‘SNL’ cold open shows Biden blaming COVID surge on ‘Spider-Man' movie fans

"Saturday Night Live"’s President Biden (played by James Austin Johnson) had a solution to the recent surge in coronavirus cases during the show's cold open this weekend: "Stop seeing ‘Spider-Man!’" 

"Spider-Man: No Way Home" has topped the box office for several weeks after premiering in mid-December. 

"Think about it. When did ‘Spider-Man’ come out?" Johnson’s Biden mused at a fake news conference in the sketch. "Dec. 17. When did every single person get omicron? The week after Dec. 17. Stop seeing ‘Spider-Man!’" 

The fake Biden then took questions from reporters – played by other "SNL" cast members. One of them asked if the president if he was trying to claim the pandemic would end if people stopped going to the movies. 

"I didn’t say ‘Don’t go to the movies’ – I said ‘Stop seeing Spider-Man!'" Johnson's Biden repeated. 

Johnson said his data was based on: "Everyone in America has seen ‘Spider-Man' like eight times. Everyone in America also has COVID."

He advised that Americans didn’t need to take a COVID-19 test to find out if they have the virus.

"Look at your hand. Is it holding a ticket that says you recently went to see ‘Spider-Man?’ If so, then you have COVID," he claimed.

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Johnson’s Biden later explained he hasn’t seen the movie because he couldn’t get tickets, suggesting his motive for asking patrons not to go may have been so he would have an easier time getting a seat. 

The fake president also expanded ‘Spider-Man’’s culpability to include this year’s record inflation and the stalling of the Democrats' voting rights bill in Congress. Johnson compared moderate Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema to villains who battle the superhero.  

"The only difference is if one of Spider-Man's villains saw Kyrsten Sinema they'd be like, ‘Hey, honey, that outfit is a little much.’" 

Later, he revealed he had discovered we are all existing in a ‘Spider-Man’-style multiverse in which there are at least three Joe Bidens: "One of them is me, one of them is a Joe Biden that lost to Trump. That Biden hosts a show on CNBC called ‘T-Birds, Tacos and Trains.’ And then there’s a third Joe Biden who’s the greatest president in history. My approval ratings are sky-high, I’m actually supported by my own party and I understand the show ‘Euphoria.’" 

When a reporter balked at the idea everyone is living in a multiverse, Johnson countered: "Doesn’t that make more sense than whatever the hell our current world is?" 

At the end of the sketch cast member Pete Davidson appeared as a shirtless, tattooed version of Biden from the "real universe." He warned the timeline the rest of us are living in is "about to collapse" after it was created as a joke in 2016 when the Chicago Cubs won the World Series. 

Davidson told the other Biden that in the "real" universe he wasn’t president.

"Did you really think you would lose four times and then finally win when you were 78?" he asked.

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Davidson then told Biden he needed to hurry through a portal to the "real" world before the current one collapses. Johnson's Biden said he would come back for everyone else after he was able to pass his still-stalled Build Back Better social spending bill there. 

But Davidson corrected him: "Dude, even in the ‘real’ world that thing’s not passing." 

Actress Ariana DeBose guest-hosted the Jan. 15 episode and Bleachers performed as the musical guest.