Given her own personal history with the company and its notorious producer, it should come as no surprise to find that actress Gina Carano has thoughts on the South Park: Joining the Panderverse special and its criticisms of Disney and Kathleen Kennedy’s ruinous obsession with identity politics.
Offering a rare criticism of the House of Mouse’s ongoing creative implosion, Joining the Panderverse begins with Cartman finding himself plagued with nightmares in which he and the rest of South Park’s citizens, for no reason and with no explanation, have suddenly been replaced by “diverse women complaining about the patriarchy”.
“The last time I had the dream, I was walking down the school hallway, and then I see Butters,” Cartman recounts to a therapist. “And that’s when I begin to notice that something’s wrong. Every0ne I cared about has been systematically replaced. And finally I want to scream and I’m like, ‘Why are they replacing every single character with someone who is diverse?!'”
“But then Kenny’s like, ‘It’s not our fault, it’s cause of Kathleen Kennedy,'” he continues, his words becoming ever more panicked by the second. “But then Kathleen Kennedy is like, ‘F–k it! Make it more lame!’, And everyone in town is like ‘No, please, Kathleen Kennedy, stop ruining everything!’, but Kathleen Kennedy is all like, ‘Put another gay diverse woman in it! Make it more f–king lame!’ And Disney stock just keeps going down and down and down! And then Bob Iger is all like, ‘No! No! What’s going on with my stocks! No, Kathleen Kennedy!'”
Yet, while the therapist dismisses these nightmares as nothing more than stress dreams stemming from his fear of being replaced by AI, Cartman soon discovers that they were actually glimpses into the Multiverse, the truth becoming apparent to him just as he and his diverse female counterpart – who herself was experiencing the same dreams but in reverse – are forcibly swapped into each other’s universe.
Meanwhile, as both Cartmans and their respective Stans, Kyles, and Kennys set out to correct this error, Bob Iger and the Disney board come to the realization that the version of Kennedy currently roaming their halls and greenlighting films – a Cartman variant whose core creative principal is “Put a chick in and make her lame and gay!” – is not their own.
Sure enough, the board soon comes to understand that not only has Kennedy been replaced, but that the situation was caused when the company’s overuse of the ‘Panderstone’, “an ancient piece of artificial intelligence that could be used to make the same movies over and over again while appealing to absolutely everyone”, tore open a hole in the multiverse.
Eventually crossing paths on the diverse world of Earth 216-B, Kennedy and Cartman call a temporary truce in order to find their way back to their home universe.
In doing so, the two are afforded a moment to clear the air, during which the two air their respective grievances over how the other handled their disagreements over the current state of Disney’s current catalogue, but in particular the Star Wars franchise.
“The Panderstone worked great for a while,” Kennedy tells Cartman. “But then came the hate mail. Ugly letters from racists who could stand that some of the Panderstone’s rehashes had diverse women characters in the lead. I decided I would show them. I would start making movies to fight all the bigotry in our society.”
“But instead of doing any real work, I turned to the Panderstone,” she then admits. “It made things so much easier. Soon, I was using the Panderstone over and over again to try and fight all the ugly feedback, which in turn was growing stronger and stronger. But I was fighting with the wrong tool. I used the Panderstone so much that it became unstable. It opened a portal to mujltiple universes and something came through.”
Turning to this meeting with her Cartman-Counterpart, Kennedy recalls, “At first we fought. I tried to send it back to its universe. But it got the upper hand. It was able to instead to send me to this universe out of its way so it could thrive in ours.”
Surprisingly, rather than vitriol, Cartman instead meets Kennedy’s story with acceptance, admitting, “That’s actually the best explanation I’ve heard as to why Disney movies all suck now.”
“I understand that maybe you were trying to make a difference, Kathleen,” he tells the producer, “but you have to admit the last few movies you’ve shit out have been real stinkers.”
“All I ever wanted was to make great entertainment, believe me,” she explains to Cartman in turn. “But as soon as you start getting piles and piles of hate mail, endless messages calling you the C-word, you can’t think straight.”
In a moment of levity amidst an otherwise stark discussion, Cartman then admits, “Well, I’m sorry I wrote all those letters. It was probably a bit much.”
Kennedy then attempts to reassure Cartman, “No, I got like 10,000 letters a day,” to which he corects, “Mm, I was doing more like 12,000 to 13,000, especially after the new Indiana Jones came out.”
Met with this revelation, Kennedy proceeds to exclaim, “Then it’s you! You’re the one who caused all this!”
“F–k you!” Cartman fires back. “You’re the one who caused all this!”
Offering a defense of her actions, Kennedy then affirms, “I wouldn’t have tried to fight racism with the Panderstone if you hadn’t written all those letters!”, prompting Cartman to likewise declare, “I wouldn’t have written all those letters if you hadn’t tried to fight racism with a f–king Panderstone!”
However, rather than continuing to argue, Kennedy instead observes, “So that’s it, that’s the connection. I reacted to you and you reacted to me.”
Realizing himself that “I guess we created each other,” Cartman then admits to his rival, “Mrs. Kennedy, I don’t think I’ve ever said this before in my life but…I’m sorry. I lashed out so hard and used the C-word so many times, you didn’t really have a choice but to doube down.”
Offering her own apology, Kennedy then asserts, “Eric, I know you care about all things Disney. I’m sorry I was so reckless with the things that you love. It was just lazy.”
Showing one last moment of humility just as a portal back to their universe appears behind them, Cartman closes out their conversation by likewise acknowledged, “I guess just wailing on woke stuff all the time is pretty lazy, too.”
And it is this last exchange in particular which drew Carano’s attentions.
Retweeting a clip of the scene, which notably cuts just after Cartman’s declaration that Kennedy’s story was “the best explanation I’ve heard as to why Disney movies all suck now”, as shared by the nerd news outlet Geeks + Gamers, Carano declared, “This is the part where KK demands any YouTubers get censored off of YouTube for sharing and laughing at this hilarious episode.”
“She’ll have YouTube disable the thumbs down option because of the ratio she’ll receive, then she’ll have her publicist ghouls make sure Variety and Hollywood Reporter run hit pieces about the South Park creators and their families smearing their names through every useful idiot she has under her thumb who would sell their soul to work for Lucas film,” said the former The Mandalorian star. “She’ll activate her online mob to repeat that the South Park creators are racist, bigot, transphobes, and demand the South Park creators publicly apologize by only using words she approves of, and finally she’ll demand they subject themselves to a re-education course of 45 people in the LGBTQ community Zoom call to sit there and listen of how badly they got their feelings hurt all over a little boop of a South Park episode.”
Ultimately ending on a cheeky note, Carano sardonically concluded her tweet, “But maybe just maybe the jig is up.”
Unsurprisingly, while Carano’s tweet was met with a wave of support and adulation from her fans, it also drew its fair share of criticism from her detractors.
One such critique, though brief, came from the official Twitter account for the Around the Galaxy podcast, wherein its administrator informed their followers, “In case you were wondering, @ginacarano has lost her goddamned mind.”
Not one to take such swings lying down, Carano in turn proceeded to lay into the Star Wars-centric podcast, firing back, “Do you always call a woman crazy just because she has more first hand experience than you & says something you don’t like or understand? Bit misogynistic don’t ya think. Tsk tsk.”
“Curious if your overlords pay you or do y’all just go ahead & shove your whole head straight up their ass for free?” she then asked, “I’m guessing for free. Might want to come out for some fresh air. For some added context, not just for you but for the people reading, one of the things your overlords asked me to do was to unfollow certain accounts because they ‘said bad thing about Kathleen Kennedy.’ That was a huge red flag for me.”
“If I were the head of one of the most powerful entertainment companies in the world, I would know that haters come with the territory & that maybe the ‘haters’ are expressing their thoughts because they actually care and caring is a good thing because as long as they care well hey, we still have something to work with,” she further posited. “Maybe we can win their hearts back eventually & maybe they do have some good things to add to the conversation (which they do & did). And at the very least they are still buying the product. ”
“Look at Mando Season 1, boom, the healing had begun,” she then recalled. “If you are a proper good leader you learn how to embrace & communicate, not dictate & silence & demand your actors & directors unfollow & shame more than half of your fan base & the people who have stuck with the franchise for decades. Side note, don’t say “The force is female” & then allow only the men to express their political views online. In fact just drop the ridiculous phrase completely.”
“One of the problems your overlords are having now is that they’ve made a lot of people completely stop caring about one of the most beloved franchises in history, all by bullying, pushing aggressive agendas & trying to silence the people criticizing them,” Carano detailed. “How are they able to tell stories they don’t understand when the ones they identify with are the Empire? They are literally trying to squash the little guys, the rebellion. No wonder the story telling is struggling.”
“They fired & dehumanized people like me who did absolutely nothing wrong, all to virtue signal to people like you, the Yes Men. But Yes Men unfortunately for you & them, do not drive culture,” she added. “Maybe they were banking on the kids picking up the slack but one of the best things about this franchise is passing it from generation to generation to share, the competition is too high to throw out something as valuable as that. Why would one generation pass it on when you’ve disrespected & thrown them away?”
“Your overlords tried to hide behind the two opposing fan bases fighting each other instead of taking responsibility,” Caraon declared. “So they encouraged the hate, all while virtue signaling they are standing up for minorities but instead using them as a shield & weapon. Funny enough just how our government works. They think people will forget & yes maybe they will but for this moment they have heard the peoples voice & it shook them. They’re choosing to stick with their weak leadership who couldn’t handle YouTubers saying mean things online, when all it would’ve taken is a true leader to step in, take the reigns, take some responsibility, stop discriminating, apologize about the things that have been done wrong, step completely out of politics, be truly inclusive & they’d be back in business. until then, they’re stuck with you, the Yes Men & their plummeting stock.”
Bringing her lengthy thread to a close, Carano ultimately affirmed, “I’m not saying I’m right on all fronts but I am open hearted & refused to discriminate based off of powerful people telling me how to think & act & if there was something I needed to apologize for I would have in a heartbeat but I didn’t say or do anything wrong. People come up to me daily to shake my hand & thank me for taking a stand, even people who think diff.
“One thing is true, good leadership makes for a better world, leading to healthier & happier people & better opportunity,” she concluded. “Look around, we are watching the devastating effects of what bad leadership can do worldwide.”
