If you were hoping to enjoy a new episode of South Park on Sept. 17, we have some bad news for you. Comedy Central’s hit animated series has been pulled from the schedule hours before the latest episode of season 27 was slated to be released.
Now, before you start spiraling, no, this schedule change was not the result of Comedy Central caving to the Trump Administration and backing down amid the blowback it’s received from critics. The last-minute decision to pull the planned episode from the schedule comes as a result of the episode simply not being ready to broadcast in time.
“Apparently when you do everything at the last minute sometimes you don’t get it done,” said Trey Parker and Matt Stone. “This one’s on us. We didn’t get it done in time. Thanks to Comedy Central and South Park fans for being so understanding. Tune in next week!”
Rather than airing on Sept. 17 as originally planned, episode 5 will instead be released on Sept. 24, and the move will unfortunately lead to a bit of a domino effect. With episode 5 pushed back a week, we’re going to see the remaining episodes all pushed back a week from their originally planned air dates.
This means we’ll now see episodes released on Oct. 15, Oct. 29, Nov. 12, Nov. 26, and Dec. 10. The scheduling shift also means the season finale will be coming later than expected as well airing closer to mid-December than early December.
The timing of the unexpected preemption is definitely unfortunate as there was a lot of anticipation for episode 5. All eyes have been on the show, with fans curious to see how the show will address the events of Sept. 10 when Charlie Kirk was shot and killed during an event at Utah Valley University.
The show parodied Kirk just a few short episodes ago, as Cartman became a right-wing podcaster and hit the road touring college campuses and debating left-wing students. In wake of Kirk's death, the episode has drawn harsh criticism with Comedy Central going as far as to pulling a rerun of the episode, titled “Got a Nut,” from its lineup last week.
It’s unclear how or if the show will address Kirk’s murder, but it seems fans are going to have to wait until Sept. 24 to see what political commentary the creators have cooked up next. Season 27 has not strayed away from pushing the envelope, so there is really know telling what topics the creators will address next and its entirely possible they could choose to address the events of Sept. 10 in a future episode.