Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		3.5

South Park: The Streaming Wars Blu-ray Movie Review

In between Season 25 and Season 26 of South Park comes South Park: The Streaming Wars. This two-part special sees the series turn its focus to a variety of topical issues that will be all the more entertaining to those who are paying attention to current events and societal trends. The primary focus of The Streaming Wars seems to be the ongoing drought and water rights issues in Colorado and the southwestern United States. Randy Marsh and others in the South Park area soon discover that there is a significant amount of money to be made in selling their water rights to those downstream. The boys quickly jump into the "streaming wars" developing a method to verify that unused water from the various farms and other sources makes it willing and waiting consumers in Denver. When there were just a few sellers in the market, the system worked well. But as greed grew and the number of sellers multiplied, those downstream needed to buy, or "subscribe", to more and more water streamers just to get what they needed for their own purposes.

It's not at all difficult to see the water crisis and its "streaming" solution as a metaphor for actual streaming service providers. When there were just a few providers in the space, Netflix and Prime, for example, it was simple for consumers to have access to mountains of content at a cost that was definitely lower than traditional cable. However as the major studios and others realized that there was money to be made, they launched their own streaming platforms and clawed back their content, forcing consumers to spend more money to subscribe to a growing number of streaming services to get all of the content they wanted. Furthermore, with more content providers out there, there is a necessary decline in the quality of new and exclusive content and a much smaller delta between the cost of traditional cable versus the cost of subscribing to multiple streaming services. And leave it to an over-sugared Butters to make some of the most concise and cutting comments on the situation.

Other topics of interest include turning one of the boys' parents into a "Karen", and the concept of gender-affirming surgery on minors being addressed in the way that South Park can or would. On slightly safer ground, they also lampoon the ongoing issue of celebrity endorsements. To a great degree, the success or failure of The Streaming Wars will depend on your level of concern about the issues addressed and how easily you are offended - though, to be fair, this disc precedes Season 26, so you should know by now if South Park is your cup of tea (or PiPi+, as the case may be) or not. Pulling no punches and driving everything to the point of absurdity, this two-part special never fails to entertain, even if there are more than a few moments where you're not sure if laughing makes you a bad person.

South Park: The Streaming Wars Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Fans of the physical releases of South Park should know exactly what they are getting from a video perspective with South Park: The Streaming Wars, with the video here being completely in line with previous releases. Colors are strong, vibrant, and nicely saturated. Also, as is part and parcel to the style of animation, occasional textures rise up and look properly fibrous and add a bit of depth and variation. These welcome levels of detail and textural variety are visible in certain clothing elements, hair, the walls of Randy's office and of Cartman's hot dog house interior, among others. I did not detect any banding or other issues which can sometimes bubble to the surface on animated releases. South Park has never been what anyone would call "visually stunning" or "reference quality", but what we have here is a very solid and stable image that should definitely please fans.

South Park: The Streaming Wars Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The English 5.1 Dolby True HD audio track isn't asked to do too terribly much but it does a good job with what it has to do. South Park has always been very dialogue-heavy and that certainly continues here. Voices are rendered well with most of the action being pushed front and center as is appropriate. There are moments when the surrounds are pressed into service adding a bit of oompf to the numerous crowd scenes, or allowing us to track objects through the soundfield. But most of the audio fireworks are reserved for a handful of music tracks, with WAP by Cardi B being the most earpopping. The other songs certainly fit the onscreen action much better, but WAP's driving and throbbing bassline makes an otherwise dry (but necessary) scene quite memorable. English SDH subtitles are also available.

South Park: The Streaming Wars Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Unfortunately, there aren't any special features included on the disc. I definitely would have appreciated a piece or two about the specials or even a full- blown commentary, but instead, we have a bare-bones release. It does come with a nice slip that replicates the front and back of the case's cover art, and it is adorned with an orange and white sticker that proclaims "New to DVD!".

South Park: The Streaming Wars Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

South Park: The Streaming Wars is sure to delight the legions of South Park fans out there, as the quality of the program and the disc is very much on par with what has come before. Edgy, topical, and wildly inappropriate it's definitely not for everyone. I like to think that I'm pretty difficult to shock or offend, but I must admit that there were a couple of moments where I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing, and that doesn't include a handful of escalating and ridiculous "gross-out" moments - you'll know them when you see them. Those are something else entirely. As we head into the 26th season, South Park: The Streaming Wars proves the show hasn't lost a step, and technical merits are strong for those considering a purchase. Recommended.