Comedy Central’s cult-favorite animated series “South Park” dropped a special Halloween episode on Friday night titled “The Woman in the Hat.” Although it arrived two days late, the episode wasted no time wading into the show’s ongoing political arc — and skewering it in signature fashion.
In the opening act, Stan mirrors what a chunk of longtime fans have been grumbling about online. He complains that the show has become bogged down in “all of this political shit” ever since the recent White House storylines began dominating the plot. His solution? Launch South Park Sucks crypto, naturally, and send Kyle’s famously irritating cousin, Kyle Schwartz, to the White House to beg Donald Trump for protection for the memecoin scheme.
What follows is a characteristically chaotic intersection of politics, paranormal gags and social satire. At the White House, Trump holds a séance led by Attorney General Pam Bondi to rid himself of a mysterious “entity in a hat” haunting him — which turns out to be none other than Melania. She isn’t the only apparition wandering the halls: FCC Chairman Brendan Carr floats through as a mummy, allegedly after “losing his freedom of speech.” The joke references an earlier episode in which Carr suffered a deliberately inflicted injury, sparking online debates about censorship.
This latest installment marks another bump in a season riddled with unusual scheduling changes. Season 28 premiered abruptly, episodes have been shifted repeatedly, and fans have waited weeks between releases. Comedy Central says the biweekly format should stabilize going forward, with new arrivals scheduled for Nov. 12, Nov. 26 and Dec. 10.
The Halloween episode also builds on an ongoing thread from last week, which explored Trump’s deteriorating relationship with his pregnant partner — Satan. Meanwhile, the viral TikTok “6-7” challenge sweeps through South Park Elementary, prompting tech billionaire Peter Thiel to embark on a tongue-in-cheek search for the Antichrist.
Despite complaints from Stan — and some segments of the fanbase — the show remains committed to pushing absurd political satire into surreal places. With three more episodes locked in before the year wraps, audiences can likely expect more mash-ups of internet culture, Beltway chaos and supernatural melodrama.
Whether fans love the new direction or not, one thing remains true: South Park hasn’t run out of ways to rile people up.