There’s a fair chance that you have a broken funny bone if you don’t love and appreciate the comedy of Key & Peele. Their incomparable comedy stylings will be missed after this season (their last), as Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key bring their show to a close. This season has checked in on old standby bits and characters that we’ve come to love over the the show’s five seasons, as well as the strange and irreverent comedy that–I would argue– is some of the best in television history. Their jabs at celebrity are rarely mean, and uses the public figure as a setup for some rather absurdist situations they find themselves in. The spoof characters are played out in such a way that that our own knowledge of that real-life person’s voice and mannerisms lends themselves to the comedy.
In three segments of their latest episode “The 420 Special”, the duo set their sights on none other than astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Each segment is set up with Peele playing Tyson and Key in the role of a fictionalized version of his wife, who appears constantly upset with him (not to be confused with Tyson’s real-life spouse). When Peele’s Tyson is confronted about things like not being ready for a family gathering, the dog peeing on the drapes, or even infidelity–Tyson launches into scientific soliloquy as if he’s doing a piece for his show Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey in order to explain away his shortcomings. Each time, as he stares into the camera manipulating cosmic graphics, Key’s wife gives up having been confused by the scientific justification that was just conveyed. Seemingly able to win every argument with this distraction tactic, Key’s wife eventually gets the last laugh when it’s brought to light that Tyson isn’t the only celebrity scientist she’s been with.
Peele’s impression of Tyson’s earnest and calm demeanor is an absolute delight juxtaposed with marital arguments and has us all wondering if the real Tyson stays as collected in real-life arguments.
What’s your favorite K&P sketch? Let us know in the comments below!
h/t io9
