A Piece of Snow Bum History Part 4

South Park is a funny little show (keep with us, there’s more to our train of thought than that.) It seems at times that Trey Parker and Matt Stone (pictured below: courtesy of http://blogs.amctv.com/)are willing to devote an entire 30 minutes of television to make as simple a point as “hey – wasn’t that movie/fad/toy/period of time/etc. weird?”

Granted- this isn’t always the case with the show: Parker and Stone have used South Park as a soapbox to challenge some weighty institutions and notions in the past such as homophobia, Scientology, racism and the proper way to raise children. Other times they poke fun at how bizarre our fad culture or celebrity worship can be. Still, very often the point of an episode really just seems to be “hey- aren’t pioneer villages weird?”.

This post is about one of those episodes.

An episode from Season 6 called “A$$pen.” It deals with the boys going to Aspen Colorado, where Stan (the show’s go-to protagonist) gets in a run-in with a cocky, hot shot skier and has to race him for… some reason. Yes indeed, the episode is a parody of all those movies listed directly below this article or, if you prefer, “hey- aren’t all those ski bum movies weird?”

Just being a parody of Snow Bum movies is not enough to earn a place in this historic countdown however. No, it is one particular piece of genius whereby ski instruction is crystallized into a very simple concept that earns its place here.

Thumper, the ski instructor, imparts the art of skiing as the two acts of “pizza” (plowing) and “French fries” (parallel) and knowing when to do which. If you confuse when you should pizza with when you should french fry (in Thumper’s words) you’re gonna have a bad time.

Observe and enjoy: www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEKHG_dXSyg