Leopold "Butters" Stotch, voiced by Matt Stone, is a character in the animated series South Park. His nickname is a word play on "butterscotch". His name might also indicate that he is of German and Scottish descent. Having a birthday that's the same day as a national tragedy (9/11, as of 2001) is just one of the many misfortunes Butters has inflicted upon him. He speaks with a distinctive, stuttering Southern accent with a wholesome manner like a child from a '50s–'60s TV show. The character is loosely based on South Park director of animation Eric Stough, whom Parker and Stone regarded as a "goody-goody" because he always worried about causing offense.
Appearance
Butters has a small tuft of light blond hair on the top of his head, and wears a turquoise jacket with dark green pants.
Butters as a metrosexual
Personality
Butters has a warm personality that everyone finds comfort in. Fans consider him one of the sweetest, most innocent, and most gullible characters on the show. He is generally much nicer and much more naïve than the other four main characters. Unlike nearly all South Park characters, he rarely curses and instead uses euphemisms such as "aw, hamburgers" or "son of a biscuit". He has cursed a few times however. Each instance was meant to be very shocking.
Butters refines himself in self-improvement in almost everything, to perfection, studying regularily and often commenting on how he "needs to learn to behave himself". Other skills include tap dancing. Unfortunately, he also has extremely low self-esteem and therefore has no judgment as to when or how to use his skills, and perceives everyone around him as knowing much more than he does. Butters is a good student and considered to be a dork by his associates. Butters seems to be constantly seeking a role model, as evidenced when he takes to Cartman (unbeknownst to him) pretending to be a robot in "AWESOM-O". He constantly struggles to find acceptance among his associates, hence why he often does menial tasks in hopes that this will earn him favor and respect.
In "Cartman Sucks" Butters is accused of being "bi-curious", and although he agrees, it's obvious he does not know what this means. Butters also unwittingly gave a very thoughtful speech in the same episode, regarding the treatment of bi-sexual children.
In "Super Fun Time," Butters is shown to be more assertive and less willing to go along with Cartman's plans and rule-breaking.
Friends
Butters has been in the show since the beginning, though initally only as a background character. He was later adopted by Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, and Eric Cartman as their fourth friend when Kenny McCormick died (semi-permanently). Later, Kyle, Stan, and Cartman decided that they didn't like Butters very much and chose Tweek to "fill the void" instead. However, he seems to be friends with classmates Pip and Dougie, as seen in "Two Guys Naked in a Hot Tub". Butters was often referred to as "a little pussy" and the boys got him to do everything for them - often getting Butters grounded in the process. However, he now seems to hang out with the four boys very often now. Butters is probably now the friend outside of the main four they hang out with the most now.
In "Toilet Paper", Butters mentioned he had a girlfriend named Carrie in Michigan. Whether this was actually true or not is unknown, though if it was, the relationship didn't last.
In the episode " Raisins ", Butters developed a crush on Lexus, a waitress at the Raisins restaraunt. However, his strong feelings for her were one-sided, as she had only been using him for his money and eventually told him they were not boyfriend and girlfriend. This caused Butters to become depressed, though he got over it in the end.
Family
Butters is an only child and his parents, Stephen (Chris in some appearances) and Linda Stotch, are very authoritarian, strict and, at some points, abusive towards their son — often berating him for things that are entirely beyond his control. This has evidently affected Butters psychologically, as he often tells himself off when his parents are not around to do it. It is also hinted that the justification for this abuse lacks sound foundation. As additional evidence of psychological problems, he has stated in "Super Best Friends") that he wakes up to the sound of his own screams. However, it clear that Linda (if only her) cares deeply for him, as she becomes hysterical when he faked his death in "Marjorine," and becomes extremely distressed when he is missing in the Imagionationland Trilogy.
He is scared of his dominating and threatening father, whom he is obliged to respectfully refer to as "Sir". His father uses fear as his primary parenting tactic with Butters, once intentionally frightening him with threats of "super-AIDS". Linda however has been shown to be much more tender to her son, hugging and kissing him often. She seems to go along with Stephen's harshness only because she believes that it is for the best of her son.
Abuse
Stephen and Linda have both abused Butters in one way or another. He is usually grounded after he gets involved with something, because they usually conclude that it was Butters all on his own, and don't believe that he is being bullied. They have also threatened to ground Butters for things he can't control, such as in "The Death of Eric Cartman", Stephen orders him to stop having nightmares or else he'll be grounded. Also in "How to Eat with Your Butt", Butters' parents ground him for making a silly face on his school photo, and are convinced that his normal face is a silly face. In "The List", it is shown that Butters parents were planning to ground him if the girls at school thought he was ugly. They have also physically beaten him in "Jared Has Aides" which was later withheld from broadcast by Comedy Central because of the abuse Butters receives, though it has been shown since.
The most distinguishing abuse was in the season five episode "Butters' Very Own Episode" which centered on how Linda sent Butters to spy on his father to find out what he was getting Linda for their wedding anniversary, and, among other things, Butters saw Stephen go into a Men's Bathhouse. Butters didn't understand what it was and told his mother, who then, in a spot of insanity, attempted to kill Butters by pushing a car with Butters inside off a dock. Linda then wrote a suicide note and was about to kill herself just when Stephen stepped in; the resulting confrontation changed her mind about suicide. Stephen and Linda tried to keep Butters' murder a secret and blamed it on "some Puerto Rican guy". Butters meanwhile found a way home and his parents came clean.
At the end of the sixth season, in the episode "My Future Self n' Me", Butters gets revenge on his parents for their abuse of him (culminating in them hiring an actor to pretend to be Butters's future self so as to scare him out of doing drugs) by paying Cartman to smear feces all over his house. The act ironically leads the Stotches to realize how badly they've treated their son and they apologize, an act that is contrasted by Stan Marsh's parents refusing to apologize for them hiring an actor to be Stan's future self, to the extent that they mutilate their actor when Stan tricks them into thinking he chopped off his own hand. Since then, the Stotches have not been shown hurting their son.
Despite all the abuse Butters has received, his parents have been shown to care deeply about their son. They do put a price on their care, however, as shown in "Stupid Spoiled Whore Video Playset" where they sell Butters to Paris Hilton for $250 million USD.
In The Return of Chef Butters briefly mentions that one of his Uncles has committed sexual acts on him but not realising that its sexual molestation.
Life and History
Butters has been referred to in scripts as "Puff Puff" and "Swanson" - Stan refers to him by this name in the opening scene of the season two episode "Conjoined Fetus Lady". When Butters spoke in the early episodes however, his voice was dramatically different from the stuttering southern accent he has now. Butters was renamed and properly introduced in the season three episode "Two Guys Naked in a Hot Tub" alongside Pip and Dougie stuck in a basement during a Meteor Shower Party. He was seen sporadically from season three through five, going from social pariah in "Two Guys Naked in a Hot Tub" to mean-spirited bully in "Hooked on Monkey Phonics" (which seems out of character for Butters, but is not entirely unlikely for an emotionally abused child).
In the episode "Jared Has Aides" Butters was adopted by Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, and Eric Cartman as their fourth friend when Kenny McCormick died "permanently" at the end of the fifth season. The writers had given Butters his own spotlight episode as the season five finale to prepare fans for Butters taking Kenny's place on the show. The episode, titled "Butters' Very Own Episode", gave Butters a complicated backstory where his father was outed as being a closet bisexual and his mother attempted to drown her son Butters in a fit of madness. They all made up at the end of the episode and nothing came of it.
Butters in class dressed as Marjorine
Butters found himself, as the new fourth friend, being put down and treated like a total outcast by his new friends. Kyle, Stan, and Cartman all openly bullied Butters, telling him how he's not cool like Kenny. Cartman in particular took perverse pleasure in making Butters suffer, to the extent that, in "Jared Has Aides", he pretended to be Butters on the phone and bad-mouthed his parents, just so he could watch them abusing him.
Butters would remain on as the fourth member of the gang for four more episodes; two of the episodes continued the plot of Butters being abused but downplayed it and in the case of "Freak Strike", ending the episode just as Butters was about to be beaten (with Cartman being beaten up instead). Ultimately, in the sixth episode of season six, "Professor Chaos", Butters is expelled from the group for being "too lame" and adopts his super-villain alter ego "Professor Chaos" as a means to get revenge against the group and society for rejecting him. Butters would run around for several episodes as Professor Chaos, only to have no one care much about his plots since many of them had, though Butters didn't realize it, already occurred on episodes of the animated series The Simpsons. Butters would eventually reveal his secret identity of Professor Chaos to Stan, although he mistook it for Butters coming out of the closet.
Though not anymore a member of the main four's group, Butters was nevertheless kept as a prominent member of the boys' extended circle. Though he has returned, Kenny's role has declined to an extent due to lack of ideas for the character and Butters has taken on a more prominent role again. Despite their ill-treatment toward him, Butters stays loyal to his friends, perhaps in hopes that they'll accept him. In a way, this has worked as recently there seems to have been some shift in the balance of friendship. The most obvious case of this being in the episode "Tsst", where Butters is calmly playing along with Stan, Kyle and Kenny, with Cartman being much more alienated than usual, as well as in "Casa Bonita", where Kyle decides to take Butters with him on his birthday to Casa Bonita instead of Cartman, implying he feels closer to Butters than Cartman.
Despite their history, Butters has recently taken on the role as Cartman's sidekick. Cartman often takes advantage of Butters' kindness and desire to be accepted in order to fulfill his schemes.
Professor Chaos
Butters' alter ego is Professor Chaos, a supervillain/mad scientist he became when the boys dumped him. He spreads chaos with his sidekick, General Disarray, and his hamsters (or "minions").
Chaos
Professor Chaos and General Disarray
Early in his career as Professor Chaos, Butters was successful at bringing chaos to his fourth grade classroom when he stole the erasers from the chalkboard. During the process of changing into his Professor Chaos costume Butters was discovered by Dougie, who chose to join him as his sidekick, General Disarray after being eliminated in the boys' quest to find a new fourth member. Together, Professor Chaos and General Disarray hatched out evil plots that included trying to flood the world with his garden hose and destroying the ozone layer with aerosol spray.
Old Plans
In the episode "Simpsons Already Did It", Butters devises a series of supposedly original evil plots, only to abandon each of them after General Disarray informs him that they have already been used on The Simpsons. He nearly goes insane after a while of this, but gets consoled later by the reassurance that this is only because the show has run so long, not his own lack of creativity.
Injuries
In the episode "Good Time With Weapons", Stan, Kyle, Cartman, and Kenny buy authentic Japanese weapons from a fair. Butters wants to play with them, but they don't allow him. Butters then transforms into Professor Chaos and has a "ninja fight" with the gang. This ends when Kenny throws a ninja star into Butters' eye, which causes him extreme pain, shocking the other boys. Luckily, Butters receives medical attention after the whole town see him in shock. In later episodes his eye appears to be fine as if it never happened.
In "Pre-School" he finds out that a bully from pre-school got out of jail, and then tries to hide. His dad later kicks him out of the house in an effort to make him have fun, but he simply gets nervous and starts singing to himself. The bully arrives and give him several bully related attacks, including a severe Indian burn.
Talents and Interests
Dance
As revealed in the episode "You Got F'd in the A", Butters is a very talented tap dancer, but his fondness for dancing was cut short at the National Tap Dancing Championship when a freak accident (caused by Butters' tap shoe flying off his foot) set off a chain reaction leading to the death of eleven people (if counting the unborn child within a pregnant victim and the two people who committed suicide after the incident). This has left Butters quite scarred, although this isn't immediately apparent. In the same episode he was further terrified as his tap shoe again started another fatal chain of events, leading to the death of five rival dancers (and their instructor) who Butters and Stan were set to face in a dance contest.
He also seems to have some break-dancing ability, as seen in the episode "Asspen". Additionally, Butters exhibits some impressive free-style dancing ability, dancing to Justin Timberlake's "Rock Your Body" in the episode "Marjorine". He showed off more dance moves at the end of "Hell on Earth 2006" during Satan's party, imitating Michael Jackson.
Singing and Music
Butters is often seen singing to himself, usually a song that goes, "Loo loo loo, I've got some apples / Loo loo loo, you've got some too." He is often cut off at that point. When he does finish, the ending is, "Loo loo loo, let's make some applesauce / Take off our clothes and loo loo loo." or, "Loo loo loo, let's get together / I know what we can do loo loo.", which, either way, could be a strange euphemism for sexual intercourse.
In "Something You Can Do With Your Finger", Butters auditions for Fingerbang by singing "Little Bunny Foo-Foo". In "AWESOM-O" he sings about his robot friend in a song that resembles the theme song of The Courtship of Eddie's Father, and he seems fond of the Chicago ballad "If You Leave Me Now".
Apparently, Butters can also play the drums quite proficiently, as he is seen doing so for Cartman's Christian rock band "Faith + 1", featured in the episode "Christian Rock Hard".
In "You Got F'd in the A", in the flashback of the horrible accident Butters caused during the championship competition, the song Butters dances to is an upbeat, yet obviously risqué song entitled "I've Got Something In My Front Pocket For You", which features the lyrics, "Won't you reach into my pocket and see what it is / Then grab onto it, just for you / Give it a little squeeze and say 'How do you do'."
More recently, in the episode "Miss Teacher Bangs a Boy", Butters is heard singing a song while using the urinal in the boy's bathroom: "Hey there Mr. Weiner, whaddaya know / Do you need to tinkle tinkle? / Yes, I do think so".
In the episode "Cartman Sucks", Butters sings Joni Mitchell's song Help Me while playing with his army figurines.
Butters frequently sings the line from Chicago's "If you leave me now" in the episode "Casa Bonita".
Intelligence and Memory
Butters openly joins and helps with some of Cartman's schemes, and is usually shown doing well at it.
Butters is shown in "Christian Rock Hard" to be highly talented in mental calculation, instantly supplying the correct answer to a complicated math problem. The context suggests this is a talent of Butters' that is well known to the others. (He also tutors Stan, at his request, in "My Future Self n' Me" — although it isn't clear in which subject, possibly more than one.)
However, in "Go God Go", he did not realise that Cartman may die if frozen in snow for several weeks - he had to get Dougie to inform him of these facts. However, this may reflect his innocence, his deference to Cartman's judgement, or he is a Autistic savant and, while extremely talented in mathematical computation does not necessarily possess scientific or even commonplace knowledge.
In the episode Professor Chaos, Butters was able to hack into the huge screen in the baseball stadium so it showed him which shows he is proficient in I.T.
Art
In "A Very Crappy Christmas", Butters makes construction paper versions of the four boys for their animated Christmas short. Butters also shows his artistic talents in the episode "AWESOM-O", when he draws a picture of himself and his robot friend (Cartman). In "Kenny Dies", he sends a letter to Kenny in the hospital which contains a drawing of them both in an airplane with the words "ME AND MY FRIEND KENNY" written above. As well, in the episode "Toilet Paper" where the four boys get into trouble by their teacher, Stan claims that, "Art is for gaywads." after Butters states that he loves art class. Briefly in the episode "It Hits the Fan" Kyle interrupts Butters tagging a building with his name in the style of a well practiced graffiti artist.
Sports
He played with the rest of the boys, as the center fielder, on their baseball team in "The Losing Edge". He was number 99 on the dodgeball team in "Conjoined Fetus Lady". He is also seen playing football with the others in "Raisins".
Trivia
- As revealed in Cartman Sucks, Butters' blood type is O.
- Being born on September 11 puts him under the zodiac sign, Virgo.
- Butters is left handed, as seen in AWESOM-O.
- The creators have said in multiple DVD commentaries that Butters is one of their "top 3 favorite characters".
- In the South Park season 6 intro, Butters is seen holding a sign saying "The Butters show" over the South Park sign.
Quotes
- I'll rather be a crying little pussy than a faggy goth kid.
- Wow this is just like Vietnam, huh fellas! Whoopee!
- Lulu I got som apples, Lulu you got some too.
- Butters: I'm a bad bear, I'm a bad old bear
His father: You're a grounded old bear.
| Main Characters | |
|---|---|
Kyle Broflovski | Eric Cartman | Stan Marsh | Kenny McCormick | |