South Park: The Cult of Cartman - Revelations DVD: Review By Brian Gallagher

Eric Theodore Cartman. Ever since the wildly-successful show South Park hit the Comedy Central airwaves in 1997, this fat little foul-mouthed character has cursed and screamed his way into the nation's hearts. The show itself has had a long history of successful DVD compilations they sell alongside the full-season sets and it was only a matter of time before a set celebrating Cartman hit the shelves... and it's about damn time!

This two-disc set features twelve carefully selected episodes that highlights Cartman at his best and worst... which is sometimes the same thing, like in the kick-off episode on this set, Scott Tenorman Must Die, where he exacts his sweetest revenge in the most disturbing and hilarious of ways. Along the way he teaches us these little "Original Life Lessons," which are minute-long summations of the lesson to be learned from each episode, like "Never take a joke too far" in the second episode, the super-hilarious Awesom-o, where Cartman pretends to be a robot to play a prank on Butters, but takes it way too far when he discovers Butters has some dirt on Cartman. There is only one episode that I really didn't find all that funny, Eek, a Penis, which is just kind of annoying and features a mouse with a penis grafted on top of it running around, hence causing the title line to be spewed over and over, in ridiculous fashion.

That's the only one I'd skip over on this whole set, folks, because the rest display the ingenious brand of humor that series creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone have showed us over and over again throughout the years. The rest of the episodes - The Death of Eric Cartman, Cartoon Wars Part I, Cartoon Wars Part II, Le Petit Tourette, Tonsil Trouble, Cartmanland, which is one of my personal favorites in the whole series, Up the Down Steroid, Super Fun Time and Ginger Kids - all show why Eric Theodore Cartman has become such a pop-culture fixture, with his blend of ingenuity, tenacity and, of course, immaturity.

The Cult of Cartman is quite simply must-own material for any South Park fan, especially those who don't have all the season sets quite yet. It's a wonderful two-disc set that shows us some of the best episodes that focus primarily on America's favorite fat kid: Eric Theodore Cartman.

The only "special features" we get here are these little "Original Life Lessons Introduced by Eric Cartman." These are these little minute-long bits before each episode, summing up the "lesson" to be learned from each episode. Some of these are pretty damn funny, some of them are lame and they're all pretty short, but a nice preface to each of these dozen episodes. It would've been nice to have a little more here, but oh well. It's just a compilation disc anyway.

These episodes are presented in the fullscreen format, in the 1.33:1 aspect ratio.

The sound for these episodes are handled in the Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound format.

They did a really nice job with this compilation disc, I thought. For one, they package it more like an actual book, with a big thick case that opens up to reveal an embossed logo of The Eric Theodore Cartman Society on the inside cover, with a tray holding both discs on the other side. There is also a sheet stuck to the back cover that lists all the episodes and talks about the Cartman way of life. Inside this disc there are even a few goodies as well, with a Cartman Society sticker and a "Official Member" card for the Cartman Society, which also has a link to visit on the back for "cool crap" and to win $10,000. Great success!

If you think the Eric Theodore Cartman way of life is superior to all others... or if you just want an awesome compilation disc of some of this hilarious character at some of his best and worst moments, then this disc surely needs to be on your DVD shelf.