Template:Infobox South Park episode The Return of Chef is the tenth season premiere of the Comedy Central series South Park. Chef returns to South Park, but the boys notice something different about him.
Within the episode, it is refered to as the second part of a fictional two part story called "Life Without Chef".
Plot
Template:Spoiler The episode begins with a fake "Previously on South Park," which explains that Chef left South Park to join the "Super Adventure Club", hoping to add excitement and meaning to his life. For three months he is gone, but, at the very beginning of "this" episode, he returns. The kids quickly notice that he is acting strange, however, and soon, he begins to express a desire to have sex with all the children (all the time using quotes from previous episodes, badly spliced together). The boys, wanting to find out what caused this, go to the Super Adventure Club headquarters, and soon discover that the group is made up of explorers who go around the world (a probable reference to Hubbard's overseas expeditions during his college years [1] ) molesting children. When the hunters try to hypnotize the boys, they realize that this "fruity club" has brainwashed Chef. (This is obviously a parody of what Matt Stone and Trey Parker believe happened to Isaac Hayes regarding his involvement in Scientology).
The boys take Chef to see a psychiatrist, who determines he has been very badly brainwashed. His solution is to make him have sex with women instead of boys to snap out of it. The boys and the psychiatrist then bring Chef to a strip club, and he snaps back to his old self again. However, spies from his club have been following him. They shoot him with tranquilizer darts, drag him out of the strip club and bring him back to their headquarters. When the boys follow them back to their headquarters and angrily demand Chef's release, the SAC leader then explains the history of their organization; its founder was an explorer who, after being beaten to every great discovery, decided to be the first person to molest boys in exotic places, and believed that doing so made him immortal (until he was hit by a train). The boys call this retarded. The SAC leader asks if it is any more retarded than the ideas of Christianity or Buddhism, and the kids agree it is.
The boys are then told that they have to leave, but they refuse to leave without Chef. They are told that security will be called on them if they will not leave, but they still refuse to leave. They find and free Chef, escaping with him across a bridge. A club member is able to convince Chef that he should rejoin the club. However, the bridge Chef is crossing then collapses after being struck by lightning.
Chef catches on fire. Unable to hang onto the bridge, Chef falls down, bouncing off several rocks before being impaled on a tree branch. He is then attacked by a mountain lion and later a grizzly bear. The animals dismember Chef and tear off his face. Stan announces "Oh my God! They killed Chef!", to which Kyle then yells "You bastards! YOU BASTARDS!!!" to the super adventurers. Cartman suggests that Chef may not be dead because "the last thing you do before you die is crap your pants". At that instant, Chef's body empties its bowels, and the boys leave the scene, dismayed that their friend is apparently dead.
A memorial service for Chef then occurs, with Kyle—obviously speaking for Stone and Parker—explaining that he didn't agree with Chef's recent decisions, but is not angry at him for leaving South Park, and wishes only to remember him as the singing, jolly man he was. We should blame, Kyle explains, the "fruity little club that scrambled his brains" and not Chef himself. He then adds that Chef is still alive in their hearts.
The scene then turns to the SAC members, who are shown with Chef's body, putting it in a suit reminiscent of Darth Vader's in Revenge of the Sith. He is brought back from death by The Super Adventure Club in a Darth Vader-like suit and gets a red spatula lightsaber. Chef then says he wants the children to suck his chocolate salty balls, a reference to Chef's Chocolate Salty Balls. Asked for clarification, he explains that he is referring to his actual balls. It is unknown if the new "Darth Chef" will play a part in future episodes.
Quotes
- Chef: I wanna/Make love!/To you/Children!
- Chef: I wanna stick my balls/Inside your rectum/Kyle!
- Darth Chef: Hello there children. How would you like some Salisbury steak? And for dessert how would you like to suck on my chocolate, salty balls?
- Chef: Alright/Goodbye/Children!
- Stan: Oh, my God. They...killed Chef.
Kyle: You bastards. YOU BASTARDS! - Kyle: A lot of us don't agree with the choices the Chef has made in the last few days. Some of us feel hurt and confused that he seemed to turn his back on us. But we can't let the events of the past few weeks take away the memories of how Chef made us smile. We shouldn't be mad at Chef for leaving us. We should be mad at that fruity little club for scrambling his brains.
Trivia
- This episode deals with the fallout of Isaac Hayes (who plays Chef) quitting the show. Though Hayes only explained his quitting was because the show makes fun of religions, the creators have expressed the belief that it is based solely on the episode "Trapped in the Closet," which spoofed Scientology, Hayes' own faith.
- Hayes did not voice Chef, but instead they used previous clips that he recorded under contract, which is why the things he say during the episode are out of tone and don't make sense.
- This episode is a parody of a previous episode "Trapped in the Closet".
- Chef dies in this episode and the town holds a funeral for him. However he is brought back by the Super Adventure Club in a parody of Darth Vader, specifically Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. In a way, this leaves the door open for potential future reconciliation and return of Chef (a "Re-Return" of Chef or "South park: a new hope").
- The quote "that fruity little club scrambled his brain" is a reference to Isaac Hayes and Scientology.
- This is the last episode where Isaac Hayes is credited as Chef. Every other episode before this except "Trapped in the Closet" (which in a bit of irony caused Isaac Hayes to quit the show) credits Isaac Hayes as Chef (regardless of whether or not Chef is in the episode).
- The story of the Super Adventure Club's beliefs heavily mirrors not only the depiction of Scientology's beliefs in "Trapped in the Closet", but Palpatine's telling of the story of his master, Darth Plagueis, in Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.
- While explaining the Super Adventure Club's beliefs, a message—"This is what the Super Adventure Club actually believes"— briefly appears on the screen, apparent mockery of the message "This is what Scientologists actually believe" that was in the "Trapped in the Closet" episode.
- It can be argued that Stan's run-in with the Scientology religion in "Trapped in the Closet" was the reason for his exasperated comment "Oh Jesus, here we go" when it is revealed that the Super Adventure Club apprently holds the secret to Life itself.
- In this episode we find out that Butters was sexually molested by his uncle.
- Chef's fall from the bridge might refer to Homer falling down Mount Springfield in "Bart the Daredevil". However, while being impaled and being mauled by a bear and lion is fatal, Homer survived falling in a similar fashion (twice) and being hit by Bart's skateboard and then the Hospital bed he was being carried on.
- The emptying of Chef's bowels when he dies is a recurring joke in South Park that can be traced back to the season 8 episode "Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes". In that episode, Wall-mart executives and even the store itself are both shown to "empty their bowels" when they die.
- Because Chef became Darth Chef, it is possible that now that he no longer sounds like Hayes, that he might be using original lines again.