March 13, 1993 – John Goodman / Mary J. Blige (S18 E15)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COLD OPENING
Richard Laymer chats with David Koresh (MIM) in the Waco compound

— I like that SNL’s doing a parody of the infamous David Koresh/Waco incident going on at this time.
— Ha, Richmeister makes yet another sudden appearance in a completely unrelated sketch. I always appreciate how they occasionally put him in different situations like this.
— Some good cracks from Richmeister about Koresh’s multiple wives.
STARS: ***½

MONOLOGUE
host & The Bravados [real] sing “So In Love”

— I like John proudly proclaiming he’s hosting during the Storm of the Century. There is something strangely kinda exciting about a live SNL episode airing during one of New York’s worst storms in history.
— When John says he wanted his fourth monologue to be special, you can hear a woman in the audience saying “You ARE special”, which John reacts to by looking towards the audience with a funny, sly smile.
— Funny line from John about a fellow passenger on the train volunteering to help kill SNL’s writers.
— The overall acapella song with The Bravados was fairly charming, though this isn’t one of John’s better monologues.
STARS: **½

WILSON COUNTERSINK FLANGES
for those with requisite technical knowledge

— I’m getting laughs from the increasingly fake-sounding, incomprehensible technical jargon, especially when it comes from Phil’s professional delivery.
— Good ending tagline about “lost prantkens”.
STARS: ***½

BIG BUDDIES
Bear (host) finds that Ox (CHF) has taken over as brain’s (ROS) protector

— Pretty funny turn with John’s burly jock finding out Rob’s nerd has made a new burly jock friend.
— The awkwardness of the forced banter between Farley and John is cracking me up.
— I like John repeatedly banging his head against the wall while saying “stupid” over and over for an absurdly long time, even if I’m not sure it was intended to be funny.
— I love the ending photo montage of John with his new nerdy friend, and then us seeing both of them happily pictured with the Farley/Rob duo.
— An overall solid, cute, and charming sketch, though something so quiet and not intended to be laugh-out-loud hilarious feels kinda odd as the lead-off sketch of an episode.
STARS: ***½

LET’S TALK AND TALK AND TALK AND TALK AND TALK ABOUT MOVIES
Soylent Green director (host) talks about his less successful sequels

— Some pretty funny random humor right out the gate with the show’s absurdly long title and Julia’s name being Mabel Blaster.
— Even before we’ve gotten to the real comedic meat with the Soylent Green sequels, the initial straightforward clip of Phil’s Charlton Heston in the original Soylent Green cracked me the hell up.
— The look on Kevin’s face while screaming at the end of the Soylent White clip is very funny.
— I’m loving the increasingly ridiculous sequels, made funnier by Phil’s memorable over-the-top utterances of “Soylent (insert thing here) is made out of people! It’s peeeoooopppplllleeee!!!” Contrary to some criticisms I’ve heard about this sketch, I feel the repetitive nature actually works well in this context.
— If you know me, you’ll know I loved the Soylent Stooges line.
— Looks like a clip titled Soylent Beef Kabobs was cut after dress rehearsal. During the Soylent Green II clip towards the end of this sketch, there’s a technical gaffe where a graphic on the bottom of the screen states the title “Soylent Beef Kabobs” (screencap below), before quickly disappearing and being replaced with the correct “Soylent Green II” title graphic.

STARS: ****

DEEP THOUGHTS BY JACK HANDEY

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Reminisce”

WEEKEND UPDATE
KEN interviews newly-crowned Storm Of The Century (CHF)
old codger Buster Jenkins (CSR) blames spaceships for the huge deficit
Sleepyhead (ADS) eventually gives editorial on Yeltsin’s near-impeachment

— Farley’s Storm Of The Century character mentioning El Nino among several storms reminds me of the famous El Nino/Weather Channel sketch Farley would later do in his 1997 hosting stint. This Storm Of The Century commentary actually kinda feels like a precursor to that El Nino sketch, as both involve Farley playing a personification of a storm.
— Farley’s overall commentary was surprisingly really forgettable and just came and went.
— I’m getting good laughs from Rock’s old man character ranting about “them damn spaceships”. He’s also making some other funny absurd comments throughout this, especially him asking where are women going to pee in space, and him saying that a space helmet costs “A lot… and 18 cents”.
— Adam, who has recently become sure-fire Weekend Update gold, tries a new Update character: Sleepyhead.
— Ehh, the overall Sleepyhead commentary ended up not working. Adam’s usually good at pulling off this kind of goofy concept, but this was a swing-and-a-miss and was probably funnier in theory than in practice. I can definitely see why Sleepyhead never ends up becoming a recurring character.
STARS: ***

HOW’D YOU DO THAT?
guests tell origins of accidental disfigurements

— Funny visual of John entering the scene with long flat fingers and a towel hook stuck in his chin.
— I’m enjoying this sketch, but something about it feels oddly quiet. Maybe because each guest is entering with no entrance music or audience applause, for some reason.
— I love Rob as a plastic surgeon detailing how he can fix the guests’ disfigurements. When he’s giving Phil details, I like the goofy smile on Phil’s face.
— A particularly priceless entrance from Farley. Great makeup job on him.
— When being asked if there’s anything he can do to help Farley, I love the cutaway to Rob just grinning and smugly saying “No!”
STARS: ***½

CRUISE
while on a cruise, Linda Richman & (host) talk about all the great food

— (*groan*) Really, SNL? Two consecutive episodes with Linda Richman? However, at least we’re seeing her outside of the Coffee Talk setting this time. It’s usually nice when we get rare instances of recurring characters being taken out of their normal setting.
— While I appreciate the more slice-of-life aspect they’re going for here, the conversations between Linda Richman and John’s character are not interesting me and are making this sketch feel long. I’d probably be more into this if I actually liked the Linda Richman character.
— Okay, I finally did get one chuckle, from Linda Richman’s startled reaction to John’s Roman Catholic/Jewish fake-out bit.
STARS: **

BLOCK PARTY
partygoers pretend to believe eccentric loser Canteen Boy’s (ADS) stories

— Adam tries out yet another new character tonight, though this is one that actually ends up becoming recurring.
— This particular Canteen Boy sketch was actually originally going to be performed earlier this season in the Danny DeVito episode, but got cut after dress rehearsal.
— Canteen Boy constantly using Canada in his obvious false stories feels like a callback to the High School Liars Club sketch from earlier this season, where Adam played a character who also kept using Canada in his lies.
— I got a laugh from Canteen Boy’s speechless, subtly panicked reaction to being asked if he’s worried someone will switch the water in his canteen when he’s sleeping.
— I like John’s obnoxious ways of messing with Canteen Boy’s head. I can picture Danny DeVito pulling off this obnoxious role well too, in the unaired original version.
— Despite some laughs, I wasn’t all that crazy about this sketch as a whole. I’m of the opinion that the Canteen Boy character is only remembered by SNL fans today because of the famous scoutmaster sketch with Alec Baldwin. The other sketches Canteen Boy starred in were never anything special, in my opinion.
STARS: **½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Sweet Thing”

TURKISH STOREKEEPER
once again, Turkish (ROS) is the target of (host)’s anti-Arab sentiments

— I’m liking the escalation of this sketch in the constant flashbacks. Like the Let’s Talk(x5) About Movies sketch from earlier tonight, this is another sketch where the repetitive nature actually works. And there’s something that tickles me about the fact that SNL’s stagehands have to constantly change the broken window, the “I’m not from Iraq/Libya/Iran” signs, and Rob’s facial hair all throughout this sketch. Aside from one instance early on in this sketch where there’s an accidental glimpse of the window being replaced behind John, the stagehands are doing a seamless job with all these quick changes.
— Good ending with John’s character, who has just made good with Rob’s Turkish character, being oblivious to the “U.S. Plane in Turkey Skyjack” headline on the opposite side of the newspaper he’s reading, and Rob trying to keep him from seeing it.
STARS: ***½

DEEP THOUGHTS BY JACK HANDEY

TO BE SURE, IT’S TIME TO ROCK!
traditional Irish singers try rock classics & rap on new albums

— An enjoyable and solid concept, with the incongruity between the singers’ old-timey Irish singing style and the popular rock songs they’re performing.
— Nice little touch with the Irish version of Born To Be Wild spelling “born” as “bourne”.
— The Irish versions of I Can’t Get No Satisfaction and Should I Stay Or Should I Go are particularly funny.
STARS: ****

THE MAN WITHOUT A SHOUT
tragedy spurs (host) never to raise his voice

— There’s a gaffe early on where it takes a stagehand two tries to break the window with a ball, then he visibly walks right past the camera. Or was that intentional?
— Not too bad of a concept of us seeing how John’s refusal to ever raise his voice negatively affects his life.
— The resulting sketch as a whole didn’t do much for me. I did like John and Julia’s acting in this, but the execution came off fairly meh and forgettable.
STARS: **

GOODNIGHTS
musical guest’s mother [real] joins her on-stage

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— There were some fairly solid things throughout the night, and two things that I felt highly about (Let’s Talk(x5) About Movies and To Be Sure, It’s Time to Rock), but I dunno, this episode as a whole had a strangely quiet, kinda forgettable feel. Even some of the good sketches had an oddly quiet vibe. Not bad an episode overall, but not one of season 18 nor John Goodman’s more memorable episodes.

MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS

 

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Bill Murray)
a mild step down

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Miranda Richardson