John Oliver on Paramount Buying Warner Bros. Monologue

John Oliver addressed Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery during Sunday night’s episode of “Last Night Tonight.”

“We might be getting a new business daddy!,” Oliver quipped at the beginning of Sunday night’s show. “Last Week Tonight” airs on HBO, which sits within Warner Bros. Discovery. Under the announced terms, Paramount plans to buy all outstanding WBD shares at $31 per share in cash, with the companies saying the deal is expected to close in Q3 2026, subject to regulatory clearances and WBD shareholder approval.

“Yeah, not great news,” he went on to say. “In fact, if I may quote anyone who’s ever accidentally sat on their Roku remote, I’m in Paramount now…how the f-ck do I get out of here?’”

Netflix on Thursday afternoon formally declined to increase its offer for Warner Bros. after WBD declared Paramount Skydance’s latest bid a “superior proposal” to the agreement it already had in hand with Netflix.

This isn’t the first time Oliver has taken aim at Paramount. Amid early chatter about a possible Paramount–WBD tie-up last September, the comedian said “Please stay the f-ck away from us. You are not my real business daddy, and you never will be!” Oliver’s concern underlying the joke was that if Paramount acquired Warner Bros. Discovery, HBO could be pulled closer to a broadcast-style corporate structure — including potential sensitivity to FCC oversight and regulatory pressure — something he has previously contrasted with the relative freedom of premium cable.

In that same episode, while walking through a hypothetical in which someone could hand Donald Trump a $15 million check earmarked for a presidential library foundation and still stay within the rules, Oliver pivoted to a punchline about what kind of “soulless” corporation would ever do something like that — and flashed Paramount’s logo on-screen to underline the target.