Last Week Tonight With John Oliver turns 10 on April 27, just before the news satire show hits 300 episodes. Those are two major milestones, and at this rate, we’ll see even more. HBO has already renewed Last Week Tonight for two more seasons after the one currently airing on Sunday nights.
The show is also a big hit on YouTube, where HBO shares each episode’s main segment and other clips from the show — albeit later in the week than they used to. The ten most-viewed YouTube uploads at the moment cover a range of topics: Host John Oliver takes Donald Trump to task in several of the clips, but others have him riffing on everything from televangelists to Miss America. In honor of Last Week Tonight’s 10th anniversary, here are the top 10.
10. “Border Wall”: 23.3 million views
In 2016, when Trump was still a presidential candidate, Oliver examined the businessman’s plan to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border to reduce crime rates. But “the crime rates among immigrants once here are relatively tiny digits,” Oliver said, “which is something Donald Trump should frankly understand, given that he has 10 of them attached to his minuscule wrists.”
9. “Miss America Pageant”: 23 million views
Oliver highlighted the ridiculousness of the Miss America pageant in 2014 — and screened a clip in which Ian Ziering asked a contestant a question about the exchange of five Guantánamo Bay detainees for one captured U.S. soldier. “I sincerely doubt the intricacies of hostage exchanges are going to be resolved by a 21-year-old PR major and the star of Sharknado,” Oliver said.
8. “Ivanka & Jared”: 25 million views
Speaking of beauty pageants, Oliver in 2017 rediscovered a cringe-worthy moment from when Ivanka Trump co-hosted the Miss Teen USA pageant, which her father co-owned, two decades earlier. “I can guarantee my brothers were loving that — are any of you up there single?” a then-15-year-old Ivanka said at the time, after the swimsuit round.
7. “Vaccines”: 27 million views
Long before COVID-19 vaccines became a hot-button topic, Oliver covered anti-vaxxers in a 2017 episode of his show — and opened up about his fears as the father of a then-19-month-old son. “He was born prematurely following a very difficult pregnancy, and I was worried about his health, and I still worry about his health a lot, but we are vaccinating him fully on schedule,” Oliver said. “And if I can overcome the temptation to listen to the irrational shouting of my terrified lizard brain, then I believe that everyone can.”
6. “Confederacy”: 30 million views
In discussing the controversy over Confederate memorials in the United States in a 2017 episode, Oliver cited a quote from Confederate general Robert E. Lee, who said that the United States should follow the example nations that “endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife.” (“It’s true,” Oliver added. “Robert E. Lee was opposed to statues of people like Robert E. Lee. So, any city that decides to keep a statue of him should, at the very least, add a speech bubble saying, ‘You know, I told you all specifically not to do this.’”)
5. “Multilevel Marketing”: 35 million views
Oliver trained his sights on multilevel marketing companies in 2016, airing a clip in which a then-distributor for the dietary-supplement maker Vemma said that the organization is “shaped like a pyramid” but not an illegal pyramid scheme. “Oh, I get it,” Oliver responded. “So it’s not a pyramid, it’s just ‘pyramid-shaped.’ You know, like a Dorito. Or an Angry Bird. Or just a pile of bulls—t.”
4. “Government Surveillance”: 37 million views
When talking about government surveillance, as Oliver did in 2015, why not talk to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden? Well, a 10-hour flight to Moscow provides one hurdle. Nevertheless, Oliver made the trip and got the interview. At a post-airing press event, Oliver said that HBO didn’t even know about the interview ahead of time — and that both the network and the studio audience agreed not to spoil the surprise, per Vox.
3. “Trump vs. Truth”: 38 million views
After hearing that Trump got his news from morning cable-news programs, Last Week Tonight paid for an informational ad about the nuclear triad — in the guise of a catheter commercial — to run on MSNBC, CNN, and Fox News in the D.C. area the morning after this 2017 episode aired. “Until we’re shut down, we are prepared to educate Donald Trump one by one on topics we’re pretty sure he doesn’t know about,” Oliver said on the show.
2. “Donald Trump”: 41 million views
In 2016, in one of the most viral episodes of the show, Oliver publicized the fact that the Trump family was once the Drumpf family. He urged Americans to “make Donald Drumpf again,” revealed that the Last Week Tonight had filed paperwork to trademark the word Drumpf, and announced a Drumpfinator browser extension that would replace all mentions of “Trump” with the family’s ancestral name.
1. “Televangelists”: 41 million views
Oliver called out “churches who exploit people’s faith for monetary gain” in a 2015 episode and — in another Last Week Tonight stunt — announced he had started a church called Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption, a process he called “disturbingly easy.” The following week, Oliver told viewers that the church had already gotten thousands of dollars in donations, and the Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption website reveals that all donations have been forwarded to Doctors Without Borders.
Last Week Tonight, Sundays, 11/10c, HBO