"The following program contains coarse language and due to its content it should not be viewed by anyone." So reads the final line of the disclaimer which opens each episode of Comedy Central's new animated series, South Park.

No doubt many prudes will agree entirely with that statement. But anyone with a mind open to aggressive, raunchy humor will love South Park. The brainchild of Colorado natives Trey Parker and Matt Stone, South Park features the warped shenanigans of four third grade boys, their families, friends, and the other inmates of the town of South Park, Colorado.

The issues faced by the denizens of the small Rocky Mountain town of South Park include alien abductions, genetic engineering, celebrity worship, assisted suicide, natural disasters, and domestic violence. In short, many of the things that make life in the nineties interesting for everyone.

Unusual Suspects

Stan Marsh is the leader of the South Park boys. This eight-year-old has more than the usual set of third grade troubles, what with his dog, Sparky, who happens to be gay, his 102-year-old grandfather who wants to die, and his older sister, Shelley, who beats him up at every opportunity.

Kyle Broslovsky is Stan's Jewish friend, who is clever and somewhat sensitive to the fact that his religion makes him different. Kyle has a kid brother named Ike who looks like a football and performs like one during games of "Kick the Baby." Kyle's mom is a busybody whose PMS-induced tantrums make life miserable for everyone.

Eric Cartman is the fat kid in this group. Cartman is senstive about his size, and claims to be "big boned." The reason for Cartman's excess weight is no secret. His mother is overprotective and feeds him anything he wants, including "Powdered Donut Pancake Surprise" as an afterschool snack. Although all these boys have foul mouths, the spoiled brat Cartman is the foulest, loudest, and most obnoxious of all.

Kenny McKormick is the real oddball of this quartet. Short for his age, Kenny constantly wears a hooded jacket. The hood muffles his voice so we can't hear what he's saying, although the other South Park residents can apparently understand him. Actually, it's probably for the best that we can't tell exactly what Kenny is saying, since he seems to be the primary third grade source of perverted knowledge. Kenny's other main distinguishing feature is that he spends part of every episode dead. He manages to get shot, microwaved, run over, trampled, decapitated, or impaled at some point in each episode. The major cliche line from this series will likely be "Oh my God! They killed Kenny!" (If South Park takes off, this could well become the "He's dead, Jim" of the late nineties.) Fortunately Kenny's body is always carried off by "the rats," and he reappears in perfect health in the next episode. He might be related to Wile E. Coyote.

The four heroes (or anti-heroes, if you prefer) are supported by several interesting characters: Mr. Garrison is their ditzy third grade teacher, whose alter ego is "Mr. Hat", a hand puppet through which Mr. Garrison communicates his rage. Chef (whose voice is provided by Issac Hayes) is the elementary school cafeteria chef, who likes to sing sexually explicit songs to the children. Wendy Testaburger is the bright third grade girl who is also Stan's puppy love interest. The mayor of South Park happens to be a vain, self-serving, clueless woman, who surrounds herself with bootlicking toadies. Uncle Jimbo is Stan's uncle, who possesses an elementary school education and owns the local gun shop. (It's nice to see that the creators of this show avoided cliche character types.)

The Spirit of Creativity

Other than the biting edginess of the humor, the main distinguishing feature of South Park is the animation, which employs a technique similar to claymation, except that clay figures are replaced with construction paper cutout characters. One result of this is that an episode of South Park costs 75% less to produce than a equivalent episode of a classical animated show like "The Simpsons."

South Park is the direct descendent of a 5 minute animated short film produced by Trey Parker and Matt Stone as a "Christmas card" for a Fox network executive back in 1995. The obscenely hilarious "The Spirit of Christmas" featured the four pint sized heroes of South Park, who witness a martial arts battle between Jesus and Santa Claus over the meaning of Christmas. This short film, which even the two young creators were afraid to put their names on because of its controversial nature, became a huge underground success, being dubbed and passed around by thousands of people all around the country.

Inevitably "The Spirit of Christmas" was scanned into computer format, and is widely available on the internet. The Official Distribution Site contains links to many sites which carry the files (as well as many South Park sites). Note that "The Spirit of Christmas" is a very large download. The Quicktime version is a 53 megabyte file.

Comedy Central is showing South Park at 10 PM (Eastern Time) on Wednesday nights. Reruns are showing up at various times late at night. Check your local listings for the showtimes in your area. Six episodes of the program currently exist, with the next new episode scheduled for broadcast around Halloween. A total of thirteen episodes have been ordered for the first season. Comedy Central also maintains an official South Park website.

South Park is most definitely not for everyone, but if you think a combination of The Simpsons and The Blues Brothers would be attractive, South Park is worth watching at least once.