Cartman's Incredible Gift

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South Park episode
"Cartman's Incredible Gift"

Episode no.	124
Airdate	December 8, 2004
South Park - Season 8 March 17, 2004 – December 15, 2004
Good Times with Weapons AWESOM-O Up the Down Steroid The Passion of the Jew You Got F'd in the A Goobacks The Jeffersons Douche and Turd Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes Pre-School Quest for Ratings Stupid Spoiled Whore Video Playset Cartman's Incredible Gift Woodland Critter Christmas

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"Cartman's Incredible Gift" is episode 813 of the Comedy Central series South Park. It originally aired December 8, 2004.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

1 Plot synopsis
2 Trivia
3 References
4 See also

[edit] Plot synopsis

Cartman attempts to fly by jumping off of his roof. He goes into a short coma, and wakes up in the hospital, where he shares a room with a victim of a serial killer. The killer cuts off the left hands of all his victims. Just as the police are lamenting the victim's death, Cartman manages to guess the hospital food's dinner and a few other paltry things, which leads the gullible cop Louis Yates to believe that Cartman is a "child wunderkind" with psychic powers. Cartman is taken to the scene of one of the murders where he has "visions" of ice cream and double-stuff Oreos (which no doubt have more to do with his own cravings than the actual crime). Yates makes the connection to Tom Johannsen, the owner of the ice-cream store, and he is arrested. Cartman ends up getting more innocent people arrested, including a group of rival "psychics". The left-hand murders continue, but the gullible cops believe these are copycat killings rather than being committed by a single killer still on the loose.

Kyle realizes that Cartman is a fraud, and is frustrated by the police's stupidity. When Kyle manages to figure out who the real serial killer is, he is completely ignored. Deciding he has to do something to stop the killer, he imitates Cartman's attempted flight so that he passes into a coma, and when he wakes up claims to have psychic powers and gives the police his original findings. Lou Yates is skeptical but goes to investigate the suspected murderer anyway, who, by this point, has abducted Cartman, furious that the soi-disant psychic has failed to "recognize his work" and name him as the true killer.

When Yates arrives, he finds many hands on the killer's wall, but ignores them, since the way they're nailed (palms facing up) makes them appear to be right hands, and he leaves, with Cartman still captured. Later, after an intense police research montage, Yates realizes that left hands look like right hands when viewed a certain way, and saves Cartman from the murderer in the nick of time, saving Cartman and killing the murderer. Kyle is now hailed as the child psychic, but by saying that psychics are not real. Yates says that, really, he solved the case with "old-fashioned police work" anyway. But there is still one score to settle: the other "psychics" choose Cartman for a "final battle". But just as they begin to point at each other and make weird sounds, Kyle yells at them to stop, causing the lightbulbs in the room to explode and some electronic devices to fall off their shelf. Naturally, he claims that there must be some logical explanation for that phenomenon.

[edit] Trivia

This episode breaks the fourth wall when on Mrs. Crabtree's crime scene. The inspectors say that she was a secondary character and that the fans won't be missing her.
This episode is similar to "The Biggest Douche in the Universe" in its treatment of psychics.
Mrs. Crabtree dies, a victim of the serial killer. It was revealed for the first time that her first name was Veronica.

[edit] References

When Butters tells Kyle not to fly too near to the sun or else he will fall into the ocean he is talking about the story of Icarus.
When Cartman threatens to make Kyle's head explode, this is a reference to the movie Scanners in which people with telepathic and telekinetic powers have the ability to make one's head explode.
The slideshow shown to Cartman and the scar on the lip of the serial killer parody the novel and film Red Dragon.
Cartman's cane in this episode is based on Johnny Smith's in The Dead Zone.
The killer bears many similarities to Stephen King's character Frank Dodd, in particular the fact that he wears a yellow raincoat when he kills.
The final scene, where Kyle accidentally blows up the lights with his mind, is a parody of Carrie.
"God"- Red Dragon reference.
The serial killer wanting to have sex with his limbless mother is a reference to a controversial The X-Files episode "Home".
The killer bears many similarities to American serial killer Ed Gein in regard to (facial) physical appearance, obsession with his mother and mutilation and collection of human body parts.
The word 'Paw' is written on the wall in the killer's dungeon, a reference to the film Saw, which also featured a deranged killer with a penchant for removing limbs from human bodies. The killer's face does bear some similarities to 'Jigsaw' (Tobin Bell).
The noise that accompanies Cartman's psychic powers is reminiscent of the noise made during Chevy Chase's famous blindfolded putting scene in the movie "Caddyshack."