The Marklars are a fictional, secular alien race that appear in several episodes. The word "marklar" is also a generic word used by the Marklars, similar to smurf.
In the South Park episode "Starvin' Marvin in Space," much of the action involves the Marklars, who use the word "marklar" to represent the meaning of any noun, including proper nouns. The Marklars say that on the planet Marklar, every person, place, or thing is referred to as "Marklar". For example, all Marklars are named Marklar, and everything on the planet Marklar (or the "marklar Marklar") is also called Marklar. Similar techniques have been previously used by other fictional races: notably the Smurfs, who only applied the word "smurf" to verbs and adjectives, the Mr. Saturn race of EarthBound, who were all called Mr. Saturn except for Dr. Saturn, and the underground creatures of Pierre Berton's children's book The Secret World of Og, who applied the word "og" to all words, with the exception of mathematical operators.
Physically, the Marklar are humanoids. They are a generally friendly race, in that they allowed the starving Ethiopians to move to their planet. They were seen briefly in another episode, "The Red Badge of Gayness", and were mentioned in the episode "Cancelled", where it was revealed that they hate the unnamed aliens from the Horsehead Nebula. They were also shown in the retelling of the story of Xenu in the episode "Trapped in the Closet" as victims of Xenu's evil plan.
[edit] Quotations
On being welcomed to the planet, Marklar (the leader of the Marklars) said: Greetings, Marklar! I am Marklar! This is Marklar.
Kyle: Marklar, these marklars want to change your marklar. They don't want this Marklar or any of his marklars to live here because it's bad for their marklar. They use Marklar to try and force marklars to believe their marklar. If you let them stay here, they will build marklars and marklars. They will take all your marklars and replace them with their marklar. These marklars have no good marklar to live on Marklar, so they must come here to Marklar. Please, let these marklars stay where they can grow and prosper without any marklars, marklars, or marklars.
Marklar: Young marklar, your marklars are wise and true.
Marvin and the boys team up, and by accidentally pressing a button, they fly to the home planet of the ship's former owner, the planet Marklar, whose inhabitants speak a language that is identical to English except for the fact that every noun is replaced with the word "Marklar". The Marklar agree to allow the Ethiopians to live on their planet. Back on Earth, the boys try to round up the Ethiopians, but the government agents seize the spaceship. The boys are able to take back the spaceship, letting Marvin load his people on while the boys distract the government agents, pretending to be Tom Brokaw. The agents are easily able to see through the disguise. Despite this, they are distracted long enough to load the ship, but Kenny is lost and seized by the government agents when the boys try to make a break for it.
The boys try to make it to Marklar, but they are confronted by the missionaries, who have built their own ship and are trying to force Christianity to Marklar. During this time, Pat Robertson is shown attempting to raise funds for various absurd weapons and vehicles to aid the missionaries while in space, most of which don't even exist. A space battle ensues, before the boys have to face the government agents. The agents have had Kenny frozen in carbonite and given to Sally Struthers so she can support them. Cartman convinces Sally that she has influenced the boys that they need to help people more. This touches Sally, so she lets the boys go and captures the missionary ship instead. Then, the wormhole is opened again, and all the ships are taken to Marklar.
When they arrive on Marklar, the aliens are very confused by the humans' trying to explain their motives. Kyle explains the situation in the aliens' own language, and the Marklar are touched. They banish the missionaries and let the Ethiopians stay. The boys promise to visit again ("when Jesse Jackson becomes president", Cartman says sarcastically). Sally Struthers then takes the boys back to Earth.