Max has released the trailer for Season 2 of The Rehearsal, a show in which Nathan Fielder rehearses given scenarios enough times to account for every possible variable. Where last season saw Fielder rehearsing grounded challenges such as parenthood and awkward conversations, Season 2 seems to see him tackling the real-life controversy of airline crashes.

The thing is, The Rehearsal‘s first season was a comedy, with Season 2 likely following suit. Except, the new season’s trailer sees Fielder developing role-play exercises for a tragic event that’s seen an unfortunate rise in occurrences lately. Fans will surely be intrigued to see how Fielder spins such a woeful headline into grounds for laughs. Can he? Should he? Will he? Fans can’t ever be sure what’s what when it comes to Fielder’s work, but they can be confident at least one of those answers is ‘yes’.

Nathan Fielder’s The Rehearsal Season 2 Releases on April 20th

In the trailer, which confirms an April 20th release date, Fielder appears to be making a legitimate attempt to address plane crashes in America. It opens with him speaking to an apparent Washington D.C. politician about a recommendation they made years ago suggesting role-playing exercises, presumably to help mitigate plane accidents. Fortunately, Fielder has ample experience conducting elaborate trials.

The thing is, it’s nearly impossible to know who’s acting and who’s not in a Nathan Fielder production. A hefty portion of his comedy revolves around documenting the follies of normal-seeming people who succumb to Fielder’s hair-brained ideas and cheeky shenanigans. With this, the audience doesn’t quite know if they’ll be watching cinéma vérité next season as part of an exposé on the shortcomings of America’s Federal Aviation Administration or just an over-the-top bit.

For instance, Season 1, Episode 1 “Orange Juice No Pulp” runs a hilarious gamut, following a socially awkward bar trivia player as he navigates one particularly difficult confession to his teammates. Over the course of the episode, Fielder learns that the trivia player has been lying about his higher education credentials to fit in with his highly intelligent teammates. Through a series of evolving measures, Fielder instructs the trivia liar to perform dry runs of his confession with an actress who impersonates one of his crew, a fast and anxious talker. At one point during the drill, he cuts off her rambling to confess, “my education credentials are a fraud”.

It’s abrupt, it’s hilariously worded, and it’s cathartic. Most of all, it’s impossible to know whether it was scripted, just like the trivia hack’s order at the bar: “orange juice, no pulp.” Brilliant.

Nathan Fielder Takes On Commercial Airline Crashes

By the time of this writing, there have been at least 109 United States plane crash deaths in 22 incidents since 2025, according to a timeline tracked by Fox4News. These include the terrible Washington D.C. American Airlines crash back in January, in which a Black Hawk helicopter collided with a commercial aircraft, killing all 67 people involved.

How does this awful story make its way into the mischievous sights of Nathan Fielder? Saturday Night Live so far hasn’t even touched the sensitive issue, even though the show is known to be fairly irreverent, especially in its coverage of the news. Still, the recent plane crash epidemic hasn’t been a complete stranger to satire, as South Park has also released its own new season trailer, which appears to take a swipe at America’s plane crash problem just as The Rehearsal does.

What’s most notable about The Rehearsal‘s take on the phenomenon as opposed to South Park‘s, is that Fielder’s show began production long before the tragic American Airlines disaster in January 2025. No one wants to believe Fielder predicted the worst U.S. commercial crash since 2009, but South Park‘s famously topical approach is clearly in response to that same disaster. Fielder had apparently read the tea leaves, noticing a trend in air traffic accidents last year before headlines were shining spotlights on them.

Should Nathan Fielder Joke About Plane Crashes?

As previously stated, Nathan Fielder was definitely working on the plane crash angle before the worst of the news came about in early 2025. With that, Fielder still stands as one of the few comedians who can broach such a topic with a level of craft and sheer aloofness that it doesn’t ring insensitive or in poor taste. Fielder fans might recall his Nathan For You series, in which he worked as a fixer for small businesses in need of assistance, including a nationally reported loophole of his: ‘Dumb Starbucks, ‘ a “parody” coffee shop.

In Nathan For You, Fielder once attempted to increase a funeral home operator’s clientele by recommending she allow people to purchase more friends to attend funerals. The subject matter is dour, grave material. Yet, while viewing a seemingly real effort to improve someone’s livelihood, audiences may find themselves literally laughing in the face of death.

Fielder is a true satirist, generally locking his targets on predators who take advantage of others and marveling at their response to whatever absurdity he stirs up. It’s not yet known how this approach will play in The Rehearsal Season 2, but it will definitely be thoroughly considered.