In September, Apple TV+ will begin airing The Problem With Jon Stewart. Six years after leaving Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, Stewart, 58, is returning to the talk-show circuit amid a political and media landscape that’s quite different than the one he left behind.
Gerry Smith for Bloomberg News:
Each hourlong episode, according to Apple, will dig into a single issue—an approach that’s similar to the HBO program hosted by John Oliver, Stewart’s old colleague.
Stewart is one of several big stars to make programming deals with Apple TV+, including Idris Elba, Oprah Winfrey, and Malala Yousafzai.
On July 20, the day Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos took a brief trip to space, Stewart posted a three-minute mock movie trailer on Twitter, giving a taste of what his show may look like. Bezos, played by Jason Alexander of Seinfeld fame, goes to space in a rocket shaped like a penis. There, he clashes with other phallic space vehicles staffed by rival billionaires Elon Musk (Adam Pally) and Richard Branson, who was played by a mop.
MacDailyNews Take: Again, as per the teaser trailer, The Problem With Jon Stewart is that he’s/it’s not funny.
Taking the piss out of Branson and Bezos we can see, Misters Suborbital Joyride 1 and 2, but Musk has actually built a company capable of launching into actual space and doing actual work.
Musk’s SpaceX is the first private company to autonomously dock a crew-capable spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS), it resupplies the ISS, it’s the largest commercial satellite constellation operator in the world, it’s the first private company to send humans into orbit, it’s the first private company to send humans to the ISS, etc. etc. etc.
Musk’s company does real work in real space (even if Elon is wrong about Apple’s App Store fees).
In golf terms, if NASA is Jack Nicklaus, Musk has already won his first major, Bezos is trying to qualify for the Korn Ferry Tour, and Branson is hanging out at the local putt-putt course.
So, Stewart, along with being mostly unfunny here (Mel Brooks did it better over three decades ago) really kills whatever joke there is by including Musk. The bit would have worked better simply by focusing on Branson and Bezos blowing millions in a race to hit in Fake Space.
https://twitter.com/jonstewart/status/1417557259886940162