SEINFELD BLOG

Alisa Carlson
Ms. Baker
AP English 3
October 27, 2005

No Soup for You!!!

A hilarious sitcom since the eighties, Seinfeld has revolutionized the world with a show that makes no sense at all, yet it is still very entertaining. “The Soup Nazi” episode, aired during the seventh season on November 2, 1995, portrayed a local soup connoisseur in New York City and his notorious ways for treating his customers. This episode takes place in New York City because scenes of famous New York City sites are shown throughout the episode, like the Soup Kitchen International and Monk’s restaurant. “The Soup Nazi” episode is set during the 1990’s because of typical cars and fashions found during that era: Elaine’s hairstyles and Jerry’s clothing. In this episode, there are five main characters: Jerry, Elaine, George, Kramer, and the Soup Nazi. The regular cast members of Seinfeld, Jerry, Elaine, George, and Kramer, are both round and dynamic. Each is complex with multiple traits, but these characters are not dynamic. The definition of a dynamic character is a character that undergoes significant change by the end of the story; the regular cast members are still the same because no one has undergone a significant change. Jerry is still hilarious and he breaks up with his girlfriend, George is insecure with himself and he begins to despise his girlfriend, Kramer is still quirky and random, and Elaine is now out to get the Soup Nazi and destroy his soup business. The Soup Nazi is notorious for his curt and terse answers to customers and he remains the bad-tempered chef throughout the entire episode. The protagonist is Elaine because she struggles to obtain the coveted soup from the Soup Nazi but she is thwarted several times. The Soup Nazi is the antagonist because he prevents Elaine from eating his delicious soups. Jerry’s character personae is of a normal person trying to get the best for themselves, he wants the soup so bad that he pretend s to not know his girlfriend when she makes a scene in the restaurant. The character of George represents the cultural and social conduct of people; George confronts Jerry about his actions in public with his girlfriend, “With all that kissing and the shmoopy, shmoopy, shmoopy, shmoopy, shmoopy out in public like that. It's disgusting!” (“The Soup Nazi”). “The Soup Nazi” episode uses indirect presentation to show, through actions and words, how the characters act.
The main conflict of this episode is Elaine’s struggle to obtain the delicious soup from the Soup Nazi. Some complications to the conflict is that Elaine has been banned by the Soup Nazi to buy soup for a year, and her friends, Jerry, Kramer, and George, are not willing to buy her soup in case the Soup Nazi’s favor no longer smiles upon them. The crisis of the episode is when Elaine returns to the Soup Nazi’s restaurant and he bans her from ever setting foot into his restaurant again. The climax is when the Soup Nazi decides to give Kramer an armoire that contains all the secret recipes to the soups. This is the climax because Kramer then gives the armoire to Elaine and she finds the secret recipes. The conclusion of the episode is that since Elaine now has the recipes for all the soups, she can now make them anytime that she wants to. Because there are several subplots like Jerry and George’s girlfriend problems and Kramer’s friendship with the Soup Nazi, these subplots unite together with Elaine’s plot and form an artistic unity, which causes the show t flow smoothly.
The theme of “The Soup Nazi” is that there are different ways to express one’s feelings for objects they cherish, but some people take it too far and it becomes an obsession. The Soup Nazi loves his soup business, but he takes the business too far when he restricts who is worthy of eating his soup and doing business with him. Jerry also becomes obsessed with showing his love for his girlfriend and bothering George with his childish, public displays of affection in public. George becomes so obsessed with trying to show Jerry how disgusting and embarrassing his antics are that he begins to be very affectionate with his girlfriend in public.
“The Soup Nazi” episode has an objective or dramatic point of view. The episode takes place during the present time and there are no flashbacks to previous episodes. In this episode, the characters thoughts were not spoken aloud and the audience only knew what they saw. This indirect presentation allows the audience to pick up the subtle and implicit hints that are spoken by the characters and not with the help of a narrator.
The structural elements of this episode, “The Soup Nazi,” adds to the eccentricities of all the characters. Usually Kramer is portrayed as the crazy man who comes up with ridiculous ideas, but in this episode, he is almost normal compared to Elaine, Jerry, and George. This episode shows audiences that Elaine may look sweet on the outside, but on the inside she is ambitious and she gets what she wants, which is the destruction of the Soup Nazi’s supreme power. Tying all the characters together with their hilarious ideas and actions, “The Soup Nazi” episode follows and makes the Seinfeld even stronger because it demonstrates the personalities and eccentricities of four characters and their typical lives.
Works Cited
"The Soup Nazi." 26 Oct. 2005 .
like because the soup is worth so much more than

This is the website that I posted my project on: http://seinfeld-fan.net/smf/index.php?topic=15.0