Saturday Night Live hasn't been genuinely funny since the '90s, but that hasn't stopped Lorne Michaels & crew from keeping the show alive to parrot the same old tired woke nonsense that has doomed the late night shows to comedic mediocrity and ratings purgatory.
While the long-running NBC sketch 'comedy' plods on, it reached arguably a new low last week with a cringy cold open attempting to poke fun at podcaster Joe Rogan, Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, and Republican Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Cruz again became the topic of mainstream media ire for rightly pointing out that Sesame Street's usage of its character Big Bird to promote vaccines for children amounts to "government propaganda." SNL attempted to mock Cruz for his position, but ultimately ended up on the receiving end of surely far more mockery than they bargained for. Here's a rundown of the Cruz portion of the sketch (via Deadline).
Aidy Bryant stepped in to play Cruz, hosting his own, far-right version of Sesame Street, Cruz Street, featuring guests such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Joe Rogan.
“When Big Bird told children get vaccinated against a deadly disease, I said, ‘Enough,’ and I created my own Sesame Street called Cruz Street,” Cruz said. “It’s a gated community. Kids are safe from the world government.” ...Bryant’s Cruz told the audience, “As you know, I was mocked for attacking Big Bird on Twitter, simply because I am a human senator and he is an eight foot tall fictional bird. But let’s see what happened to Big Bird after he got the vaccine.”
Then Big Bird arrived, telling Cruz, “Oh man. I don’t feel too good.”
“So this is what happened to you a week after you got the vaccine?” Cruz asked.
“It sure is,” Big Bird told him. “My feathers fell out. My nuts got huge. And my joints don’t work. It’s real bad man.”
Then Cruz responded, “Don’t worry. I read online that you can take a bath in Borax, and that will cleanse you of any nanotechnology.”
The opening then turned its attention to Rogan, who last month made CNN's resident medical 'expert' squirm for not correcting the network's false claims about ivermectin.
Honestly, the fact that the media is still trotting out the same tired, debunked misinformation to attempt to discredit people who go against their ridiculous Covid narrative is proof that we're winning. I mean, other than the small percentage of people who get their news from the likes of CNN and MSNBC, is there anyone else alive who honestly thinks ivermectin is "horse paste"? Anyone? Frankly, it's getting old.They then turned to “our resident medical expert, Joe Rogan,” with the podcast host played by Pete Davidson, who boasted, “I used to host Fear Factor, and now doctors fear me.”
“Can you help me, Joe?” Big Bird asked.
He then gave Big Bird zinc, ayahuasca, and some horse medicine.
“Why would a bird take horse medicine?” Big Bird asked.
“I am a human, and I took horse medicine,” Rogan responded.
Then he added, “And I am speaking of things that are horse-like. Today’s two sponsors are the letters ‘S’ and ‘D.’ As in I can ‘S’ my own ‘D.'” (We’ll see what Rogan says to that one.)
Predictably, Twitter users panned the opening for the unfunny propaganda it was:
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Every time I think the comedic community has hit the bottom of the comedy barrel, they somehow find a new level of unfunniness https://t.co/ga7azYTqXy
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) November 14, 2021
It’s not fair to compare this to Pravda.
— Buck Sexton (@BuckSexton) November 14, 2021
Pravda was much funnier than this. https://t.co/o6HGRiYDzU
There were a hundred ways to do this sketch and have it be funny. The show now is just lazy mediocre hacks. https://t.co/txIq8j9Qyr
— Tim Dillon (@TimJDillon) November 14, 2021
SNL simps so hard for the regime that they don't even make an attempt to do comedy anymore https://t.co/xb6PiCOFB4
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) November 14, 2021
Who the fuck is even laughing at this shit, aside from how terrible it is? https://t.co/mI3fWjTNZb
— Eric July (@EricDJuly) November 14, 2021
Make SNL Funny Again https://t.co/EzrXdsCELq
— Clifton Duncan. (@cliftonaduncan) November 14, 2021
Peak 2021 comedy right here. Part of my soul died while watching this. https://t.co/ORV3neC8h8
— The Critical Drinker (@TheCriticalDri2) November 14, 2021
SNL used to be funny. https://t.co/CnlJDleDNk
— Adam Crigler (@AdamCrigler) November 14, 2021
Absolute cringe https://t.co/EpCe5OHOcH
— Marc Clair (@MarcDClair) November 14, 2021
#RIP comedy. @nbcsnl ?? https://t.co/KQ41d1slWL
— Laurence Fox ?? (@LozzaFox) November 14, 2021
Finally, I'll leave you with this, which sums it all up beautifully:
SNL doesn’t mock the regime. It is the regime. So it’s not really funny anymore. https://t.co/Laus2wGYVc
— Erielle Davidson (@politicalelle) November 14, 2021