Starvin' Marvin/Trivia

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"Starvin' Marvin/Trivia"

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This page contains trivia for "Starvin' Marvin". Remember, trivia must be factual, provable, and it is always best to cite your source for not-so-obvious trivia. If you would like to dispute a trivia point, please discuss it in the talk page.

Trivia

• This is the first episode that Trey Parker wrote entirely by himself.
• While eating at the all-you-can-eat buffet, Kyle Broflovski is seen slicing a ham. This is not normal, as pork is eschewed in Jewish cuisine. However, he could have been cutting it for someone else or it may just have been a deliberate throwaway joke.
  • The Broflovski family is shown to not keep kosher in the episode "Conjoined Fetus Lady" when they serve pork at dinner with Nurse Gollum and Mr. Mackey.
• This is the first appearance of Kenny's parents, Carol McCormick and Stuart McCormick, as well as his brother Kevin McCormick.
• This is the first episode in which Wendy speaks without interacting with Stan.
• Jerry Seinfeld called Parker and Stone to voice a character. Because Trey Parker and Matt Stone tend to give celebrities obscure roles as a joke, they offered Seinfeld a non-speaking role to be "Turkey #4". However, Seinfeld declined his character role and did not go on the show. This was revealed on Goin' Down to South Park.
• This episode is one of the few episodes to be given a PG rating by the BBFC and TV-14 rating by the FCC. Most South Park episodes are rated 15 in the UK and TV-MA in the US.
• Whenever the sports watch is seen, the time displayed is 4:20, a common reference to marijuana.

References to Popular Culture

• This episode parodies actress/activist Sally Struthers, best known for her role of Gloria Bunker on the sitcom All in the Family, especially her involvement with charity groups and the irony of her person weight gain when she is trying to champion starving people in third world countries. In real life, Struthers has been involved with Christian Children's Fund and International Correspondence School. It is also said that she was a fan of the show until this episode aired, which she was deeply offended by, despite Matt and Trey not having any personal grudge against her.
• The Terrance and Phillip Thanksgiving Special is based on the Pilgrims first arrival in what would become America in November 1620.
• Kyle incorrectly believes that Sally Struthers was on the sitcom Full House.
• The Teiko digital watches offered by Sally Struthers' charity organization are a parody of Seiko, a Japanese watch manufacturer.
• The charity is for the starving people of Ethiopia, a country in Africa. Ethiopia, in spite of the fact that it is a quickly developing country, still has a high rate of poverty, especially in rural areas.
• Cartman calls Stan "Vas deferens", the vas deferens is a duct in the human penis that allows the flow of urine and semen out of the body.
• Cartman confuses a food drive with a Caesarian section.
• When mocking Wendy's views on the feeding the poor, Cartman says he can hear the "Flower children" calling him. This is another slang term for Hippie.
• Mr. Garrison's comment about Wendy and Cartman's "Dickens" is a reference to the late author Charles Dickens whose work usually included social commentary on poverty and the poor. In fact, the conversation of Eric and Wendy about poor houses and how people rather die to go in it is a short version of a dialogue from A Christmas Carol, a Dickens novel.
• According to Mr. Garrison, Englebert Humperdink was the first man on the moon. He is either talking about the German composer Englebert Humperdink or the modern day pop musician who adopted his name. In reality, the first man on the moon was astronaut Neil Armstrong.
• When Mephesto is showing Chef slides of Turkey DNA, apparently one of the slides is a close-up of Vanessa Redgrave's private parts. She is the matriarch of the Redgrave theater dynasty, and is known for her acting, especially her role in the 1977 film Julia which netted her an Oscar for best actress.
• When Cartman is stranded in Ethiopia, he comes across the Red Cross. In reality, the Red Cross is an international humanitarian movement to aid those in need. It was founded in 1863 by Henry Dunant.
• The entire battle between the mutant turkeys and the people of South Park is a parody of a scene from the 1995 film Braveheart. One of the turkeys and Chef also satirize Mel Gibson's character William Wallace. Furthermore, Kyle moons the turkeys as the warriors did in the film.
• At the end of the episode, Stan and Kyle believe that people on TV are real too. They then believe that Angus MacGyver, the main character from the TV series MacGyver, is a real person.

Continuity

• When the boys are in Principal Victoria's office, a picture of Kathy Lee Gifford as she appeared in "Weight Gain 4000" can be seen on the bookshelf.
• Starvin' Marvin, Sally Struthers and other related characters later make their return in "Starvin' Marvin in Space".

Kenny's Death

• He is attacked by Mutant Turkeys and loses an eye during the attack.

Goofs

• On the second part of the Terrance and Phillip thanksgiving special, when it snowed, the snow went off the TV.
• When Kenny is inside the machine with the cans, for a frame part of his parka continues outside of the machine.

Dubbing Changes

International Titles

Language	Title	Translation
Czech	Hladovej Marvin	Starvin' Marvin
Finnish	Nälkä-Marvin	Hunger-Marvin
French	Le Petit Éthernopien	The small Ethernopian
German	Ein Fettwanst in Äthiopien	A fatso in Ethiopia
Hungarian	Kákabélű	Poo Belly
Italian	Donato l'allupato	Donato the Hungry/Horny
Japanese	大食いカートマンと腹ぺこマーヴィン (Ōkui kātoman to harapeko māvu~in)	Glutton Cartman and Starvin' Marvin
Latvian	Izbadējušais Mārvins	Starvin' Marvin
Mandarin Chinese	感恩節，四賤客領養「ㄅㄚˇㄅㄨ」 (Gǎn'ēn jié, sì jiàn kè lǐngyǎng bǎ bū)	Halloween, the boys adopt Starvin' Marvin
Polish	Głodny Marvin	Starvin' Marvin
Portuguese (Brazil)	Marvin faminto	Starvin' Marvin
Russian	Кошмарный Марвин (Koshmarnyy Marvin)	Nightmarish Marvin
Spanish (Latin America)	Paco, el Flaco	Paco, The skinny
Ukrainian	Марвін Голодарвін (Marvin Holodarvin)	Marvin Holo-darvin

Common

• Mr. Garrison names different personalities as the first person to land on the moon in the following dubs:
  • Hungarian: Marilyn Monroe
  • Italian (1st): Elvis Presley
  • Japanese: Usagi Tsukino / Sailor Moon
  • Portuguese (Brazil): Luciano Pavarotti
• Microphone sound effects at the food drive are included in the Cantonese, French, Japanese and Mandarin Chinese dubs.
• When Dr. Mephesto tries to warn the mayor about the mutant turkeys, the laughs from the mayor's aides can be heard in the French, Hungarian, Italian (2nd) and Ukrainian dubs.
• In the Brazilian Portuguese and Latin Spanish dubs, Sally Struthers is dubbed as Shelley Winters, a famous actress from the Hollywood Golden Era.
• The cans of creamed corn donated by the third-grade class is replaced with other food items in the following dubs:
  • Cantonese: Potato chips
  • French: Chestnut cream
  • German, Italian (2nd) and Polish (Comedy Central): Sweetcorn
  • Mandarin Chinese: Unspecified, expired food
  • Portuguese (Brazil): Corn soup
• Chef quotes other celebrities over Vanessa Redgrave while examining Dr. Mephesto's microscope:
  • German and Hungarian: Whitney Houston
  • Mandarin Chinese: Shu Qi
  • Portuguese (Brazil): Sharon Stone
• The price of the all-you-can-eat buffet is rounded up to $7 in the Cantonese and Brazilian Portuguese dubs.

Cantonese

• The sports watch is assigned a prefix name of "007", a number attributed to James Bond.
• Upon discovering that Sally Struthers is hoarding food, Cartman curses the former using the dubbed lyrics to "Kyle's Mom's a B****". This precedes the following episode where the song would be performed in full.

French

• Mention of the Full House show is replaced with the family drama series Party of Five.

Italian (1st)

• The title card for the Terrance and Phillip Thanksgiving Special is replaced with simply a translated text of Lo speciale di Trombino e Pompadour.

Mandarin Chinese

• While planning on the distribution of canned food to the poor, Mayor McDaniels intends to lace the food with poison and kill the poor, in an effort to improve gross income per capita as well as her own political achievements.
• The canned food which Kenny won from the Grab-o-lux is expired pet food, with its brand parodying Pedigree Petfoods.

Polish (Comedy Central)

• Mr. Garrison pleads the class to bring more diverse food, commenting that "Kenny's family is going to have a corny Christmas" instead of Thanksgiving.

Ukrainian

• Clyde's cries as the mutant turkeys attack the classroom are muted.