South Park S27 Ep 3 Review
It’s over, people; Tegridy Farms is over. Nature is finally healing on South Park!
When Randy made the decision to start a marijuana farm seven years ago our time, I don’t think anyone expected it to last. His family clearly hated it, and fans saw it as just another one of the Marsh patriarch’s selfish manias. Unfortunately, the joke refused to end, living long past the point it was funny. I’ll admit, I grew to at least tolerate it after Post-COVID: the Return of COVID, but I still found it to be annoying and wanted nothing to do with it. After what’s felt like an eternity, though, we’ve finally seen the end to Tegridy Farms. And what caused this ending, you may ask? ICE and ChatGPT.
Keeping with the season’s theme of taking shots at the President, ICE has managed to hit Tegridy Farms where it hurts, arresting the immigrants who help Randy and Towelie operate the farm. With his back against the wall, it looks like Randy starts to realize that his family never liked the farm and wanted to move back home. In typical Randy fashion, he doesn’t simply take the L and move on. Instead, he tries to double-down by finding new ways to keep his business afloat using the power of ChatGPT.
Member the First Time South Park Mocked AI?
This isn’t the first time that South Park has offered its opinion on the AI craze that’s been going around. After all, the show had previously satirized ChatGPT’s lack of originality in a previous season. In that time, though, the AI has evolved, becoming able to communicate with users verbally. As a result, more people are using it for assistance, with the show interpreting this by having multiple people use it throughout the episode. Randy and Towelie use it to keep their business afloat. Satan uses it to try finding a way out of his relationship with the President. Even Sharon reluctantly uses it to get Randy to stop using it. There’s just one problem that show makes glaringly obvious: it doesn’t give any answers.
As it becomes apparent throughout the episode, ChatGPT in-universe lacks the ability to give any meaningful answers to problems. All it does is say what users want to hear, effectively being a sycophant, brown-noser, and butt-kisser. Since this is South Park, though, people like Randy and Towelie treat the AI’s vague descriptions like gospel, regardless of how dumb they really are.
There’s a Difference Between ChatGPT and True AI
I already mentioned it the first time South Park satirized ChatGPT, but it’s too soon for people to start relying on AI to help with everything. Firstly, because there are no safeguards to keep it from going Skynet, or at least understand and appreciate morality. Secondly, becoming overly-reliant on AI could rob people of their ability to think for themselves or know the difference between a good idea and a bad one. In this case, ChatGPT gives Tegridy Farms bad ideas. The next thing you know, Randy and Towelie are freeing a Mexican from an ICE center and then turning themselves into an AI think-tank while micro-dosing on ketamine.
The real kicker, though, is their “master plan” to save Tegridy Farms: send Towelie to Washington to suck up to the President. In keeping with the season’s theme of taking shots at the President, Matt and Trey make their disdain for him no secret. They depict Washington a city controlled by the National Guard much like how it is at the time the episode came out. They have many iconic monuments to past leaders remade in the President’s image. And funniest of all, they have a line of world leaders and business tycoons waiting in an actual line to glaze him and give him gifts. Sadly for Towelie, he finds out too late that Randy, high on ketamine, has made him his gift to the President, who uses him as a *** rag. Poor Towelie!
Ultimately, Tegridy Farms is doomed, and everyone knows it. The only thing keeping it together is Randy’s stubborness, which Sharon finds a workaround for. While Randy’s high on ketamine, she acts like ChatGPT, talking Randy through things until he finally concedes that Tegridy Farms was a failure. He goes to rest, leaving Sharon free to sell the farm, allowing her family to finally move back to South Park. As for Randy, he completely forgets he sold Towelie off, meaning we likely won’t be seeing the poor towel anytime soon. But who cares? Tegridy Farms is finally gone…or is it?
The Return of Tegridy Farms?
If you’ll recall, Tegridy Farms was still operating in the potential future set up by Post-COVID: The Return of COVID. Unless negative continuity is in play, this means there’s a chance that it could return. For the time being, though, there’s no place for Tegridy Farms in the world as it is today. That, and the joke ran its course six years ago. I’m just happy that it’s over, so I’ll take the win. Sadly, it comes with the reveal that South Park will be continuing with its bi-weekly schedule for the foreseeable future. It stinks, but what can you do? At least it will give the show more time to get ammo against the President.
Also, #FreeTowelie #Freetowelie
