'SNL' slams Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar during 'Weekend Update.' Too bad he's beyond parody

Come on. The U.S. House of Representatives censured Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar. There was no way “Saturday Night Live” was going to let it go.

The show didn’t. But it kind of blew it.

Gosar, who on Wednesday was censured and stripped of his committee assignments, got off relatively easy. The absurdly partisan real-life debate leading up to the vote could have provided enough fodder for the entire episode, way more than enough for a single segment.

Maybe "SNL" decided it was hard to parody that kind of alternate reality.

Simu Liu hosted the episode, with Saweetie as musical guest. The cold open once again featured Cecily Strong with her Jeanine Pirro impression, but she didn't discuss Gosar.

Instead it fell to Colin Jost in “Weekend Update” to make a joke in a quick story about the Arizona congressman, who posted an anime video with his face superimposed on a character that kills another character with the face of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and threatens President Joe Biden.

Not so funny.

Unfortunately for 'SNL,' Gosar's behavior is often beyond parody

The bit began with a picture of Gosar frowning. (Google him. They’re not hard to find.) Jost said, “Arizona congressman Paul Gosar, seen here watching an interracial couple walk by, has officially been censured.”

OK, that was kind of funny.

Jost continued.

“I don’t know, he’s a 60-year-old man who makes his own anime,” Jost said after describing what Gosar had done. “When he heard he was being punished he was probably like, ‘Is it nipple clamps? I just hope an octopus doesn’t do anything to me.’”

And that was it. The show was done with Gosar.

It missed an opportunity when Jost made fun of Rep. Matt Gaetz. The Florida congressman suggested he might be willing to offer an internship to Kyle Rittenhouse, who on Friday was acquitted after shooting and killing two people and injuring a third during a protest in Wisconsin.

After Rittenhouse's acquittal, Gosar tweeted that he would arm wrestle Gaetz “to get dibs for Kyle as an intern.”

Nothing the show could have done would have been more ridiculous than that.

The show has skewered Gosar before

“SNL” has spoofed Gosar before. In 2019 the show savaged him for his questioning of Michael Cohen during a House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing. Kyle Mooney played Gosar as spitting mad and incomprehensible as he questioned Ben Stiller’s Cohen.

This was the hearing, you may recall, in which Gosar said, “Look at the old adage our moms taught us — liar, liar, pants on fire,” while pointing to a poster saying the same.

Oh, just to be clear: That was the real Gosar and a real poster during the real hearing, not the “SNL” version.

It’s sometimes hard to tell.

Reach Goodykoontz at bill.goodykoontz@arizonarepublic.com. Facebook: facebook.com/GoodyOnFilm. Twitter: @goodyk. Subscribe to the weekly movies newsletter.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: 'SNL' joked about Paul Gosar 's anime, censure. But he's beyond parody