Pajama Day (South Park)

"Pajama Day (South Park)"
South Park episode
Episode no.	Season 25 Episode 1
Directed by	Trey Parker
Written by	Trey Parker
Featured music	"Pajama Time!" by The Laurie Berkner Band
Production code	2501
Original air date	February 2, 2022 (2022-02-02)

"Pajama Day" is the twenty-fifth season premiere of the American animated television series South Park. The 312th episode overall of the series, it premiered on Comedy Central in the United States on February 2, 2022. It is the first South Park episode to air in its regular time slot since "Christmas Snow", which premiered December 11, 2019.

Plot

Mr. Garrison introduces his students to his new boyfriend, Rick; when he leaves, Garrison receives a call from another boyfriend, Marcus. When the students fail to cover up for Garrison, his angry tirade catches the attention of PC Principal. As punishment, Principal revokes the fourth-graders' upcoming Pajama Day privileges.

The mandate angers Eric Cartman, who swears to take action. Meanwhile, Wendy Testaburger and some other female students beg Principal to allow them to reinstate their privileges, comparing his actions to those of Nazi Germany. Mr. Mackey advises Principal reconsider his actions, but Principal believes that so doing would be a sign of weakness. That night, Cartman has a nightmare about being ridiculed, causing his mother Liane to call Principal. Liane threatens to call the media and make it so no student can wear pajamas. As a sign of protest, the town's adults begin wearing their pajamas. Principal calls Wendy and asks her for advice on how to resolve the situation.

Eventually, some citizens wear regular clothes to work or to go out for a meal, but they are ridiculed and denied entry, with a diner at a IHOP being arrested for refusing to wear pajamas at the restaurant. They all compare the traits of their pajama-wearing contemporaries to those of Nazi Germany. During a meeting with the fourth-graders, Wendy suggests they simply apologize to Garrison. The following day, Butters Stotch falls asleep as Garrison further describes his relationship with Rick, again infuriating Garrison and catching Principal's attention.

At the Park County Police Station, arrests increase with various incidents involving people wearing or not wearing pajamas and the comparisons to Nazi Germany escalate. On Pajama Day itself, a local news reporter is wearing a Nazi uniform and speaking German with a tuba band playing in the background. Principal becomes willing to reinstate the fourth-graders' Pajama Day privileges and subsequently resign, but changes his mind when Wendy informs him of the upcoming Opposite Day. Principal announces instead of being Pajama Day, it is actually Opposite Day, which allows the fourth graders to do the opposite of what they were told, and thus resolving the situation without having to retract his ban.

Reception

The season premiere ranked number one on cable that evening among the 18–to–49 demographic with a 0.44 rating, beating out NBA telecasts on ESPN, All Elite Wrestling on TBS, and a FIFA World Cup qualifying match on Fox Sports 1 featuring the United States men's national soccer team. ViacomCBS' simulcast of the episode across Logo, MTV, MTV2, Paramount Network, Pop, and TV Land added to those figures.

Don Caffrey with The A.V. Club gave it a C+ rating, criticizing it as a tired COVID-19 joke, saying "It feels uninspired and just plain odd to see South Park symbolizing pandemic hysteria when the show tackled it in a much more literal fashion less than two months ago." Caffrey also observed that the pajamas in the episode were being used as a metaphor for objections to wearing masks during the COVID pandemic, stating "about halfway through, it becomes clear that the pajamas are a stand-in for masks during COVID-19—a joke that immediately deflates."

Charles Bramesco with The Guardian was critical of the episode, stating in his review "Parker and Stone continue to thrive on the non-commentary that their strategy of partial metaphor affords them, hiding behind the joke once it comes time to make a statement beyond the broadly agreeable. The divisiveness of pajama-wearing allows them to get a few good blows in, as in the scene that sees an anti-pajama-er declaring that he'll never be cozy again, a succinct summation of the self-defeating 'own the libs' philosophy currently dominating conservative thought."

Liz Shannon Miller with Consequence enjoyed the simplicity of the episode. In her review she commented "What makes this such an effective season opener, though, is the fact that those touches of old-school South Park are accompanied by the usual sorts of evidence that this episode was written extremely recently...Hearts have been broken and lives ruined in the quest to do what's achieved here so easily: A funny story, well told."

Justin Epps of Bubbleblabber enjoyed the episode, giving it an 8.0 out of 10 and praising it for a smooth return to the normal episode format after two years of specials. During his review, he writes that "the show was extremely satisfying", and that "With a new crop of episodes and a few more specials heading to Paramount+, South Park fans should hold their head high with confidence that the 25th season shows no signs of declining quality."

External links

• Pajama Day at IMDb
• "Pajama Day". South Park Studios. February 2, 2022.