A Full Breakdown Of Every Single Reference In Pete Davidson’s “I’m Just Pete”

It didn’t take long for Pete to become a viewer favorite and breakout star, and fans were left saddened last year when it was announced that he’d be leaving SNL after seven seasons. 

Pete went on to star in the Peacock original series Bupkis, which premiered in May of this year, and has also made appearances in multiple high-profile movies since leaving Saturday Night Live, including Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Fast X, and Transformers: Rise of the Beasts.

Unfortunately, the episode ended up being canceled because the Writers Guild of America went on strike, with the comedy series taken off our screens until the union reached a new deal with the studios last month.

Saturday Night Live made a triumphant return over the weekend — and Pete was on hand to finally make his debut as celebrity host during the season premiere. 

In the sketch, rewritten as “I’m Just Pete” and almost four minutes long, Pete mimics Ken’s appearance and high-energy dance numbers from the film. 

But as showstopping as the performance was to watch, it was what SNL viewers heard that really struck a chord as Pete poked fun at every aspect of his personal and professional lives with the witty, self-owning lyrics. 

In fact, no stone was left unturned as Pete made self-deprecating references to everything from his physical appearance to his infamous 2022 beef with Kanye West (now known as Ye) and his Beverly Hills car crash earlier this year. 

Here is a full breakdown of the meaning behind everything Pete acknowledges in the song — and buckle up, because it’s a truly wild ride. 

Referencing his Bupkis costars, they ask, “How do you get Joe Pesci and Edie Falco and no viewers?” which prompts the musical montage. 

“No one cares about the work I do, I made a show with Joe Pesci too, and no one streamed it but my mom,” Pete’s homage to Ken kicks off. 

If you weren’t aware, comedy series Bupkis is described as being a “heightened fictionalized version of Pete Davidson's life," and while it was generally well reviewed by viewers and critics — it has a score of 78% on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes — it didn’t attract many viewers.

Pete later revealed that he had been high when he paid the deposit, and suggested that he regretted the extravagant purchase. Speaking on Seth Meyers’s Family Trips podcast, he said, “I saw a link and sent a deposit, and now I’m stuck with a fucking boat.”

He added that because they’d been left “in a hole” by their own actions, he and Colin had recently decided to try to transform the vessel into a New York hot spot.  

Pete said in the June podcast, “We wanna be able to dock it from April to September, maybe October, in New York, and it will be like a restaurant.”

“There will be a concert venue. There will be a movie theater upstairs, like, sort of [a] restaurant area," he went on. "And then there's hotels in it. So we'll have a couple of those. And then in the winter, tug it to Miami."

When Seth said that Pete had really “thought this through,” Pete made it immediately clear that the plans were only out of necessity. He explained, “Colin called me and he's like, 'Hey, can you hop on this call about the ferry?' And I was like, 'We’re still doing that thing?!' He's like, 'Yeah. This is pretty serious.’”

In case you somehow managed to miss it, when Kim Kardashian started dating Pete toward the end of 2021, her ex-husband — Ye — took issue with the whole thing, to say the least. 

Over a seriously intense three-month period at the start of 2022, Ye would refer to Pete as “Skete” in regular brutal tirades on social media that were parroted by the rapper’s fans. 

In fact, Pete ended up deleting a new Instagram account just days after he’d created it after his posts were flooded with comments calling him “Skete.”

But the beef wasn’t limited to name-calling, with Ye sparking serious backlash when he encouraged his fans to “scream” at Pete if they saw him in the street, decapitated a Claymation of the comic in a music video, and seemingly threatened to put Pete’s “security at risk.”

It was later reported that Pete had to seek “trauma therapy” to help cope with the way Ye and his fans had treated him. 

So it’s perhaps unsurprising that Pete also acknowledges his tumultuous love life in the sketch, where he admits that he is better known for his relationships than for his work as a comic.

And Pete’s high-profile romances with so many beautiful women over the years have led critics to question how he manages it, with the star’s looks and lifestyle regularly coming under fierce scrutiny as a result. 

This is a direct response to a cruel comment that was made back in 2018 when he was dating Ariana. At the time, Barstool Sports tweeted, “Does Pete Davidson have butthole eyes?” Pete has since acknowledged the creative insult multiple times in his stand-up shows.

Pete goes on to joke, “I’m just Pete. Anyone else I would be a three, but I guess I’m hot for a dude in comedy 'cause it’s an ugly industry.”

While Pete desperately tried to downplay what she said at the time, his reputation has preceded him ever since, and Kim even admitted that it was his “BDE” that first attracted her to him before they started dating.

Referencing other insults that have been hurled his way over the years in “I’m Just Pete,” Pete pokes fun at his slim frame as he sings, “I’m 6 feet 4 and 100 pounds,” and goes on to mention his highly publicized struggles with mental health and addiction.

Previously, Pete had been to rehab for cocaine addiction and alcoholism, as well as for mental health treatment amid his PTSD and borderline personality disorder diagnoses. 

“I deleted all my accounts online because doctors said the internet wasn’t good for me,” Pete admits. 

Despite his brief return to Instagram amid the Ye beef last year, Pete has actually been largely offline since 2018. 

He told fans at the time that he was logging off because “the internet is an evil place and it doesn’t make me feel good,” and social media was having an overwhelmingly negative impact on his mental health. 

In June, Pete was charged with reckless driving after he crashed his Mercedes-Benz into the side of a home in Beverly Hills and caused serious damage. 

Sources claimed at the time that Pete was driving at a high speed, mounted the sidewalk, and struck a fire hydrant before the collision. Thankfully, nobody was injured in the accident, but the house had to be demolished because of the damage to its foundation.

“Pete’s willingness to make himself the joke really took this to the next level,” one person wrote on a Reddit forum. 

One more echoed, “You have to appreciate the level of self-awareness.”