In this laugh-so-loud-you’ll-piss-yourself-comedy, working actor Gary Johnston (whose busy doing a broadway musical called "Lease" – hilarious) is recruited by a counter terrorist squad known as Team America. You see, the world has fallen victim to numerous terrorist attacks and it is Team America’s hope that with the help of a solid actor, a terrorist group can be infiltrated and the whereabouts of their next target will be revealed, and their evil designs thwarted. Reluctantly, Gary agrees to take part in the deadly mission, but first, he must be surgically altered and made up to look like the enemy. Thus, his journey begins.

What follows is an adventure so wildly imaginative and so outrageously funny, that I just soiled myself thinking about it. Team America: World Police features an all star cast including Alec Baldwin, Tim Robbins, Susan Sarandon, Matt Damon, George Clooney, Peter Jennings, Kim Jong Il, and propaganda master extraordinaire, Michael Moore.

This movie has it all; adventure, comedy, violence, satire, politics, romance and a sex scene to end all sex scenes. Seriously! You have to see it to believe it. In fact, it was recently reported that the infamous love making sequence had to be trimmed to avoid the NC-17 (the MPAA is off their rocker). One golden shower and a pearl necklace later, Team America received the (R). Even with the clips, it will go down as one of the great love scenes in the history of film.

And the music–Sweet Jesus–the music. As was the case in South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut, Team America is populated with a spectacular track listing of original tunes that take the movie to an even higher level of comedy. Highlights include "America, Fuck Yeah!," "Everyone Has Aids," and "Montage." This is hilarious stuff.

On a more serious note, stylistically speaking, Team America really is a breathtaking piece of film making. This is the greatest puppet epic since The Dark Crystal, and the time and care that’s gone into bringing this world to life is truly something to behold. I thought it a master stroke that, much of the time, these puppets are shot like they’re in the real world rather than a fantasy puppet world. It kicks up the funny factor. With any luck, Team America will hopefully revive puppetry as the true art form that it is.

Parker and Stone have been quoted as saying that the obvious inspiration for Team America was the old Thunderbirds show. And in fact, at one point, they tried to aquirre the rights to it but were beaten to the punch by Universal who ultimately drained the iconic show of it’s magic and went live action on the tale. Dismayed but hardly detoured, Parker and Stone set out to create their own adventure in which they would incorporate puppets into a world better suited for their particular comic sensibility.

There’s also been much talk about the speed and efficiency with which these comic masterminds work. Along with the help of several gifted puppeteers, and an expert squad of technical wizards, team Team America put this impressive looking film together in record breaking time, and in fact, the movie was completed just mere hours before it’s scheduled release (actually, earlier. Team America was sneak previewed a week before it’s due date).

The puppets are astonishing creations (particularly, their eyes) and Parker and Stone have been very open about the complexity of this shoot with the press. The hard work has paid off and you will see it up there on the screen. The screenplay is somewhat the rush job, and quite frankly, I’m quite confident that they were writing a lot of this stuff on set. Not surprisingly, there’s cursing and sex gags galore. This is, after all, from the creators of South Park. The jokes fly fast and furious and while some certainly fall flat, I found myself laughing uproariously for about one hundred minutes of the one hundred and five minute running time. And even when a joke didn’t work, I was so awestruck by the visual aspect of the movie that it didn’t matter.

Parker and Stone supply most of the voices, and there are many moments that are very "South Park" (Kim Jong Il is a little too Cartman), but it doesn’t take away from the overall experience. The best thing about Parker and Stone is that they don’t take sides. Black/white, man/woman, republican/democrat...it’s all fair game. They’re fully prepared to make fun of anyone and everyone, including themselves. They don’t take much of anything too seriously. I can’t speak for mass audiences, but I personally find this refreshing. This is a film that will have huge appeal to the movie geeks of the world (yes, I am one). Team America is to the Jerry Bruckheimer style actioneer what Shaun of the Dead is to the Zombie picture, and I enjoyed every second of it.

Team America will certainly offend a heap load of people. For my money though, it isn’t half as offensive as Fahrenheit 9/11. Don’t get me wrong. I like a lot of Michael Moore’s work, but that movie is blatantly one sided, and I’m really irritated that people consider it a documentary. Team America is what it is; An action/political satire/musical puppet epic. It’s also one of my favorite movies of the year. Sadly, Parker and Stone have been vocal about not being so keen on the making of the movie, and have even gone so far as to say; "if we knew it was going to be this tough, we probably wouldn’t have done it". Lucky for the viewer they did. Trey and Matt, I salute you.

Grade: B+

Adam Mast, ZBoneMan.com