
The delay of South Park comes with the release of a new poster featuring familiar characters like Stan, Kyle, Cartman, Kenny and even Jesus. The series has now set its season 27 release date for Wednesday, July 23.
Parker and Stone expressed their frustration about the situation openly on social media, where they described the merger as a “shitshow” that “ruined” South Park. They emphasized that they are working hard on new episodes and hope fans will eventually get to see them, despite the issues behind the scenes.
South Park’s streaming rights are a major point of contention. The previous exclusive streaming deal with HBO Max, worth $500 million, just expired, and no new exclusivity deal has been struck. Instead, it appears that multiple non-exclusive deals are being considered. Paramount Global wants to offer the series on its own streaming service, Paramount+, and has already announced that South Park would be available in the US starting in July.
At the same time, the streaming rights are also being offered to other platforms, including Warner Bros. Discovery (the parent company of HBO Max) and Netflix. This has led to legal conflict, with Parker and Stone’s lawyers sending a letter to RedBird, Skydance and Jeff Shell (who is expected to become president of Paramount Global following the acquisition).
The letter accuses RedBird of sabotaging negotiations by, among other things, attempting to force a shorter streaming term of five years and having new seasons run exclusively on Paramount+ for a year before being made available elsewhere. Parker and Stone do not support these efforts.
Despite the expiration of the HBO Max deal and confusion over its launch on Paramount+, the first 26 seasons will remain available on Max (in the US) for now, thanks to an extension during negotiations. The series can therefore still be viewed on that platform. Paramount+ has yet to provide an official update on when South Park will actually arrive, leading to uncertainty among fans.
It is expected that Paramount+ will still offer the series in time for the new season. In the meantime, Parker and Stone will continue to work on the project with their team.