When Tragedy Becomes Punchline: Satirical Journalism, American Gaze, and the Spectacularization of Trump^s Military Strikes on Iran
Nila Kusuma Windrati, Irsanti Widuri Asih

Universitas Terbuka

Abstract

This study examines the representation of the United States-Israel armed offensive against Iran within punchline content published on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon^s official Instagram account (@fallontonight) throughout March 2026. Departing from a paradox inherent to American political satire-its capacity to simultaneously critique domestic power structures and reproduce imperial ways of seeing the Other-this study interrogates how the comedic mechanisms of late-night talk show content, repackaged for Instagram consumption, operate ideologically when they intersect with an active military conflict. Situated within a critical paradigm and employing a qualitative interpretive approach, the study deploys Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA) as its primary analytical method, integrating Fairclough^s three-dimensional CDA framework with Kress and van Leeuwen^s visual grammar. The theoretical framework is organized around three intersecting axes: satirical journalism, which positions late-night talk shows as a hybrid genre mediating entertainment and political critique- the American gaze, which illuminates how the United States constructs Iran as an object of commentary rather than a sovereign subject- and media spectacle, which foregrounds the transformation of wartime violence into consumable content. Three Reels published between 3-24 March 2026 are analyzed, selected based on the three highest engagement figures in the dataset of ten Reels, with combined engagement reaching 7.9 million likes, 85,100 comments, and 3.7 million views. Findings demonstrate that Fallon^s punchlines operate through constitutive ambivalence: they perform a critique of Trump^s foreign policy while structurally converting Iranian civilian suffering into spectacle consumed through laughter-yet systematically evacuated of Iranian voice and subjectivity.

Keywords: satirical journalism, American gaze, media spectacle, Iran conflict, late-night television, deep mediatization

Topic: Strategic Communication in the Digital Sphere: Cultivating Civic Trust through Data-Driven Approaches (Digital Communication- Public Communication Strategy- Civic Trust)