Original air date: 11/22/2000
The fourth graders amp up their annual Thanksgiving performance of The Miracle Worker, which includes Timmy adopting a crippled turkey named Gobbles.
This episode contains the following tropes:
- All for Nothing: It turns out the kindergarteners play wasn't as amazing as Butters made it out to be.Stan: (annoyed) We worked our asses off to compete with that?!
- Artistic License – History: Parodied and exaggerated. The autobiographical story of The Miracle Worker is turned into a musical with over-the-top acting, elaborate song-and-dance numbers, and a turkey that does tricks standing in as the Kellers' family pet.
- A Boy and His X: Much of this episode revolves around the relationship between Timmy and his pet turkey, Gobbles.
- Cursed with Awesome: Gobbles' deformity ends up working in his favor when he is sent to a slaughterhouse. With his head always slouched to the ground, the turkey is able to avoid getting decapitated by the giant buzzsaw that kills all the other birds.
- Death Glare: The other kids shoot one at Butters for overselling the kindergarteners play by a massive degree.
- Epic Fail: One of Cartman's attempts on Gobbles' life is to drop a stage light on him. He cuts the wrong one, which falls on Kenny.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Lamond is hit with this when Timmy gets the hunters to shoot Alinicia the turkey.
- Loophole Abuse: While the 4th grade is required to perform the story of Helen Keller for the pageant, there's no rule as to how they can do so. As a result, Cartman decides to jazz it up with musical numbers and effects.
- Make It Look Like an Accident: Lamond convinces Cartman to get rid of Gobbles this way so that Alinicia can perform in the play. During a rehearsal, Cartman keeps moving Gobbles around the stage to find the perfect spot to drop a spotlight on the turkey, but his calculations were way off and crushes Kenny instead.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Jeffrey Maynard is based on Colm Wilkinson, the originator of the Jean Valjean role in Les Misérables.
- Not Me This Time: When Stan and Kyle see Timmy depressed, they are convinced Cartman got rid of Gobbles. Cartman proceeds to tell them that while he may have tried to kill Gobbles, he is not responsible for his disappearance.
- Only a Flesh Wound: Timmy suffers no repercussions to getting shot in the shoulder.
- Pet the Dog: While Kyle didn't want to buy the disabled turkey because the other kids would get pissed at him, he relents after the farmer mentions that he was going to kill it, even paying $50 despite finding the price to be too steep.
- The Prima Donna: Timmy refuses to play Helen Keller if the students won't let his pet turkey, Gobbles, be in the play. Meanwhile, Lamond's turkey, Alinicia, refuses to do her tricks if she has to share the spotlight with another bird. With both the play's lead and its star attraction at odds with each other, this naturally causes a lot of problems for the production.
- Running Gag: Literally — Butters keeps running down the hallway and bursting into the back of the auditorium to breathlessly update the kids on the kindergarteners' skit.
- Shoo the Dog: Mercilessly parodied. After Lamond lies to Timmy and tells him Animal Control Services is going to take Gobbles away, Timmy is forced to release his pet turkey. Sad music plays as he reluctantly pushes the bird away...while only ever being able to say either his name or Gobbles' name. The camera then pans over to other over-the-top sad scenes, such as a girl crying over her dead dog, a father and son crying over their dead wife and mother, and a couple crying over their failed marriage. The scene ends with a woman addressing the audience, asking "Have you done the right things in your life?"
- Shout-Out:
- The Running Gag with Butters is this to The Right Stuff's unnamed recruiter (played by Jeff Goldblum) who several times is seen running down a hallway to breathlessly inform his higher-ups on the latest developments in the Soviet space program, though he only gives them information they don't know already once.
- The turkeys watching a relaxing video of beautiful scenery before being killed may be one to the "going home" scene from Soylent Green.
- Small Role, Big Impact: Butters' role in the episode is very minor and his screen time is limited, but his recurring reports on the kindergartners' play, which he describes as a Thanksgiving Extravaganza, are what ultimately drive the plot as the fourth graders don't want to be shown up by kids half their age.
- Stylistic Suck: The kindergarteners' play turns out to lack any of the pyrotechnics or special effects that Butters was hyping up (only having a confetti cannon and a wooden horse), is barely over 10 seconds in length, and one of the kids flees in terror from the noise made by the confetti cannon. To say the fourth graders are displeased by the gap in quality between the two plays would be a major understatement.
- Taking the Bullet: A non-fatal example with Timmy for Gobbles.
- Thanksgiving Episode: The episode takes place around Thanksgiving, and in South Park Elementary, it's apparently a tradition that the fourth graders do a performance of The Miracle Worker at this time. While sprucing the play up, the kids even decide to give it more of a Thanksgiving flavor by replacing Keller's dog with a turkey that does tricks.
- They Killed Kenny Again: Kenny is crushed to death when a stage light meant to hit Gobbles falls on him instead.
- Watch It Stoned: Sick of seeing the fourth graders doing a play of The Miracle Worker, Principal Victoria admits she got stoned so that she won't kill herself out of annoyance. It leads to her being easily impressed by the weirder moments of the play.
