About the Blog
I love cartoons. Old ones. New ones. Hand-drawn, computerized, and stop-motion. I love comics. Old-timey strips and comic books. Irreverent alternative comics, both sixties style and Fantagraphics style.
I love cartoons. Old ones. New ones. Hand-drawn, computerized, and stop-motion. I love comics. Old-timey strips and comic books. Irreverent alternative comics, both sixties style and Fantagraphics style.
Comics, Comix, and Cartoons
Banned Cartoons – Too Rude for TV (South Park)
(Sat 02/09/2008 11:09am)
South Park and Tom Cruise
In 2005, Comedy Central aired “Trapped in the Closet”, an episode of their controversial cartoon series “South Park” that poked vicious fun at movie superstar Tom Cruise and Scientology. In the episode, the Tom Cruise character believes that Stan, one of the South Park kid characters is the reincarnation of Church founder L. Ron Hubbard. But, the most offensive scene was where the Nicole Kidman character (Cruise’s then wife) and the John Travolta (a fellow Scientologist) character try to coax the Tom Cruise character out of a locked clothes closet. To the actor, this added insult to injury because he had suffered from years of unfair tabloid speculation on his sexual orientation.
Comedy Central
At the time of the controversial South Park episode, Cruise was shooting the third installment of his successful “Mission Impossible” series. Because Comedy Central and Paramount Pictures were owned by the media conglomerate Viacom, Hollywood sources claimed that Tom Cruise had threatened to pull out of the picture unless the South Park episode was pulled out of Comedy Central’s reruns. Cruise himself denies putting any pressure on the network. However, “Trapped in the Closet” was indeed pulled out of the rerun schedule.
The Los Angeles Times dubbed the incident “Closetgate.”
Isaac Hayes
Soul singer Isaac Hayes played the South Park character Chef. Because he’s a Scientologist, he also found the “Trapped in the Closet” episode to be offensive, and quit the show in protest.
Reprieve
To Comedy Central’s credit, they wound up putting the episode on their web site and have recently begun to rerun it.
(Sat 02/09/2008 11:09am)
South Park and Tom Cruise
In 2005, Comedy Central aired “Trapped in the Closet”, an episode of their controversial cartoon series “South Park” that poked vicious fun at movie superstar Tom Cruise and Scientology. In the episode, the Tom Cruise character believes that Stan, one of the South Park kid characters is the reincarnation of Church founder L. Ron Hubbard. But, the most offensive scene was where the Nicole Kidman character (Cruise’s then wife) and the John Travolta (a fellow Scientologist) character try to coax the Tom Cruise character out of a locked clothes closet. To the actor, this added insult to injury because he had suffered from years of unfair tabloid speculation on his sexual orientation.
Comedy Central
At the time of the controversial South Park episode, Cruise was shooting the third installment of his successful “Mission Impossible” series. Because Comedy Central and Paramount Pictures were owned by the media conglomerate Viacom, Hollywood sources claimed that Tom Cruise had threatened to pull out of the picture unless the South Park episode was pulled out of Comedy Central’s reruns. Cruise himself denies putting any pressure on the network. However, “Trapped in the Closet” was indeed pulled out of the rerun schedule.
The Los Angeles Times dubbed the incident “Closetgate.”
Isaac Hayes
Soul singer Isaac Hayes played the South Park character Chef. Because he’s a Scientologist, he also found the “Trapped in the Closet” episode to be offensive, and quit the show in protest.
Reprieve
To Comedy Central’s credit, they wound up putting the episode on their web site and have recently begun to rerun it.
