‘South Park’ Fans Freak Out Over 22-Year-Old Callback in the Season 27 Trailer
A beloved but nearly disappeared South Park character is coming back to the show after more than two decades away from the series — maybe he’ll finally get a pot pie in Season 27.
Yesterday, the trailer for the longest-ever-awaited South Park season dropped and sent the fandom into a frenzy that only a two-plus-year hiatus can conjure up. When South Park Season 26 concluded in March 2023, fans had no idea that Trey Parker and Matt Stone were going to starve them of South Park episodes in the longest off-season in South Park history, only ever offering up streaming-exclusive specials as appetizers to tide us over during the content drought. Now, with a full 80 seconds of new South Park material to analyze and a release date mercifully on our plates, we can rejoice in the return of South Park and feast on this exciting teaser while we look forward to July 9th.
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As we wait for actual new South Park episodes to finally make it back on the menu, some fans noticed that Parker and Stone are cooking up something classic in one of the frames of the teaser below, as the Season One character Starvin’ Marvin appears in a some kind of spaceship being chased by P. Diddy.
The emaciated Ethiopian child whom the boys named “Starvin’ Marvin” made his debut on South Park during his eponymous Season One episode, in which Marvin gawks at the grotesque wealth of food available to South Park residents right before a horde of mutant turkeys attacks the town. After getting Cartman briefly deported to Ethiopia in his stead, Marvin eventually returns to his home country with a bounty of monstrous turkey corpses for his friends and family to feast upon.
Marvin’s second and most recent starring role in a South Park episode was in the Season Three episode “Starvin’ Marvin in Space,” during which Marvin stumbles upon an alien spaceship that he uses to transport his people to the planet Marklar where they find shelter and sustenance. And, as the above promo suggests, Marvin’s space piloting talents will come into play when the boys come under attack from accused pedophile and sex trafficker P. Diddy later this year.
Marvin made a handful of cameos in South Park episodes and shorts following “Starvin’ Marvin in Space,” but he sadly hasn’t been seen in the main series since 2003. When observant fans noticed Marvin in his spaceship during the Season 27 teaser, they couldn’t believe their eyes. “IS STARVING MARVIN BEING CHASED BY FUCKING DIDDY,” one viral tweet about the trailer reads.
In the South Park subreddit, one of the top posts following the teaser drop exclaimed, “Starvin’ Marvin is back for season 27!”
“With Diddy? Yikes that can’t be good,” a concerned commenter and Marvin Maniac replied.
However, exuberance at seeing an old friend return to the series after such a long absence dominated the discussion about Marvin’s reappearance, as one fan wrote, “Easily the part I’m most excited about is seeing our favorite marklar again. Also I hope they make Diddy wild, like Mel Gibson levels of wild.”
But for as happy as we are to see Marvin again, there are still plenty of reasons to be concerned about his well-being. Besides the fact that Marvin seems to be under attack from most powerful accused pedophiles in show business, he somehow hasn’t put on any more weight in 22 years on Marklar.
