List of South Park characters


South Park is an American adult animated television sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central television network. The ongoing narrative revolves around four boys, Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Kenny McCormick, and Eric Cartman and their bizarre adventures in and around the fictional Colorado town of South Park. The town is also home to an assortment of characters who make frequent appearances in the show, such as students and their family members, elementary school staff, and recurring characters.
Stan Marsh is portrayed as the everyman of the group, as the show's official website describes him as "a normal, average, American, mixed-up kid." Kyle is the lone Jew among the group, and his portrayal in this role is often dealt with satirically. Stan and Kyle are best friends, and their relationship, which is intended to reflect the real-life friendship between South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, is a common topic throughout the series. Cartman—loud, obnoxious, and obese—is sometimes portrayed as the series' antihero and his antisemitic attitude has resulted in an ever-progressing rivalry with Kyle. Kenny, who comes from a poor family, wears his parka hood so tightly that it covers most of his face and muffles his speech. During the show's first five seasons, Kenny died in almost every single episode before returning in the next without explanation.
Stone and Parker perform the voices of most of the male South Park characters. Mary Kay Bergman voiced the majority of the female characters until her death in 1999. Eliza Schneider, Mona Marshall, April Stewart, and Kimberly Brooks have voiced most of the female characters since. A few staff members such as Jennifer Howell, Vernon Chatman, John Hansen, and Adrien Beard have voiced other recurring characters.

Creation and inception

Following the success of the 1995 short Jesus vs. Santa, creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone conceived a plan to create a television series based on the short, with four children characters as the main stars. The series was originally set up at 20th Century Fox Television for its primetime premiere on FOX, which previously commissioned Parker and Stone to develop the short. However, FOX was not pleased with the show's inclusion of Mr. Hankey, a talking poo character, and felt it wouldn't bode well with viewers. The network's executives also said that placing kids as the stars could not be as funny and popular as it would with the grown-ups and families, like The Simpsons and King of the Hill.
As a result, Parker and Stone broke off relations with FOX and took the series somewhere else. They pitched the series to MTV and Comedy Central, and decided it was best suited for the latter, fearing the former could turn it to a more kid-friendly show later on. Comedy Central agreed to pick up the series, and the premiere episode, "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe", debuted on the network on August 13, 1997, while Mr. Hankey would debut in the tenth episode, "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo".
In tradition with the show's cutout animation style, the characters are composed of simple geometrical shapes and uninflected patches of predominantly primary colors. They are not offered the same free range of motion associated with hand-drawn characters, as they are mostly shown from only one angle, and their movements are animated in an intentionally jerky fashion. Ever since the show's second episode, "Weight Gain 4000", all the characters on the show have been animated with computer software, though they are portrayed to give the impression that the show still utilizes the original technique of cutout animation.

Cast

Stone and Parker voice most of the male South Park characters. Mary Kay Bergman voiced the majority of the female characters until her death in 1999, near the end of the third season. Eliza Schneider and Mona Marshall succeeded Bergman in 1999 and 2000 respectively, with Schneider leaving the show in 2003, after the seventh season. She was replaced by April Stewart, who, along with Marshall, continues to voice most of the female characters. Bergman was originally listed in the credits under the alias Shannen Cassidy to protect her reputation as the voice of several Disney characters. Stewart was originally credited under the name Gracie Lazar, while Schneider was sometimes credited under her rock opera performance pseudonym Blue Girl.
Some South Park staff members voice other recurring characters; supervising producer Jennifer Howell voices student Bebe Stevens, writing consultant Vernon Chatman voices an anthropomorphic towel named Towelie, and production supervisor John Hansen voices Mr. Slave, the former gay lover of Mr. Garrison. South Park producer and storyboard artist Adrien Beard, who voices Tolkien Black, the only African-American child in South Park, was recruited to voice the character "because he was the only black guy building" when Parker needed to quickly find someone to voice the character during the production of the season four episode "Cartman's Silly Hate Crime 2000".

Main characters

Stan Marsh

Stanley "Stan" Marsh
is voiced by and loosely based on series co-creator Trey Parker. He first appeared in The Spirit of Christmas and is portrayed as "a normal, average, American, mixed-up kid." Stan is a third- then fourth-grade student who commonly has extraordinary experiences not typical of conventional small-town life in his hometown of South Park. Stan is also commonly portrayed as the main protagonist of the series. He acts as the de facto leader of his friend group, often encouraging them in difficult times and taking charge in social causes. Much like his best friend Kyle, Stan often learns a valuable lesson by the end of episodes. Stan has black hair, light skin, blue eyes, and is of average nine-year-old height. He usually wears a navy-blue beanie cap with a red trimming and a red pom-pom ball on the top of it, matching red gloves, a light-brown jacket with a matching red collar, blue jeans, and black shoes. Stan has his father's hair color and his mother's skin tone.

Kyle Broflovski

Kyle Broflovski is voiced by and loosely based on series co-creator Matt Stone. Having appeared first in The Spirit of Christmas shorts, he often displays the highest moral standard of all the boys and is usually depicted as the most intelligent. When describing Kyle, Stone states that both he and the character are "reactionary", and susceptible to irritability and impatience. In some instances, Kyle is the only child in his class to not initially indulge in a fad or fall victim to a ploy. This has resulted in both his eagerness to fit in, and his resentment and frustration. Kyle is distinctive as one of the few Jewish children on the show, and because of this, he often feels like an outsider amongst the core group of characters. His portrayal in this role is often dealt with satirically, and has elicited both praise and criticism from Jewish viewers.
In many episodes, Kyle contemplates ethics in beliefs, moral dilemmas, and contentious issues, and will often reflect on the lessons he has attained with a speech that frequently begins with, "You know, I learned something today..." Kyle has curly red hair, a light skin tone,, and is of average nine-year-old height. He wears a bright-green ushanka hat, matching green gloves, an orange coat with a matching green collar, army green cargo pants, and black shoes.

Eric Cartman

Eric Theodore Cartman first appeared in the 1992 short series The Spirit of Christmas and is voiced by Trey Parker. Cartman has been portrayed as the main antagonist of the show due to his short-tempered, aggressive, prejudiced and emotionally unstable character. These traits are significantly augmented in later seasons as his character evolves, and he begins to exhibit psychopathic and extremely manipulative behavior. Cartman is depicted as highly intelligent, able to execute morally appalling plans and business ideas with success. His intelligence goes further, as Cartman is shown to be a multi-linguist, able to speak many different foreign languages fluently. Among the show's main child characters, Cartman is distinguished as "the fat kid", for which he is continuously insulted and ridiculed. Cartman is frequently portrayed as a villain whose actions set in motion the events serving as the main plot of an episode. Other children and classmates are alienated by his insensitive, racist, homophobic, antisemitic, misogynistic, lazy, self-righteous, and wildly insecure behavior. Cartman is also the most prejudiced character on the show. He often makes antisemitic insults towards Kyle for being Jewish, constantly teases Kenny for being poor, particularly manipulates and mistreats Butters Stotch and displays an extreme disdain for hippies. As a result, Cartman usually gets the consequences for his actions due to a flaw in schemes or other characters proving to be smarter than him. Despite his antagonistic tendencies, Cartman has been portrayed as a protagonist or antihero on several occasions. He has short straight neatly-parted brown hair, pale skin,, and an extremely fat body with neck flab and a double chin. Cartman wears a small teal hat with a small flat yellow puff-ball on top and a matching yellow band where the forehead part of the hat begins, a large bright-red coat, matching yellow gloves, brown khaki pants, and black shoes.

Kenny McCormick

Kenneth "Kenny" McCormick debuted in the 1992 shorts. His soft-muffled and indiscernible speech—the result of his parka hood covering his mouth—is voiced by co-creator Matt Stone. He is friends with Stan and Kyle, while maintaining a friendship with Eric Cartman. Kenny is regularly teased for living in poverty, particularly by Cartman. Prior to Season Six, Kenny died in almost every episode, with only a few exceptions. The nature of the deaths was often gruesome and portrayed in a comically absurd fashion, and usually followed by Stan and Kyle respectively yelling "Oh my God! They killed Kenny!" and "You bastard!". In the episode "Kenny Dies", Kenny dies after developing a terminal muscular disease, while Parker and Stone claimed that Kenny would not be returning in subsequent episodes and insisted they grew tired of having Kenny die in each episode. For most of season six, his place is taken by Butters Stotch and Tweek Tweak. Nevertheless, Kenny returned from the year-long absence in the season six finale "Red Sleigh Down", and has remained a starring character since, although he only appears once in Season 20. Kenny's character no longer dies in each episode, and has only been killed occasionally in episodes following his return. Kenny's superhero alter ego, Mysterion, first appeared in the season 13 episode "The Coon". It is revealed in the season 14 three-part story arc "Coon 2: Hindsight", "Mysterion Rises" and "Coon vs. Coon and Friends" that Kenny canonically has an ability to resurrect after dying, though he is always the only one who can ever remember dying, despite his friends always bearing witness. It is revealed that each time he dies, Kenny's mom spontaneously gives birth to him, and then is put back in his orange parka and in bed, to regenerate overnight. This was due to his parents' involvement in the cult of Cthulhu, whose meetings they would only attend because of the free alcohol. Kenny has bright-blond hair, a light skin color, blue eyes, and an average eight-year-old height. He wears a large orange parka whose large hood conceals his blond head completely with a faded-brown inside, matching faded-brown gloves, orange pants that match his parka, and black shoes. Kenny has a brother named Kevin, and a younger sister named Karen with whom he has a good relationship.