I suppose every show must have a few duds after airing over 100 episodes. With that point being made, this episode capital S-U-C-K, suck, suck, sucks. The side story, wherein Roger tries to irritate Hailey and Jeff into giving him their $50,000 from the previous episode, is relatively funny, I suppose, but the side story, wherein Stan and Francine compete to see who's the better parent is positively ridiculous, unfunny, and just plain stupid. The two's quarrel revolves around whether Stan's strictness or Francine's leniency is the better way to raise Steve after Hailey's eloping. Even though the answer is obviously "don't let kids do whatever", the story acts like the two are both bad, with Stan's method turning clone Steve, named Steverino to distinguish, into a cat murdering, head-juggling, Steve-kidnapping sociopath. The moral seems to be "don't set any high expectations for your kids, and only be strict when they are literally farting on their own mother." It's just ridiculous. Seth obviously doesn't have any kids and it shows. This really stuoid lesson would be less "ugh"-inspiring if the episode at least had some humor thrown in there, but it doesn't. It's as unfunny as a German Prime Minister in South Park. Its all lame attempts at shock laughs like Steve winning a "spanky" for "pulling it 11 times in one day" or Roger arriving in Thailand and ordering "3 12-years old boys with no MSG". Obviously off-color humor is no stranger to this show, but there is a difference between off-color humor and "jokes" where the shock value is the only actual punchline. There's a difference between South Park and Terrance & Phillip. You dig? Apparently S Mac does not dig. The long and short is the episode is not very good. 2/10. Very no good.
Review of Son of Stan
