December 8, 1990 – Tom Hanks / Edie Brickell & New Bohemians (S16 E8)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
Mr. Subliminal gives an editorial reply about America’s Iraq policy

— Kevin’s Mr. Subliminal routine is a very promising way to start the show.
— Lots of hilarious subliminal dialogue so far, particularly “Nobody wants war (republicans).” and “We need to give Hussein a face-saving way to leave Kuwait (bodybag).”
— A particularly great subliminal line right now, with “What’s the best weapon to use to topple a power-hungry megalomaniac like Hussein? (Marla Maples)”
— Nice touch how he even delivered “Live from New York…” subliminally.
STARS: ****½

MONOLOGUE
Paul Simon, Steve Martin, Elliott Gould [real] welcome host to 5ers club

— I love Tom breaking down the meaning behind each hosting stint.
— Very exciting and classic turn with Tom taking us into the Five-Timers Club.
— Ha, Paul Simon, after we just saw him as a musical guest two episodes ago.
— Speaking of Paul, there’s been confusion among some SNL fans over why Paul is considered a five-timer, as it’s widely thought that he only hosted four times: seasons 1, 2, 11, and 13. I made an argument in my review of SNL’s supposedly-hostless 100th episode that both Paul Simon and James Taylor were actually billed as that night’s official hosts (an argument I still stand by), which would explain the inclusion of Paul in this Five-Timers monologue.
— I liked the knock on “Joe Versus the Volcano”, with Paul saying there was a worry that movie would keep Tom from reaching his fifth hosting stint.
— HUGE audience reaction to the reveal of Steve Martin.
— Tom: “Thanks, Mr. Martin.” Steve: “Please, call me Mr. Steve Martin.”
— Love the Five-Timers handshake.
— Elliott Gould, making his first SNL appearance since his ill-fated season 6 hosting stint!
— Even though I’ve seen this monologue about 100 times before, it feels more special during this particular viewing to see all these cameos from five-timers, as someone who has reviewed every single SNL episode up to this point during this SNL project of mine.
— Elliott’s complaint about how “it really is easier to get to number 5 these days” is actually more of a valid point now than it was in 1990, with undeserving people like Jonah Hill and Scarlett Johansson somehow reaching their fifth hosting stint in recent years.
— Hilarious sudden appearance from Jon Lovitz as the waiter, in his first of what will turn out to be many SNL appearances since leaving the cast.
— Tom: “Jon Lovitz?!? You work here???” Jon: “Hey, work is work.”
— Great touch with the items on the menu being named after cast members.
— In reruns of this episode, when Paul orders the “Joe Piscopo” off the menu, Steve looks at him and asks a disapproving “REALLY?” However, in the live version I’m watching, right when Steve was about to say his “REALLY?” line, Jon unintentionally cut him off and went on with the sketch.
— Hilarious part with Ralph Nader trying to get into the club despite only being a one-time host.
— Excellent ending with the other Five-Timers advising Tom to literally “phone in” the end of his monologue.
— An overall phenomenal and legendary monologue. The only flaw was the glaring absence of Buck Henry. I know he wanted to show loyalty to the original cast by not appearing in any regular episodes after the original era ended, but couldn’t he have made an exception for this very special monologue?
— Come to think of it, Candice Bergen was also absent, though she’d later make up for it in the more recent Five-Timers Club monologues with Justin Timberlake and Jonah Hill.
STARS: *****

GROSS-OUT FAMILY
family doesn’t take each other’s word when it comes to unpleasant stimuli

— Tom’s reaction to drinking from the carton of spoiled milk cracked me up.
— Funny blooper: when Farley slams the door after entering, a knick-knack shelf falls off the wall and crashes on the floor, which everyone in the sketch diverts their attention to for a few seconds.
— I loved Farley’s reaction to drinking the spoiled milk: “Stop the music, that is BAD!”
— The “Later that night” title screen being shown during the extended stair-falling sequence was really funny.
— A perfect silly premise for this SNL era, and also for Tom Hanks, who is always a pro at selling stuff like this. He was particularly good during the ending of this sketch, with him alternating back-and-forth between drinking spoiled milk and sitting on a nail sticking out of a chair.
STARS: ****

GAME BEATERS
Mr. Short-Term Memory is a contestant; Tony Randall cameo

— Tom’s insanely excited reaction to being on the gameshow are priceless.
— The short-term memory routine is coming off particularly great in this setting.
— Very funny how Phil constantly makes on-the-spot changes to the gameshow rules to work around Tom’s forgetfulness.
— Classic interactions between Tom and Tony Randall. I especially liked Tom’s reaction to Randall giving him an autograph that he had just asked for: “So you just hand these out to people you meet?”
— The cutaways to Phil’s fuming glares into the camera throughout this are perfect.
STARS: *****

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Woyaho”

WEEKEND UPDATE
DEM & Dennis Millers (DAC) & (host) sing “Jingle Bells”

— Loved Dennis joke about the Pope turning and running away when being greeted by a crowd of people doing the Arsenio whooping sounds.
— Great to see the return of Dana’s Dennis Miller impression, and the addition of Tom as a third Dennis Miller.
— I love how Tom’s Dennis impression is an even more exaggerated version of Dana’s impression.
— Classic sequence with the three Dennis Millers performing a “Jingle Bells” number with some Dennis Miller-isms replacing some of the original lyrics.
STARS: ****

THE GLOBAL WARMING CHRISTMAS SPECIAL
excess carbon dioxide effects felt

— Ah, a very well-regarded sketch that I always enjoy.
— Funny Carl Sagan voice from Mike.
— I absolutely love Tom’s Dean Martin voice.
— The segment with Victoria as an emotional Sally Struthers is a very funny spoof of Struthers’ real-life tear-filled PSAs.
— Loved Jan’s reaction to getting paint thrown on her fur coat.
— Dana’s Paul McCartney voice is uncanny and hilarious.
— Great scene with Kevin as the ridiculously tanned George Hamilton.
STARS: *****

P. WHIPPED
panelists’ female-dominated relationships complicate show

— Love how the “P. Whipped” title graphic is accompanied by a sound effect of a cat and a whip.
— Dana: “When I first met Linda, I knew it was whipped at first sight.”
— A good laugh from the sponsors (last two screencaps above).
— The guys’ ways of showing how pussy-whipped they are are providing some good amusement.
STARS: ***½

SABRA SHOPPING NETWORK
(host) & callers argue over overpriced duds

— Here comes the lesser-known predecessor to the famous Sabra Price is Right sketch from the following season.
— Very funny accent from Tom.
— Love Tom’s claim that the VCR has “Sony guts”, because the inside of it is supposedly the same as Sony.
— Dana’s stealing the sketch with his hilarious fast, high-pitched foreign speaking.
— A big laugh from Tom trying to pass off the little walkman as a CD player.
— Tom’s excessive amount of “look look look”s when showing off the aforementioned alleged CD player cracked me up.
— Adam Sandler makes his very first SNL appearance. He had been hired as a writer the previous week, and the show is starting to do with him what they had recently done with Rob Schneider and David Spade, having him make lots of uncredited appearances in sketches to test him out before eventually adding him to the cast as a featured player.
— Overall, this undeniably pales in comparison to the classic Sabra Price is Right follow-up (it doesn’t help that during my early SNL fandom days, I had been exposed to Sabra Price is Right many times before I first saw Sabra Shopping Network), but it’s still funny in its own right.
STARS: ***½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “He Said”

REPEATING GUY
(host) seeks psychiatrist’s (PHH) help regarding double-take reactions

— Yet another example of a silly sketch that Tom Hanks was born to pull off. Not many other hosts could sell a goofy, somewhat thin premise like this as well as he can.
— The scene with Tom making an exaggerated goofy face whenever he holds himself back from doing a double-take is very funny, though the dress rehearsal version shown in reruns is funnier, as it features a blooper with Victoria helplessly cracking up at Tom’s exaggerated facial expressions.
— Loved the sudden house explosion at the end, as a callback to the earlier throwaway mention of the house being made of exploding wood.
STARS: ***½

CHRISTMAS MESSAGE
AWB’s tree-hunting tale has parallels to stalking & murdering a human

— Interesting change of pace for A. Whitney Brown.
— Some really good laughs from his disturbing story about hunting a tree, made even funnier by his bizarre cracking-voiced delivery.
STARS: ****

GOODNIGHTS

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— An outstanding episode and has always been one of my personal favorites from this era. From beginning to end, this was a very solid show, and there were so many classic and near-classic pieces in the first 2/3rds of the episode.

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (John Goodman)
a slight step up

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
It’s the one-year anniversary of me starting this ‘One SNL a Day’ Project! Dennis Quaid hosts the Christmas episode of the season.