Cartoon attacks Hayes and Scientology

South Park has got its own back on former star Isaac Hayes by turning his character Chef into a paedophile and brutally killing him off.

The soul singer recently quit the show complaining that its ridicule of religion had gone to far – although creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker said it was only when Hayes’s own Scientology beliefs were mocked that he took the moral high ground.

And when the 10th series launched in the US last night, the animators go their own back, with thinly-veiled attacked on the movement.

In the first episode, Chef is brainwashed by the ‘Super Adventure Club’ – described as ‘that fruity little club for scrambling his brains’.

And after the experience, he repeatedly tells the South Park children he wants to ‘make sweet love’ to them.

Hayes’s part was patched together from lines taken out of context from previous shows.

The children take him to a strip club to rekindle his love for women, but he ends up being brainwashed again.

Finally, he meets a sticky end by falling off a bridge and being burned, stabbed and mauled by a lion and a bear.

During the eulogy at his funeral, the children say:  ‘A lot of us don't agree with the choices the Chef has made in the last few days. We shouldn't be mad at Chef for leaving us. We should be mad at that fruity little club for scrambling his brains.’

When Hayes announced he has quit the show, he criticized its ‘intolerance and bigotry toward religious beliefs.

But Stone said: ‘In 10 years and over 150 episodes of South Park, Isaac never had a problem with the show making fun of Christians, Muslim, Mormons or Jews. He got a sudden case of religious sensitivity when it was his religion featured on the show.’

 

Published: 23 Mar 2006