December 2015 Featured Article Winner

Officer Barbrady is South Park's main police officer, with a relatively poor vocabulary. He is extremely incompetent at his job, usually being incapable of solving the crimes he is legally obliged to investigate. Despite this, he does manage to maintain the balance of peace in South Park as shown in "Chickenlover" when, shortly after he retired, the city fell into chaos.

In "Naughty Ninjas", he was fired from his job as a police officer for shooting an unarmed 6-year-old Latino boy. Following that, he was temporarily reinstated to combat ISIS in "SoDoSoPa". However, he was fired yet again for shooting children playing ninjas.

He was reinstated from his police officer job in the time between "PC Principal Final Justice" and "Splatty Tomato". Likely due to him tracking down Leslie Meyers.

Contents show]

Background

In the episode "Toilet Paper", Barbrady talks about an abusive upbringing, saying how his uncle Charles would beat him with a belt. Furthermore, his father would dress him like a girl and make him sit on his uncles' laps, highlighting sexual abuse.

For the first six seasons, Officer Barbrady was the only Police Officer in South Park, as shown in "Chickenlover". However, during the seventh season, Sergeant Yates and several other officers were added, starting in "Lil' Crime Stoppers" and Officer Barbrady became the Police Chief. Since then, he has appeared in the background, and as shown in "Die Hippie, Die" and "Erection Day", it has seemingly been so long his voice has actually changed. However, his voice seems to have returned to normal once again in "The Snuke".

It appears that the decline in his role made him a lot more competent, as in "Quest for Ratings", he arrests a pharmacist for selling drugs to minors, in "Two Guys Naked in a Hot Tub", he questions the evidence for a "religious cult" in Mr. Mackey's house party, he realizes his mistake when he gives Jimmy directions to a sleazy part of town, shows apparent discomfort after helping to kill Britney Spears in "Britney's New Look", and told Randy that South Park was being ravaged in "Pandemic". He also tried to stop the Obama supporters from disturbing the peace in "About Last Night...", but fails and his patrol car gets tipped over by rowdy supporters.

He appeared more often during episodes in Season Fourteen with him being relatively prominent in "Medicinal Fried Chicken", "200" and "It's a Jersey Thing".

Illiteracy

Barbrady was illiterate until the episode "Chickenlover" when the Chickenlover enacted a plot to make him read by having sex with chickens. Barbrady was also sent to school to learn how to read by the Mayor. The Chickenlover made Barbrady learn where he would strike next by reading the clues left at the crime scenes. When the arrest was finally made, Barbrady acted gratefully to the Chickenlover, but had to arrest him nonetheless for being a gallophile. Chickenlover then gave him the book Atlas Shrugged which Barbrady thought was "a load of crap" and made him realize reading is "a waste of his time".

Appearance

He wears a traditional blue police officer's uniform, and black sunshades. He appears to be slightly overweight. Barbrady is likely near deaf; he wears a hearing aid and speaks in a loud, expressionless manner. Of note, he has not been seen without the sunglasses except during the ending of "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe", but his eyes, mouth and cheeks are changed due to the alien control and so it was unknown what he looked like without his sunglasses until "Naughty Ninjas" where he was forced to give up his police belongings including his sunglasses. He now wears a brown jacket over a blue dress shirt and gray trousers.

To see images of Officer Barbrady, visit Officer Barbrady/Gallery.

Personality

Officer Barbrady fits the personality of an oaf: unintelligent, willing to use unnecessary force, etc. He is illiterate and illogical, and is prone to make foolish decisions, often making the incident even worse. However, in "Naughty Ninjas", he does appear to have a compassionate side. When he is fired as policeman and returns home to his dog, he promises her that he will get another job in order to pay for her medicine.

Criminal record

Despite being a cop himself, Barbrady has committed a few crimes in the series.

Family

In "Chickenlover", Barbrady is revealed to have a wife. She is mentioned again in "Spookyfish". However, she has yet to appear and is seldom mentioned. In "Naughty Ninjas", a picture of her is shown hanging in Barbrady's apartment; she never appeared physically in the episode which suggests that she either divorced Barbrady or died.

In "Naughty Ninjas", he is shown to live alone with his very elderly sick dog who he called by an affectionate name.

Relationships

Many episodes which feature both Barbrady and Mayor McDaniels, it is implied that they are in a relationship - in "Pinkeye", they are seen "not wearing any pants" (Barbrady in lingerie) and McDaniels shirt open, insisting to Chef it has "nothing to do with the Japanese mafia". In "Summer Sucks", McDaniels is at her desk when suddenly Barbrady's voices comes up asking where the "little man in the boat" is. McDaniels tells him to keep looking and at the end of the scene, swoons when he says he's found him. Despite this, in "Spontaneous Combustion", McDaniels is seen reading "Jugs" and in "The Coon", Cartman questions the Mayor's sexuality, implying that their relationship is secret.

Also, despite the fact that Barbrady is generally portrayed as a bumbling oaf, the Mayor still tended to call on him up until Season Seven. This is due to the fact that until then he was the only officer in the town.

In "Naughty Ninjas" it is revealed that Barbrady takes care of an elderly female dog.

Trivia

Prominence