Recap / South Park S 4 E 16 The Wacky Molestation Adventure

Original air date: 12/13/2000

When Kyle isn't allowed to go to the Raging Pussies concert, Cartman tells him to tell the cops his parents molested him. Eventually South Park is left without parents and the city devolves to anarchy.

Wacky Molestation Adventure contains examples of:

• Achievements in Ignorance: Kyle manages to bring democracy to Cuba by writing a letter that touches the heart of Fidel Castro. Gerald and Sheila are equal parts dumbfounded that Kyle managed to do it, and horrified because they now have to let him go to the Raging Pussies concert. That is, until they decide that they're Not Even Bothering with an Excuse and refuse to let Kyle go anyway because they don't want him to go.
• An Aesop: Parents can be controlling and heavily regulating, but they do it out of love. Also, reckless accusations of sexual abuse have severe consequences.
• Artistic License – Law: Given that the presumption of innocence is a constitutional right, accusations alone should not land all of the parents in prison. But then again, the town of South Park isn't exactly known for its legal ethics.
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • The job opportunity of Mark's life turned out to be as a manager of Denny's in Breckenridge.
  • In a couple scenes, Mark and Linda talk about having children, with the former being against it because he doesn't think he'd make a good dad. When it's all over, both agree that Mark actually does have what it takes to be a dad, but Linda then immediately announces that this experience has convinced her to get tubes tied.
• Borrowed Catch Phrase: Stan and Kyle's usual dialogue whenever Kenny dies is paraphrased when Mark and Linda discover his corpse at the feet of the Provider.
  Mark: It's a boy. They... killed him.
  Linda: The bastards.
• Both Sides Have a Point: No one has the moral ground here:
  • Gerald and Sheila should've cut their losses and let Kyle go to the concert instead of trolling him with an Impossible Task that he ended up accomplishing anyway. But they did all this in the first place because they're his parents and they didn't want him to go to a concert that he was too young for, and to their credit, they admit that they were wrong for trolling him. It doesn't help their case that they didn't think to offer Kyle an alternative reward to compensate for not going to the concert.
  • Kyle had every right to be angry with his parents for their sarcastic request, something he ended up doing despite its impossibility, and also had the right to go to the concert since it wasn't gonna affect him in the way they thought it might. But he needed to realize they did that out of tough love, and getting them arrested for false charges of molestation was absolutely wrong. Luckily, he figures that out in the end.
• Brick Joke: Kenny's death comes as an offhand joke at around the middle of the episode, and at the end when the parents are released from jail, Kenny's parents are looking for him.
• Calling the Old Man Out: Kyle is absolutely livid when he finds out Shelia and Gerald were never going to let him see the Raging Pussies concert after they admit they weren't serious about the "bring democracy to Cuba" chore. While Shelia and Gerald admit they didn't handle this correctly, by the time they explain why they really don't want Kyle going to that concert, he's too angry at how his parents trolled him to listen.
• Continuity Nod: Kyle's dead grandmother is once again mentioned.
• Disaster Dominoes: Kyle being honest with his parents about the concert instead of lying like Stan and Cartman did ultimately leads to a bunch of adults being sent to prison, young children being left to fend for themselves, and the town descending into total anarchy - all over the space of ten days!
• Disproportionate Retribution: Kyle had every right to be mad at his parents for lying to him, but making a false molestation accusation was crossing the line.
• False Rape Accusation: Most of the kids do this to their parents, and the ones who don't get hit with one flee town.
• Impossible Task: Kyle's parents tell him he can't go to a concert unless he cleans out the garage, shovels the snow out of the driveway, and brings democracy to Cuba. Of course, he succeeds at all three (hilariously, he considered the second task the one that would be most difficult).
• Insane Troll Logic:
  • The children thinking that a statue could provide them with the fresh food, water and power that their parents used to supply them with.
  • Before the prison bus arrives to return the parents home, the boys wonder if they'll be mad about all this. Stan reasons they can't be too mad since they made them an apology banner. They aren't mad, but this is because in their time off they ended up believing that they really molested their kids and are trying to apologize for it, despite the kids trying to explain it was a lie.
• Jerkass Ball: All the children in South Park hold this by having their parents falsely arrested so they could have the town to themselves.
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Several South Park children do this by getting their parents arrested for molesting them when they didn't.
• Karma Houdini: None of the children face punishment for getting their parents and other adults arrested for child molestation as the parents get brainwashed into believing they did molest their children.
• Laser-Guided Karma: This is about the only time Shelly is punished for abusing Stan when he sics the cops on her by saying she molested him too. Subverted further though, because Shelly was going to beat Stan up for getting their parents arrested.
• Manly Tears: Castro while reading Kyle's letter. It convinces him to give up Communism.
• Moving the Goalposts: Gerald and Sheila say that Kyle can only go to the Raging Pussies concert if he does three things, the last of which is an Impossible Task. When Kyle manages to do all three anyway, Gerald and Sheila then decide that Kyle still can't go to the concert, this time outright admitting to Kyle that it's because they're just flat out refusing to let him go no matter what he does, and weren't going to let him go in the first place.
• Never Land: After all the adults get arrested on false sexual abuse accusations, the town becomes this.
• No Sympathy: Despite admitting they lied about being molested, the boys show no concern for the horrible ordeal their parents went through, Mark and Linda are understandably horrified. Earlier Stan questioned what happens to Kyle's parents after they get arrested, but Kyle vindictively hand waves it, claiming they are liars who deserve anything they get.
• Not Even Bothering with an Excuse: Kyle's parents say he can attend a Raging Pussies concert if Kyle cleans out the garage, shovels the driveway, and brings democracy to Cuba. Kyle does all three, accomplishing the final task by writing a letter so moving that it touches the heart of Fidel Castro. However, Kyle's parents still refuse to let him go to the concert, this time on the grounds of "because we don't want you to go", tacitly admitting that they were never going to let him go to the concert. This ultimately kicks off the Teenage Wasteland plot when Kyle calls child services on his parents as revenge.
• Oh, Crap!: Gerald and Shelia react this way when they learn Kyle thought they were serious about bringing democracy to Cuba, and he did.
• Parental Neglect: The other three boys tell Kyle they didn't actually tell their parents about the concert. Stan told his he was sleeping at Cartman's, Cartman that he was at Kenny's, and Kenny didn't say anything because his parents don't care.
• Police Are Useless: Played with, since the police are actually quick to act upon allegations of child abuse. Too quick for that matter, they quickly arrest all the parents in town with no real evidence, and then take no action afterwards to protect the now parentless children. When questioned on this, one official just makes the offhand assumption Kyle and Ike can just live with their Grandma (ignoring Sheila's protests she's been dead for years) and then carts the parents away, leaving the two kids to their own devices.
• "Risky Business" Dance: Kyle, after his parents are arrested.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After the arrest montage, the kids notice the city is otherwise deserted. Cartman observes that after so many adults were arrested, the remaining ones have moved out in order to avoid suffering the same fate.
• Shaming the Mob: After the truth about the magic M word comes out.
  Mark: Is that what happened to the adults here? You lied to the police and said they molested you!? My God, they were your parents!
  [kids stare at him in shock]
  Stan: Parents?
  Mark: The birth-givers. Your birth-givers. Don't you remember? They are your providers, not some statue! And they're not off in some fantastical, faraway land now; they're in prison, probably crying themselves to sleep, cold and lonely, and I'm sure missing you all very, very much. Your birth-givers took care of you. That's what their laws and their rules were for. Because they love you, and they didn't want you to end up living like this. [pointing to the statue] He won't take care of you. Your parents, your providers, will.
• Shout-Out: Mark refers to Craig as "Spaceman Spiff".
  • Meanwhile, the entire segment of Kyle writing a letter to Cuba is a parody of the 'Blue Christmas' song segment from the Rankin Bass special 'Year Without A Santa Claus', right down to the shot of Kyle drawing himself with a tear on his face.
  • Stan's speech about "The before time" is a reference to the "Miri" episode of "Star Trek".
  • And of course, the basic concept of a town run by creepy children with no adults present draws on Stephen King's "Children of the Corn".
  • The part where Kyle and Stan explain to Mark and Linda what happened to the town, is matched almost shot for shot from a similar scene in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome.
• Skewed Priorities:
  • The children selfishly squabble over leadership of the town rather than figuring out a way to get their parents back or find food, water, and power.
  • The police of South Park are also quick to arrest any adults for molestation charges, (without any evidence for that matter) but take no interest at all in caring for the unsupervised children afterwards. Whatever police authority is left in South Park is shown "rehabilitating" the persecuted parents while leaving the children reduced to their desolate situation.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: "Old Time Rock and Roll" plays during a montage of South Park adults getting arrested for false child molestation charges.
• A Taste of Defeat: As mentioned above, this is about the one and only occasion Stan gets unnegated revenge on his Big Sister Bully Shelly, having her arrested for molestation just seconds from another beating.
• The Cake Is a Lie: When Kyle succeeds at fulfilling Shelia and Gerald's condition of being allowed to go the Raging Pussies concert if he brought democracy to Cuba, they admit that it was merely an attempt to get Kyle off their backs about it, and still deny him permission to go.
• They Killed Kenny Again: When Mark and Linda try to get the book, we learn that Kenny was an off-screen sacrifice to the Provider.
• Too Dumb to Live: The children turn out to be this because they expatriated their own parents to prison, meaning they no longer had anyone to buy food and utilities for them, so they succumb to a suicidal path of sacrificing one of themselves each night to a statue they dub "The Provider".
• What Happened to the Mouse?:
  • Liane's ex-boyfriend who Cartman got arrested three months prior is not mentioned after the boys confess they lied, which means he could still be locked up for a crime he didn't commit.
  • Also, Stan's older sister Shelley is arrested with the adults and it's never shown what happened to her while the adults are in jail. She probably went to juvenile hall.
• Whole-Plot Reference: This episode is a parody of Children of the Corn (1984). There are also homages to Mad Max (the outfits the children wear), Lord of the Flies (children operating without adult supervision), Army of Darkness (the MacGuffin book) and Logan's Run (the Carousel, human sacrifices). The climax is also a nod to the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "Miri" where Captain Kirk delivers a speech to the children that they need supervision; Mark just about does the same thing at the end.
• With Friends Like These...: Cartman getting Chef of all people arrested by lying about being molested by him (although it may have just been because he was in bed with Liane at the time).
• You Are Better Than You Think: Linda tells Mark he could be a great father despite his refusal for ever having children.