Preview: The Poor Kid

Recapping what has been an improved season:

• "Ass Burgers" - essentially part 2 of "You're Getting Old," and when I review the episodes they'll be treated as such. Not as dramatic as the first part, and lacks as powerful of an ending, but on the whole much funnier. And while the expected reset ending happened, I'm going to remember the final shot of Stan getting drunk for a long time. (A-)
• "The Last of the Meheecans" - going back to the old ways very quickly. Butters accidentally becoming the leader of the Mexicans? Cartman getting hired as a border patrol guy? (Though the Texans vs. Mexicans game was good, and a nice way to end the episode.) Not terrible, but not great either. Just filler. (C)
• "Bass to Mouth" - just because Lemmiwinks sounds similar to Wikileaks isn't a reason to finally bring him back. He's a one-joke character who was probably the worst part of his original episode. And Matt and Trey weren't even ripping on Wikileaks - TMZ instead. Cartman was funny at first, but the shitting pants joke, as usual, was run into the ground. (C)
• "Broadway Bro Down" - at first this looked like yet another "Randy has a new interest" episode, which tend to suck. But this had a purpose, namely to get Sharon to give him a blowjob. Loved the bro out, especially given that most of Broadway's gayer than Hollywood. Shelley wasn't great, and the ending was another one where a stupid joke writes it (the kid dying because he wasn't wearing his life jacket), but on the whole this was good. (B)
• "1%" - not very funny. Except that Cartman actually grows up. That's enough to knock it up a notch. (B)
• "A History Channel Thanksgiving" - ripping on cable shows wasn't funny when Matt and Trey did it two years ago and bottomed out with an F episode. Don't know why they chose to go back. And this also brought back the warmed-over movie parody, in this case "Thor." And speaking of stuffing, couldn't everyone just make it from scratch? It's better that way. (D)

On the subject of tonight's episode, I have high expectations. I'm excited to see Kenny. He's been very underused as of late, except in the very overrated Coon & Friends triple parter. This could be very good.