as this.
  • Justified with Sheila and Kyle, since they're being that way to help their friends.
• Joisey: The entire episode is built around this stereotype.
• Look Behind You: Kyle tries to warn Cartman that Snooki is behind him, only for Cartman to be Wrong Genre Savvy by thinking Kyle is trying to pull this trope. It's only because Kyle continues to insist that Cartman look that he finally does.
  Cartman: Dude, what the fuck is that thing behind me?
• Minor Injury Overreaction: Cartman starts bawling when Kyle pushes him against a tree, crying about a small scratch behind his head. Cartman later exaggerates the story to the other kids.
• Moral Myopia: Pretty much everything Jersey women in the episode say is derisive gossip about other women. When people get sick of it and start throwing shade right back, the Jersey women explode.
  Teresa: Ears out to here! So I tell her "you got big ears, sweety." I'm not trying to be mean, it's just a Jersey thing. Why be effected? I mean, you've got a big chin. We've all got imperfections.
  Sharon: Right. Just like your eyes are too far apart.
  [Beat]
  Teresa: [To a camera crew.] That was totally uncalled for for what she did. My eyes are too far apart? I'm like "who is she? Is she God?" No. [Cut back to the dinner table.] You don't ever. Ever! You ratjob. Prostitution. Whore! You probably sell your muff for six-dollars, you fucking psycho bitch! Fuck you! [Teresa flips the table.] You're nothing but garbage! That's what you are! You're garbage! You sick, old-woman, muff-garbage! Muff cabbage! Fuck this psycho bitch!
  Sharon: Wow.
• One-Winged Angel: Parodied by Kyle's Jersey side, "Kyley-B", which was treated as this and a Superpowered Alter Ego.
• Painful Transformation: Kyle undergoes this when he goes into his Jersey form at Sizzler.
• Phrase Catcher: "It's a Jersey thing."
• Rape as Comedy: The Snooki rapes several people, such as Stephen, DogPoo, and Cartman — "Snooki want smoosh-smoosh!"
• Shout-Out:
  • Kyle's "transformation" into a Jersey kid resembles Scott's first transformation in Teen Wolf.
  • South Parks' final stand against the Jerseyites takes a page from Les Misérables.
• Smart Ball: Adults of South Park are useful and competent in this episode. This is a rare thing to happen.
• Take That!: At New Jersey culture, but especially Jersey Shore and Snooki.
  Randy: (waving a South Park flag) Fuck you, Jersey!!!
• Talk to the Fist: When Snooki won’t stop babbling to Kyle, he punches her in the face, and only then does she whimper and run away.
• Title Drop: "It's a Jersey thing."
• You Are What You Hate: Before he learned of his Jersey heritage, Kyle was mostly indifferent to the other Jerseyites, only questioning the overabundance of them. Then when he learns about his Jersey origins, he’s horrified and refuses to associate with them at all costs.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Once New Jersey gets sent back to the East Coast, Bin Laden gets a new hole in his head.
  Randy: We got him!