South Park Theory: The Town Is A Giant Experiment For The End Of The World
Throughout its time at the forefront of adult animation, "South Park" has featured some truly wild stories and moments. While some of these extend outside the borders of the titular town, the vast majority of these outlandish tales take place within the now-iconic Colorado locale. At first glance, this may seem like your typical cartoon wackiness, but if you dig a bit deeper, there could be more to the story. Just ask Redditor u/zmmar007, who proposes that the town of South Park is caught in an experiment that could bring about the end of the world.
This theory stems from the prevalence of dark magic throughout "South Park," which most often manifests itself in Kenny McCormick's (Matt Stone) semi-regular deaths and subsequent resurrections. The mysterious Cult of Cthulhu, which could be connected to Kenny's regenerations, is also at the forefront of this theory, given its potentially high-profile members and their sinister plans for South Park. "What is their goal? To conquer the world, heaven, and/or hell? Are they all working together or is there competition amongst them?" they write, positing that they desire to reshape the entire Earth with their dark magic, beginning with South Park itself.
All in all, the idea of a magic cult attempting to reform the world and using South Park as a testing ground is a pretty far-fetched theory — one that's made even more so when compared to an entirely separate one.
Another theory suggests a more rational explanation for South Park's wild occurrences
The sheer absurdity of "South Park" may lend credence to the apocalyptic cult theory, but it's not the only attempted explanation out there for the show's wackier elements. In fact, another brings things back down to Earth a bit in terms of the wildness level. A fellow "South Park" fan on Reddit, u/ninjatofu1014, made a thread of their own to explain the outlandish stories on "South Park." "Everything weird and unrealistic (fantastical, unlikely, out of the ordinary, supernatural) is all, in fact, simply the boys' imaginations helping the boys understand the world around them," they write.
Continuing, they rattle off some examples of "South Park" episodes that exemplify the main crew's — in this case, Eric Cartman (Trey Parker), Kyle Broflovski (Matt Stone), and Stan Marsh (Parker) — ability to turn mundane life events into over-the-top tales. This theory also addresses Kenny's ability to die yet return without a scratch, chalking it up to the boys' incapability of letting their genuinely dead friend go. To rationalize this to themselves, they even go as far as creating Kenny's superhero alter-ego, Mysterion, who can return from beyond the grave with ease.
Are these "South Park" theories undeniably true? Not quite, but who doesn't love a good fan theory?