South Park is once again impressively contemporary with a Season 15 premiere that takes aim at Apple's customer policies, soon after news broke of an alleged "secret log file" on iPhones. This seemed like a perfect opportunity to pull off an epic corporate spoof, but although this episode does get in some zingers, it's not nearly as strong as previous season openers.

Not that the episode was a turd, by any means. It started with usual South Park flair as we find Cartman being a dick and showing off an iPad he doesn't really have. The gag with Cartman goading his mother to f#!k him goes on a bit too long, as South Park jokes often do. It was a cool joke the first time, mildly humorous the second time, and quite tired after that. Then there are the Apple Geniuses. While that topic certainly is ripe for satire, the jokes here were generic and could have pretty much described any retail customer service experience. I'll give the writers some credit for the Genius "quickening" idea though – it was original, if not entirely amusing.

Still, this episode does make the most amazing Terms of Use Agreement joke ever. 'Cause we all know nobody reads them, and leave it to Apple to insert the most insane terms into theirs. The "you agreed to it!" shtick is good, and I was starting to like this story, but then things got odd when the plot takes a turn and ties into The Human Centipede (if you really are in the dark about this movie, you should Google it). I feel like the whole idea was just a ploy to give Cartman a reason to deliver this gem: "It does email, and web browsing, and it s**ts in Kyle's mouth?!"

I get the impression that the SP team just saw the Human Centipede movie and/or trailer and decided to wedge that into the episode somehow. I'm all for poop jokes, if they actually add something to the episode, but this one didn't do much for the story or the comedy.

I judge the success of South Park episodes by asking two simple questions:

1.) Did it make me laugh? 2.) Did it make a good point?

Item 2 is certainly covered in this installment. The ridiculousness of User Agreements and those who don't read them is a point well made, and we should all be a wee bit more cognizant of exactly what we're agreeing to (although the enforceability of unreasonable terms in EULAs can always be judged by the courts). But the bigger issue here is one of putting your faith in a corporate giant that may not have your best interests in mind.

With that said, my first criteria was not quite met. I didn't find this all that funny. It invoked a smile here and there, but for the most part my funny bone was left untickled. Now, comedy is often simply a matter of taste (and there are certainly those out there with bad taste), and I'm sure some viewers thought this was the most awesome thing since the awesome train came to awesome town but I was left unsatisfied.

I just expected something... smarter. Apple is a huge comedic target with plenty of foibles to make fun of in new ways, but this episode chose an elaborate poop joke of all things to make its central point. Yes, South Park often makes heavy use of toilet humor, but this is not even that good of a poop joke.

I can't help but compare this with Futurama's iPhone episode, "Attack of the Killer App", which felt like a much better spoofing of Apple and their rabid fans. But even that episode, great as it was, had an awful Susan Boyle joke that threatened to ruin the whole thing. "HUMANCENTiPAD" suffers similar problems with a basic concept that was great, but had some issues with the supporting material.

Despite my gripes, I still think this is a decent opening for the series and I'm only disappointed because I hold this show up to high standards. This isn't a stellar episode for the franchise, but even on a bad day South Park is still better than half the crap on Wednesday nights. But I am certainly hoping that things improve as the season progresses.

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