For nearly 30 years and more than 300 episodes, South Park has been one of the funniest, most controversial, and most popular shows on the air. It has produced some truly memorable and hilarious characters, from the incredibly horrible Eric Cartman to the ridiculous Randy Marsh to the smooth-talking Chef to Kenny and all of his consistent deaths to the eccentric Mr. Garrison and more. That’s not even to mention recurring characters like Satan, Towelie, Jimmy, and Timmy. When it comes to picking out the best South Park character in history, there is some stiff competition. However, it feels like Butters Stotch takes the top spot.
Butters started as a background character who was one of the classmates of the main group of kids. His role slowly increased over time, and what makes him stand out is how different he is from everyone else. He’s naive, sensitive, gullible, optimistic, and anxious, which makes him a perfect character to put in the show’s famous absurd situations. His reactions to Cartman bullying him or to some of the more vulgar things that happen on the show are a huge part of the fun. Several episodes of the series truly showcase what makes Butters such a great character.
It was around Season 5 that Butters really became a prominent player on South Park. Early on in Season 6, he was the focal point of “Professor Chaos”, an episode that established Butters’ alter ego. The boys fired him from his role as the “New Kenny” for being too lame, causing him to create a supervillain persona known as Professor Chaos. Simply seeing the always sweet Butters try to be evil is enough to make this a standout episode.
“Professor Chaos” gets taken to the next level when you realize that all of Butters’ plans to bring chaos to the world are so small. They involve stealing erasers from the classroom, flooding the world with a garden hose, and spraying aerosol cans to destroy the atmosphere. It’s exactly the kind of ridiculous thing that really only works with a character like Butters. Without his innocent demeanor behind it all, these scenes wouldn’t be nearly as funny.
Typically, the best thing to do with a lovable, nice kid like Butters is to put him in scenarios that go against his personality. That’s the case with Season 13’s “Butters’ Bottom B***h”, which sees Butters start by doing something relatively innocent and have it grow into something more. He pays $5 to get his first kiss from a girl (at a kissing booth of sorts), which leads to him starting his own “kissing company,” which somehow branches out into him turning into a pimp.
That’s the kind of premise for an episode that makes South Park what it is. Butters is shockingly adept in his role as a pimp, even going as far as to offer health care to his employees. He becomes tougher, uses foul language, and even surprises other pimps with how good he is. The whole thing leads to an investigation by an undercover detective, though Butters eventually quits and encourages his employees to manage themselves.
The Season 8 premiere of South Park impressed with some of the show’s best-looking animation. The kids purchase ninja weapons at a flea market and when they play with them, the visuals turn into something straight out of an anime series. The boys refuse to let Butters join them, so out comes Professor Chaos. This leads to a big battle with Butters as the villain, but the game stops being fun when Butters gets hit in the eye with a ninja star.
The way the episode cuts out the cool music and action to go quiet before Butters screams is perfectly done. Not wanting to get in trouble, the boys dress up poor Butters as a dog to try and take him to a vet, rather than a doctor. The vet wants to put Butters to sleep, so he escapes and struggles through the town with his injury. Stuff like this, where we see Butters react to bad things that happen to him, is why he’s such a great character.
“The Return of the Fellowship of the Ring to the Two Towers” is a great Butters episode and one of the best South Park episodes in history. Parodying The Lord of the Rings, this installment sees the boys tasked with bringing a copy of the first film to Butters’ parents, who want to borrow it. The kids see it as a quest, only for it to be revealed that the movie was accidentally swapped with a pornographic tape that Butters inadvertently watches.
When the tape is taken from Butters, he basically turns into Smeagol/Gollum from The Lord of the Rings. There aren’t many things funnier than watching Butters stalk the rest of the boys just so that he could reclaim the video. It’s a tremendous subplot that shows how Butters can be a scene stealer without being the focus. The final shot of him clutching his “precious” in a pile of other returned rental videos is the cherry on top.
What better episode to display what makes Butters great than one dedicated to him? “Butters’ Very Own Episode” aired during Season 5 and even gave Butters a signature jingle that is etched in the memory of South Park fans forever. It’s the sweetest little tune, which sets you up for an unexpectedly dark episode. Butters’ mom tasks him with spying on his dad to help plan an anniversary gift, only for Butters to find him entering a gay bathhouse.
When Butters reveals this to his mother, she snaps and tries to murder her own son by driving him into the lake. It might be dark, but what makes the episode so great is how Butters reacts to this. He takes it in stride as if his mom just made a mistake and doesn’t grasp what actually happened. The boys end up mocking him for his unhinged parents, which oddly brings him closer to the gang and sets him up as a major player in South Park going forward.
