“Thank you, Shake Weight.” – Sharon
“Creme Fraiche” was lazy, lacking in laughs, and just a generally boring season finale.
After the excellent conclusion to the Coon Trilogy, the episode that followed disappointed overall.
Randy has become obsessed with cooking shows, and it’s becoming a burden on the rest of the family. He stays up most nights watching celebrity chefs like Paula Deen and Guy Fieri, and then tries and fails to make their elaborate meals. Oh, also he masturbates to the cooking shows because why not?
Sharon initially becomes concerned that she isn’t attractive enough to earn Randy’s attention so she begins working out with the Shake Weight to improve her health and self-esteem. Eventually, it becomes almost self-aware (just like Skynet), going from praising Sharon for her beautiful soul to becoming needy for more and more workouts.
If you weren’t aware, using the Shake Weight resembles a distinct sexual act and that’s the gist of the joke for twenty minutes. Of course, Saturday Night Live made a funnier observation about this months earlier. And the really sad part is that the Sharon/Shake Weight storyline was the best thing the episode had going for it.
Usually, Randy-centric episodes are among South Park’s best (“The Losing Edge” anyone?), but in a continually disconcerting pattern, the focus was taken off of characterization and actual comedy writing and put towards making fun of reality television stars. This would all be well and good if there were actual, you know, jokes involved, but for the most part people like Gordan Ramsay and Bobby Flay were simply given animated characters with little humor thrown in. The only chef who was parodied with any actual satire was Jamie Oliver (he can’t stop crying about kids eating healthier) and that just wasn’t funny.
But at any rate, Randy’s obsession leads to a cooking showdown between him and the entire Food Network roster. When he’s about to put the finishing touches on his dish, he notices that he left his crème fraîche at home.
He rushes back to try and find it and Sharon confronts him about their struggling marriage. When Randy mentions that his cooking addiction has kept him up all hours of the night, she uses her newly formed Shake Weight ability to “tire him out.” Fully satisfied, Randy falls asleep, realizing that compared to a good “old-fashioned” (I’ve definitely never heard that phrase before), cooking is lame.
And just like that, the 14th season of South Park comes to an end.
Some stats and info about South Park, “Crème Fraîche”
TV SHOW – South Park
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 14, Episode 14
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – Comedy Central
GENRE – Comedy, Animated Shows
CREATED BY – Trey Parker, Matt Stone
This review was originally published on TV Geek Army.