Comedian John Oliver does a brutal takedown of Elon Musk, Tesla CEO fires back

Love him or hate him, but there is just no ignoring Elon Musk. The Tesla CEO was the subject of the latest episode of the enormously popular HBO show Last Week Tonight hosted by comedian John Oliver where he did a scathing assessment of the world's wealthiest person and his rather eccentric ways of doing business.

Oliver was in full form during the course of the entire episode, drawing humorous references to Musk's actual ways of conducting himself and marshalling his numerous businesses. He pointed to the ‘bait and switch’ tactics in the early days of Tesla, Musk's numerous product launch-related follies like the shattered glass at the Cybertruck unveil and how Musk attempted to keep his California factory running during the peak of Covid.

While Oliver did recognise the fact that Musk has emerged as an enormously powerful global figure - even highlighting how many believe Musk is a ‘net positive’ - the comedian also leaned heavily upon reports that Musk has a significant play in many crucial areas. One such report highlighted by Oliver states, "Musk’s companies control more of the internet, the power grid, the transportation system, objects in orbit, the nation’s security infrastructure, and its energy supply."

And in typically nonchalant fashion, Oliver mixes respect and roast for Musk. “I’m probably now more impressed by what he’s doing but more worried by the fact that he’s the one doing it," he says in one section of the episode.

A response was always going to come and it did soon after the episode was aired. “Oliver was great several years ago, but stopped being funny when he sold his soul to wokeness where humor is basically illegal," Musk tweeted on X, formerly called Twitter before he took over the micro-blogging platform and brought in numerous changes.