Three years ago, John Oliver randomly chose to pick a fight with the “Air Bud” franchise, as he tends to do. On Sunday night, the HBO host reignited that feud — before ending with a call to audition for the role of Buddy in the upcoming film himself.
“Last Week Tonight” was indeed off this week, so this particular segment came as a web exclusive, which you can watch below. To start, Oliver reminded viewers that he first denounced the franchise in 2022, but forgave anyone who might have missed it.
“Maybe you just saw a video called ‘Air Bud: Last Week Tonight,’ and saw that it was almost 15 minutes long, and decided to do literally something else with your time, because you suddenly remembered how many lives you had,” Oliver said.
Oliver then quickly recapped the franchise and his previous speech about it, and assured everyone that he stood by “every point.” He also explained that, yes, he now has even more to say about “Air Bud,” as he recently learned that a 15th film is coming, titled “Air Bud Returns.”
“14 is just too many movies,” Oliver said. “It seems cosmically unfair to me that there are 14 “Air Bud” movies and still only three “Bill and Teds,” two “Freaky Fridays” and a solitary “Michael Clayton.” I’m just saying they put Buddies on the moon, don’t tell me they can’t do a “Michael Clayton Goes to France”, “Michael Clayton: The College Years” or “Michael Clayton: Scared Stupid”. They could, and they should!
More than disputing the fact that 15 “Air Bud” films will soon exist, Oliver was baffled by the fact that the film was holding open auditions for the role of Buddy, which creator and director Robert Vince announced via an online video, in which his own dog made an appearance.
“I’m sorry. You don’t have the dog yet?!” » Olivier bellowed. “You’re trying to crowdsource the dog?! In the words of Josh’s dad in the original ‘Air Bud’: ‘I think I’m in hell.’ Because it’s completely crazy. In fact, it’s so insane that I don’t even have time to register the strangeness of announcing the search for your dog when the most “Air Bud” dog I’ve ever seen is sitting right next to you.
“He’s like a casting director making a video asking for a Timothée Chalamet type while standing next to a well-trained but heartbroken Finn Wolfhard,” Oliver continued angrily. “That’s a fucking insult!”
“Air Bud Returns” found its dogs and will be released in 2026. But Oliver wasn’t done.
“Look, I’m not mad at these dogs. I’m not mad at the return of the ‘Air Bud’ franchise,” he said. “I’m not even angry about the open search of dogs in general. I lied earlier when I pretended to be angry about it. I’ve never been angry about anything in my life! I’m not angry right now. I’m happy. My only problem is that I didn’t get a chance to audition.”
The late-night host admitted he couldn’t have auditioned because the rules explicitly required a purebred golden retriever. But Oliver chose to remove the rules.
“I ask you this: Doesn’t auditioning for the role of Buddy, a character who doesn’t speak and can only play basketball, sound pretty good to me? And isn’t letting me audition that much more within the spirit of the law, if not the letter? And isn’t that, ultimately, what ‘Air Bud’ really is?”
“The argument here is on my side, and I am very serious about the hearing,” he continued. “So at this point, I guess I would say the ball is in Robert Vince’s court, except, honestly, I don’t think it is. I think it’s actually in mine.”
From there, Oliver pulled out a basketball, walked to a hoop on stage, and offered Vince a deal: If Oliver made the shot, he would have a chance to audition. As he shot the ball, a clip played, prompting Oliver to deliver his final message: “Your move, Robert Vince.”
