South Park, Season 13, Episode 11: "Whale Whores"

Episode Recap:

Stan gets to go to the Dolphin Experience at the Denver Aquarium for his birthday, but everything is ruined when the Japanese show up and start killing everything in sight. They kill the dolphins, the beluga whales, and the orcas, and Stan's birthday celebration is ruined. Later, the Japanese even show up at a Dolphin's football game and kill the players.

Stan tries to get the boys motivated to fight against the Japanese and save the whales and dolphins, but nobody wants to help. Butters tells Stan about the show "Whale Wars," and Stan decides to join the ship's crew. Unfortunately, the crew are pretty light-weight in their methods, and their only real method of fighting back is throwing stinky butter at the Japanese boats. When the ship's captain is killed, Stan sets the Japanese boat on fire. Soon, Stan is the new star of the show, and the crew is actually fighting back against the Japanese.

The crew appears on Larry King Live, and Stan becomes more and more frustrated that people care more about the show's ratings than they do about the whaling problem. Cartman and Kenny, looking for celebrity status, show up and join Stan's crew. Out on the high seas, they run into the ship from "The Deadliest Catch." The crew from "The Deadliest Catch" is mad because "Whale Wars" is stealing their audience. "The Deadliest Catch" is the least of their problems, though. The Japanese have turned to more drastic measure, specifically kamikaze fighter pilots. After their boat is destroyed, Stan, Cartman, and Kenny are arrested by the Japanese.

The president of Japan explains that the reason why the Japanese hate whales and dolphins is because they believe that the bombing of Hiroshima was carried out by whales and dolphins. The Americans gave the Japanese a doctored photo of the plane that dropped the bomb which shows a whale and dolphin piloting the plane. Stan nearly tells the Japanese the truth, but then he comes up with a better idea. He presents the Japanese president with the "true" photo which shows the plane being piloted by a cow and a chicken. The Japanese leadership howls in rage, and Japanese warriors begin attacking helpless cows and chickens instead of whales and dolphins.



Final Thoughts:

I complained that last week's episode was a bit too generic and didn't feel fresh and unique to this year. Good satire has to be current, and I didn't think that last week's was current enough. "South Park" redeemed itself this week, though, with "Whale Whores." "Whale Whores" was hilarious, shocking in the right ways, and spoke to today's obsession with dangerous reality television such as "The Deadliest Catch" and "Whale Wars." Finally, the World War II tie-in put this episode back on the level that I have come to expect from "South Park." Well done. For those who are unfamiliar with the program "Whale Wars," check out the clip below.