Thunderbirds meets South Park meets the War on Terror

Submitted by Anon on 9 February, 2005 - 6:42

Sacha Ismail reviews Team America: World Police

This is the latest concoction from “South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone. It is, believe it or not, even cruder than the famous TV series. You’ve been warned. If toilet humour and extreme profanity aren’t your thing, don’t see it. It is also less funny and less effective as political satire, so I left feeling rather disappointed.

“South Park” wasn’t as explicitly political as this film is; nonetheless, most episodes included potshots at various right-wing freaks, including anti-semites, gun nuts and the American military. It had a lefty feel to it.

“Team America”, though it has a much more obvious target in US militarism, takes a scattergun approach, targeting everyone from the eponymous warriors on terror to rich liberals who alibi foreign dictators.

Now this could be good, but the problem is that the film doesn’t do this on the basis of a consistent and positive view of the world. Instead, it just attacks everyone, so that by the end you’re left with the feeling that the authors don’t really have an alternative to the war on terror and might be willing to support it after all. Once you’ve got over the initial gimmick (“Look! Puppets doing rude stuff and making fun of George Bush!”), the film is actually quite boring, which is the last thing I expected it to be.

Now, a puppet-film about the Russian revolution: that would rock…

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