South Park exploded into the national consciousness in 1997, becoming the most popular, outrageous and controversial animated series to hit airwaves since Beavis and Butt-Head. The brainchild of creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, South Park began in 1995 as a five-minute animated short commissioned by a Fox network executive and distributed throughout the industry as a video “Christmas card.” The short, titled “The Spirit of Christmas,” was endlessly dubbed as it passed hands throughout Hollywood, becoming an underground sensation; ironically, Parker and Stone — fearing their depiction of hand-to-hand combat between Santa Claus and Jesus Christ would incense many viewers — did not even add their names to the finished product to avoid controversy.

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