SNL says what we all thought in its Star Trek billionaire sketch

Saturday Night Live returned this weekend and the show wasted no time targeting the bizarre billionaire space tourism race that has unfolded over the past few months. Guest host Owen Wilson played former Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos in a skit on a fictional new show called Star Trek: Quest for the Ego, on “the voyages of the SS New Shepard and her crew of random nerds,” whose mission is “to kind of fly through space blundering in a ship that looks like a penis,” according to the voiceover.

You will recall that the real Bezos traveled to the edge of space in Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket in July, with a crew that included his brother Mark (played in the sketch by Wilson’s brother Luke), an 82 pilot. years and space legend Wally Funk and Dutch high school student Oliver Daemen. But Richard Branson, CEO of Virgin Galactic, beat Bezos within days when he took a trip aboard his company’s SpaceShipTwo space plane. And SpaceX sent its first crew of private citizens into space earlier this month, but CEO Elon Musk did not join them for the ride.

In the SNL skit, Branson (Alex Moffatt), flying nearby in a ship with mood lighting purple, challenges Bezos to a race after exchanging a few standard brother greetings for a flight that the voiceover calls a “crisis. from midlife to cosmic proportions “. in which they accidentally crash into the international space station. But wait, danger lurks around every corner: Suddenly Bezos’ ship is bombarded with photon torpedoes and yes, of course, it’s Elon Musk (Mikey Day, making a precise impression of Musk’s speaking style. ).

“Space is only big enough for a weird white billionaire,” “Musk” told “Bezos.”

In reality, of course, neither Bezos nor Musk had much humor about each other’s space aspirations. “You can’t go on your way to the moon,” the real Musk told reporter Kara Swisher in an interview last week while discussing Bezos and Blue Origin. In response, Amazon sent The edge a 13-page PDF list that included all of the times SpaceX has filed lawsuits.

The SNL sketch took one last blow to Bezos before it was packed: an Amazon employee (Kenan Thompson) beams aboard Bezos’ ship to deliver a package, and before he leaves, asks to use the room bath.

Wilson-as-Bezos throws him a plastic bottle.

You can watch the entire SNL billionaire Star Trek sketch below.