Original air date: 8/19/1998
A film festival from Los Angeles comes to South Park and corrupts it with their lack of culture. Meanwhile, Kyle tries to save Mr. Hankey from dying and Chef tries to cash in on the festival by selling his suggestively named treats, "Chocolate Salty Balls".
"Chef's Salty Chocolate Balls" episode contains examples of:
- Chekhov's Gag: Chef's Chocolate Salty Balls revive Mr. Hankey.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: Chef's food products and the songs he sings to advertise them.
- Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male: Verbal example only, but Wendy calls Cartman "Fatass", to which Cartman retaliates by calling her a "skinny bitch". Only then does Mr. Garrison step in and punish Cartman. To be fair, it's been well established even before this episode that Garrison can't stand Cartman and prefers Wendy so it might be a favoritism issue, not a sexism issue.Mr. Garrison: Eric, if you call Wendy a bitch one more time, I'm sending you to the principal's office.
Cartman: (Beat) Bitch.
Mr. Garrison: That's it, Eric! - Evil Laugh: Robert Redford launches into a diabolical cackle after he declares he will use the Sundance Film Festival to change South Park into a huge crowded city just like Los Angeles...only to stop mid-laugh and ask the camera to zoom in on him as he does that. He then rewinds his speech to the end, laughing maniacally again, and the camera indeed zooms in on his face for dramatic effect.
- Eyelash Fluttering: Wendy does this to Stan holding his hand in the cinema, with the usual outcome: Vomit Indiscretion Shot
- Flat Joy: The townsfolk, after Mr. Hankey saves South Park by covering it, and them, in literal crap.
- Gay Cowboy: Cartman dismisses independent films as being about "gay cowboys eating pudding". Trey and Matt actually said before Brokeback Mountain came out that "if they eat pudding, we're going to sue."
- Jerkass: Robert Redford. He takes the film festival to South Park so it becomes a huge town with traffic jams because he has to deal with it in Los Angeles and plans to do the same in every other small town he can.
- Karmic Death: Robert Redford is killed by Mr. Hankey's poo wave after killing Mr. Hankey twice.
- Noodle Incident: Why was Mr. Garrison swimming around in the sewers in a full diver suit? The world will never know.
- Sell-Out: Stan accuses Cartman of being this when he sells Mr. Hankey's current dilemma to a movie producer. Neither of them actually know what a sell out is, except "if you work in the entertainment business and make money" you're one. Cartman decides he likes it anyway.
- Shout-Out:
- In yet another homage to the works of Rankin/Bass Productions, Mr. Hankey's first Disney Death and Really Dead Montage mixed with a Dark Reprise with his theme (complete with the singer imitating Jimmy Durante) parodies the scene where Frosty melts in Frosty the Snowman.
- The government agent in a hazmat suit taking the supposedly dead Mr Hankey away, along with his body being kept in a huge oxygen tent, are all references to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.
- Mr. Hankey's poo wave is a direct Shout-Out to Fantasia, as well as one to The Rocky & Bullwinkle Show afterwards.
- A dying Mr Hankey mutters "There is another Skywalker..." spoofing Return of the Jedi.
- Take That!:
- Against the Sundance Festival and Robert Redford, since Trey Parker and Matt Stone tried to have Orgazmo screen there but weren't allowed. There are also jabs at Sundance starting as an independent film festival, but it turned into a big Hollywood event.
- Kyle and Stan comment on how the American remake of Godzilla and Independence Day (both directed by Roland Emmerich) sucked ass when they're trying to figure out what an independent film festival is.
- After Mr. Hankey drives out the film festival, Wendy apologizes for taking Stan to all those movies and admits that most indie movies suck.
- They Killed Kenny Again: Kenny is trampled by a crowd leaving a theater. Stan and Kyle are not present; instead, a moviegoer says, "Oh my God, I found a penny!", and his friend replies, "You bastard!"
