Fall guys are old hat, macabre-wise. There was the terrible heat Piggy took in Lord of the Flies and the gruesome sacrifices of hot-headed teens every slasher flick, ever. But of all the unfortunate characters born to bear the brunt of bad situations, South Park masterminds Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s creation– and repeated destruction– of Kenny McCormick was a whole special brand of deadly awful.
It wasn’t enough that his trademark orange parka muffled his voice or that his alcoholic mother and trailer-trash father left his family life lacking. And it didn’t satisfy Parker and Stone just to shoot Kenny with a spaceship’s fireball, trample him with a herd of cows and run him over with a police car—all of which occurred in the show’s premiere episode. Instead, they continued to kill his tiny cut-out figure over and over again until season 5’s “Kenny Dies,” when his passing garnered some more serious attention and the murder rate eked to a near halt.
Classifying and categorizing Kenny’s deaths, which we undertook in honor of our first-ever violence issue, turned out to be a harrowing task that opened up question after question about death’s dour variables. Is getting cooked in fire different than being burned? How to factor in intent? Should we parse out vehicular accidents from cattle tramplings? Does the agent of death matter? Is sacrifice its own category or merely a subset? Do getting torn apart and cut up merit separate headings? We phoned polling experts, enrolled in data management courses, begged our business staff to help—and still the pressure of accuracy threatened to crush us like, well, any of the 17 different objects that crushed Kenny himself.
But like South Park, which is now in the middle of its twelfth season, we persevered. Amidst grotesque caveats, we now proudly present our cross-referenced, comprehensive catalog of Kenny McCormick’s South Park deaths. Moments when Kenny miraculously escapes the clutches of quietus (only to die later in an episode) are marked with a pound sign.
Kenny dies 84 unique times.
Grim Reaper: 2
1.06
Credits of seasons 2-4
Electrocuted: 1
3.01 – Struck by lightening, brought back to life when girlfriend performs CPR
Exploded: 8
2.08 – Firecracker explodes in hand
2.11 – Head explodes due to planetarium demonstration’s intensity
3.02 – Spontaneously combusts due to withheld flatulence
3.10 – Gets seizure from video game, explodes, spills over with rats
3.16 – Insides explode from pressure buildup due to an anally-inserted tampon
4.08 – Due to a gas buildup when antacid mixes with water
4.09 – Blown up while with Afghan counterpart
7.15 – Upon being zapped by Saddam Hussein
Shot: 9
1.01 – By spaceship #
1.02 – By Mr. Garrison, who was trying to shoot Kathie Lee Gifford
1.03 – By Ned after escaping volcano
1.10 – Turned into a duck-billed platypus by Damien, then shot by Jimbo
2.10 – By police while trying to surrender, in front of Marilyn Manson
4.03 – By police in Elian Gonzalez-style raid
5.11 – By airport security
9.03 – By Chinese mafia
11.14 – By Wendy Testaburger’s stray bullet
Attacked by Animal: 6
1.01 – Trampled by cattle #
1.08 – Swarmed by mutant turkeys
2.07 – Attacked by a huge, black, scary monster #
2.13 – Gored by bull’s horns
3.05 – Attacked by bear while impersonating a deer
3.13 – Beaten up by Cartman’s Phonics Monkey
Run Over: 10
1.01 – Police car
1.13 – Train
2.07 – The Fonz’s motorcycle
2.17 – Mining cart full of underpants
3.12 – Snowspeeder, while in ED-209 costume
4.06 – Ambulance
4.07 – While trying to fix Timmy’s wheelchair, a la Speed
4.17 – By car during filming of The Spirit of Chistmas
5.10 – Motorcycle
9.04 – Ice cream truck # (later died when taken off feeding tube at hospital)
Crushed: 17
1.02 – In the school play by the Native American Hut #
1.03 – By a large volcanic bomb ejected from the volcano #
1.07 – Mir satellite # (revived as zombie via Worcestershire sauce embalming.)
1.07 – By a falling angel statue and then by a crashing airplane
2.03 – By car tipped upside down # (steps out through sunroof)
2.03 – By tree (twice: once it misses, once it hits)
2.04 – By grave stone
2.08 – By bleachers
2.09 – By theater crowd
2.12 – By mosh pit in Cartman’s treehouse
3.03 – By chandelier
4.01 – By bricks after flying off sled
4.07 – By piano
4.09 – By elevator
4.13 – By Cartman’s door against a wall
4.14 – By stage light
8.07 – By ceiling, after being thrown by “Mr. Jefferson,” who is really Michael Jackson
Dismembered: 9
1.04 – Arms and head ripped off by three Middle Park Cowboy football players
1.07 – Cut by chainsaw wielded by Kyle to end the zombie curse
1.11 – By Iraqi sword
2.06 – By audience members on Jesus and Pals
2.14 – Head bitten off by Ozzy Osbourne #
2.18 – By conveyor belt in front of prehistoric man exhibit
3.06 – Pulled by magnet into giant fan
5.07 – Face sliced by boomerang
Credits of season 7 on
Burned or Cooked: 3
1.05 – Knocked into a microwave oven with a chair and cooked by a mutant clone of Stan
3.14 – By a National Guard warning flare
5.08 – Falls into lava trying to save a Gamesphere console
Asphyxiated: 1
1.11 – By tetherball
Hit by projectile: 2
2.05 – Overpowered dodgeball thrown by Chinese opponent
4.04 – Hit by frying pan
Disease/Bodily failure: 5
2.10 – Chicken pox
3.16 – Fatal defecation after playing “Brown Note”
5.01 – Laughs to death
5.02 – Vomits intestines
5.13 – Dies of “terminal illness”
Sacrifice: 2
3.09 – To open conch shell that Moses is trapped in
4.16 – During Carousel, a ceremony based on Logan’s Run
Frozen: 1
3.11 – Frozen in carbonite
Drowned: 1
4.02 – With cement shoes on
In a dream: 1
4.06 – By alien-like baby brother
Impaled: 2
5.06 – By metal pipe, during roller coaster ride
6.15 – By flagpole during movie trailer, as part of the body of Rob Schneider, who ingested a roast beef containing Kenny’s recently-exorcised soul
Mysterious/Unknown: 2
3.03 – Dies in unknown manner while waiting for Chef at bus stop (revived mysteriously at dawn) #
5.12 – Seen dead without explanation
Mixed/other: 3
2.02 – Self-sacrificially, while turning on hospital generator. (Sacrifice, electrocuted)
2.15 – Drowned by Stan’s goldfish (Drowned, attacked by animal)
5.04 – Mass suicide in reflecting pool at Lincoln Memorial. (Sacrifice, drowned)