Spontaneous Combustion (South Park episode)
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| South Park episode | |
| "Spontaneous Combustion" | |
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| Episode no. | 302 |
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| Airdate | April 14, 1999 |
| South Park - Season 3 April 7, 1999 – January 12, 2000 |
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| ← Season 2 | Season 4 → |
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| List of all South Park episodes | |
- For the physical phenomenon, see spontaneous combustion.
"Spontaneous Combustion" is episode 302 of Comedy Central's animated series South Park. It originally aired on April 14, 1999.
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[edit] Plot synopsis
In this episode, Kyle discovers that his dad and his mom are having marital difficulties, and he and the others (Kenny, Stan and Cartman) all try to find "an erection", which is what he's lacking. However, various members of the town—beginning with Kenny—start to spontaneously combust randomly, which causes the townspeople to attend church more, and compels Mayor McDaniels to order Randy Marsh (Stan's father) to discern the cause for the explosions.
The boys get drawn into presenting the Stations of the Cross in church, with Cartman tied to the cross in the role of Jesus, after repeated pleading that he couldn't play any other role. Afterwards, the boys take the cross and put it up outside the church, with Cartman still attached, so that he'll die and get an erection to give to Kyle's dad (having confused "an erection" with "Resurrection"). Meanwhile, Randy manages to find out that the combustions are caused by people refusing to fart in front of their partners (Kenny was visiting Kelly, his girlfriend from Rainforest Schmainforest) and so encourages everyone in town to fart every few seconds (The catastrophe is characterized with a picture of Jocelyn Wildenstein). For this he wins the Nobel Prize (hosted by Whoopi Goldberg), much to the ire of South Park's only other scientist, Dr. Mephisto, who wanted to win the prize for creating a turtle with seven asses; he plots revenge.
Another crisis then comes up, when a heat wave hits the town, and again Randy is hired to figure out the cause. However, Mephisto beats him to it—he discovers that it is the methane gas from all the farting that led to the global warming, and everybody turns on Randy, unsure whether or not to fart. He is stoned and forced to walk through the town with his own statue on his back, being denied by his friends (as Jesus was in the Stations of the Cross). Meanwhile, Kyle's dad manages to get an erection, after seeing some attractive, young female clients undress in his office (to show him the skin cancer they claim Randy was responsible for).
Randy does not want to try to find a solution for his problem, since all the people in town would still hate him, even if he managed to solve the combustion/global warming conundrum; however, Stan tells him that he learned something from the Stations of the Cross, and that was that even though Jesus was hated by all the people he knew and denied by his friends, he still did what he had to do and as he was dying, stating, "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" (Confusing the Bible with Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan). Randy declares that people need to fart only in moderation, and everyone turns back to him. He ends up winning the town's accolades again, and an award three weeks later... at which point the boys remember they left Cartman out on the cross. They run to get him, and find him still alive (if extremely shriveled) having survived for the three weeks on his accumulated body fat.
[edit] Kenny's death
Kenny dies by spontaneous combustion early in the episode.
[edit] Trivia
- Cartman's infamous line, "Screw you guys, I'm going home!", is uttered twice in this episode.
- When Stan is delivering the line, "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few," he holds up the star trek finger spread sign.
[edit] Goofs
- When Randy explains how methane gas contributes to spontaneous combustion, the molecule shown on the diagram is actually cyclopropane.
- While methane is indeed a naturally occurring and anthropogenic greenhouse gas, it does not damage the ozone layer.
[edit] External links
| Preceded by "Rainforest Schmainforest" |
South Park episodes | Followed by "The Succubus" |
