"Better a fallen rocket than never a burst of light."
~ Tom Stoppard, The Invention of Love

Friday, September 22, 2017

News Satire Roundup: September 18th-September 21st



No Last Week Tonight again, but that’s because of the Emmys this past week.  Kinda hard to record a show when you’re so busy bringing home gold!  Congrats to the show on its wins for Outstanding Variety Talk Series and Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series – both were well-deserved, and I heartily enjoyed both of John’s speeches (along with host Stephen Colbert’s bit commiserating with Jimmy Kimmel afterwards.)  It admittedly boggles my mind to see The Daily Show get pretty much zero love (though its online “Between the Scenes” segments did win a Creative Arts Emmy beforehand,) but even though I would’ve nominated that show for both categories, I’d have still given the trophies to John and co. for some truly excellent work.  This show fires on all cylinders pretty much all the time, and the dedication really shows!  And hey – with Game of Thrones ineligible for awards this year, someone had to carry the HBO banner!


Monday, September 18 – Nice Emmys excitement at the beginning, although, among the big wins for Black folks, I wish they’d mentioned Riz Ahmed too, since he’s the first Asian man to win an Emmy in any acting category ever.  Glad they covered the awful interpreter for Hurricane Irma (as soon as I saw the bright yellow shirt and the blank expression, I knew it was gonna be bad.)  Because this is our world now, there was another story on Trump tweets, this time on him calling Kim Jong-un “Rocket Man” and retweeting a doctored GIF of him hitting Hillary Clinton with a golf ball; I enjoyed Trevor’s proposition that Trump can pander to his base with immature GIFs as long as he keeps working with Democrats on policy.  Treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin got a profile – I loved Trevor wondering how often he’s had to explain to Trump that he doesn’t really know Batman.  Rapper Gucci Mane was the guest, talking about his new book and album.

Tuesday, September 19 – Amusing observation that a story about Donald Trump Jr. dropping his Secret Service detail included lots of counterintuitive details about his whereabouts.  Excellent story on Trump’s speech at the UN general assembly.  The jarring dissonance between the disparate “you do you” and “you do what we tell you” themes was absolutely bizarre, but Trump’s threat to “destroy North Korea” had me shaking.  Regardless of whether or not he’d actually do it, the fact that he can boldly claim he will with no thought to the millions of people that live there (not to mention the surrounding region) is chilling.  Desi had a good field piece on a Trump-supporting golf course owner who realized the wall would cut across his course.  His dedication to working against his own self-interest was mind-boggling.  The guest, Olivia Munn, talked martial arts and LEGO representation in the media.

Wednesday, September 20 – I liked the opening blurb on the offers not pouring in for Sean Spicer, complete with a montage of him failing to speak words.  The big focus of the night, though, was on the new healthcare bill.  Trevor’s impression of Lindsey Graham pumping himself up was hilarious, and he did a great job driving home the damning point of the bill:  that the GOP is trying to rush it through, not because they believe in it, but because they’re hard-pressed to pass something and don’t want to need any Democratic votes to do it (which they would if it doesn’t pass by month’s end.)  Lewis also did a piece on it – after demonstrating that the GOP leadership don’t understand how health insurance works, he tore into millennials for thinking they’re “invincible” and not buying insurance, driving premiums up.  Guest Ellen Pao discussed her experiences with sexism in the tech industry and what’s needed for real change.

Thursday, September 21 – Funny opening with the Melania Trump billboard about learning English – I especially liked the crack that it would be even more apt with a picture of Trump.  The latest on the Russia investigation, with the FBI raiding Paul Manafort’s house in the middle of the night.  Trevor had some good jokes on the raid, and he segued into a great bit about people on the Trump team being awful liars – he made good use of a clip of Manafort terribly denying any Russia connection, and he did an awesome impression of Sean Spicer having “all the tells.”  Roy talked about Toys R Us filing for bankruptcy, mostly riffing silly ideas on how the store could win back his business as a parent over online retailers.  Bill Gates was the guest; he had great things to say about his charity and, despite everything, the positive progress of the world.  He also gave Trevor some tips about how to convince a billionaire to give him all their money.

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