At the end of next week The Amber Ruffin Show will premiere on Peacock. If it’s anything like the work Ruffin’s done on Late Night with Seth Meyers or Comedy Central’s dearly beloved Detroiters, it’ll be pretty great. She’s a fantastic comedy writer, a charming performer, and can speak with knowledge, authority and empathy on some of the most important issues facing America today. We’re excited, okay?
It’s unfortunate there wasn’t room in late night for a host like Ruffin back when the television landscape was limited to only five broadcast networks, dozens of cable channels, and a half-dozen major streaming services run by some of the biggest media companies in the world. But now that a seventh major streaming service run by one of the biggest media companies in the world has launched—Peacock, natch—there’s finally enough space in the industry for a show hosted by a proven and experienced TV performer whose writing has been critically acclaimed for years. Ain’t progress great?
With the show’s Sept. 25 premiere barreling towards us, Peacock has finally revealed its first trailer, which you can watch below. And hey, it definitely looks like a show we’d watch. As she’s shown for years on Late Night, Ruffin talks truth to power in a disarmingly cheerful way, which is a refreshing change of pace from the smugness and exasperation typically seen in political comedy these days. A perfect example of that aired on Late Night last Friday, when Ruffin used a goofy, upbeat song to blow up Trump’s asinine claim to have “done more for the military than almost anybody else.” We’ve embedded that video below, too. If this is the kind of stuff we can expect from The Amber Ruffin Show, then we expect it to become a regular part of our streaming diet.