It’s time for the kickoff of the fall portion of South Park Season 16 - and because I'm a clever writer, that’s a pun meaning that "Sarcastaball" is a football satire.

The whole affair was on-target with its lampooning of football, while also staying true to the characters. It played off of Randy’s propensity for sarcasm and it mixed in current events – at least current sporting events – in a way that the make for the best episodes.

Of course it took the whole “sarcastaball” concept beyond its logical extreme into areas no one should have to see. And of course an episode about the NFL and football right now couldn’t be made without referencing the controversy over the replacement referees.

Heck, the episode even made sure to reference the terrible call from the Packers-Seahawks game this past Monday, That’s what the quick turnaround time of the show can do, and hey, someone not on Twitter had to make fun of the refs, even if the lockout finally ended around the time the joke was made. But the memory and the mockery remain.

Jim Rome was well-satirized on the show, though he’s so sarcastic as is that it's hard to tell when he isn’t being that way. Also, this was probably the best advertising for him and his TV show that he could have gotten, now that he’s away from the ESPN behemoth and on the far-less-behemoth-esque CBS College Sports. He still exists, he still does have a show! South Park said so!

Actually, all of the football parodies - especially of Roger Gooddell being uncaring about anything other than the money he and the league are making while players old and young suffer brain damage, as comically represented in the opening of the episode - were pretty much spot-on.

After all, the man is the commissioner of a multi-billion dollar league that allowed games to turn into jokes over $3 million in pensions. Trey Parker and Matt Stone tackled the issue well: sure, people don’t want players turning into vegetables who don’t know where they are at any given moment. But no one wants the game turned into a lovey-dovey affair. Then again, they had no good answers for how to do it either. Interesting.

And poor Cee-Lo got raked over the coals with a parody of him singing the national anthem, though the fake voice wasn’t actually all that much off from his actual voice, just with an intentionally bad quality to it.

So, though it’s probably something that shouldn’t be discussed in too much detail: how about Butters’ Creamy Goo? That whole aspect wasn’t disgusting at all! It was really appealing and didn’t make me wish I hadn’t been watching at all! People really needed to see that! I mean, South Park would never take things that far! They never would! This was totally unexpected! But I totally didn’t want to stop watching because of this whole plot thread, no sir!

Everyone’s going to accuse South Park of going soft, and not having gross-out humor at all! This is not sarcastic!

Well, beyond the fact that I wanted to throw up at times, I have to say that it is good to have you back, South Park. A great debut for the back of season 16. Visit our update South Park quotes section for more laughs.