[There was a video here]

South Park kicked off its 15th season tonight in an episode that combined four show staples: potty humor, political satire, parody and pondering the human condition. It was smart and timely, funny and outrageous. And it was a little depressing, too.

One needn't look further than the episode's title, "Ass Burgers," an admittedly clichéd play on Asperger's syndrome, for the potty humor. The politics were covered with a Michele Bachmann-esque controversy over the effect to which school-mandated vaccinations cause kids—and in this episode, Stan—to develop things like Asperger's. There was a riff on The Matrix in which others with Asperger's implored Stan to reveal the "illusion" of happiness to everyone else by imbibing him with Jameson. But the episode ended on a depressing note, as you'll see in this four-minute highlight reel.