Jimmy Fallon savagely mocks Jeff Bezos’ rocketship: ‘It’s the only rocket that shrinks in the cold’

Jimmy Fallon couldn’t help himself when he took the mick out of Jeff Bezos’ intriguingly-shaped rocket as the Amazon billionaire shot himself into space yesterday.

After a whipsmart 11-minute journey to space with his rocket New Shepard, the Blue Origin founder landed safely back on Earth amid a trend of very rich people going to the great beyond.

The world looked on as Bezos, the world’s richest man, flew to 350,000ft (106km) on the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.

Addressing the monumental moment – which came a week after Virgin founder and billionaire Sir Richard Branson also flew to space – Fallon couldn’t help but mock the shape of Bezos’ ship, which many felt was rather phallic.

First addressing this trend of billionaires heading to space, Fallon said: ‘Tomorrow Warren buffet is going to try and get up there with balloons like the old guy from Up.

‘Natural career progression for anyone who starts an online book store.’

Bezos landed safely after heading to space (Picture: AFP)

Drawing attention to Bezos wearing a cowboy hat with his suit, Fallon continued: ‘You know you’re rich when you put that on and everyone who works for you goes, “Oh, it looks great. Yeah. You’re a man of the people, just going to space”.

‘He looks like a mash-up between Buzz Lightyear and Woody: two for one.

The ship, though (Picture: Reuters)

‘He got the spacesuit and cowboy hat together by searching for the “mid-life crisis bundle”.’

Talk then turned to the shape of the rocket, as Fallon asked ‘why would you design it like that?’

Putting 30 seconds on the clock to see how many jokes he could do, Fallon began with: ‘It’s the only rocket that shrinks in the cold.’

‘It looks like R2-D2 took Viagra,’ Jimmy added, before quipping: ‘Right after launch the rocket goes into sleep mode.’

The Roots’ Tariq ‘Black Thought’ Trotter chimed in: ‘They keep it in the top drawer of a bedside table’ as well as ‘looks like someone undid their asteroid belt’.

Jimmy wasn’t done, joking: ‘Next stop, the O-zone,’ and ‘it took a long time to erect it.’

Steve Higgins then offered deadpan: ‘It looks like male genitalia.’

Showing some competition between the billionaires, Bezos’ rocket travelled more than 10 miles (16km) higher than Sir Richard’s flight to space last week with Virgin Galactic.

More: US TV news

Accompanying Bezos was his brother, Mark, 53, pilot Wally Funk, 82, an avid aviator who trained with Nasa to go to space in 1961 but never had the chance, as well as 18-year-old Oliver Daemen.

The flight, which lasted around 11 minutes from launch to landing, saw the astronauts experience three or four minutes of zero-gravity as they travelled above the Karman Line, which is considered to be the boundary of space.

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