John Oliver Explains Why He Loves Octopuses

The rather forthright John Oliver quite giddily extolled the many virtues of the octopus species while taking a short break during his regularly scheduled program for Last Week Tonight. Oliver not only gave a short lesson as to why the plural of octopus is octopuses and NOT octopi (the word comes from Greek, not Latin) but he proceeded to give a number of visual and aural examples as to why octopuses are such amazing creatures.

It is genuinely confusing to me that octopuses aren’t the most celebrated animals on the internet, especially when every fact about them is a hit fact! They have three hearts, they have blue blood, they have beaks, they have massive brains…Also, did you know they can change their shape, color, and texture? Because they can. …And that’s not all. Some of these stealth bagpipes can go on full-on Animorphs.

Oliver also compared the physiology of the giant Pacific octopus to that of a mere human.

there is so much more to know about octopuses. I didn’t even get into the fact that the giant Pacific octopus has as many as 2,240 suction cups that can grip objects and also taste. You think thumbs are such a big deal? Thumbs?! Call me when you can taste 2,000 slices of pizza without getting your mouth involved, you fucking idiot!