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With its pudgy, simplistic character designs and sharp-edged humor dicing up current trends, American animated comedy South Park is about as different from anime as it can be in look and tone. But every now and again the show’s focus swings around to Japanese culture, and the theme of its most recent episode was none other than yaoi/boys’ love, the anime subgenre of male homosexual romance that’s loved by legions of female fans.

So while the episode featured the inane logic of South Park’s citizens and resulting laughs fans expect, it was also filled with anime-style artwork depicting its two male characters who had become the darlings of the city’s amateur artist community.

As the episode, titled “Tweek x Craig,” opens, the children of South Park Elementary are gathered for an assembly to promote greater cultural awareness and appreciation. The topic being discussed?

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Granted, the cast pronounces it “yowie” instead of “yaoi,” and the accompanying Japanese text actually says “boys’ love,” but those are pretty minor points compared to some of the misunderstandings the characters leap into with both feet before the episode ends.

During her presentation, class president Wendy describes yaoi as:

“…a blend of emotion and beauty, involving two people whose love is looked down upon. The art tries to show that all love is magical.”

So far, all of the kids seem onboard. But then she shows some examples, drawn by a group of Asian students at the school and starring two of their classmates, blond-haired Tweek and permanently hat-wearing Craig.

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With the town’s recent push to be more socially accepting, most of the children, along with their teachers and many of the other adult residents of South Park, are quick to voice their support of Tweek and Craig’s love. It sounds like a positive, life-affirming moment…but Tweek and Craig aren’t gay.

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As fans of the genre will tell you, though, yaoi artists tend not to be bothered by such details as the actual sexual orientations of their muses. Couple this with South Park’s citizens’ tendency to get caught up in any sort of trend or hysteria, and soon Tweek and Craig yaoi art is everywhere.

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It even starts showing up at local art festivals, where the representations of unabashed affection have a ripple effect on the emotions of the community, bringing couples closer together.

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Still, not everyone comes to grips with the situation so easily. Confused about how such relationships happen, Stan asks his father an important question.

▼ “What makes the Asians decide who they’re gonna make gay?”

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Mr. Marsh, in an effort to show his son how progressive he is, pretends to know more about the subject than he really does. After some misguided research, the conclusions he comes to include:

“Japan, of course, is who does the yaoi to make people gay.”

“I used to think that being gay was a choice, but you don’t get to decide. Japan picks who they pick and that’s that.”

Meanwhile, Tweek and Craig, exasperated by their repeated failed attempts to explain that they are not, in fact, gay, decide to cut their losses. If they publicly pretend to break up, that should at least stop the yaoi artists from drawing pictures of them, right?

▼ Wrong

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There’s plenty of yaoi fan art that operates under the theory that hate and love are just two sides of the same coin. All the boys’ public charade does is fuel a new genre of art showing their bitter, tragic, and entirely assumed fallout.

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The episode never really picks a side in the debate over whether yaoi art is a positive form of expressive entertainment or the result of obsessive delusion. Instead, in typical South Park fashion, it drops jokes on both sides of the issue, making comedy its first priority and social commentary a distant second. Still, it’s clear the show’s producers have an appreciation for the subject matter, as evidenced by the wide variety of art styles on display.

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But as depictions of Tweek and Craig as a happy couple disappear from South Park, a sense of gloom falls over its actual couples.

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Will romance return to South Park? Can Tweek and Craig have a bromance without it being mistaken for boys’ love? The answers to these questions, plus the sexual orientation of Cartman’s inner cupid, are all revealed in “Tweek x Craig,” which can be watched in its entirety here on South Park’s official website.

Related: South Park Studios episode page
Source: Jin
Images: South Park Studios