John Oliver married a cabbage with Steve Buscemi as justice of the peas on Last Week Tonight

But who was the mother-in-slaw?

John Oliver loves him a stunt. And on Last Week Tonight, it's often to prove a point or stick it to someone who deserves it.

But on last night's episode, the Emmy-winning host married a cabbage out of the goodness of his heart. And, of course, his love of a stunt.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver
John Oliver marries a cabbage with Steve Buscemi officiating on 'Last Week Tonight'. HBO

Why a cabbage? Well, ostensibly, this all sprang from a segment on artificial intelligence — which is out of control, by the way — and its prowess at creating images. AI image generators like DALL-E, craiyon, and Midjourney allow human users to type in all sorts of prompts to create random images in mere seconds, such as Judi Dench fighting a centaur on the moon. Images that, clearly, need to exist.

There's also a database of images people have created and other late night hosts barely made the cut — on Midjourney, Trevor Noah and Jimmy Kimmel had just three pieces of art apiece dedicated to them, while Oliver had 493. A great deal of them were made by user @postpoopzoomies, who gifted the internet with "John Oliver as Mona Lisa" and "John Oliver at brunch with the girls and he's laughing because Debbie told a funny joke."

But @postpoopzoomies' crowning achievement was, no doubt, a collaboration with fellow user @Margaret involving Oliver and a cabbage. It's a tale old as time, or at least should be?: Late night host gets confused in a cabbage field, late night host throws cabbage at a child, late night host falls in love with cabbage, late night host marries cabbage, late night host accidentally eats cabbage in sleep. Dickens could never.

The AI dutifully made all the accompanying images in this traditional tale and did a pretty impressive job — except when it came to the Oliver-cabbage wedding.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver
AI's brave attempt at depicting John Oliver marrying a cabbage. HBO

"It's at this point that the AI, for the very first time, seems to struggle with a prompt because that seems to be an image of me getting married to myself and the cabbage somehow being there as a witness. But that's not what this story is about, is it?" Oliver gripes. "This story deserves better. @postpoopzoomies deserves better. As did @Margaret. We all deserve better."

What else could Oliver do but create a better image of himself marrying a cabbage? Literally, what else could he do? Enter beloved character actor Steve Buscemi to act as officiant to the human-vegetable wedding of the century. Oliver even promises, to the best of his abilities, not to accidentally eat the love of his life in his sleep, which is all really any of us can ever ask for.

Check out the long and winding road to this cabbage wedding in the clip from Last Week Tonight below:

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