The one advantage \u201cTurkey Trot\u201d has over \u201cThe Woman in the Hat\u201d is that it doesn\u2019t struggle as much in tying together the two halves of the episode. This week kicks off with the cash-starved Chamber of Commerce resorting to (what else?) Saudi Arabian funding to bankroll their annual 5k run. That dovetails neatly enough with the show\u2019s latest Trump Administration spoof, as Secretary of Defense War Pete Hegseth shows up to rescue the imprisoned Peter Thiel at his boss\u2019 behest. <\/p>\n
South Park’s Most Topical Episodes<\/p>\n
It also helps that this episode makes more of a meal out of lampooning Hegseth than \u201cThe Woman in the Hat\u201d did with its very brief, surface-level spoof of Stephen Miller. The show is every bit as scathing as it was with officials like Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem (who also makes a return appearance to commit more acts of canine murder). It\u2019s amusing to see Hegseth portrayed as a glorified YouTuber in perpetual search of content. The fact that he comes equipped with his own theme song and spends half the episode getting pushed around by Sgt. Yates just makes the spoof that much better.<\/p>\n
But beyond satirizing Hegseth himself, this episode doesn\u2019t have a lot else going for it. The Turkey Trot storyline itself falls pretty flat after the initial Saudi Arabia reveal. It becomes one of those cases where the show repeatedly seizes on the same handful of beats long after the novelty is gone. How many times do we need Cartman to rehash the same race science joke? Haven\u2019t we seen him try to exploit his fellow students for his own selfish ends 1000 times before? Maybe some viewers might appreciate a slightly more traditional storyline involving the South Park kids, but this just feels like something that\u2019s been done before, and better. <\/p>\n
At the very least, there was potential to dig a lot deeper on the Saudi Arabia front. Perhaps this episode would have been better off if that were the sole focus, rather than bringing Hegseth and the military into the fray. Having him launch an attack on the Turkey Trot race is a neat enough way to tie things together, but it doesn\u2019t end up yielding as much humor as you\u2019d expect. It\u2019s all a fairly anticlimactic way of tying things up, right down to the overly predictable twist of Tolkien accidentally winning the race and proving Cartman correct.<\/p>\n