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John Oliver Praises AEW, Pans ICE & Gets In a Dig at Warner Bros

During HBO's Last Week Tonight, John Oliver called out ICE, praised AEW, Brody King, and MJF, and got in a dig at Warner Bros. Discovery.

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Article Summary

  • John Oliver spotlights AEW's bold stance against ICE on HBO's Last Week Tonight season premiere.
  • AEW's Brody King's "Abolish ICE" shirts help raise funds for organizations fighting ICE tactics.
  • Uncensored "F**k ICE" chants aired during AEW Grand Slam: Australia on TNT.
  • Oliver jokes about Warner Bros. Discovery's leadership changes, linking them to DHS/ICE.

John Oliver and HBO's Last Week Tonight had a ton of ground to cover with its season premiere on Sunday night, with Donald Trump and his Department of Homeland Security's ICE goon squad getting (and rightly so) the majority of the focus. If you've been following our coverage, then you know that AEW wrestler Brody King hasn't exactly kept his feelings on ICE a secret. His "Abolish ICE" shirts have even raised a ton of funds for organizations looking to protect folks from ICE's tactics and give them legal recourse. But it would be the "Fuck ICE" chants, first on an edition of AEW Dynamite and then during AEW Grand Slam: Australia (this past weekend), that would see the message break through into mainstream coverage.

AEW
Image: HBO Screencap

Near the opening of the show, Oliver addressed the growing pushback against ICE across the media spectrum, offering AEW as an example of how it's springing up in places that might surprise some folks. After showing a clip from "AEW Grand Slam," Oliver noted that the crowd picked the perfect spot for the chant, that King was in the zone, and that MJF (aka, Maxwell Jacob Friedman) hit the perfect "Jim from 'The Office'" look to punctuate the moment. But for Oliver, the best part is knowing that Trump's DHS has been paying for ad time to promote ICE during a show that openly pushes back on it. It's also worth noting that Warner Bros. Discovery and AEW owner Tony Khan decided to keep the "Fuck ICE" chants and not bleep them during the airing of AEW Grand Slam: Australia on Saturday night (the event was taped earlier in the day).

Speaking of Warner Bros. Discovery, Oliver also took a minute to twist the knife on the current Paramount Skydance/Netflix situation. "Having an endless cavalcade of rapidly changing bosses would clearly be a distraction, though I gotta say, you do eventually get used to it," Oliver noted when discussing the leadership changes over at DHS/ICE, displaying the Warner Bros. Discovery logo. "I don't even know which of these companies [Paramount or Netflix] is gonna be my new business daddy yet. It's like a 'Mamma Mia!' situation except less fun and way less sexy. But incidentally, if it is indeed Netflix, sorry for all the times I called your catalog a 'who's who of who the fuck is this?'"

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Ray FlookAbout Ray Flook

Serving as Television Editor since 2018, Ray began five years earlier as a contributing writer/photographer before being brought onto the core BC team in 2017.
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