Though it's perhaps overshadowed by that other long-running American cartoon, it can't be overstated how deeply engrained South Park is within a certain sect of American culture. Suffice to say, it's about time that Matt Stone and Trey Parker's bawdy show got a full adidas shoe collab.
I recently listened to a podcast breaking down the making-of and plot of 1999's South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut and it gave me newfound respect for Stone and Parker, who worked their asses off to produce South Park in the mid-'90s.
Almost from the jump, the show smashed Comedy Central's viewership records as teen boys marveled at the novelty of seeing children (voiced by Stone and Parker) spew obscenities. Over time, South Park shifted from a heightened day-in-the-life kinda program to a more topical, ripped-from-the-headlines show without ever really sacrificing the gross-out humor and questionable politics.
But make no mistake: South Park remains one of the network's top shows, if not it's single biggest hit. There's a reason that Stone and Parker scooped $900 million in an exclusive film deal for Paramount Plus.
With demand never really declining, South Park merch is as desirable as ever.
A Towelie-themed adidas Campus 80 released in 2021 was the show's first adidas team-up and it set the standard, selling out instantly and still commanding a premium on resale sites (recent flips of the $100 sneaker on StockX vary from $380 to $500).
So it was wise for Foot Locker to snag the exclusive on the complete South Park x adidas collab, available now on Foot Locker's site in North America and Europe.
You've got some, frankly, kind of weird models selected for this team-up, though.
Take the Kenny-themed NMD_R1 for instance: it's very nicely detailed — perhaps the best of the bunch — it's just not a particularly relevant model these days (total 2015 vibes).
There are two Forum Lows (one for Cartman and one for his AWESOM-O alter-ego), though, which makes sense. The AWESOM-O one features more thoughtful features while Cartman's is simply red, yellow, and cyan.
Stan and Kyle get their own Stan Smith (get it?) and Superstar, respectively, which are also pretty straightforward. Points for the fuzzy stuff on Kyle's Superstar and Stan's branded tongue, though.
Perhaps the most surprising reference received the most thematic sneaker. Who could've expected to see Butters' Professor Chaos alter-ego getting his own NMD_R1, let alone one in a tasteful colorway with shiny metallic foil?
This adidas collab, which includes some matching apparel, is strictly for the South Park heads.
Which makes sense, because there's clearly still a lot of them.
