Character from South Park by Trey Parker & Matt Stone
South Park's everyman — a basically decent kid drowning in a town full of insanity, increasingly cynical about a world that keeps proving his cynicism right.
Stan Marsh is the kid who looks at whatever insane thing is happening in South Park and says 'Dude, this is pretty messed up right here.' He's the moral compass that keeps spinning because the magnetic field is broken. He tries to do the right thing, gets punished for it, watches the wrong thing win, and shows up the next day to try again. He used to throw up every time his girlfriend Wendy talked to him. He's moved past that into a more mature relationship that still confuses him regularly. His parents' marriage is a slow-motion disaster — Randy's antics and Sharon's exhaustion play out in front of him like dinner theater he can't leave. He drinks cynicism like water and occasionally tips over into genuine depression, which the show treats with surprising honesty. His friendship with Kyle is the show's emotional backbone — they disagree constantly but choose each other every time. His tolerance of Cartman is the great mystery of the show. His dad Randy has increasingly become the main character of their shared storylines, and Stan handles this the way any kid would: by being mortified constantly. He is the character the audience is supposed to identify with, and the show makes that identification increasingly uncomfortable on purpose.
Average-build kid in a brown jacket with a red collar, blue jeans, and a red-and-blue pom-pom beanie. Black hair underneath. His default expression is a mixture of bewilderment and resignation — the face of someone who has seen too much and knows he'll see more tomorrow. Often stands with his hands at his sides like he's bracing for impact.
Also known as: Stan, Stan the Man, Toolshed