Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
60 MINUTES
Bill Clinton (DAH) & Bob Dole (DAA) do a Point-Counterpoint about Iraq
— Good to see a Dan Aykroyd cameo, even if it always feels a little awkward seeing him play Bob Dole anytime after Norm Macdonald became SNL’s definitive Dole.
— An okay dry speech from Darrell’s Bill Clinton, if certainly long.
— There’s the obligatory classic “You ignorant slut” one-liner from Dan.
— Solid fast-paced delivery from Dan as usual during his very wordy and long Dole speech, but his speech isn’t featuring much to laugh out loud at. This is the kind of overly-wordy, “tell, don’t show” style that’s slowly been taking over these cold openings lately, much to my chagrin.
— An odd and somewhat rare occurrence of “Live from New York…” being delivered by an unseen voice-over while a still photo is shown of a logo. Not exactly an exciting way to kick off an episode, especially after a very dry, long-feeling, and occasionally dull cold opening like tonight’s.
STARS: **½
MONOLOGUE
Sir Mix-A-Lot (TRM) defends host’s kingdom from other royal rappers
— Funny reveal of Queen Latifah being an actual queen of a kingdom.
— That loud, stuffy British voice that Seth often relies on is kinda like nails on a chalkboard to me. It’s almost starting to get on the same level of the awful nasal, throaty voice that Maya uses when playing certain black roles.
— Very solid and fun execution of this premise, and there are so many funny little rap/royalty jokes all throughout this, such as the LL Cool J/ “Don’t call it a callback, he’s been here for years!” bit.
STARS: ****
106 & PARK TOP TEN LIVE
Baby K & his producer (host) perform infantile hip-hop
— OH FUCKING NO. The return of that god-awful Baby K character. At least his previous appearance, as horrible as it was, was just a very short Update commentary. Now he gets a FULL-FLEDGED SKETCH?!?! Oh, spare me, SNL.
— The gag in this sketch with Maya sounding very stilted and unconvincing when talking in street lingo is weak and tired.
— Ugh at that music video. And I remember an online SNL fan at this time complained that that music video felt very MADtv.
— Latifah’s performance is very good, but this sketch is brutally unfunny.
— A minor laugh from Dean happily saying “Me too” after Baby K admits he still has bathroom accidents sometimes.
— (*groan*) Another musical performance in this sketch?
STARS: *
LIVE WITH REGIS & KELLY
Frenchie Davis (host) sings
— Good to see this back.
— We get our very first instance in these sketches of Amy’s Kelly Ripa saying “I don’t know who that is, Reege. WHO IS THAT?!?!”, which would go on to be one of the most remembered aspects of these sketches.
— Good ad-lib from Darrell when Amy’s Ripa holds him particularly tight and rests her head on his shoulder: “Careful, or we’re both gonna get pregnant.” I enjoy the way Darrell and Amy always play off of each other in these sketches.
— A lot of really good lines from Latifah’s Frenchie Davis.
— Amy attempts to make Darrell crack up by climbing all over him, which eventually succeeds in getting Darrell to break, which is still a little rare to see by this point of Darrell’s tenure.
STARS: ****
WHO FARTED?
FOX reality show traps contestants in room with a gas passer
— Feels weird seeing Darrell with his normal look while being grouped with the rest of the cast in a sketch where they’re all playing nameless characters.
— A very juvenile premise, but it’s certainly coming off funny in this suspenseful reality show trailer. Much better than that awful and lazy fart sketch the show had recently done with Matthew McConaughey.
— Parnell’s always-great voice-over work is making this even funnier.
STARS: ***½
WHERE ARE THEY NOW?
’60s girl group sought a follow-up dance craze hit
— A huge technical issue is occurring in the studio right now, which not only causes the opening “Where Are They Now?” title sequence to have no music, but also forces Latifah, Maya, and Amy to do their first few musical numbers with absolutely NO background music. Wow. There’s some talk about this in one of the updated versions of the “Live From New York” SNL book, where either Maya or Amy discloses the fact that she and her fellow two performers were informed right before this sketch went on air that they would have to perform their songs without background music, due to audio problems going on.
— During the video packages detailing things about the girl group that Latifah, Maya, and Amy are playing, faint voices from inside SNL’s studio can unintentionally be heard in the background, including a woman’s voice repeatedly counting down. All of these audible voices are obviously related to the technical problems going on with the music. I wonder if the woman being heard constantly counting down is someone in the SNL Band.
— These musical performances feel odd and bare-bones without any background music.
— I’m a few minutes into this sketch, and if you haven’t noticed, I have yet to say anything about the actual content of the sketch itself. That’s because I haven’t been finding anything too funny or noteworthy about the content. All the technical issues of this sketch are more interesting to me than the material itself is.
— The background music has now finally kicked in, halfway through this sketch. I can’t remember if SNL would later replace the first half of this sketch with the dress rehearsal version in reruns, but I assume they do.
— Okay, this sketch is starting to pick up a little with Maya’s character descending into insanity.
— I like Latifah telling Amy “You was always more of a ho than me.”
— Funny reveal of Amy being the mother of Baby Jessica, the baby who fell down a well in the 80s.
STARS: **½
I’M A CELEBRITY… WHO FARTED?!
ABC reality show has famous flatulence
— While it’s very questionable they’re doing a SECOND one of these fart-based reality show promos, and I want to say SNL is pushing it, this is coming off pretty fun with all the celebrity impressions in place of the nameless contestants from the first Who Farted ad.
— Great to see Jimmy’s dead-on Gilbert Gottfried impression back, which is what Jimmy debuted on SNL with in his very first episode.
— Jeff’s Gary Busey is always a riot.
— Gary Busey, when denying it was him who farted: “Trust me, buddy, you’ll know when a Juicy Busey hits you between the eyes.”
— This was kept at a short-and-sweet length.
STARS: ***
WEEKEND UPDATE
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed (HOS) is upset by picture taken just after capture
fresh from his Grammy gig, Dustin Hoffman (JER) stammers kudos for NYC
Trevor The Broadway Guy (CHP) emotes regarding musicians’ strike
— Oh, god. It now seems to be a weekly thing on Update for Tina’s opening joke to be a horrible, cringeworthy joke in which she punctuates it with some kind of desperate, corny, and unfunny gesture or ad-lib. Then the camera cuts to a deadpan and straitlaced Jimmy, who proceeds to approach his jokes the RIGHT way. I said this in my last review, but it’s fucking surreal how Tina and Jimmy have gradually been switching personalities over the course of this season.
— A bad anti-Bush joke from Tina. That’s something that would soon go on to be ANOTHER annoying weekly thing from her: doing unfunny anti-Bush jokes that seem more focused on pushing her own political views than on getting the audience to laugh. I never liked Bush either, and even *I* recall finding this weekly habit of Tina’s to be annoying.
— Horatio’s Khalid Shaikh Mohammed commentary has some laughs, with his comparisons to who he looks like in his infamous photo, but portions of this feel awkwardly improvised and have too many silent pauses. Perhaps portions of this are improvised, given that when this episode would later be re-aired, the dress rehearsal version of this commentary would be used, in which some of the dialogue is very different and also seemingly improvised, and Horatio and Jimmy’s performances are much more loose. So loose that, at one point for a brief moment, Horatio jokingly slips in an “ova heah” bit, referencing that dreaded Aquarium Repairmen sketch from earlier this season.
— Jeff rebounds nicely after his awful Baby K bit from earlier tonight, with a fantastic and fun impression of how Dustin Hoffman acted at that year’s recent Grammys. Jeff even looks like him here.
— Parnell’s Trevor The Broadway Guy is at least a change from the roles that Parnell is usually typecast in, and it’s certainly nice seeing him get a front-and-center showcase, but unfortunately, I’m not finding myself laughing here.
— Much like the Khalid Shaikh Mohammed commentary, the Trevor The Broadway Guy commentary would later be replaced with the dress rehearsal version in reruns, which is longer than the live version. One of the things the dress version of the commentary has that the live version doesn’t is Parnell’s Trevor mentioning doing an off off off off off off-Broadway show (I can’t remember exactly how many “off”s he used, but it was a lot). I’m now wondering if Jeff’s Dustin Hoffman commentary was also replaced with the dress rehearsal version in reruns. If so, wow, SNL might as well have just shown the dress version of this ENTIRE Update in reruns.
— It’s become a running gag these past two Updates for Jimmy to do a joke about Vagina Auction, a non-existent(?) FOX reality show.
— Tonight’s weekly end-of-Update walk-on from SNL writer Eric Slovin has him dressed as Thomas Jefferson and using Jimmy’s pencil to sign the Declaration of Independence.
STARS: **½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Dy-na-mi-tee”
GIVE UP THE HAM
(WLF) pleads for peace via song when (host) & (AMP) fight over a ham
— Oh, here comes a favorite of mine.
— When this sketch originally aired, I remember thinking Amy looked very Hillary Clinton-esque in that wig and dress, which is funny in retrospect, given that Amy would later start playing Hillary the following season.
— After Amy’s dignified and lengthy description of what she plans to do with the ham, I like Latifah’s simplified, ghetto version of her own plans for the ham: “I’m gonna take this ham home and I’mma eat it.”
— I love this sketch so much that I’ll refrain from ranting about the fact that this is Kattan’s SECOND drag role tonight, in addition to the fact that his only other appearance tonight besides those two drag roles was playing a flamboyant gay role (Gelman in the Live With Regis And Kelly sketch).
— The increasingly out-of-hand fight over the ham has a nice escalating absurdity to it, and I also like how Latifah and Amy’s respective friends are opposite versions of the same archetype.
— I love Will’s delivery of “Everybody just needs to cooooool out” when he walks on and takes the ham away from the fighting customers.
— There’s Will’s classic Give Up The Ham musical number, a legendary Forte moment, and a great example of how much he hit the ground running in his first season with his delightful oddball style.
— Great ending with Parnell stepping in front of the camera as a random spokesman and explaining the story behind this sketch, which includes the writer being drunk.
STARS: *****
TV FUNHOUSE
“X-Presidents” by RBS- SpongeBob SquarePants rejects cartoon jingoism
— I got a huge laugh from Reagan’s line, regarding Carter’s Nobel Prize: “They should call it the No-Balls Prize.” Reagan’s bitter one-liners in these cartoons never fail to kill me.
— Funny war propaganda cartoon clips of Bugs Bunny and Grape Ape, the former of which is based on an actual WWII Bugs Bunny cartoon (“Bugs Bunny Nips The Nips”).
— Nice to see that Spongebob Squarepants’ appearance here is being voiced by Tom Kenny, Spongebob’s real voice actor.
— Some laughs from the display of how inappropriate Spongebob would be for a modern-day war propaganda cartoon.
— Wow, after a Spongebob appearance, now we get a Powerpuff Girls appearance? Unfortunately, all of these famous cartoon character appearances aren’t turning out as epic as one might think. This cartoon is a little too average for my likes.
— No musical number at the end? Don’t these X-Presidents cartoons always end with one?
STARS: ***
PROFILES IN JAZZ
’20s singer’s (host) lyrics didn’t hide sexual content
— Great to see Darrell’s Jack Perkins impression back for the first time in years.
— “Joe The Plumber”? Well, that now sure brings up unintended memories of the future 2008 elections.
— Dammit, Maya’s doing that godforsaken nasal, throaty voice ONCE AGAIN. Her over-reliance on that voice lately is getting ridiculous.
— Some laughs from Latifah’s increasingly un-subtle sexual songs.
— Fred is hilarious and spot-on in his interview as a pretentious, unemployed jazz historian.
— Wow, two roles in one sketch for Tracy.
STARS: ***
DON’S APOTHECARY
overly-personal apothecary Don (HOS) drives business to Walgreens
— This is the first of two of these Don’s Apothecary sketches. I remember not caring for these at all when they originally aired, but Horatio would later give a backstory about this sketch during an interview, explaining that he when he came up with these sketches, he was attempting a slice-of-life, relatable feel, and based it on real-life childhood experiences from when the neighborhood he grew up in went through a change. Knowing that, I’ll hopefully have more of an appreciation for these sketches now that I’m revisiting these.
— I love Will’s inexplicably dignified, proud delivery when correcting Horatio by telling him “No, I have herpes.”
— A few minutes into this sketch, and, while I’m indeed enjoying the relatable feel that Horatio intended for these sketches, I’m still not finding this sketch all that great, and all the juvenile medical-related jokes aren’t doing much for me.
— Didn’t care for the Walgreens twist ending. It also reminded me too much of that “Gary’s Fish Tanks” twist ending from that dreaded Aquarium Repairmen sketch.
— I’m not 100% sure, but I think this sketch would later be replaced with the dress rehearsal version in reruns (seems to be a lot of that in this episode), which includes some differences in the last portion leading up to the Walgreens twist ending.
STARS: **½
MISTER ROGERS TRIBUTE
HOS sings “You Are Special” to mark the passing of Mister Rogers
— A nice change of pace with us getting a display of a more tender, emotional side of Horatio.
— A very sweet tribute to Mister Rogers after his passing.
— Great ending with the famous Mister Rogers trolley passing by at the end.
STARS: N/A (I’m never sure if any of SNL’s tribute pieces warrant a rating)
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A pretty average episode. There were a few strong things, including one of my favorite sketches of the season (Give Up The Ham), but quite a lot of the episode felt comprised of average material, as well as a few iffy things here and there. Queen Latifah was a pretty fun and reliable host as expected.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Christopher Walken)
a step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Salma Hayek
Baby K gives me flashbacks to Howie Mandel always doing that dumb baby voice in his stand-up. Which I guess later became the Bobby’s World voice.
I wish Queen Latifah would have hosted in better eras. She works very hard in the episodes she hosts, but they are not peak times for the show.
It’s not like other Update anchors didn’t have obvious political biases, but this is kinda when the show begins to descend into Clapter-bait for me. A lot of the problems for me are that superior political shows like Daily Show/Colbert Report were beginning to make the same points in funnier ways.
I get the impression that someone (NBC? Lorne? Tina? All of the above?) was eager for Update to be held in the same regard as the Comedy Central duo.
The “comedy news is more important than real news” and “Jon Stewart is the most trusted journalist in America” shifts in TV cable and sketch comedy were very detrimental for Update. Norm had a bit a few times where he would say something obviously pandering and then wait for the audience to applaud. And sure enough, this became the norm (no pun intended) for the show by the early ’00s. I think the worst version may be when Amy joins Update and she does all her cutesy stuff to get the audience to react the right way. There was something of a break in Seth’s run as the show never knew what to say about Obama, but that era also ended up feeling like it was on autopilot. I think only in the last few years has Update sort of gone back to the strength it had in its peak years (not counting the most recent one as it mostly just made me cringe, aside from the kind words about Che’s grandmother).
I think Fey was actually pretty anti-Daily Show from what I remember. She didn’t like the clapter element either. I wonder if there was pressure for Update to skew in that direction given the show’s popularity. All I know, SNL has never been able to land heavy-handed political sentiment. It flopped in the early 80s, it flopped in the GWB years and it’s flopping now. And the thing is, like Stooge, I don’t even disagree with the sentiment, you just have to write a good sketch/joke. The pitfalls are too great when you’re writing from a place of anger. It’s just no fun. You might be right, but it’s a drag.
It’s interesting, I really like the Jost/Che duo as well. They don’t always succeed, but you can tell they’re desperately pushing for a shift in the tone of Update after damn near 15 years of the same vibe. Meyers was an improvement, but you’re right, John, pure autopilot – steady as she goes. Never bombing, never blowing you away.
As for the SNL From Home Update segment, I think it really exposed how beholden to the old style Jost is. Che has flaws, but his approach still excites me.
When Seth starts I notice that he is a bit of the heavy to Amy (like SNL’s version of the movie about the plucky female anchor and the stuffy, snide, but ultimately harmless male anchor), which is interesting for a limited period. When he’s on his own the awkwardness with “tough” or “non-PC” or what have you punch lines (and he does have some that he’d never, ever do today) is more evidence, and he did wisely move away.
This is totally off topic at this point, so I’ll stop, but the last few Updates before the show had to halt production were probably my favorites since the best of the Norm years. Just about everything worked, and Update felt like itself, rather than an attempt at something else. I know they likely won’t be able to go back to that groove, so I will just be glad for those few weeks, I guess.
Forte’s “Give Up the Ham” was my first “holy-shit-who-is-this-guy!?!” moment.
Horatio speaks of “Don’s Apothecary” at length on the “Good One” podcast:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/horatio-sanzs-dons-apothecary-sketch/id1203393721?i=1000384200615
I remember on the Lonely Island blog, one of the early shorts (“Young Chuck Norris,” I think) was credited to “Andrew ‘Give Up the Ham’ Steele,” so I’m assuming Steele wrote that sketch.
Until recently, I had completely forgotten that Queen Latifah hosted twice. That explained why I remembered “Give Up the Ham” in spite of giving up the show by the time of her ’04 episode. (the confusion isn’t helped by Tracy playing the type of drag role Finesse Mitchell was lumbered with over and over)
The lazy black stereotypes (and we’ll be seeing plenty of those through the rest of the decade…) cluttering up the sketch make it more of a slog to start up, but when Will arrives, nothing else matters. Hearing that nasally melodic “give up the ham…let the ham go…” was like reuniting with an old friend. He’s just wonderful, so wonderful that reverting to a Rod Serling type of explaining the sketch ending could have felt like a copout; fortunately, Parnell is just as wonderful. Many of the SNL pitchmen tend to use one, or at most two, types of voices, but Parnell very carefully tailors his delivery to fit the tone of the sketch, perfectly capturing the late ’60s and early ’70s patronizing-and-“down” narrator style. I don’t think anyone on SNL before or after Parnell has managed to be quite so consistently inventive and brilliant in what is often a thankless role.
Will hit these pieces out of the park over and over his first season. There were bumps ahead, of course, but he has a creative and highly watchable body of work all the way to his final year in the cast. SNL never really has known how to fill the void he left – Paul Brittain never had much of a chance before whatever happened with his exit. Taran Killam and Beck Bennett both had their moments (and Beck has had a nice recovery this season after a slump), but also both feel more overly self-aware and self-conscious as performers – or the show as a whole has moved in that direction and they went along. The closest may be Kyle Mooney, who has been consistent these 7 seasons and also brings something no one else brings to the show, but Kyle has a very specific style, whereas with Will, there was something so unpredictable about him. Considering the shaky state of the male cast for years before Will arrived, rather than focusing on why he hasn’t been replicated, I should just appreciate how truly individual he was.
It’s always nice to see Dan’s Bob Dole (even if he was a little too noticeably reliant on cards), but the cold open doesn’t have much to it. There is no real reason for its existence, which is made clear when a lengthy portion is devoted to Dole reliving a cold open from a decade earlier (from Kevin Kline’s episode) for some feud with Hillary Clinton. The return of Clinton, beyond making me cringe as soon as that blasted thumb went up in the air for easy audience applause, also has little comic value (essentially just a regurgitation of “don’t you miss me” and reciting the names of foreign leaders to fill time). The main takeaway seems to be Lorne knowing Parnell’s W impression wasn’t working but not knowing what to do about it. Keeping the ‘character’ offcamera was the best move, but this wasn’t the best substitution.
You’d never know this Horatio sketch was intended as a slice-of-ilfe piece. Presumably by this point slice-of-life pieces were much more difficult to get on the air, so they had to rewrite and rewrite with more “comic” moments which, frankly, aren’t funny, and the whole thing is further let down by Horatio’s usual stumbliness and lazy performances. I wish this had been salvaged.
The Mr. Rogers goodbye was a sweet tribute to a wonderful man, and one of the more positive moments I remember Horatio’s tenure by.
I’ve been reading your reviews since the beginning of this project and have finally caught up to your “current day.” Some background, I used to watch SNL with my dad every Saturday up until he died in 2001. When he passed away I stopped watching and I’ve only watched the show live since twice: The David S. Pumpkins episode from 2016 (random) and Eddie’s hosting return. Basically anything after Will Ferrell left is completely foreign to me. I’m a long time fan of the show that never knew about the hardcore online community. Because of your project Stooge I’m coming into this season with fresh eyes. Plus it’s a nice distraction at work while the world burns outside.
Some stray observations about this era:
-This seems like such a weird cast, like a basketball team with no star to take over when needed and just a bunch of role players. If the writing were better you could kind of hide that but it’s painfully average. Every good era has had someone like that-the next one is probably Bill Hader. I’m probably skipping someone though.
-I had no idea Kattan and Maya were so detested by fans. Maya is really talented but perhaps used wrong. Maybe this changes in her later seasons. Kattan (as stated in your reviews) had crappy characters early on and stayed on the show too long.
-Odd to realize how much longer Darrell stayed. If his apathy was so palpable why keep him on? Were impressionists that hard to come by in sketch comedy at this time?
Keep up the good work Stooge!
Kattan def stayed too long, but I think he kinda at least goes out on a decent note–his Buddy Mills character, as pointed out, is a very solid new character for a last season, and he stops doing some of his REALLY played out characters.
Thanks, Lammy.
I sometimes think Lorne may have felt sympathy for Darrell, as he had a lot of struggles in the ’00s, from what his book suggested.
The Cold Open feels like a last minute decision. Did an Update piece get bumped up and if so what did it replace?
This episode will be tomorrow’s Vintage selection. Please think positive thoughts that they will include “Give Up the Ham,” because if there is one thing this country needs right now, it is peak Will Forte.
I can’t imagine what will air in the 60 minute edit tomorrow night. That Who Farted reality show spoof is so dumb as is Baby K on 106 & Park. Plus the TV Funhouse is questionable and 20s Singer is probably too risqué for the hour.
My guess: Cold Open, Monologue, Regis & Kelly, Where are they Now, Update (minus Dustin Hoffman), Ms. Dynamite, Ham
I had the same thoughts. There was something morbidly amusing in guessing what would not be cut from the ’06 Natalie Portman episode (and seeing some of the reactions to what made it to air), but that was a wonderland compared to some episodes in the earlier ’00s, the most brutally dated era of SNL to me.
I also want to see if anyone says “Who was Dean Edwards???”
That a Classic SNL with a Regis sketch aired the same day he died is a ghoulish coincidence.
Even eerier is the next episode Stooge will be reviewing also has a Regis sketch.
Anyway, the rundown for the vintage was cold open, monologue, Regis and Kelly, Weekend Update (jokes and Horatio only), Ms. Dynamite (1 performance), Give Up the Ham, raunchy jazz singer, Mr. Rogers tribute. To their credit they managed to cobble together a decent episode.
Jeff Richards was completely excised – the only cast member who was. I guess Lorne or whoever is never getting over whatever happened there.
That’s sort of a shame, because outside of Baby K, Jeff had a decent show.
Incidentally, I think I saw Baby K’s high school graduation on Zoom. 😉
This SpongeBob appearance was produced during the show’s temporary halt in production while they were working on the movie. During this period, Tom Kenny’s voice for the character slowly started to get higher.
You think Steve Martin would have cameod in this episode since Queen Latifah is hosting and promote their awful film together.
Most of Queen Latifah’s sketches had her rapping or singing. And yet she wasn’t MG. Does anyone remember Ms. Dynamite?
I did like in the jazz sketch how Fred Armisen’s character gives a long, wordy analysis, which immediately segues into “Yeah, Alberta was a ho!” Sums it up.
It’s crazy that up to this point, only 3 black women have hosted SNL. Queen Latifah is only the THIRD black woman to host SNL and the second woman hosted 17 years prior. I understand that SNL has a rough history with diversity and that they have gotten better in recent years, but damn