John Oliver calls out John Cena’s “weird” apology to China

John Oliver has taken aim at John Cena and his “weird” apology to China on his topical show Last Week Tonight.

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Cena came under fire in May after calling Taiwan a country during an interview. The actor, who was promoting Fast And Furious 9, said that Taiwan, an island separated from mainland China by the Taiwan Strait, would be the first “country” able to watch the film.

“I made one mistake,” Cena said afterwards on Chinese social media network Weibo (as per South China Morning Post). “I love and respect China and Chinese people. I’m very, very sorry about my mistake.”

John Cena apologized in Chinese on Sina Weibo after calling Taiwan a country during an interview promoting Fast & Furious 9 pic.twitter.com/dzRKIYgEzL

— Joe Yizhou Xu (@JoeXu) May 24, 2021

Now Oliver, while discussing Taiwan on his show on Sunday (October 24), has addressed Cena’s remarks.

“It’s weird John Cena apologised to China,” he said after playing Cena’s apology video. “It’s weird he did it for calling Taiwan a country. And it’s weird to see him do it in pretty decent Mandarin. That’s just too many weird things.”

Earlier this month, the trailer and release date for Cena’s upcoming show Peacemaker was released. The Suicide Squad spin-off will land on HBO Max on January 13, 2022.

Speaking to NME, Cena revealed how his “grossly inappropriate” outtakes from The Suicide Squad inspired the forthcoming series.

“In pushing the boundaries of Peacemaker, I started to lean into a lot of the nuances that I enjoy,” he said.

“None of it made the movie – not one bit – and everyone on the cast was very patient during that exploration. A lot of it was grossly inappropriate – certainly not acceptable – but you do get to a place where you define a character.”

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