About Last Night... (South Park)
In a satire of American partisan politics, mass hysteria ensues as liberals celebrate with drunken rioting and conservatives experience apocalyptic panic.
In a parody of the films Ocean's Eleven and Entrapment, Obama and McCain use the hype and fear of Election Night to carry out a high-tech heist from the Smithsonian.
Parker and Stone briefly considered parodying Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight by having then-President George W. Bush gallantly take the blame for the Smithsonian heist.
Following the announcement of the 2008 presidential election results, Barack Obama and John McCain address their supporters on national television as the people of South Park watch.
The town's Democrats, including Randy and Sharon Marsh and the Broflovskis, express a belief that Obama is the Messiah, crudely taunt their Republican neighbors and begin to celebrate drunkenly in the streets.
The Syndicate has conspired to win the election by running Obama and McCain against each other, so that the winner can access a hidden tunnel from the Oval Office, break into the Smithsonian's Museum of Natural History, and steal the Hope Diamond.
They watch as Randy, believing that Obama's win means that he no longer needs a job, punches his equally liberal boss in the face and breaks his nose.
When Officer Barbrady attempts to restore order (after Stan called him over to his neighborhood), the drunken crowd assumes that he must be a Republican, loudly boos him, and overturns his police car.
Ike, who had been a member of the heist the entire time, blows up a private jet that contains dummies of the criminals and alters hospital records to declare everyone involved legally dead.
[1] The episode satirizes the variety of reactions from liberals and conservatives in the aftermath of election returns: "somewhere between a boozy orgy of celebratory puking in the streets and apocalyptic panic".
[5] The team initially intended to create an alternate version in case McCain won, but found the prospect too daunting, considering their quick production schedule.
In a possible scenario in which McCain was declared the winner, the duo intended to air the completed episode as is and deal with what was termed their "Dewey Defeats Truman" moment later.
[3] "Trey Parker and Matt Stone have always turned around South Park episodes with impressive speed, but Wednesday night was ridiculous," said James Hibberd of The Hollywood Reporter.
[6] "About Last Night...", along with the thirteen other episodes from South Park's twelfth season, were released on a three-disc DVD and Blu-ray set in the United States on March 10, 2009.
The sets included brief audio commentaries by Parker and Stone for each episode, a collection of deleted scenes, and two special mini-features, The Making of 'Major Boobage and Six Days to South Park.
