The Mexican Staring Frog of Southern Sri Lanka: Stan, Kyle, Kenny, Cartman and classmates are assigned a Vietnam war project, to interview a vet and get the real story of what went on. Hey, Stan's Uncle Jimbo was in 'Nam, so who better to ask? Presenting Jimbo's tales of fairground rides and single-handed annihilation of the Viet Cong troops (and from back when Ned had a voice), Mr Garrison is incensed and gives the boys an F-. Out for revenge on Stan's fibbing uncle, our pipsqueak heroes expand upon a Loch Ness monster style myth of a frog whose stare can render one catatonic, with shonky video footage of a plastic frog, and Cartman in a frock. With this video "evidence" Jimbo and Ned's Huntin' and Killin' TV program begins to kick rival show Jesus and Pals' butt in the ratings - so what's a deity to do? Well, turn the program into a Jerry Springer-esque chat show, that's what! Our moral for this episode? Lying is bad. Oh, and Kenny gets killed…

Flashbacks: Ms Crabtree, resident loud-mouthed, bird's nest hairdoed (literally) bus driver loses control in treacherous mountains, sending the bus off a cliff, into a river and down a waterfall before it comes to rest balanced precariously on a cliff. Filling the kids with fear of an evil black monster that will eat them if they leave the bus, she sets off to find help. A career in stand-up comedy and the love of a truck driver sidetracks her however. Meanwhile the kids reminisce about better times, flashing back to season one episodes, but with neat little twists (for instance Cartman's anal probe becomes an ice cream truck). Without even thinking to look for them, the kids' parents fear they have all run away, and get a Live Aid type televised singalong happening to beg their bairn to return home. It all seems rather bizarre, surely there's a good reason? Look out for cameos from chin on legs Jay Leno, and even Fonzie (though he's not real). In all this has a delightfully nasty poke at the questionable TV habit of padding out with flashback episodes, and I nearly forgot - Kenny dies, a few times.

Summer Sucks: Uh-oh! Mr Hat has disappeared! Still, the kids couldn’t care less, as school's out and it's summer holidays time. But what's this? Some silly kid blew his hands off with fireworks, so they have been banned in Colorado - how can they fill their summer now? The mayor is also concerned, the big Fourth of July celebration at Stark's Pond is imminent, and with no fireworks the whole thing will be a major fizzer. The idea is hit upon to have the world's biggest snake firework, usually a tiny disc which you light and it emits a tail of ash - however this one is half a mile wide, twenty storeys high and needs a fleet of choppers to put into place - sadly though nobody considered the consequences. As the deadly tail of ash destroys cities and lives, who or what can save the day? Meanwhile Cartman struggles against first-grader pee at his swimming lessons, Mr Garrison loses the plot without his alter ego (even seeing Dr Katz, who for once doesn’t appear in wobblevision), Jimbo and Ned head off to Mexico to purchase some REAL fireworks, and Officer Barbrady has trouble finding the little man in a boat - for a while at least... Kenny also gets killed.

Chef's Salty Chocolate Balls: South Park is chosen as the new home of an annual independent film festival, and the hordes descend. Everybody is out to make a buck, even Chef sets up a stall to sell his salty chocolate balls, giving much opportunity for fun double entendres and a fab nod to his alter-ego Isaac Hayes' Theme From Shaft (which had a certain FNARR quality all of its own) at one point. But what's that voice Kyle is hearing whilst doing plops? Could it be Mr Hankey? The boys scour the sewers in search of their do-do friend, and discover he's not do-doing too well due to the influx of film types, and their vegetarian food effluent unbalancing the town's delicate eco-system. Kyle crusades to save his pal, however the film types think he's pitching a film (cue Tom Hanks and a monkey as Mr Hankey), until a fabulously brown climax where Mr Hankey, with the help of Chef's salty chocolate balls, goes all Sorcerer's Apprentice and drives away the human refuse with, umm, more human refuse. A moral tale on how some towns just can’t cope with such massive annual influxes, with a few hearty stabs at the independent film industry - and you guessed it, Kenny dies.

Into season two, and with the production of South Park moving more into the realm of computer assistance in its creation, the video quality seems to have improved a bit from the earliest episodes. For somebody used to viewing the show through an SBS snowstorm though the DVDs come as an utter revelation, hitherto unseen things such as the woollen textures on the boys' beanies spring to life, and there's a general clarity that is a joy to behold.

This isn’t to say that they are entirely perfect. Flashbacks in particular appeared a bit washed out at times, and The Mexican Staring Frog had a big white flash in the middle of it (around the 12-minute mark if you really wish to know) - only briefly, but an unpleasant surprise nonetheless. Still, they ain't gonna get better than this, and I think the only issue which a fan who wishes to collect the series would have with this disc is the lopping of the Braniff and Comedy Central logos from the first three episodes, usually murdering specially prepared end credits songs off extremely abruptly. A bit dumb, peoples.

Sonically it's in Dolby 2.0 - it sounds fine enough, in fact there's sufficient quality to discern the odd variances in the voice recording, particularly notable with Chef who apparently records his work in New York and sends them in on tape. Lip synch is a bit dodgy at times, but duh it's a cartoon, silly...

Unlike with the first season there are no special Trey and Matt intros to these episodes, although they were rather annoying in their inability to be skipped. Indeed there are no chapters at all within the episodes, so if you want to pop by a favourite scene you have to scan the entire episode. There are no extras at all, although much brief amusement can be gleaned from popping over to the French soundtrack, where even the title song (and Kenny!) are parlez-vousing Francais fluently.

This isn’t the best selection of episodes available, however they all have their moments of hilarity, sauciness, barbed humour and even pathos - what more can a South Park fan ask for?