Team Late Night had weeks to prepare their best shots against Orange Man Bad over summer vacation. The results? Suffice it to say there’s a reason the late-night format is heading for the dustbin of history.
To be fair, ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel managed an entire monologue without crying in his return from summer break. Otherwise, it was business as usual. Yawn.
The most depressing part? The not-remotely-biased media now treats ‘South Park’ like the Holy Grail, reciting every aspect of each new episode to maximize its cultural impact.
“Oh, you delicate, chubby little teacup. … You want us to be canceled because we make jokes about you? I thought you were against cancel culture. Unfortunately for Frosty the Snowflake, the only place we are going is to New York.”
Stop it … you’re killing us.
Comedy kingpin Stephen Colbert struck next, and suddenly the walls were closing in on the 47th president. The far-left propagandist had to remind his audience that rumors of President Donald Trump’s demise weren’t true and that wishing for a leader’s death wasn’t the decent thing to do.
Maybe spending a decade telling fans Trump is the veritable Antichrist has repercussions.
Then, Colbert turned his comic firepower on Vice President JD Vance, who endured a soupçon of hecklers at the suddenly crime-free Union Station in D.C.
“He’s in a train station; he’s going to bang a bench,” Colbert cracked about Vance. At least we know where “The Late Show’s” $100 million-a -ear budget goes. Comic gold like that does not come cheap …
Goin’ ‘South’
Nor does access to all things “South Park.” Trey Parker and Matt Stone cozied up to Paramount to the tune of $1.5 billion a few weeks ago. The TV pranksters earned that cash with a show that never pulls its punches.
Left. Right. Up. Down. Pick a target, and “South Park” has smashed it over the years. And, along the way, earned the right’s respect for being an equal-opportunity offender.
Now? Each new “South Park” episode features another dreary bit where President Trump beds Satan. Literally. The show’s first four installments all featured the already stale bit, along with other smart bombs against GOP-adjacent targets.
Meanwhile, a Democratic Party that defends gang members, rising crime rates, and men claiming to be trans brutalizing women in sports gets off without a warning.
The most depressing part? The not-remotely-biased media now treats “South Park” like the Holy Grail, reciting every aspect of each new episode to maximize its cultural impact.
Weird that reporters did no such thing over the show’s 28-year-run …
Hope after ‘Nope’?
It’s been three years since Jordan Peele deposited his cinematic stink bomb “Nope” on an unsuspecting public. That 2022 dud marked a massive letdown from Peele’s masterful 2017 debut, “Get Out,” and solid 2019 follow-up, “Us.”
We’ve been waiting to see if Peele can return to his former glory. Now, we’ll have to wait a bit longer. He had originally staked out October 2026 as the date for his next, untitled project. That’s no longer in the cards.
Quentin Tarantino is currently stuck on his 10th and presumably final film. He can’t commit to a project or a release date. Peele, who seemed bound for greatness after “Get Out,” has reached a Tarantino-style impasse in less than 10 years. Impressive …
Wright and wrong
Some things in pop culture are inevitable. Whenever Hollywood gets creative with its casting decisions, a small but vocal segment of Comic-Con Nation howls in protest. Remember when Sony cast four comic actresses to take over the “Ghostbusters” franchise in 2016? Or when Disney cast black actress Halle Bailey to play the formerly white Ariel in 2023’s “Little Mermaid” update?
Some fans are simply purists, and that’s understandable. A much smaller contingent operate from a whiff of misogyny and/or racism. Not remotely cool.
And once in a while, this kind of creative casting generates a collective shrug. No outrage. No hashtag complaints. That happened when actor Jeffrey Wright took over as Commissioner Gordon in 2022’s “The Batman.” Wright is a fine actor, and his addition to the cast was greeted as warmly as the rest of the geek-friendly film.
Zero controversy.
“I really find it fascinating, the ways in which there’s such a conversation, and I think even more of a conversation now, about black characters in these roles,” Wright said. “It’s just so f**king racist and stupid. It’s just so blind in a way that I find revealing to not recognize that the evolution of these films reflects the evolution of society, that somehow it’s defiling this franchise not to keep it grounded in the cultural reality of 1939 when the comic books were first published. It’s just the dumbest thing. It’s absent all logic.”
He’s a terrific actor and even better faux victim.
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