October 12, 2002 – Sarah Michelle Gellar / Faith Hill (S28 E2)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS
George W. Bush (CHP) notifies Saddam Hussein of impending regime change

— Parnell has now officially succeeded Will Ferrell as SNL’s Bush impersonator, after Darrell’s failed attempt at a Bush impression in the preceding episode’s dress rehearsal was given a hard pass by Lorne and got cut from the live show.
— The copy I’m reviewing of this episode is missing the first minute or so of this cold opening, which includes, at one point, SNL lampshading the new casting of Bush by having Parnell’s Bush say “I know what you’re thinking: I do look different. One word: Botox.”
— I believe this ends up being the only Parnell-as-Bush sketch in which Parnell wears a prosthetic nose. Not sure what the point of the prosthetic nose is anyway, as it adds nothing to the resemblance to Bush.
— Darrell’s Dick Cheney only seems to be there as security for viewers while we witness this debut of a new Bush impression. You know, I don’t know about other viewers, but I certainly don’t need Darrell’s Cheney as a security blanket to help baby-walk me through the “frightening” experience of seeing a new Bush impression. I’ll be just fine, thank you.
— Not too bad of a Bush impression from Parnell, though it certainly doesn’t make you forget Will Ferrell’s impression. Parnell’s impression is a bit more loose and less stiff than I had remembered it being.
— Cheney’s line about Cheech Marin being a Saddam Hussein lookalike is pretty funny.
— Parnell’s Bush has some okay lines throughout this. Nothing particularly noteworthy or memorable, but passable.
STARS: ***

MONOLOGUE
vampires (CHK), (RAD), (AMP) are offended by host’s joke about slaying

— Amy’s vampire daughter character whining “I wanted to bite the Jimmy Fallon!” is pretty funny.
— A few chuckleworthy lines from Kattan throughout this, but a lot of this monologue isn’t anything special.
— This overall monologue was a complete waste of Sarah Michelle Gellar. Sure, the same could be said for Sarah’s season 24 monologue (and I did say that in my review of it), in which she just stood there while cast member after cast member hit on her, but at least that was still a funny and somewhat memorable monologue nevertheless. Tonight’s monologue, on the other hand, was nothing special at all, and, aside from the Buffy The Vampire Slayer connection, could’ve been done with ANY generic female host. Why have Sarah Michelle Gellar up there onstage doing pretty much nothing while the audience vampires get all of the “funny” material? Sarah has proven in the past that she’s perfectly capable of carrying great material on SNL.
STARS: **

SWIFFER SLEEPERS
kids in dirt-collecting pajamas clean by sliding around

— Blah, a weak, cheesy, and unfunny visual gag to base an entire fake ad around.
— This ad is way too cutesy for my likes, and the alleged “comedy” isn’t enough to balance out the saccharine cutesiness.
— I know Amy’s just imitating the general demeanor of moms you see in typical real commercials of this type, but there’s something sad about watching her overly-cutesy, cloying performance in this. I remember how, at this time, this commercial was one of the first things that made it sadly official to me that UCB-era Amy Poehler was a very different performer from SNL-era Amy Poehler.
— This fake ad ends with absolutely NO applause from the audience. If it’s because they didn’t like this ad (I certainly don’t recall hearing them laughing at ANY point during this), then I 100% support them on that.
STARS: *

SAFETY DAY
Be-Safe Gang’s (FRA), (AMP), (host) supposed street smarts are bad advice

— Due to the fact that the preceding fake ad went into this sketch with no audience applause, Parnell seemed a little hesitant and unsure of when to start delivering his first line. However, his first line, “And that was why the Indians deserved it”, was great, but, again, got NOTHING from the audience.
— Fred Armisen playing a character with his own first name. That may be because this sketch is based off of a comedy bit that Fred used to do pre-SNL.
— Amy’s whole sponge/ecstasy bit is hilarious.
— I like the obviously made-up terms that Sarah claims to the students that they can supposedly catch, such as “genital diabetes” and “crotch botchulism”.
— Fred bitterly telling Rachel “I hope you get assaulted every day for the rest of your life” is very funny.
— Fred’s bad demonstrations of “safe” ways to protect yourself against attackers are fantastic, particularly the pen-in-the-trigger bit. You can tell that the material he’s performing in this sketch is something he’s honed in his comedy act prior to SNL, because his execution of his portions of this sketch are coming off more polished and assured than than Amy and Sarah’s are (though they’re both fine in this).
STARS: ****

DENTIST
music enraptures inept romantic as he fantasizes about being a dentist

— A variation of Kattan’s Masseuse sketch from the preceding season’s Derek Jeter episode. Speaking of the Masseuse sketch, I forgot to point out in my review of it that Kattan’s character in it was apparently the same character he played in the seductive dancing/music sketches from the Teri Hatcher and Renee Zellweger episodes. The SNL episode guide that I borrow my sketch synopses from call this recurring character “inept romantic”. SNL Archives, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to think Kattan’s characters in these sketches are the same.
— I didn’t care for the Masseuse sketch, and so far, I’m not caring for this Dentist sketch either. In fact, this dentist sketch is coming off even worse to me.
— The fantasy-within-a-fantasy twist ending was very weak, and (rightfully) received absolute silence from the audience (once again tonight).
— A surprisingly fairly short sketch, but I’m certainly glad it’s over with, because I didn’t enjoy a moment of this.
STARS: *

TRANS AMERICAN AIRLINES
Trans American Airlines is proud to ensure security via racial profiling

— A lot of laughs from this airline proudly touting their new racial profiling procedure as their way of screening passengers.
— The way this is being played so perfectly straight and dry makes the brilliant and funny material even more brilliant and funny.
— Tracy, on the claim that the terrorists have won when airlines use racial profiling: “Why would terrorists want racial profiling? That’s how you catch ’em.”
STARS: ****½

CORONA
Corona drinker Craig (JIF) is full of beer & Miles Away From Sober

— An odd and unfunny commercial so far. I remember the Corona commercials that this is spoofing, but this spoof isn’t working at all.
— What makes this commercial even odder is the fact that Jimmy’s girlfriend is voiced by Amy but is physically played by a female extra (only shown from the back). I don’t understand that AT ALL. Why not have Amy physically playing the role? Or if you’re gonna have a female extra play the role, then why not have her saying her own dialogue instead of inexplicably dubbing Amy’s voice in for her?
— Overall, boy, was this lame. I went through this entire commercial without a single laugh. The audience apparently agrees with my negative opinion once again tonight, as I didn’t hear a single laugh from them during this commercial either, for the billionth time tonight.
STARS: *

LOOKALIKES
Saddam Hussein (DAH) seeks self-preservation by sacrificing look-alikes

— Darrell has become SNL’s new Saddam Hussein impersonator in the post-Ferrell era. That doesn’t last long, though.
— Kattan has been all over tonight’s episode so far. Maybe SNL felt bad about how very little he did in the preceding week’s season premiere, and are trying to make up for it tonight.
— Horatio’s walk-on as an extremely slobbish, morbidly obese Saddam “lookalike” is cracking me up.
— Horatio milks his exit by trying to make Jimmy laugh as usual.
— I could do without this turning into a cliched parody of the “How am I funny?” Goodfellas scene. Pure laziness.
STARS: **½

CORONA
Corona drinker Craig once again throws a bottle into the ocean by mistake

— (*groan*) A second one of these?
— Yikes, this already-dead commercial is made even more awkward by a bad technical error early on, in which Jimmy’s attempt to answer his phone gets interrupted by an accidental cutaway to a plain black screen with the words “Corona #2” (screencap below), producing a few seconds of dead air. Awkward as hell.

— Oh, how utterly hilarious. Jimmy drunkenly throws his beer bottle into the ocean AGAIN, because it was such a laugh riot when he did it in the first Corona ad. [/end sarcasm]
— Overall, this ad was even less funny than the first Corona ad, if that’s even possible . The complete lack of audience laughter during these Corona ads, as well as the lack of actual funny material, make me forget I’m watching a spoof and feel more like I’m watching the actual Corona commercials it’s spoofing.
STARS: * (If I could give out negative stars, I would here)

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Cry”

WEEKEND UPDATE
Dell Computer dude Steven’s (SEM) chipper demeanor belies his depression

TIF celebrates the blow dealt to the Jewish Federation Of Greater Seattle

Ramada sisters (MAR) & (host) describe life in the B-list celebrity scene

 

— As someone who used to absolutely HATE those “Dude, you’re gettin’ a Dell” commercials back when they originally aired, I remember how excited I was during the original airing of tonight’s episode to see SNL portraying the guy from those commercials and skewering his annoyingness and camera-mugging.
— Pretty good turn during the Dell Computer Guy’s commentary, with his doctor showing up and informing us of the Dell Computer Guy’s many psychological disorders.
— Tina’s overall rant about the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle did not work for me AT ALL. Unlike most of her traditional Update rants, this one was way too silly and exaggerated for my likes, and most importantly, it wasn’t the least bit funny.
— Jimmy occasionally doing a Norm Macdonald-type delivery and punchline to a joke seems to be a new thing this season, as his yodelers joke tonight was another Norm-esque bit, much like Jimmy’s smallpox joke in the season premiere. I don’t know if these Norm similarities from Jimmy are intentional or not, but I’m liking it. Jimmy continues to show early signs of improving as an Update anchor this season, while Tina continues to show early signs of going downhill as an Update anchor this season.
— Oh, god. As if I didn’t have enough complaints about the preceding season’s Hilton Sisters bit on Update from the Kirsten Dunst episode, now they do a variation of it by having Maya and Sarah play the fictional Ramada Sisters. Again, I ask, what is with SNL’s early obsession at the time with the Hilton Sisters, who weren’t even universally known yet?
— At one point in the Ramada Sisters commentary, Tina asks the sisters about Paul Thomas Anderson, which is interesting in retrospect, given the fact that Maya herself would later marry Anderson. I’m not sure if she was in a relationship with him yet at the time of this episode.
— The entire Ramada Sisters commentary went by without a single laugh from me (BTW, how many times have I said that about something in this episode?). A complete waste of time.
STARS: **½

MAKING THE VIDEO
grimy Christina Aguilera (host) likes getting “Dirrty”

— A promising idea to spoof the making of Christina Aguilera’s then-new “Dirrty” music video.
— The outlandish and insane things being added to this video to make it “dirrty” and skanky were really funny at first, but have kinda lost their luster after a while.
— Sarah’s performance is solid in this, and reminds me why she was such a well-liked host in her first two SNL episodes. She sadly hasn’t been getting many opportunities to shine in tonight’s episode. This reminds me that Sarah did an interview during the week of this episode, in which she expressed excitement and optimism over potentially becoming a five-timer in the future and potentially doing a monologue similar to Tom Hanks’ legendary Five-Timers Club monologue. It’s sad to think back on that interview in retrospect, as tonight would end up being Sarah’s last time hosting. She never got to reach that coveted fifth hosting stint, or even a fourth hosting stint.
— Something seemed to go horribly wrong during Dean’s portion of this sketch as Redman. He delivers his whole spiel EXTREMELY awkwardly and hesitantly, with lots of unsure pauses and painful dead air, as if he’s lost and has no idea what the hell he’s supposed to say. When I later saw a re-airing of this sketch in an E! rerun of this episode (NBC themselves never re-aired this episode, presumably because of how poorly received it was), they used the dress rehearsal version of Dean’s scene, in which he delivers his lines absolutely perfectly, with no hesitation or awkwardness. His lines in that version were also a bit different from his lines in the live version of the sketch. So what went wrong with Dean during the live version? Did SNL re-write his dialogue right before air, and he perhaps didn’t get to see the changes until doing the sketch on live TV? (Even if so, that’s still no excuse for him looking so lost and reading his lines so terribly and awkwardly. Lots of cast members over the years have had to deal with last-minute line changes on the air, which is part of the nature of SNL, and those cast members have handled it very smoothly.) Or did the cue cards accidentally get dropped during Dean’s scene, forcing him to awkwardly make up some dialogue?
— I like how Sarah and all the other performers hold a frozen pose for a long time during the sketch-ending audience applause.
STARS: ***

ARLI$$
(host) watches Arli$$ to avoid laughter-induced loss of bladder control

— The premise of using a DVD set of the supposedly unfunny comedy show Arli$$ as a form of bladder control is okay, but not particularly creative. Also, I can’t help but find it kinda hypocritical that this sketch is coming from such a troubled SNL episode like tonight’s. Judging from how dead the audience has been during a lot of portions of tonight’s episode, the audience would probably argue that tonight’s episode could be used as a form of bladder control just as much as an Arli$$ DVD set would.
— This overall piece was surprisingly very short and straightforward. No clever additions or anything. Pretty bland.
STARS: **

NO WRESTLING
TRM & LOM fail in their attempt to get host & musical guest to wrestle

— Ah, the return of the Tracy-chats-with-the-host-after-a-sketch bit, after the Garth Brooks and Jamie Foxx episodes from season 25.
— An okay reveal of Tracy attempting a ploy to get Sarah and Faith Hill to wrestle each other, but I prefer the previous Tracy-chats-with-the-host sketches that mostly just feature Tracy rambling and ranting about stuff in his trademark manner.
— Lorne, to Tracy, when finding out about his Gellar/Hill wrestling ploy: “I thought we had this discussion after the Reese Witherspoon/Alicia Keys episode.”
— Meh, a very predictable and cliched turn with Lorne following his scolding of Tracy by trying his own ploy to get Sarah and Faith to wrestle.
— Ah, it turns out that Lorne’s scolding of Tracy and then trying to get Sarah and Faith to wrestle was all part of Tracy’s plan.
— I love Tracy harshly telling Lorne “You can’t do nothin’ right!” and “I don’t know why I keep you around here!”, as if Tracy’s the boss and Lorne is working for him.
— We get a variation of the legendary one-liner “Go get me a soda… BITCH!” by having Tracy now tell Lorne “Go get me a Pepsi, biotch!”, which is certainly nowhere near as funny as the original one-liner, but I guess it’s a better choice than just repeating the original one-liner, which only worked really well the first time in the Garth Brooks piece and suffered diminishing returns when Tracy repeated it in the Jamie Foxx piece.
STARS: ***

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Free”

MY LOVE
(MAR)’s dedication to offering herself to her man (TRM) overexcites him

— Our second edition of the series of Tracy/Maya semi-dramatic slice-of-life pieces.
— Turns out that this particular Tracy/Maya semi-dramatic slice-of-life piece is more comedic than the other ones, as Tracy has lots of funny one-liners about Maya’s breasts in between her serious, deep, straight-to-camera poetic speech about her man.
— Funny ending punchline, with Tracy following the end of Maya’s speech by saying “I creamed my jeans back when you said ‘breasts’.”
STARS: ***½

CORONA
police pursue Corona drinker Craig after he beans a waiter with a bottle

— Aw, geez, I forgot about this horrible runner. Enough with these Corona ads already!
— Okay, I finally got an actual laugh in these Corona ads, with Jimmy beaning the waiter with a beer bottle. Not sure that cheap punchline was worth such a horrible set-up with the first two insufferable Corona ads, though.
— Once again, absolutely NO applause from the audience at the end of this ad. I lost count long ago of the number of segments in this episode that ended with no applause.
STARS: **½

BLAME SADDAM
Americans’ economic discontent is incongruously aimed at Saddam Hussein

— I’m enjoying all the serious testimonials, with Americans inexplicably blaming Saddam Hussein for personal issues they’re struggling through. Some pointed satire here.
— Even among these serious testimonials, Tracy (who’s been getting tons of airtime tonight, BTW) manages to get a huge laugh with his hobo character saying a very angry and pride-filled “You can’t threaten my way of life anymore, Saddam!” while searching for food in a trash can.
— Maya’s ending voice-over: “Saddam, America is pissed off. Maybe not at you, but you’ll do.”
STARS: ****

SEXUAL HARASSMENT SEMINAR
loutish Merv The Perv (CHP) undermines goal of sexual harassment seminar

— The debut of what would go on to be Parnell’s ONLY big solo recurring character, Merv The Perv.
— Unlike subsequent Merv The Perv sketches, this first one doesn’t feature an opening title sequence.
— When this originally aired, I recall this felt like Parnell was playing a character originally written for Will Ferrell. Watching this sketch again now, I can still see some Ferrell in Parnell’s characterization here, but I’m enjoying his performance nonetheless.
— Speaking of Ferrell and Parnell, Parnell has been VERY dominant in tonight’s episode, starring in tons of important lead roles, just like Ferrell used to. As I said in my last episode review, Parnell’s increased post-Ferrell airtime in the first two episodes of this season had me thinking back then that Parnell was taking over as SNL’s new utility star, which made me very eager, especially as someone who’s always felt that Parnell is criminally underappreciated and underutilized. Sadly, this spotlight that Parnell’s been receiving on SNL so far this season does not last. As early as the very next episode, he goes back to mostly being underutilized, pushed into the background, and relegated to lots of thankless straight roles. (*sigh*) Well, it was nice while it lasted, folks. I’ve heard some online SNL fans at the time theorize that, due to the very poor reception the first two episodes of this season got, SNL perhaps figured that Parnell’s Ferrell-esque airtime and Ferrell-esque roles was one of the reasons why this season was being negatively perceived by viewers, and thus, one of SNL’s ways of trying to “fix” this season was to go back to status quo with Parnell, by using him the same way he was used in his previous seasons. We may never know if that theory is true or not, but it is something to think about. I’d like to think the theory isn’t true, but you do have to wonder why Parnell’s airtime suddenly gets scaled back after the first two episodes of this season seemed to be pushing him hard as the new leader of the show.
— I like how snappy and fast-paced Merv The Perv’s constant skeevy one-liner responses to Sarah’s lines are. Solid delivery from Parnell here.
— The mock-PSA ending with Sarah and Parnell wasn’t anything special.
STARS: ***

GOODNIGHTS

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very mixed and shaky episode, with a bit more bad than good. Even most of the good stuff was merely average or pretty good, with barely anything in the show standing out as great (which is especially a shame considering the VERY LARGE number of segments this episode contained). Most of the bad stuff, on the other hand, wasn’t just bad – it was worryingly terrible. This episode contained quite a number of what’s sure to be some of my least favorite pieces of this entire season. And not just sketches and commercials; even some individual moments within otherwise okay segments were particularly awful, such as Tina Fey’s Seattle rant and the Ramada Sisters commentary, both on Weekend Update, and Dean Edwards’ painfully awkward moment in the Making The Video sketch. I believe this episode has long had a negative reputation and I remember made lots of SNL fans at the time (including me) become very worried about the quality of this new season, and made us wonder if we were in for a disaster year on the level of season 20.
— Also, the studio audience of tonight’s episode needs to be addressed, because, my god, were they one of the toughest crowds SNL has ever had. So many moments in this episode were met with eerie silence in the studio, and a countless number of segments ended without ANY of the usual sketch-ending applause, as if the audience was flat-out REFUSING to applaud what they had just sat through. I recall an alleged audience member from this episode claiming online how, at one point in this episode, during a commercial break, the audience was so miserable that a large group of them started a “We want Ferrell!” chant. No idea if that’s true or not. I’ve always leaned towards it not being true, but who knows?

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

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Matt Damon)
a step down

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
John McCain