'SNL' goes after AI, startup culture, and 'predatory tech guys'

• 'SNL' fired shots at startup culture in its latest episode.
• Comedian Ben Marshall played Pennywise the clown pitching a new AI company to trap kids.
• In another segment, a Sprite exec admits its new flavor tastes bad because "we used AI to make it."

"Saturday Night Live" took aim at startup culture and AI across multiple sketches in its Halloween broadcast, including a spoof of the stereotypical big-talking startup dude, channeled through Stephen King's Pennywise.

"We started a company — it's called WeAllFloat.ai," comedian Ben Marshall, playing the malevolent clown, said in the segment. "Instead of trapping one kid with one balloon, what if you had hundreds of AI agents, each with their own digital balloons?"

Before Pennywise came on, "Weekend Update" host Michael Che got a joke in about the floundering stock price of Google's parent company, Alphabet.

"Today's Google Doodle hung itself," Che said, referring to the animations Google sometimes uses on its homepage.

And in another spoof of advertising execs trying to plug a new Sprite flavor on a Latin telenovela, a Sprite rep admits the drink tastes bad because "we used AI to make it."

"For the first time in history, AI screwed up," she says sarcastically.

Though "SNL" hasn't shied away from lampooning AI and the buzzy startup culture associated with it before, Saturday's broadcast honed in on the Lone Star State as a place where soulless, profit-driven techies are flocking to start new companies.

Indeed, since 2020, more than 200 companies have relocated their headquarters to Texas. Many cite comparatively lax regulatory laws and a business-friendly atmosphere.

Of course, though, moving down south doesn't guarantee profitability. Pennywise, for instance, might have some trouble getting his AI startup off the ground.

"Got a little crew together of cool, like-minded, sober, predatory tech guys," Marshall says in the segment. "I live in a loft in Austin with three other motivated young Christians."