His eyes filled with wonder and his voice full of humility, Victor Glover—ready with his Artemis II crewmates to complete a record-setting trip around the moon—addressed the camera. He looked out the window, startled by his home planet staring back at him. “Being a person of faith,” he said firmly, “this has certainly brought me closer to God.” And then: Pringles can be drifted in the frame.
“Oh, man,” Glover said angrily. “You have to Velcro your snacks to the wall!”
last night, Saturday Night Live paid tribute to the astronauts aboard NASA’s Orion spacecraft with a simple and cute joke. Glover (played by the show’s host, Colman Domingo) continued to try to record a strong message for the people at home—a message that would explain why science is still important and has the power to inspire humanity. But his colleagues continued to spoil the vibe.
In the sketch, astronauts Jeremy Hansen (Marcello Hernández) and Reid Wiseman (Mikey Day), commander of Artemis, fight over a Pringles can. “Guardians of the finders, you have lost!” Hansen joked. Glover implored: “Hey, guys, I’m filming a fantasy video. Can you guys stop messing around?” Hansen was unprofitable. “It’s Day 9, and we’re just tired, right?”
The width of the space is humbling to look. But it can certainly make even the most sane astronauts cringe a little. The sketch was based on the tension between the Artemis II mission commanders and the reality of being stuck in a steel pipe with three other people and no privacy. At one point, Wiseman, a stream of goo hanging from his nose, marveled that his sneeze had frozen (“I mean,” he said, laughing, “this is happening right now”); later, Hansen walks in, struggling with a bathroom bug (“My pee-pee-pee is stuck in the pipe again!”).
Now, this may be because I grew up in Orlando, not far from the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, but when I was learning about NASA in elementary school, almost every discussion centered around one in which the students pestered the teacher with questions about how the astronauts went to the bathroom. Space exploration is a symbol of science at its most modern, but the subject has always raised a few chuckles among the public about what everyday life must be like for astronauts. Extraterrestrial space travel—what it takes to go to the stars—is more than most people can understand. But anyone can understand how difficult it must be to use a toilet to relieve oneself.
NASA and space exploration have long represented the sum of what humanity can achieve when humans work together and pursue knowledge as the ultimate goal, even when conditions on Earth are turbulent. The Apollo 11 mission and Neil Armstrong’s famous quote—”That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind”—came as America reeled from the deaths of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., and as opposition to the Vietnam War bitterly divided the nation. It has been short to note in the history books that the Apollo 11 mission served as a beacon of hope and cultural unity in a dark and troubled time. And while such observations can balance difficulty, the idea has persisted for a reason.
The Artemis II mission took place in a very different political and cultural time – where the theory and practice of science have been. attacked relentlessly and the Trump administration. This is the time that the secretary of Health and Human Services has explained clear contempt for science and when “loyalty” you rule the day. (During “Weekend Update,” Michael Che he joked that the Artemis II astronauts had “returned safely from their 10-day trip around the Hollywood soundstage,” a reference to long-running conspiracies that the moon landing was faked.) It’s also a time when social media and cable news have created a more widespread and dispersed information environment, fostering in many people’s emotions, distortions, confusion, often.
This is the state of affairs SNL he was cleverly captured. Domingo, like Glover, often tried to make a point by quoting famous NASA astronauts. And time and time again, those efforts were thwarted. “‘We don’t realize what we have on Earth until we leave it,'” he read, quoting Jim Lovell (of Apollo 8 and Apollo 13 mission fame). Then she said: “Those words have struck a very different chord right now—” Kaka snorted, open-mouthed Christina Koch (played by Sarah Sherman, who didn’t need lines to get laughs), hovering in her viewing column. “Guys,” Glover complained, “Christina fell asleep again without Velcroing.”
Glover regrouped: “I’d like to read another quote from another great astronaut, Sally Ride,” the first American woman in space. “‘Looking at the Earth from orbit makes you realize how fragile our lives are.'” Once again, his colleagues were not paying attention. Koch bounced again, this time with glasses and a Harry Potter lightning bolt falling on his face.
But the voyage of Artemis II showed that science can still be scary, and that Americans are not completely lost in anxiety. On Friday evening, my social media feed was flooded with people (including Glover’s daughter) cheering for workers to return home, good news for a weekend that started with Donald Trump threatening to delete it “the whole civilization.” NASA effort, no SNLdiagram, also showed that although science and hope have made strides recently, no calculation has been reduced.
As the skate drew to a close, Glover tried, one last time, to send an important message to Earth. “I’m going to do this quickly because people are going crazy,” he said. “My one hope for everyone on Earth is this—” Then Hansen and Wiseman moved closer, with a urinal. Glover insisted: “The video is over. Everyone, be kind.” The zero gravity bathroom humor may have undercut the moment, but the unifying message came through loud and clear.
