Mecha-Streisand
Encyclopedia
"Mecha-Streisand" is the 12th episode of the first season
of the animated television series South Park
. It originally aired on Comedy Central
in the United States on February 18, 1998. In the episode, Barbra Streisand
obtains the Diamond of Panthios from the South Park boys and transforms into a giant mechanical dinosaur called Mecha-Streisand. She is ultimately defeated by The Cure
frontman Robert Smith
, who himself transforms into a giant moth monster.
The episode was written by series co-creators Trey Parker
and Matt Stone
along with writer Philip Stark
, and was directed by Parker. "Mecha-Streisand" was a parody of the Japan
ese Godzilla monster movie franchise, with Streisand resembling Mechagodzilla
and Smith resembling Mothra
. Actor Sidney Poitier
and film critic Leonard Maltin
also appear as giant creatures resembling Gamera
and Ultraman
, respectively.
According to Nielsen ratings
, "Mecha-Streisand" was seen by 5.4 million viewers, a record high viewership for a South Park episode at the time. Barbra Streisand was critical of the series and her role in "Mecha-Streisand", although Leonard Maltin complimented his portrayal.
discovers a mysterious stone triangle, which he promptly throws away in disinterest. Shortly after Kyle
picks it up, the archeologist guide identifies the writing on the triangle as Anasazi. Kyle appears on television to discuss the find, making a jealous Cartman want the triangle back. Cartman constantly pesters Kyle until he returns the triangle to him. Meanwhile, Leonard Maltin
comes to South Park and asks Chef
whether he has seen Barbra Streisand
. Maltin, who saw Kyle and the triangle on television, tells Chef the boys are in great danger.
Later, Streisand finds the boys at the bus stop and demands the "Triangle of Zinthar", and gets aggravated when they reject her. As they search for Streisand, Maltin tells Chef she is seeking the triangle to complete the ancient relic, the "Diamond of Pantheos", which will allow her to become an evil and dangerous creature that could conquer the world. Later, Streisand dons a disguise and visits the boys again, offering them a monetary reward for the triangle. Stan
, Kenny
and Kyle are suspicious, but Cartman insists they go along for the money. Streisand takes them to her condo in the mountains, where she chains the boys up and tortures them with her singing voice. Cartman relents and gives up the triangle, which he had hidden in his shoe.
Streisand combines the triangle with the diamond, transforming herself into a giant mechanical dinosaur called Mecha-Streisand, and begins to completely destroy South Park. Maltin and Chef arrive to free the boys, and Maltin asks the boys to call The Cure
lead singer Robert Smith
for help. Maltin then transforms into a giant robot and battles Mecha-Streisand, but he is quickly defeated. The boys evade fiery debris from the fight, but Kenny is killed when he stops to play tetherball
and gets strangled by the rope. Actor Sidney Poitier
arrives and turns into a giant turtle with fangs to fight Mecha-Striesand, but he too is easily defeated. After getting a call from the boys, Robert Smith arrives and transforms into a giant moth. After a great battle, Smith punches the Diamond of Pantheos away from Mecha-Streisand, who explodes and dies. The boys split the diamond again to try to prevent anyone else from getting the power, but the episode ends with the boys cowering in the presence of a giant Ike.
and Matt Stone
, along with writer Philip Stark
, and was directed by Parker. "Mecha-Streisand" first aired on Comedy Central
in the United States on February 18, 1998. Robert Smith, lead vocalist and guitarist for the English rock band The Cure, makes a guest appearance as himself, marking only the second time a celebrity guest played a major role in an episode, after Natasha Henstridge
in "Tom's Rhinoplasty
". Following the success of "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo", a large number of celebrities started contacting Comedy Central with the hopes of making guest appearances in South Park episodes, allowing Parker and Stone to practically take their pick of guest stars. Parker, a fan of The Cure, said it was his life-long dream to meet Smith, and he was one of the few celebrities Parker specifically requested to make an appearance. Smith performed all of his lines via telephone and Parker used the first reading of each line, even though they were executed in a very dead-pan voice.
When Parker and Stone made fun of celebrities in previous South Park episodes, they were chosen at random; however, they chose to mock Barbra Streisand based on a strong distaste for the actress. Part of the reason they disliked her was that after Colorado passed Amendment 2
, an amendment to the Colorado state constitution forbidding homosexuals from being recognized as a protected class, Streisand made a public statement speaking out against the state and all its citizens, promising she would never visit Colorado again. Parker said he also finds her singing voice annoying, which inspired the scene with Streisand torturing the boys by singing to them. The duo tried to make Streisand's portrayal as "sick and disgusting as possible" in "Mecha-Streisand". Mary Kay Bergman
, a voice artist who had done most of the female voices on South Park, portrayed Barbra Streisand in the episode.
South Park animators created the episode using PowerAnimator
, the Alias Systems Corporation
animation program most commonly known as "Alias". Eric Stough
, director of animation for the series, said "Mecha-Streisand" was slightly more challenging to animate than other first season episodes due to the laser beam-type effects featured in the final monster fight, which were specifically designed to resemble a low-budget monster movie with poor graphics. The scenes with an instructional guide taking the kids on a fossil hunt were based on real-life arrowhead
-digging excursions Parker and Stone went on in Red Rocks Park
during their childhood in Colorado. During a scene with Chef and Leonard Maltin driving in a car, actual video photoage of Colorado roads are visible through the back window of the car. The footage was shot by a friend of Parker and Stone and used because the animators did not yet know how to create road in perspective
.
ese Godzilla monster movie franchise. Parker and Stone watched many Godzilla
films during their childhoods, and Parker said he knew from the beginning of South Park that he would base an episode around the films. Streisand is based on Mechagodzilla
, the mechanical doppelgänger
of the Godzilla monster. Smith is based on Mothra
, the giant moth
-like monster from the 1961 film Mothra
, which Parker described as his favorite of the Japanese monster films. The scene in which six-inch-tall twins appear and ask actor Sidney Poitier to fight Mecha-Streisand are based on similar scenes and characters from the Mothra film. Poitier portrays a monster similar to Gamera
, a flying turtle monster, and film critic Leonard Maltin transforms into a superhero resembling that of Japanese television character Ultraman
. During the fights sequence, Stan shouts for Smith to "use robot punch", a line frequently used in Ultraman television shows.
When the monsters battle each other at the end of the episode, a Japanese man sings songs about each of the monsters while they approach. This mirrors a common element throughout actual Japanese monster movies, which commonly frequent theme songs for the monster characters. Parker wrote the songs in Japanese language
. The English translation for the lyrics sung when Robert Smith transforms translates are, "I really like Robert Smith", and the lyrics sung about Mecha-Streisand translate, "Barbra, Barbra, she's a bitch, Barbra". When Streisand becomes Mecha-Streisand, the line was written in Japanese, "From this moment on, I am Mecha-Streisand!", but Parker said Bergman misread some of the words so the on-air translation was imperfect. Before Leonard Maltin transforms, he screams in Japanese, "Listen, listen, here's a tulip", which Parker said is a phrase Japanese children say before passing gas
.
During the fight scene, a number of skyscrapers are shown getting destroyed. Parker, who acknowledged the buildings were never featured in any other South Park episode, said they were modeled after real-life skyscrapers in Denver and included in "Mecha-Streisand" only so they could get destroyed during the monster fight, a frequent element of battles in real Japanese monster films. Musical elements from the Hanna-Barbera
cartoon Super Friends
is also featured during the battle. Actress Sally Struthers
, who was previously lampooned in the South Park episode "Starvin' Marvin
", is briefly seen during a scene in "Mecha-Streisand", in which she is filming a movie scene with Poitier. Kyle tells Robert Smith, "Disintegration is the best album ever". The line was based on Parker's own enthusiasm for The Cure's 1989 album, Disintegration, and Robert Smith himself would go on to say in an interview that the line was his "happiest moment". As Smith walks into the sunset, a version of The Cure's "Lovesong", featured on Disintegration, is played on the Japanese Lute (Biwa
). Officer Barbrady makes a reference to singer-songwriter Fiona Apple
with the line, "Well, you ain't Fiona Apple, and if you ain't Fiona Apple, I don't give a rat's ass."
In its original American broadcast on February 18, 1998, "Mecha-Streisand" received a 6.9 Nielsen rating
, translating to 5.4 million viewers in 3.2 million households. At the time, it was a record high viewership for a South Park episode, breaking the record that was set earlier that month by "Damien".
Parker and Stone were very happy with the episode, but received feedback from fans that it was one of the weaker episodes of the first season, and that the constant jokes about Barbra Streisand started to grow redundant. Many fans also did not like Kenny's tether ball accident death scene because it had nothing to do with the plot of the episode, which Parker and Stone said was supposed to be the joke.
Streisand herself took a negative view of her portrayal, stating in a Mirabella
interview, "I enjoy satire and parody, [but] I wonder if shows like South Park and Beavis and Butt-head
don't add to the cynicism and negativity in our culture, especially in children." Parker and Stone created the second season
episode "Spookyfish
" in response, where they took a picture of Barbra's head and placed the image into all 4 corners of the screen and called it "Spooky-vision".
Leonard Maltin complimented "Mecha-Streisand", and told Parker and Stone his children particularly enjoyed his portrayal in the episode.
"Mecha-Streisand" was released, along with 11 other episodes, in a three-disc DVD
set in November 1998. It was included in the third volume, which also included the episodes "Starvin' Marvin
", "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo" and "Tom's Rhinoplasty". "Mecha-Streisand", along with the other twelve episodes from the first season, was also included in the DVD release "South Park: The Complete First Season", which was released on November 12, 2002. Parker and Stone recorded commentary tracks for each episode, but they were not included with the DVDs due to "standards" issues with some of the statements; Parker and Stone refused to allow the tracks to be edited and censored, so they were released in a CD separate from the DVDs. In 2008, Parker and Stone made "Mecha-Streisand" and all South Park episodes available to watch for free on the show's official website, "South Park Studios".
The episode was revisited twelve years later in the Season 14 episode "200
", featuring a new design of Mecha-Streisand, which includes a chainsaw where her right hand would be, what appear to be missile launchers and missile packs on her hips and shoulders, respectively, and steam that emits from her nipples. During the duet with Neil Diamond, Mecha-Streisand lets out a green cloud from her groin that seems to disgust the people of South Park. The original Japanese theme song for the creature also plays in the episode. The Mecha-Streisand featured in "200" is designed with more sophisticated computer imagery than the original, as the animation quality of the series has improved over the years in general.
South Park (season 1)
The first season of the American animated television series South Park initially ran for 13 episodes on the US network Comedy Central, from August 13, 1997 to February 25, 1998. The creators of the series, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, wrote and directed most of the season's episodes, while Dan...
of the animated television series South Park
South Park
South Park is an American animated television series created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central television network. Intended for mature audiences, the show has become famous for its crude language, surreal, satirical, and dark humor that lampoons a wide range of topics...
. It originally aired on Comedy Central
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American cable television and satellite television channel that carries comedy programming, both original and syndicated....
in the United States on February 18, 1998. In the episode, Barbra Streisand
Barbra Streisand
Barbra Joan Streisand is an American singer, actress, film producer and director. She has won two Academy Awards, eight Grammy Awards, four Emmy Awards, a Special Tony Award, an American Film Institute award, a Peabody Award, and is one of the few entertainers who have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy,...
obtains the Diamond of Panthios from the South Park boys and transforms into a giant mechanical dinosaur called Mecha-Streisand. She is ultimately defeated by The Cure
The Cure
The Cure are an English rock band formed in Crawley, West Sussex in 1976. The band has experienced several line-up changes, with frontman, vocalist, guitarist and principal songwriter Robert Smith being the only constant member...
frontman Robert Smith
Robert Smith (musician)
Robert James Smith is an English musician. He is the lead singer, guitar player and principal songwriter of the rock band The Cure, and its only constant member since its founding in 1976...
, who himself transforms into a giant moth monster.
The episode was written by series co-creators Trey Parker
Trey Parker
Trey Parker is an American animator, screenwriter, director, producer, voice artist, musician and actor, best known for being the co-creator of the television series South Park along with his creative partner and best friend Matt Stone.Parker started his film career in 1992, making a holiday short...
and Matt Stone
Matt Stone
Matthew Richard "Matt" Stone is an American screenwriter, producer, voice artist, musician and actor, best known for being the co-creator of South Park along with creative partner and best friend, Trey Parker....
along with writer Philip Stark
Philip Stark
Philip Stark is an American television and film screenwriter. A native of Houston, Texas, Stark graduated with a degree in Radio-Television-Film from The University of Texas at Austin in 1995....
, and was directed by Parker. "Mecha-Streisand" was a parody of the Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese Godzilla monster movie franchise, with Streisand resembling Mechagodzilla
Mechagodzilla
is a fictional character from various films in the Godzilla series, introduced in Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla . He is Godzilla's mechanical doppelgänger and one of the most popular Toho kaiju...
and Smith resembling Mothra
Mothra
is a kaiju, a type of fictional monster who first appeared in the serialized novel The Luminous Fairies and Mothra by Takehiko Fukunaga, Shinichiro Nakamura, and Yoshie Hotta...
. Actor Sidney Poitier
Sidney Poitier
Sir Sidney Poitier, KBE is a Bahamian American actor, film director, author, and diplomat.In 1963, Poitier became the first black person to win an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in Lilies of the Field...
and film critic Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin is an American film and animated film critic and historian, author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives.-Personal life:...
also appear as giant creatures resembling Gamera
Gamera
is a giant, flying turtle from a popular series of kaiju films produced by Daiei Motion Picture Company in Japan. Created in 1965 to rival the success of Toho Studios' Godzilla during the daikaiju boom of the mid-to-late 1960s, Gamera has gained fame and notoriety as a Japanese icon in his own...
and Ultraman
Ultraman
is Japanese television series that first aired in 1966. Ultraman, the first and best-known of the "Ultra-Crusaders," made his debut in the tokusatsu SF/kaiju/superhero TV series, , a follow-up to the television series Ultra Q...
, respectively.
According to Nielsen ratings
Nielsen Ratings
Nielsen ratings are the audience measurement systems developed by Nielsen Media Research, in an effort to determine the audience size and composition of television programming in the United States...
, "Mecha-Streisand" was seen by 5.4 million viewers, a record high viewership for a South Park episode at the time. Barbra Streisand was critical of the series and her role in "Mecha-Streisand", although Leonard Maltin complimented his portrayal.
Plot
During an archeological dig, CartmanEric Cartman
Eric Theodore Cartman is a fictional character in the American animated television series South Park. One of four main characters, along with Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, and Kenny McCormick, he is generally referred to within the series by his last name...
discovers a mysterious stone triangle, which he promptly throws away in disinterest. Shortly after Kyle
Kyle Broflovski
Kyle Broflovski is a fictional character in the animated television series South Park. He is voiced by co-creator Matt Stone. Kyle is one of the show's four central characters, along with his friends Stan Marsh, Kenny McCormick, and Eric Cartman...
picks it up, the archeologist guide identifies the writing on the triangle as Anasazi. Kyle appears on television to discuss the find, making a jealous Cartman want the triangle back. Cartman constantly pesters Kyle until he returns the triangle to him. Meanwhile, Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin is an American film and animated film critic and historian, author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives.-Personal life:...
comes to South Park and asks Chef
Chef (South Park)
Jerome "Chef" McElroy is a fictional character on the Comedy Central series South Park. He was voiced by Isaac Hayes. A cafeteria worker at the local elementary school in the town of South Park, Colorado, Chef was generally portrayed as more level-headed than the other adult residents of the town...
whether he has seen Barbra Streisand
Barbra Streisand
Barbra Joan Streisand is an American singer, actress, film producer and director. She has won two Academy Awards, eight Grammy Awards, four Emmy Awards, a Special Tony Award, an American Film Institute award, a Peabody Award, and is one of the few entertainers who have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy,...
. Maltin, who saw Kyle and the triangle on television, tells Chef the boys are in great danger.
Later, Streisand finds the boys at the bus stop and demands the "Triangle of Zinthar", and gets aggravated when they reject her. As they search for Streisand, Maltin tells Chef she is seeking the triangle to complete the ancient relic, the "Diamond of Pantheos", which will allow her to become an evil and dangerous creature that could conquer the world. Later, Streisand dons a disguise and visits the boys again, offering them a monetary reward for the triangle. Stan
Stan Marsh
Stanley Randall "Stan" Marsh is a fictional character in the animated television series South Park. He is voiced by and loosely based on series co-creator Trey Parker. Stan is one of the show's four central characters, along with his friends Kyle Broflovski, Kenny McCormick, and Eric Cartman...
, Kenny
Kenny McCormick
Kenneth "Kenny" McCormick is a fictional character in the animated television series South Park. He is one of the four central characters along with his friends Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, and Eric Cartman. His oft-muffled and indiscernible speech—the result of his parka hood covering his...
and Kyle are suspicious, but Cartman insists they go along for the money. Streisand takes them to her condo in the mountains, where she chains the boys up and tortures them with her singing voice. Cartman relents and gives up the triangle, which he had hidden in his shoe.
Streisand combines the triangle with the diamond, transforming herself into a giant mechanical dinosaur called Mecha-Streisand, and begins to completely destroy South Park. Maltin and Chef arrive to free the boys, and Maltin asks the boys to call The Cure
The Cure
The Cure are an English rock band formed in Crawley, West Sussex in 1976. The band has experienced several line-up changes, with frontman, vocalist, guitarist and principal songwriter Robert Smith being the only constant member...
lead singer Robert Smith
Robert Smith (musician)
Robert James Smith is an English musician. He is the lead singer, guitar player and principal songwriter of the rock band The Cure, and its only constant member since its founding in 1976...
for help. Maltin then transforms into a giant robot and battles Mecha-Streisand, but he is quickly defeated. The boys evade fiery debris from the fight, but Kenny is killed when he stops to play tetherball
Tetherball
Tetherball is a North American game for two opposing players. The equipment consists of a stationary metal pole, from which is hung a volleyball from a rope, or tether. The two players stand on opposite sides of the pole. Each player tries to hit the ball one way; one clockwise, and one...
and gets strangled by the rope. Actor Sidney Poitier
Sidney Poitier
Sir Sidney Poitier, KBE is a Bahamian American actor, film director, author, and diplomat.In 1963, Poitier became the first black person to win an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in Lilies of the Field...
arrives and turns into a giant turtle with fangs to fight Mecha-Striesand, but he too is easily defeated. After getting a call from the boys, Robert Smith arrives and transforms into a giant moth. After a great battle, Smith punches the Diamond of Pantheos away from Mecha-Streisand, who explodes and dies. The boys split the diamond again to try to prevent anyone else from getting the power, but the episode ends with the boys cowering in the presence of a giant Ike.
Production
"Mecha-Streisand" was written by series co-founders Trey ParkerTrey Parker
Trey Parker is an American animator, screenwriter, director, producer, voice artist, musician and actor, best known for being the co-creator of the television series South Park along with his creative partner and best friend Matt Stone.Parker started his film career in 1992, making a holiday short...
and Matt Stone
Matt Stone
Matthew Richard "Matt" Stone is an American screenwriter, producer, voice artist, musician and actor, best known for being the co-creator of South Park along with creative partner and best friend, Trey Parker....
, along with writer Philip Stark
Philip Stark
Philip Stark is an American television and film screenwriter. A native of Houston, Texas, Stark graduated with a degree in Radio-Television-Film from The University of Texas at Austin in 1995....
, and was directed by Parker. "Mecha-Streisand" first aired on Comedy Central
Comedy Central
Comedy Central is an American cable television and satellite television channel that carries comedy programming, both original and syndicated....
in the United States on February 18, 1998. Robert Smith, lead vocalist and guitarist for the English rock band The Cure, makes a guest appearance as himself, marking only the second time a celebrity guest played a major role in an episode, after Natasha Henstridge
Natasha Henstridge
Natasha T. Henstridge is a Canadian fashion model turned actress. Her most notable on-screen roles include Species, The Whole Nine Yards, It Had To Be You, Ghosts of Mars, She Spies, the TV series Eli Stone, and the Canadian TV mini-series Would Be Kings, for which she won the Gemini Award for...
in "Tom's Rhinoplasty
Tom's Rhinoplasty
"Tom's Rhinoplasty" is the eleventh episode of the first season of the animated television series South Park. It originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on February 11, 1998. In the episode, the South Park Elementary boys become infatuated with the new substitute teacher Ms. Ellen,...
". Following the success of "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo", a large number of celebrities started contacting Comedy Central with the hopes of making guest appearances in South Park episodes, allowing Parker and Stone to practically take their pick of guest stars. Parker, a fan of The Cure, said it was his life-long dream to meet Smith, and he was one of the few celebrities Parker specifically requested to make an appearance. Smith performed all of his lines via telephone and Parker used the first reading of each line, even though they were executed in a very dead-pan voice.
When Parker and Stone made fun of celebrities in previous South Park episodes, they were chosen at random; however, they chose to mock Barbra Streisand based on a strong distaste for the actress. Part of the reason they disliked her was that after Colorado passed Amendment 2
Romer v. Evans
Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620 , is a landmark United States Supreme Court case dealing with civil rights and state laws. It was the first Supreme Court case to deal with LGBT rights since Bowers v...
, an amendment to the Colorado state constitution forbidding homosexuals from being recognized as a protected class, Streisand made a public statement speaking out against the state and all its citizens, promising she would never visit Colorado again. Parker said he also finds her singing voice annoying, which inspired the scene with Streisand torturing the boys by singing to them. The duo tried to make Streisand's portrayal as "sick and disgusting as possible" in "Mecha-Streisand". Mary Kay Bergman
Mary Kay Bergman
Mary Kay Bergman was an American voice actress and animation voice over teacher, who was the lead female voice actress on South Park from the show's 1997 debut until her death and was best known as the official voice of Snow White for the Walt Disney Company starting in 1989 with the Snow White...
, a voice artist who had done most of the female voices on South Park, portrayed Barbra Streisand in the episode.
South Park animators created the episode using PowerAnimator
PowerAnimator
PowerAnimator and Animator, also referred to simply as "Alias", the precursor to what is now Maya and StudioTools, was a highly-integrated industrial 3D modeling, animation, and visual effects suite. It has had a long track record, starting with Terminator 2: Judgment Day in 1991 and ending in Star...
, the Alias Systems Corporation
Alias Systems Corporation
Alias Systems Corporation , headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, was a software company that produced high-end 3D graphics software. The company was formed in 1995 when Silicon Graphics bought Alias Research, which was founded in 1983, and Wavefront Technologies, founded in 1984, then merged...
animation program most commonly known as "Alias". Eric Stough
Eric Stough
Eric Stough is the animation director and producer of the Emmy and Peabody Award-winning television series South Park. He was also the animation director of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut and has worked with Parker and Stone on Orgazmo, Team America: World Police and the Broadway hit The Book...
, director of animation for the series, said "Mecha-Streisand" was slightly more challenging to animate than other first season episodes due to the laser beam-type effects featured in the final monster fight, which were specifically designed to resemble a low-budget monster movie with poor graphics. The scenes with an instructional guide taking the kids on a fossil hunt were based on real-life arrowhead
Arrowhead
An arrowhead is a tip, usually sharpened, added to an arrow to make it more deadly or to fulfill some special purpose. Historically arrowheads were made of stone and of organic materials; as human civilization progressed other materials were used...
-digging excursions Parker and Stone went on in Red Rocks Park
Red Rocks Park
Red Rocks Park is a mountain park in Jefferson County, Colorado, owned and maintained by the city of Denver as part of the Denver Mountain Parks system. The park is known for its very large red sandstone outcrops. Many of these rock formations within the park have names, from the mushroom-shaped...
during their childhood in Colorado. During a scene with Chef and Leonard Maltin driving in a car, actual video photoage of Colorado roads are visible through the back window of the car. The footage was shot by a friend of Parker and Stone and used because the animators did not yet know how to create road in perspective
Perspective (graphical)
Perspective in the graphic arts, such as drawing, is an approximate representation, on a flat surface , of an image as it is seen by the eye...
.
Cultural references
"Mecha-Streisand" is a parody of the JapanJapan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese Godzilla monster movie franchise. Parker and Stone watched many Godzilla
Godzilla
is a daikaijū, a Japanese movie monster, first appearing in Ishirō Honda's 1954 film Godzilla. Since then, Godzilla has gone on to become a worldwide pop culture icon starring in 28 films produced by Toho Co., Ltd. The monster has appeared in numerous other media incarnations including video games,...
films during their childhoods, and Parker said he knew from the beginning of South Park that he would base an episode around the films. Streisand is based on Mechagodzilla
Mechagodzilla
is a fictional character from various films in the Godzilla series, introduced in Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla . He is Godzilla's mechanical doppelgänger and one of the most popular Toho kaiju...
, the mechanical doppelgänger
Doppelgänger
In fiction and folklore, a doppelgänger is a paranormal double of a living person, typically representing evil or misfortune...
of the Godzilla monster. Smith is based on Mothra
Mothra
is a kaiju, a type of fictional monster who first appeared in the serialized novel The Luminous Fairies and Mothra by Takehiko Fukunaga, Shinichiro Nakamura, and Yoshie Hotta...
, the giant moth
Moth
A moth is an insect closely related to the butterfly, both being of the order Lepidoptera. Moths form the majority of this order; there are thought to be 150,000 to 250,000 different species of moth , with thousands of species yet to be described...
-like monster from the 1961 film Mothra
Mothra (film)
is a 1961 Kaiju film from Toho Studios, directed by genre regular Ishirō Honda with special effects by Eiji Tsuburaya. It is the kaiju eiga debut of screenwriter Shinichi Sekizawa, whose approach to the genre grew to prominence during the 1960s...
, which Parker described as his favorite of the Japanese monster films. The scene in which six-inch-tall twins appear and ask actor Sidney Poitier to fight Mecha-Streisand are based on similar scenes and characters from the Mothra film. Poitier portrays a monster similar to Gamera
Gamera
is a giant, flying turtle from a popular series of kaiju films produced by Daiei Motion Picture Company in Japan. Created in 1965 to rival the success of Toho Studios' Godzilla during the daikaiju boom of the mid-to-late 1960s, Gamera has gained fame and notoriety as a Japanese icon in his own...
, a flying turtle monster, and film critic Leonard Maltin transforms into a superhero resembling that of Japanese television character Ultraman
Ultraman
is Japanese television series that first aired in 1966. Ultraman, the first and best-known of the "Ultra-Crusaders," made his debut in the tokusatsu SF/kaiju/superhero TV series, , a follow-up to the television series Ultra Q...
. During the fights sequence, Stan shouts for Smith to "use robot punch", a line frequently used in Ultraman television shows.
When the monsters battle each other at the end of the episode, a Japanese man sings songs about each of the monsters while they approach. This mirrors a common element throughout actual Japanese monster movies, which commonly frequent theme songs for the monster characters. Parker wrote the songs in Japanese language
Japanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...
. The English translation for the lyrics sung when Robert Smith transforms translates are, "I really like Robert Smith", and the lyrics sung about Mecha-Streisand translate, "Barbra, Barbra, she's a bitch, Barbra". When Streisand becomes Mecha-Streisand, the line was written in Japanese, "From this moment on, I am Mecha-Streisand!", but Parker said Bergman misread some of the words so the on-air translation was imperfect. Before Leonard Maltin transforms, he screams in Japanese, "Listen, listen, here's a tulip", which Parker said is a phrase Japanese children say before passing gas
Flatulence
Flatulence is the expulsion through the rectum of a mixture of gases that are byproducts of the digestion process of mammals and other animals. The medical term for the mixture of gases is flatus, informally known as a fart, or simply gas...
.
During the fight scene, a number of skyscrapers are shown getting destroyed. Parker, who acknowledged the buildings were never featured in any other South Park episode, said they were modeled after real-life skyscrapers in Denver and included in "Mecha-Streisand" only so they could get destroyed during the monster fight, a frequent element of battles in real Japanese monster films. Musical elements from the Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. was an American animation studio that dominated North American television animation during the second half of the 20th century...
cartoon Super Friends
Super Friends
Super Friends is an American animated television series about a team of superheroes, which ran from 1973 to 1986 on ABC as part of its Saturday morning cartoon lineup...
is also featured during the battle. Actress Sally Struthers
Sally Struthers
Sally Ann Struthers is an American actress and spokeswoman, best-known for her roles as Gloria Stivic on All in the Family, for which she won two Emmy awards, and as Babette on Gilmore Girls.-Personal life:...
, who was previously lampooned in the South Park episode "Starvin' Marvin
Starvin' Marvin (South Park)
"Starvin' Marvin" is the ninth episode of the first season of the American animated television series South Park. It first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on November 19, 1997. In the episode, Cartman, Kenny, Kyle and Stan send money to an African charity hoping to get a sports watch,...
", is briefly seen during a scene in "Mecha-Streisand", in which she is filming a movie scene with Poitier. Kyle tells Robert Smith, "Disintegration is the best album ever". The line was based on Parker's own enthusiasm for The Cure's 1989 album, Disintegration, and Robert Smith himself would go on to say in an interview that the line was his "happiest moment". As Smith walks into the sunset, a version of The Cure's "Lovesong", featured on Disintegration, is played on the Japanese Lute (Biwa
Biwa
The is a Japanese short-necked fretted lute, often used in narrative storytelling. The biwa is the chosen instrument of Benten, goddess of music, eloquence, poetry, and education in Japanese Shinto....
). Officer Barbrady makes a reference to singer-songwriter Fiona Apple
Fiona Apple
Fiona Apple McAfee Maggart is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. Apple met international acclaim for her 1996 debut album, Tidal, which was a critical and commercial success...
with the line, "Well, you ain't Fiona Apple, and if you ain't Fiona Apple, I don't give a rat's ass."
Reception and release
Nielsen Ratings
Nielsen ratings are the audience measurement systems developed by Nielsen Media Research, in an effort to determine the audience size and composition of television programming in the United States...
, translating to 5.4 million viewers in 3.2 million households. At the time, it was a record high viewership for a South Park episode, breaking the record that was set earlier that month by "Damien".
Parker and Stone were very happy with the episode, but received feedback from fans that it was one of the weaker episodes of the first season, and that the constant jokes about Barbra Streisand started to grow redundant. Many fans also did not like Kenny's tether ball accident death scene because it had nothing to do with the plot of the episode, which Parker and Stone said was supposed to be the joke.
Streisand herself took a negative view of her portrayal, stating in a Mirabella
Mirabella
Mirabella was a women's magazine published from 1989 to 2000. It was created by and named for Grace Mirabella, a former Vogue editor in chief....
interview, "I enjoy satire and parody, [but] I wonder if shows like South Park and Beavis and Butt-head
Beavis and Butt-Head
Beavis and Butt-head is an American animated television series created by Mike Judge. The series originated from Frog Baseball, a 1992 short film by Judge. After seeing the short, MTV signed Judge to develop the concept. Beavis and Butt-head originally aired from March 8, 1993 to November 28, 1997...
don't add to the cynicism and negativity in our culture, especially in children." Parker and Stone created the second season
South Park (season 2)
Season two of South Park, an American animated television series created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, began airing on April 1, 1998. The second season concluded after 18 episodes on January 20, 1999...
episode "Spookyfish
Spookyfish
"Spookyfish" is the fifteenth episode of the second season of the animated television series South Park, and the 28th episode of the series overall. "Spookyfish" originally aired in the United States on October 28, 1998 on Comedy Central...
" in response, where they took a picture of Barbra's head and placed the image into all 4 corners of the screen and called it "Spooky-vision".
Leonard Maltin complimented "Mecha-Streisand", and told Parker and Stone his children particularly enjoyed his portrayal in the episode.
"Mecha-Streisand" was released, along with 11 other episodes, in a three-disc DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
set in November 1998. It was included in the third volume, which also included the episodes "Starvin' Marvin
Starvin' Marvin (South Park)
"Starvin' Marvin" is the ninth episode of the first season of the American animated television series South Park. It first aired on Comedy Central in the United States on November 19, 1997. In the episode, Cartman, Kenny, Kyle and Stan send money to an African charity hoping to get a sports watch,...
", "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo" and "Tom's Rhinoplasty". "Mecha-Streisand", along with the other twelve episodes from the first season, was also included in the DVD release "South Park: The Complete First Season", which was released on November 12, 2002. Parker and Stone recorded commentary tracks for each episode, but they were not included with the DVDs due to "standards" issues with some of the statements; Parker and Stone refused to allow the tracks to be edited and censored, so they were released in a CD separate from the DVDs. In 2008, Parker and Stone made "Mecha-Streisand" and all South Park episodes available to watch for free on the show's official website, "South Park Studios".
The episode was revisited twelve years later in the Season 14 episode "200
200 (South Park)
"200" is the fifth episode of the fourteenth season of South Park, and the 200th overall episode of the series. It originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on April 14, 2010...
", featuring a new design of Mecha-Streisand, which includes a chainsaw where her right hand would be, what appear to be missile launchers and missile packs on her hips and shoulders, respectively, and steam that emits from her nipples. During the duet with Neil Diamond, Mecha-Streisand lets out a green cloud from her groin that seems to disgust the people of South Park. The original Japanese theme song for the creature also plays in the episode. The Mecha-Streisand featured in "200" is designed with more sophisticated computer imagery than the original, as the animation quality of the series has improved over the years in general.
External links
- "Mecha-Streisand" Full Episode at South Park Studios
- "Mecha-Streisand" Episode Guide at South Park Studios