Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Prisoner Re-Entry
November 9, 2015 4:58 PM - Season 2, Episode 33 - Subscribe

The UK unveils new surveillance laws. A hearing reveals that the honors to US veterans that often precede sporting events are frequently paid for by the Department of Defense. A certain Washington football team complains about its offensive trademark being cancelled by listing other companies with offensive names whose trademarks still stand. And Now: Everybody Wants To Be An Outsider. Main story: Prisoner re-entry, and the formidable societal and legal obstacles set up to harass prisoners reentering society. John Oliver interviews Bilal Chapman, a tomato grower subject to many of those problems. YouTube (19m)

The UK: "Earth's least magic kingdom."
Veterans: "The only people on earth who can pull off a camo jacket... Gwyneth."
The Washington Redskins: "Amazingly, only the 19th most indefensible thing about the NFL."
posted by JHarris (9 comments total) 4 users marked this as a favorite
 
The reporting that John Oliver has done on the prison system has been fantastic and deserves an award of some sort. His interview with Bilal Chapman was both thoughtful and compassionate and I really hope he provides a follow-up on the reaction Bilal got upon returning to work (I'm hoping it was positive).

This show impresses me every week and the only thing I hate about it is that it has more of a limited audience than it deserves due to it being on HBO.
posted by triggerfinger at 7:32 PM on November 9, 2015


Being on HBO is an advantage, too. HBO is known to care a lot less about ratings than your typical cable/network organization. Not to mention, the main story is on Youtube, which is much easier to access than HBO. I think the tradeoffs are probably worth it.
posted by axiom at 8:50 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]


Yeah, that's a good point. I agree it's probably worth it.

(Also, doing my best to do my part by frequently sharing LWTWJO Youtube clips across my social medias).
posted by triggerfinger at 9:25 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


The reporting that John Oliver has done on the prison system has been fantastic

Has he covered prison gangs and racial violence yet? He certainly made light of it with the SpongeBob joke (which I laughed at).
posted by paper chromatographologist at 6:21 AM on November 10, 2015


I think the HBO-vs.-mass-audience thing was tellingly commented uponst in Oliver's appearance on the last Daily Show -- Stewart was visibly envious at Oliver's jokes about longform work and not having to throw to commercial.
posted by Etrigan at 6:30 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]


And now Stewart will be on HBO, too!
posted by Mogur at 4:38 PM on November 10, 2015


Did anyone else catch the Easter egg in the opening credits? Do they do something like this each week and I've just never noticed before?
posted by noneuclidean at 6:30 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]


Do they do something like this each week and I've just never noticed before?

Yep, that part of the credits changes every episode. (My husband and I always pause on that part to see it and read the caption.)
posted by pitrified at 7:14 PM on November 10, 2015


At the end of the interview with Chapman, I turned to my wife and said "John Oliver is a mensch."
posted by dry white toast at 8:46 PM on November 10, 2015


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