Grand Theft Auto IV's Niko pops up on SNL

by Justin McElroy { May 14th 2008 at 2:00AM }

We talked before about the late-night media frenzy surrounding Grand Theft Auto IV's release, since it was kind of hard to miss GTA if you watch TV between 11 p.m. and 1 a.m. It gave us no small satisfaction to see the game pop up on one of the late-night comedy stalwarts as Niko and Vlad (played by Bill Hader and Fred Armisen) appeared on Saturday Night Live's Weekend Update. You can see the clip from last Saturday above.

Now, is it ... funny, per se? Well, our ribs have been more fiercely tickled, that's for sure. But they're trying. Isn't that the important thing?

Tags: grand-theft-auto-iv, gta-iv, gtaiv, snl

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

noskillbassist @ May 14th 2008 2:09AM

Sorry to jump on the whole "LOL UR LATE JOYSTIQ" bandwagon, but how about you guys try and get these stories out... on time? I mean hell, it's SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE and you're posting it on TUESDAY NIGHT.

Josh @ May 14th 2008 2:16AM

Don't be an ass.

Hala Madrid!! @ May 14th 2008 2:26AM

Actualy is Wednesday morning, but I guess you live in a different time zone.

noskillbassist @ May 14th 2008 2:29AM

How am I being an ass? Is it too much to ask for stories that aren't days old?

XLM @ May 14th 2008 4:16AM

I don't watch SNL anymore, so this was news to me... Tuesday 10:15pm here in Hawaii.

Even if they blogged about it a minute after it aired it still wouldn't have been funny.

I think Josh was on to something.

JJ Rooster @ May 14th 2008 9:33AM

No it's true, Joystiq is usually half a day or more late on news you can read about on Kotaku. Sorry guys, but they do move quicker for some reason.

DemonGSides @ May 14th 2008 10:09AM

But you get half as much Otaku bullshit here. Thats a price I'm willing to pay.

Now, if we could only get rid of the /b/ references in the comments...

Player1 @ May 14th 2008 10:34AM

Maybe you should go to Kotaku where you can be first to know about this and other important stories like game-themed cakes, and what toothpaste Brain Ashcraft likes.

And why are these guys doing the robot?

Kanadwen @ May 14th 2008 11:19AM

I'd rather read late news than news given by horrible writers.

deaftly @ May 14th 2008 2:07PM

Agreed, Kotaku and everything else Gawker related is just garbage.

ZeroCorpse @ May 14th 2008 2:23PM

Yeah, but the staff and many of the readers at Kotaku are complete and utter assholes. I may have some gripes with Joystiq, but at least they don't ban people for expressing a contrary opinion. I respect that.

Kotaku is a self-enabling cesspool of whiny Internet trolls, and the bloggers themselves resemble that description, too.

Oh, yeah, there are some good folks at Kotaku, but the bad ones out-shout them, and generally ruin the place. Kotaku is great if you're a 4chan retard or a fratboy who thinks being a douchenozzle is funny, but it's not exactly a place for intelligent discussions or exchanges of ideas. If you introduce an idea that runs opposed to the ideas of the bloggers themselves, they'll cut you down and block you.

Childish.

Joystiq is just fine for those of us who don't idolize Maddox and who want to have decent discussions rather than fanwank circle-jerks.

Player1 @ May 14th 2008 4:11PM

It's so nice to see others dislike Kotaku as much as I do. One of their former writers actually sent me $5 through paypal once so I could "buy a clue". That's when it became pretty clear they were all tools.

Dave @ May 14th 2008 2:15AM

Honestly, how did that skit get on the air? As an avid watcher of SNL, I do think they're on the upswing right now, but damn was that a dud.

Platinum_Skeet @ May 14th 2008 9:31AM

I don't know why they have their hands cuffed like that GTA has open hands now... WOW SNL should've did a little more research before making this skit...

ViagraFiend @ May 14th 2008 10:07AM

I dont know...the Walken SNL was good but the other new ones have sucked.

The googly eyed gardner still makes me laugh.

NATO_Duke @ May 14th 2008 11:26AM

yeah, this skit fails.

The recent Walken family reunion and googly-eyes-gardener skits were awesome though. I think of it whenver I go to the nursery.

Sora267 @ May 14th 2008 6:17PM

I saw this when it aired, and at the time, I thought it was kinda funny, but it was 12:30 in the morning and I had woken up at 6 AM that day so meh.

I think it would have been funnier if they had a Jack Thompson imitation flaming the crap out of the game.

Hala Madrid!! @ May 14th 2008 2:17AM

Is stupid what they're doing with their hands
this is just bad comedy but at least they tried.

Jake @ May 14th 2008 2:20AM

Ok, so Hader looks KINDA LIKE Niko, and Armisan KIND OF looks like Vlad...

BUT

The first thing I had to ask myself was, WTF ARE THEY DOING WITH THIER ARMS?!?!

Other then that... It was pretty meh.

holyice7 @ May 14th 2008 2:24AM

This counts as trying now?

...the costumes weren't bad.

GamerCrusader @ May 14th 2008 2:27AM

Obviously they were doing the robot to express their opinions that the city runs like clockwork forcing them into their regular habits of killing maining and otherwise jackassery around the city. -- Pffffft! HAHHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHHA.. sorry. Costumes = Good, Arm movement = wtf, couldn't watch much beyond that without laughing at their poor slapstick humor. Not be mistaken for laughing for the humor itself, but laughing at them instead.

Carrie @ May 14th 2008 2:28AM

Maybe it's cause I haven't played GTA4 yet but, seriously, why are they moving their hands like that?

I haven't watched SNL for years... and I don't think I'll start again anytime soon.

Lone Starr @ May 14th 2008 2:45AM

I think the whole point of the arms was to make fun of the graphics/lack of fingers etc. It seems completely odd though to build an entire skit off of such an obscure premise - I don't think the majority of SNL viewers are avid GTA IV players.

I'm more surprised that people were apparently having a great time in the studio.

Richie @ May 14th 2008 3:25AM

That skit would have been funnier if they made it a few years ago since the movements in GTA are more realistic. Also, add the simple fact that this is next gen and characters have fingers. Actually the movement and even emotions is very good in the new game.

Korova @ May 14th 2008 7:51AM

I dont know, I thought the mocking of the way VG characters move was very funny. Beyond that there was no other jokes really. But the movement was funny to me. It may have been a product placement.

Anyway, I laughed initially and then just waited. That happens a lot with SNL skits.

Judd @ May 14th 2008 9:52AM

Seriously, this joke might be relevant if it was based off of GTA 3. I just can't stand it when television and movies try to be topical about video games and they show that they have no idea what they're talking about.

You ever see a show where a kid is playing a video game and all you hear in the background are generic beeps and bloops? It's as if video game audio has not advanced since the Atari 2600.

I mean of all games to mock the movements of characters, they choose the one that is the first to run on a new engine?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphoria_%28software%29

I'm not saying I expect Ivy League research from SNL, but thinking that video game graphics haven't moved beyond the blocky characters of the Playstation, is like thinking that there is no difference in special effects between the new and old Star Wars trilogies.

Dingobloo @ May 14th 2008 2:30AM

Were they imitating GTA or thunderbirds... I can't even tell.

Ranko @ May 14th 2008 2:32AM

Or could those hand movements be an indirect way of making fun of Micheal J. Fox?

Hala Madrid!! @ May 14th 2008 2:41AM

ROFLMAO You Sir are funny.

BeckRokk @ May 14th 2008 2:34AM

I got to see the credits for GTA IV today and while reading them, I saw Fred Armisen's name come up as a few minor characters on Integrity, I think. COINCIDENCE?!

samred @ May 14th 2008 2:45AM

Yeah, Fred Armisen voices the hot dog vendor and a few others; his name's in the instruction booklet credits as well. I figured that fact would make a GTA/SNL crossover at least a little likely.

Lone Starr @ May 14th 2008 2:51AM

sam,

People who read instruction booklets are a rare breed. But you read the credits in the booklets. You must be one in a million.

Please sign my tit.

rTwelve @ May 14th 2008 3:34AM

PROTIP: Bill Hader is one of the guys on Pacemaker on PLR

refinedsugar @ May 14th 2008 9:08PM

Him doing the Pervert on Integrity 2.0 with Lazlow had to be the funniest radio bit.

'You wanna show me parts of your body, I wanna touch them'

lol

Sean @ May 14th 2008 2:37AM

Why is SNL still on the air?

SkreeHunter @ May 14th 2008 2:47AM

I think the hand motions are them making fun of the way hands used to be in games. Like The Sims 1 era hands.

mundox @ May 14th 2008 2:54AM

really funny... not

Ken Shammy @ May 14th 2008 2:58AM

What the fuck was that?

Superking @ May 14th 2008 3:05AM

Wow. That was so bad I think it gave me cancer!

jim @ May 14th 2008 3:33AM

i get the hands thing but what was with the swaying back and forth? that part of it confused me ;[

Kenny @ May 14th 2008 4:04AM

the bit about following the yellow line to roman's wherehouse was a good one. no one except people who have played the game or any sandbox game would get that one.

Consolcwby @ May 14th 2008 4:04AM

The only thing this skit did for me... was to remind me how great SNL used to be. It's too bad.

Chimaera @ May 14th 2008 5:08AM

Sigh, SNL. You always seem to disappoint me now-a-days

EMaster @ May 14th 2008 6:47AM

That sounded like it was written by by 55 year old dad who doesn't know shit about GTA or video games other than pong in General. SNL shoudl just die those guys have not been funny in almost a decade.

Amirisme @ May 14th 2008 7:49AM

Dude... This is lame....

carg0 @ May 14th 2008 8:01AM

is that what passes for "trying" on SNL these days?

Void Munashii @ May 14th 2008 8:10AM

Wow, thanks for reminding me why I do not watch SNL.

Craig Fergusson's monologue was much funnier. It actually had a point and an ending, not just an eject when they realized that they had no real ideas for the bit.

xFenixKnightx @ May 14th 2008 8:54AM

Good to know Im not missing much by not watching SNL. This just isnt funny, I was just watching and waiting for something to happen.

SNL went downhill since Will Ferrel & Jimmy Fallon left. Mad TV is just so much better IMO. BTW, Tina Fey & Amy Poehler have never been funny, ever!