Tolkien Black is a fictional character in the

adult An adult is an animal that has reached full growth. The biological definition of the word means an animal reaching sexual maturity and thus capable of reproduction. In the human context, the term ''adult'' has meanings associated with social an ...

animated television series An animated series, or a cartoon series, is a set of Animation, animated films with a common title, usually related to one another. These episodes typically share the same main heroes, some different secondary characters and a basic theme. Series ...

South Park ''South Park'' is an American animated sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, and developed by Brian Graden for Comedy Central. The series revolves around four boysStan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormickand the ...

''. He was voiced by

Trey Parker Randolph Severn "Trey" Parker III (born October 19, 1969) is an American actor, animator, writer, producer, director, and musician. He is best known for co-creating ''South Park'' (1997) and '' The Book of Mormon'' (2011) with his creative part ...

in early appearances, but ''South Park'' art director

Adrien Beard Adrien Beard (born ) is an American voice actor, storyboard artist, producer, and director. He provides the voice of Tolkien (Token) Black in ''South Park'', as well as serving as the art director and lead storyboarder on the series. Beard ha ...

took over in 2000 and has performed the character since. Until 2022, the character's name was "Token Black" as a play on

tokenism In sociology, tokenism is the social practice of making a perfunctory and symbolic effort towards the equitable inclusion of members of a minority group, especially by recruiting people from under-represented social-minority groups in order for th ...

. His name was changed in the episode " The Big Fix" to Tolkien, after

J. R. R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawlinson ...

Biography

Tolkien attends South Park Elementary, he initially is a third-grade student of Mr. Garrison's class before moving up to fourth-grade. He was originally the only black student attending the school until Nichole Daniels was introduced in " Cartman Finds Love". Residing in South Park, he is the

only child An only child is a person with no siblings, by birth or adoption. Overview Throughout history, only-children were relatively uncommon. From around the middle of the 20th century, birth rates and average family sizes fell sharply for a number of ...

and son of Steve and Linda Black, who were originally the only African American family in the town until the Daniels family first appeared.

Character

Creation and design

Tolkien debuted in the series' first episode, " Cartman Gets an Anal Probe", though having no spoken lines. He was composed with

construction paper Construction paper, also known as sugar paper, is coloured cardstock paper. The texture is slightly rough, and the surface is unfinished. Due to the source material, mainly wood pulp, small particles are visible on the paper's surface. It is u ...

and animated through

stop motion Stop-motion (also known as stop frame animation) is an animated filmmaking and special effects technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exh ...

. From " Weight Gain 4000" onward he is animated digitally, though in a way which mimics the original use of the construction paper. Tolkien is not offered the same free-ranged motion as hand-drawn characters, as he is shown on one angle, and is animated with a jerky fashion. Tolkien is African-American, with dark brown skin and short black hair, and usually wears a light purple long sleeve shirt with a yellow letter "T" on it, and dark blue jeans. Up until season 5, Tolkien, along with other African-Americans, had darker skin. Adrien Beard speaks with his normal vocal range and is edited with

Pro Tools Pro Tools is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed and released by Avid Technology (formerly Digidesign) for Microsoft Windows and macOS. It is used for music creation and production, sound for picture (sound design, audio post-productio ...

, which alters the pitch to that of a fourth grader. Following the release of " The Big Fix", Tolkien's name was edited in all previously-released material to match the retcon, including subtitles of past episodes. Because "The Big Fix" establishes that Stan and Randy have been unaware of Tolkien's real name up until this point, Tolkien's name is still subtitled as "Token" in their dialogue. Stan and Randy are meant to represent the audience, as the episode contains a scene of a character directly speaking to the audience about Tolkien's real name.

Personality and traits

In " With Apologies to Jesse Jackson", Tolkien is upset by Randy Marsh's use of the word "

nigger In the English language, ''nigger'' is a racial slur directed at black people. Starting in the 1990s, references to ''nigger'' have been increasingly replaced by the euphemistic contraction , notably in cases where ''nigger'' is Use–menti ...

s" on '' Wheel of Fortune'', and refused to acquiesce to Stan's demand that he declare that it was not a problem. In " Christian Rock Hard" he becomes increasingly irritated with

Eric Cartman Eric Theodore Cartman, commonly referred to as just Cartman, is a fictional character in the adult animated sitcom ''South Park'', created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. He is voiced by Parker, and is one of the series' four main characters, ...

's pandering to racial stereotypes. In that episode, he is annoyed when he is able to spontaneously play

bass guitar The bass guitar (), also known as the electric bass guitar, electric bass, or simply the bass, is the lowest-pitched member of the guitar family. It is similar in appearance and construction to an Electric guitar, electric but with a longer nec ...

, despite never having learned to play it, a confirmation of one of Cartman's claim that all black people can play the bass guitar. Cartman's racial language culminates in Tolkien beating him up by the end of the episode. Tolkien is shown to be a talented singer in the episodes "

Wing A wing is a type of fin that produces both Lift (force), lift and drag while moving through air. Wings are defined by two shape characteristics, an airfoil section and a planform (aeronautics), planform. Wing efficiency is expressed as lift-to-d ...

" and " Here Comes the Neighborhood".

Reception

''Paste'' magazine ranked him at No. 17 on a list entitled "The Top 20 Best ''South Park'' Characters". He was ranked at No. 19 by Looper on a list entitled "25 Popular ''South Park'' Characters Ranked Worst to Best".

References

External links

Tolkien Black
at South Park Studios {{DEFAULTSORT:Black, Tolkien South Park characters Black characters in animation Child characters in television Television characters introduced in 1997 African-American characters in television Fictional characters from Colorado Fictional Catholics Male characters in animated television series Animated characters introduced in 1997