Roger Ebert Should Lay Off the Fatty Foods

Some people claim that this has the longest title of any "South Park" episode. Actually, the episode with the longest title is "The Mexican Staring Frog Of Southern Sri Lanka" also from this season. The funniest thing is that the title means absolutely nothing at all. Roger Ebert appears as a constellation for less than five seconds. The title was probably just meant to be a joke and nonsensical. The real plot is that a guy is hypnotizing people to go to his planetarium.

I did in fact go to a few of those on field trips when I was a kid. This episode features them dying out and seeing as how I haven't heard of them in years, they probably have died out at this point. There were still good jokes, but it wasn't one of the best episodes. I liked the design of the villain. You always make guest characters look more realistic to make them stand out more. I like the "Star Trek" references too. ***

This episode is the best example of "raw" early SOUTH PARK. They start with a classic STAR TREK episode, "Dagger Of The Mind," and basically act out the entire plot, including legendary Star Trek bits like the "Vulcan Mind Meld." Stan and Kyle actually quote the episode word for word at the end, complete with Shatner diction. "Stan, can you imagine -- a mind -- drained by that thing." And Officer Barbrady, for no particular reason, is hypnotized into believing he is Elvis Presley, complete with the worst Elvis imitation ever. "Okay, man, okay. I'm the King! I'm the King!" Why this episode works so well is that it feels very homegrown and not at all put on -- just a bunch of guys goofing on a STAR TREK classic that every television watcher in America knows by heart.

If SOUTH PARK was the Beatles, this episode would be "Love Me Do."

Maybe my least favorite episode of the season, though I can't say for sure. It's just really really forgettable for me honestly. I don't know why, there's just not much going on. 6.9.

Love it. Love the references such as s2 ep 11 they are referencing the whole episode off of one of the original star trek episodes

The title of this episode is called "Roger Ebert Should Lay Off The Fatty Foods".It's a strange title since Roger Ebert is only mentioned once in the episode and has no significance to the plot.The plot has the children going on a field trip to the planetarium.The owner however has some hypnosis device which makes children want to go back and visit or work in the planetarium.His plan is to make everyone in South Park love the planetarium, but Stan and Kyle are on his case and try to stop him.Meanwhile, instead of going on the field trip, Cartman ditches and auditions for a cheesy poofs commerical.He is bad yet so is everyone else and he gets to be on TV.Only no one is really watching because they are all at the planetarium.This is a pretty funny and good South Park episode...but with a strange title!