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| "Unfulfilled" | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Episode no. | Season 22 Episode 9 | ||
| Directed by | Trey Parker | ||
| Written by | Trey Parker | ||
| Featured music | "Sixteen Tons" by Tennessee Ernie Ford "Sweet Love" by Anita Baker | ||
| Production code | 2209 | ||
| Original air date | December 5, 2018 (2018-12-05) | ||
| Episode chronology | |||
| |||
| South Park (season 22) | |||
| List of episodes | |||
"Unfulfilled" is the ninth episode of the twenty-second season of the American animated television series South Park. The 296th overall episode of the series, it premiered on Comedy Central in the United States on December 5, 2018. It is the first of a two-part story arc that concludes the season.
The episode centers upon the decision by the corporate retailer Amazon to choose the town of South Park as the location for its new fulfillment center, a reference to the 2018 competition among various U.S. cities to be chosen as the second headquarters of that company. While the development is a boon for those in the town who enjoy purchasing from the retailer, working conditions there lead to a strike, which leads to a visit to the town by Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos, who is depicted as one of the alien Talosians from the original 1965 Star Trek pilot "The Cage".
Plot
Stephen Stotch has recently began working at the Amazon fulfillment center as a floor manager to pay off the onlime purchase of accessories that his son Butters Stotch need for the town's bike parade. The fulfillment center also caused many local businesses to have closed down due to the public's preference for buying things online. But then Stephen's co-worker, Josh Carter, is accidentally grabbed by a sorting robot and compressed into a small package. Amazon statement "human error" is to blame outrages the facility's boxers as their resulting strike shuts down the fulfillment center and delays the fulfillment of the public's orders with members of the public forming a counter-protest for boxers to resume work so that they can receive their purchases. Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos, depicted similarly to the lead Talosian from the original 1965 Star Trek pilot "The Cage", appears at South Park City Hall and threatens Mayor McDaniels, who had assured him that the town was the perfect location for the center, to close her Amazon Prime account if she fails to get the strikers back to work.
Amazon's later retaliation of downgrading the strikers' account status causes a conflicted Stephen to become a scab, though the only one working at the fulfillment centers. As the events upfold, Stan Marsh and Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman and Kenny McCormick were initially dismissive in the bike parade until seeing firsthand the popularity Larry Zewiski, the haughty winner of a previous parade. The four decide to win the prize as a group under a single theme, only to from the strike to impedes them from receiving buy accessories for their bikes. This forces them to travel to the local mall, dilapidated and populated solely by zombie-like employees who cannot provide the diverse inventory that online merchants offer. Stan contacts Bezos, and says that the mall zombies will work as boxers at the fulfillment center if Bezos ships their bike parade-related purchases to them first. Bezos agrees to this, and when the strikers learn of this, Josh, still permanently stuck in a small box, decides to lead them to revolution.
Reception
Jesse Schedeen of IGN rated the episode a 8.2 out of 10, stating that he enjoyed the science-fiction elements woven into the plot, including the depiction of Jeff Bezos as "basically a mash-up of the Talosians from Star Trek and the aliens from The Twilight Zone episode 'To Serve Man.' All in all, a more satisfying take on a controversial billionaire than last season's lukewarm Mark Zuckerberg parody."
John Hugar of The A.V. Club gave the episode a grade of A-, and said of the political themes of the story, "Perhaps Trey and Matt realized the arguments they were making were more left-wing than what they had been previously known for."
References
- ^ Schedeen, Jesse (December 5, 2018). "South Park Season 22, Episode 9: 'Unfulfilled' Review". IGN. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
- Baysinger, Tim (December 3, 2018). "‘South Park: Amazon Moves to Town And They’re Not Too Happy About It in Latest Episode (Video)". TheWrap. Retrieved December 11, 2018.
- Asher Hamilton, Isobel (December 7, 2018). Jeff Bezos was ridiculed by 'South Park' and portrayed as a giant-brained, telepathic supervillain. Business Insider. Retrieved December 11, 2018.
- ^ Bramesco, Charles (December 6, 2018). "South Park Recap: Amazon Comes to Town". Vulture. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
- Di Placido, Dani (December 8, 2018). "'South Park' Review: 'Unfulfilled' Attacks Amazon With Razor-Sharp Satire". Forbes. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
- Hugar, John (December 5, 2018). "South Park takes some hard shots at Amazon in a surprisingly anti-capitalist episode". The A.V. Club. Retrieved December 6, 2018.
External links
- "Unfulfilled" at IMDb
- "Episode 2208 'Unfulfilled' Press Release". South Park Studios. December 3, 2018.
- Humphries, Matthew (December 7, 2018). "South Park Depicts Jeff Bezos as a Sinister Telepath". PC Magazine.
| South Park episodes | |
|---|---|
| Season 22 | |