It took an entire year, but Chris Rock finally addressed Will Smith‘s slap in his Netflix standup special, “Selective Outrage,” on Saturday.
One reviewer called the 58-year-old comedian a “sad old man yelling at clouds” in the comedy special.
“Perhaps Chris Rock should have titled his new Netflix standup special, ‘Get Off My Lawn,'” the critic wrote.
Others praised Rock as an iconic comedian a year after an angry Smith stormed onstage at the 2022 Oscars and rage slapped Rock for joking about his wife Jada Pinkett Smith‘s buzz haircut.
“People are like, ‘Did it hurt?’ It still hurts! I got summertime ringing in my ears!” Rock said, referring to Smith’s Grammy-winning single “Summertime” by DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince (1991).
“But I’m not a victim, baby. You will never see me on Oprah, Gayle, crying,” he said.
Rock addressed the stinging criticism by his toxic masculinity friends who demanded to know why he didn’t fight back. He pointed out Smith’s height advantage over him.
“Will Smith is significantly bigger than me,” Rock reasoned. “He does movies with his shirt off! You’ve never seen me do a movie with my shirt off. If I’m in a movie getting open heart surgery, I got on a sweater. Will Smith played Muhammed Ali in a movie! You think I auditioned for that part? I played Pookie in ‘New Jack City.’ … Even in animation, he’s bigger: I’m a zebra, he’s a shark.”
He continued: “I love Will Smith … he’s made some great movies. I have rooted for Will Smith my whole life. And now I watch ‘Emancipation’ just to see him get whooped. Got me rooting for massa: ‘Hit him again!'”
But Rock also disappointed feminists by specifically targeting Pinkett Smith for giving her embattled husband the look that supposedly triggered him to single-handedly destroy his iconic career on the same night he received his first Oscar award.
Rock insinuated that Smith slapped him because Pinkett Smith blamed Rock for not quitting his 2016 Oscars hosting gig over the “Oscars so white” controversy.
“Nobody was picking on her. She said, me, a grown-ass man, should quit his job because her husband didn’t get nominated for ‘Concussion.’ Then he gave me a concussion.”
Rock also brought up Pinkett Smith’s sordid love affair with troubled artist August Alsina.
“Anybody that really knows knows I had nothing to do with that sh*t. I didn’t have any entanglements,” Rock said. “She hurt [Smith] way more than he hurt me.”
Watch the video below.
