The world of South Park centers on a fictional mountain town in Colorado. All of the show’s main characters call South Park home and it appears to be a lightning rod for a seemingly endless barrage of pure insanity. But there’s another nearby town, one that might just be a lot more normal, at least in comparison to South Park. That town’s name is North Park, and the residents probably collectively wish they had different neighbors.
South Park isn’t a real town, first and foremost. That being said, there is an area in Park County, Colorado called South Park that’s basically just a big grassy region. The largest community in it is Fairplay, which some people believe to be the basis for the fictional town of South Park. Considering what happens in the TV series and what the town’s residents are like, that’s not a comparison some people would want made with their home.
Like the real-life park that bears its name, the fictional TV version of South Park is also located in Park County. This town attracts more absurdity than Springfield. In the very first episode of the series, aliens abduct Eric Cartman and install a massive communications array in his butt. And that was probably the most logical storyline in the entire series by far. Things just got weirder and weirder from there — not that anyone is complaining.
But there is at least one other community in Park County on the show. North Park is, not surprisingly, north of South Park. It made its debut early on in Season 2, Episode 8 when a kid from North Park was injured while playing with fireworks. The end result was a fireworks ban in the county that led to the creation of the world’s biggest black ash snake. It nearly destroyed the world.
The town played a more prominent role in Season 5, Episode 16. Cartman inherited a large sum of money and used it to buy an amusement park. Being an intolerant racist, misogynist and homophobe, Cartman generally hates a lot of people for a lot of reasons. Yet, he seems to hate lines the most, which is what led to him creating Cartmanland. And the amusement park he briefly owned was the North Park Funland.
As a general rule, North Park isn’t particularly prominent in the series but it does come up from time to time. South Park ends up playing the North Park Sarcastaball team in Season 16, Episode 8. But from what fans have seen over the years, it actually appears to be a relatively normal place when compared to South Park. That’s not a particularly difficult bar to get over, though, and it does raise the question of why South Park is the way it is.
If North Park is the next town over, it wouldn’t be surprising to find out that it was filled with oddballs and all insane goings-on as well, but by all accounts, North Park may actually be the sleepy mountain town South Park claims to be. Just as long as Eric Cartman never moves there, that should continue to be North Park’s status quo for the foreseeable future. If anyone can mess any place up, it’s him.
About The Author