"
Not Without My Anus" first aired on
April Fools' Day, and was a
brilliant practical joke played on
South Park fans at the time. The
previous week, the first part of the
two parter about
Cartman finding out the
identity of his
father was
aired. The episode ended with the famous
To Be Continued tagline, and the promise that next week they would find out who
Cartman's dad was (
Chef?
Mr. Garrison?]) there hadn't been such a great
cartoon mystery since "
Who Shot Mr. Burns".
Schedules were probably built around that second episode. Fans trusted Matt and Trey to show the conclusion the next week, as promised. Everyone at my school was talking about it...I think I was in 8th or 9th grade. South Park was very, very hot. We all tuned in and got...
Not Without My Anus, that stupid Terrance and Phillip movie that had nothing to do with Cartman or his father.
APRIL FOOLS!
Fans were enraged...we had to wait until next season for the conclusion...or would there even BE a conclusion(?) we wondered. Of course, we now know that Cartman's dad was actually his "mom", a hermaphrodite.