South Park brought back a surprise character with their latest Thanksgiving special, and with it has retconned a plot hole that has come up in the last few years. South Park is nearing the end of its run with Season 28 of the animated series, and commemorated the holiday season with its first Thanksgiving focused episode in 12 long years. But as the animated series continues to make changes to its status quo and sets up more for the future, the series is also taking some time to wrap up some of the questions that have been popping up in the last few years.
South Park is no stranger to killing off characters and bringing them back decades later, and that’s already happened a few times throughout this year thus far. The newest episode of Season 28 officially brings Ned Gerblanski back to the series for the first real time since he was seen during Season 22’s “Bike Parade,” and this actually retcons some of his background appearances seen in the years since. Confirming that he’s indeed still fully injured, it definitely answers fans’ questions about Ned’s status at last.
South Park Confirms Ned Is Still Injured
South Park Season 28 Episode 4, “Turkey Trot” sees Saudi Arabia funding the town’s annual Turkey Trot, and people around the town enter in order to win some prize money. Two of those entrants are Jimbo and Ned, whose reappearance in the series confirms he’s still very much injured following the ManBearPig attack. Ned was mauled by the global warming stand in back in Season 22’s “Time to Get Cereal,” and was then later revealed to be wounded and in a wheelchair at the end of his follow up appearance in “Bike Parade” later that same season.
But interestingly enough, Ned was also shown to be completely fine in the years since. He had been spotted in a crowd celebrating with the rest of the town during South ParQ Vaccination Special, and even front and center during the Season 26 episode, “Japanese Toilet.” In both of these appearances, Ned looked the way he used to without all of the scars and injuries he received during the mauling. So with his return in Season 28, he’s not only confirmed to be healing more from his injuries but has been given a whole new character design as a result.
South Park Is Not Afraid of a Retcon
South Park is not afraid of retconning long term developments or changing the status quo in order to keep the animated series constantly in step with the current world. We’ve seen plenty of those changes just this year as with fully introducing United States President Donald Trump to the events, the show’s characters have gone through a number of notable changes as there are currently questions about how people like Randy Marsh will be moving forward in the future.
This flexibility is one thing fans have loved about South Park after all this time, and it even still has an adherence to whatever long running canon is already in place. The show is willing to retcon things (such as this which is likely just an animation mistake using Ned just as filler in background shots) that don’t make sense, or even just ignore them completely. Whatever happens to be funnier or better for the story, and that’s just a good sign for the future.
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