South Park Season 29, Episode 3 review and recap: "You Love It on Your Face"

Let's talk about the decline. South Park delivers one of the weakest episodes in recent memory with "You Love It on Your Face."

Warning: This review contains full spoilers for South Park Season 29, Episode 3!

Yes, this was probably the weakest new South Park episode in years. As is often the case with the show's smaller moments, "You Love It On Your Face" has some fun ideas and ideas, but none of them come together as a cohesive whole. Speaking of being scared...

This week, the series has decided to turn its attention to Gen Z/Gen Alpha culture and key issues such as appearance and aura farming. Honestly, I was really hoping the opening scenes would be a springboard for something else. Yes, aura cultivation is really silly and funny, but did we need an entire episode of the exercise?

In performance, "You Like That on Your Face" feels like a spiritual sequel to Season 8's "You Got F'd in the A," only with halo battles replacing past dances. Unfortunately, this episode compares very unfavorably to its predecessor. It pulls too many punches and doesn't really flesh out its ideas in a satisfying way. I don't know that "Hey, look how stupid and self-absorbed kids are these days" really makes for the best content.

The episode also relies heavily on the repeated sobbing of Sephora employees as they apply cream to children's faces and ask, "Do you like your face?" We get it. It's like porn but with kids. It's not very funny the first few times, and it certainly isn't funny at the end when the twisted Sephora manager emerges from the darkness.

Again, the funniest parts are found in episode 3. The initial reveal of Sephora Backrooms is pretty funny (although that's another element that ultimately goes nowhere). Also welcome is the return of pet impersonator Farmer Ted. And Randy himself going into Max's guise and transforming himself into a fourth grader is probably the highlight of the episode. Either way, the South Park team really should have relied more on that subplot. Randy can usually be counted on to carry the series, at least when he's not selling his Tegridy Farms wares. But I guess we'll see if this particular development continues in future episodes.

Season 29, Episode 2 - "Billionaire Weenietown"

It's clear that despite the show's humorous title change, season 29 aims to move away from the political approach of seasons 27/28 and return to a more classic brand of South Park that emphasizes younger characters. This approach worked well enough in the first two episodes, but here it's completely flat. I don't know if South Park desperately needs to go back to bashing the Trump administration at every turn, but it needs to create a more coherent storyline for the season and do a better job of addressing the more pressing issues of the day. This is not

South Park easily hits its lowest point in recent seasons in "You Like It On Your Face." While there are some memorable points and ideas in this episode, none of them come together as a coherent or satisfying whole. This episode feels like a weak throwback to "You Got F'd in the A." We're now halfway through season 29, and the show needs to do a better job of creating a satisfying and overarching storyline.