“Christmas Snow” is the 8th Christmas-themed season finale and the 10th Christmas-themed episode in the overall 23 seasons of South Park. The series creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, have never shied away from bringing up critiques from critics and fans in actual episodes. I guess Trey, who has written all of this season, definitely had some things to get off his chest regarding criticism in the finale, “Christmas Snow”.
Some of the best episodes to come from South Park have been their Christmas-themed episodes, but there has been a steady decline in the last few seasons. I personally rank season 22’s “Bike Parade” pretty low. In their defense, South Park has been on since 1997, it’s kind of par for the course. I mean, Mr. Hankey can only save so many Christmases before things go to complete shit, bad pun intended. Plus, Mr. Hankey was run out of town last season. Maybe that was Trey letting us know he had no intention of reusing Mr. Hankey for this year’s Christmas special. Instead, he brings back Santa and Jesus, who appeared in fan-favorite “Red Sleigh Down” from the sixth season. Santa and Jesus aren’t the main stars of this episode though. Additionally, Cartman and friends have no involvement. If you’d grown tired of the show leaning on Randy’s entrepreneurial shtick, I have some bad news: the season finale becomes a Tegridy Farms special.
The episode starts with the South Park tree lighting ceremony, a nod to “Red Sleigh Down.” Santa is called a buzzkill, likened to Greta Thunberg for trying to get people to see how their current ways are harmful and destructive. However, Santa wasn’t talking about global warming, his talking points revolved around driving under the influence of alcohol. He gets an ordinance passed to ban the distribution of alcohol until January 2nd. Leaving the mayor and the show itself to turn to good old Tegridy Farms for help for shenanigans. I guess Stan, Kyle, Cartman, and Kenny were busy.
While I’m not completely upset we’re back at Tegridy Farms—I’ve been wanting to go back since “Board Girls”—I do think the show’s creators missed an opportunity to end the season with the South Park kids. “Turd Burglars” was one of the funniest episodes this season. It’s not like the South Park team isn’t aware of what episodes resonated more with fans than others. There is a point in the episode when Randy shows the mayor some of the specials that didn’t perform well, one of them being Mexican Joker. Funny enough though, I actually thought “Mexican Joker” was one of the stronger episodes from this season because it was the most ludicrous out of all of them.
The Christmas special Randy and Towelie come up with is a mixture of specials previously made this season but with a dash of cocaine. The adults of South Park get their Christmas spirit back. The mayor flips out when she finds out Randy put cocaine in the special, but Randy quickly solves that issue by getting cocaine legalized. The mayor should have known by now asking Randy for help is like adding cocaine to your problem. South Park is aware of fans tired of the “add a dash of Randy” South Park formula, especially with jabs at Shelly’s problem with marijuana.
Santa ends up getting an ordinance passed to ban weed sold by Tegridy Farms until January 2, but then Randy starts selling marijuana-free cocaine. The bottom line stressed in this episode: You might be tired of Randy’s entrepreneurial bent, but South Park creators are going to lean into it regardless. To their credit, it does get the job done. Randy’s Christmas special gives the season finale the funniest payoff. It comes after the high-speed chase between Santa and Randy, after Santa tries to get rid of all of the Tegridy cocaine. Jesus finally shows up, and the next thing you know he, Santa, and Randy are high as hell. Jesus even makes it snow cocaine all over South Park. A wild ending, courtesy of Tegridy Farms.
Randy declares the Christmas special a success, and I would have to agree. While “Christmas Snow” isn’t “Woodland Critters Christmas,” or even “Red Sleigh Down,” it is an adequate close to season 23 and maybe the Tegridy Farms storyline as well. Hopefully, this is a sign season 24 can get back to the true stars, the South Park kids.
Stray observations:
- I wonder if South Park is truly done with Tegridy Farms.
- I actually enjoyed the Scott Malkinson episode and wouldn’t mind if season 24 involved more of the tertiary child characters. Let’s get back to that.
- Which will end first? South Park or The Simpsons?