Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
COLD OPENING
Church Lady & mother (host) gang up on Saddam Hussein (PHH)
— This ends up being the final Church Chat sketch during Dana’s tenure as a cast member.
— Funny advertisement at the beginning with Church Lady’s Canned Ham.
— Funny “I’m going to keep it” bit regarding Saddam’s hat, as Church Lady’s way of imitating Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait.
— Great inclusion of John Goodman as Church Lady’s mother.
— A lot of laughs from Church Lady and her mother’s detailing of marines’ “bulbous buttocks” alternating back-and forth between aligned and askew during their desert training.
— Excellent sequence with Church Lady and her mother ganging up on Saddam and beating the hell out him, complete with cartoonish sound effects.
STARS: ****½
MONOLOGUE
host does an impression of his newborn daughter Molly
— When talking about how much his life has changed since hosting SNL just a year ago, he mentions Tom Arnold constantly firing and rehiring him from the show “Roseanne”. Is that true?
— I liked his bit about still having the pregnancy weight after the birth of his baby.
— His impression of his baby is very funny.
STARS: ***½
BAD IDEA JEANS
— Rerun
MISTER
people in (host)’s store are referred to by their annoying traits
— Funny reveal of John and Julia’s trait-based insulting names towards each other turning out to be their actual names.
— I like how the names are carrying over into other people at the store, particularly Farley’s substitute repairman character being named “Mr. I-Don’t-Have-To-Do-a-Good-Job-Because-I’m-Just-Filling-In”.
— Phil’s outlandish police report at the end was funny.
STARS: ***½
WEDDING DAY
Keith Richards (DAC) helps ease Mick Jagger’s (MIM) wedding day jitters
— Mike’s Mick Jagger impression is very funny and spot-on. Great Keith Richards from Dana too.
— It’s always interesting seeing Mike and Dana paired up in non-Wayne’s World sketches.
— Some really funny lines.
— Great touch with Keith’s tears at the end.
STARS: ****
PLAYER-WITH-YOURSELVES CLUB
Telly Savalas (PHH) touts Player-With-Yourselves-Club wanking privileges
— Hilarious reveal of the concept.
— Phil is priceless in this as Telly Savalas.
— Savalas: “Unlimited Kleenex. I’m talking two-ply, baby!”
— Savalas: “All the latest videotapes cued up to the good parts, baby, ‘cuz players don’t have time to fast-forward!”
— Loved Phil’s delivery of “Ohhh, yeah!” at the end.
STARS: ****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Epic”
THE MCLAUGHLIN GROUP
controlling moderator McLaughlin (DAC) has all the answers
— I believe this ends up being the final occurrence of a sketch appearing in between the first musical performance and Weekend Update slot.
— The debut of a sketch that I’ve always loved from this era.
— I’m enjoying the hell out of how fast-moving this is, made even funnier with Dana’s McLaughlin frequently cutting off the panelists’ answers, and occasionally telling them “Wrong!” (though he’s not doing the latter as much as he would in future installments).
— Haha, this is killing me, especially the increasingly insane questions. This is a riot.
— Yet another aspect I love about this sketch is the nicknames McLaughlin gives to the panelists, especially the one long-winded name he gives to Jack Germond.
STARS: *****
WEEKEND UPDATE
DAS likens Iraq attacking Kuwait to his older brother picking on him
— David Spade in his very first Update commentary as himself.
— David’s overall dolls commentary was decent, though nothing memorable and very different from the type of Update commentaries that he would typically do later on.
— I loved Dennis’ friendly noogey-ing of David after his commentary ended. It’s interesting seeing how Dennis interacts with all the new kids in this season’s cast whenever any of them do an Update commentary, especially considering this ends up being the only season Dennis works with them.
STARS: ***
CHEW
flow of dinner table conversation is interrupted by the need to chew food
— Funny realistic premise with the timing of dinner table conversations constantly getting delayed as the people at the table take the time to chew their food before answering a question they were asked.
— A good laugh from John hesitating to insert food in his mouth while making sure nobody is about to ask him a question, only for him to immediately be asked a question by Kevin when finally inserting the food in his mouth.
— Loved John vengefully turning the tables on Kevin by asking HIM a question as HE’S eating.
— The look on Rock’s face while doing the waiting-to-chew-before-speaking thing is particularly funny.
— Hilarious when Farley does the waiting-to-chew-before-speaking thing even when recovering from the Heimlich Maneuver.
— It’s amazing how they’re able to mine this many laughs out of a simple premise like this.
STARS: ****
WAYNE’S WORLD
Madonna’s Justify My Love video is on at Garth’s house
— Surprisingly, this is the first time Wayne’s World has appeared all season. Wonder why they waited this long, considering the huge popularity of this recurring sketch.
— Also strange that this is buried so late in the show, though the reason for that is because they’re going to air a racy Madonna music video that MTV refused to play.
— Wayne: “Madonna is such a babe… she’d give a dog a bone.”
— Love Wayne and Garth’s commentary during the Madonna music video. Some of the funniest lines include “There’s Prince!”, the reference to the famous “Three Men and a Baby” urban legend of a ghost appearing in the background, and “Look at the unit on that guy!”
— Nice to see John reprising his cop character from a previous Wayne’s World sketch.
STARS: ****½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “From Out of Nowhere”
DAVY CROCKETT
Davy Crockett (host) doesn’t know what to make of his bookish son (MIM)
— Pretty funny nerd characterization from Mike.
— I laughed at the cutaway to Phil’s puzzled face during Mike’s long-winded intelligent spiel (second screencap above).
— The result of the overall sketch wasn’t particularly interesting, though not particularly terrible either. The sketch had a strange charm that made it a little more likable than it normally would be.
STARS: **½
PAT
(KEN) tries to figure out the sex of androgynous co-worker Pat (JUS)
— Ladies and gentlemen, we have a major recurring character debut!
— Viewers at the time probably had a hard time telling who that was playing Pat in this sketch, especially considering how new Julia Sweeney is at this point. The mystery is answered during the goodnights that follow this sketch, where Julia still appears in her Pat costume, but sans the wig, glasses, and eyebrows.
— Feels a little odd in hindsight seeing a Pat sketch without the opening credits and theme song. That wouldn’t be introduced until the third installment.
— This being the first time Pat has ever appeared, Julia’s characterization is coming off funny and fresh. I also like how the voice is a lot less high-pitched and whiny than it would be in later installments.
— Some really funny fake-outs with it seeming like Pat’s going to answer a question that will reveal Pat’s gender, only for Pat’s answer to be something gender-unspecific.
— A good laugh from the reveal of Pat’s ex-fiancee having the unisex name Chris, as well as Chris being involved with someone with the equally-unisex name Terry.
— Pat: “I guess it’s that time of the month.” Kevin (thinking THAT reveals Pat’s gender): “Oh, okay.” Pat: “Bills.”
STARS: ***½
GOODNIGHTS
— This is Adam Sandler’s first episode as a writer. He will begin making uncredited appearances in bit roles very soon.
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very solid episode. Aside from the Davy Crockett sketch, everything worked for me, and several of the sketches were particularly strong. We also got a memorable debut of two sketches that would go on to become recurring (McLaughlin Group and Pat). Much like his first time hosting, John Goodman did another great job as host, though he seemed a little underutilized at times tonight.
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Dennis Hopper)
a step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Tom Hanks joins the Five-Timers Club