Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
SANTA CHENEY
Dick Cheney (DAH) plays Santa to kids’ politically-convenient requests
— A memorable opening image of Darrell’s Dick Cheney pulling down his fake Santa beard and making that trademark Cheney grin at the camera.
— Some laughs from the kids obviously reading off scripted wordy, un-childlike requests as their Christmas wish.
— Good visual of Will’s President Bush sitting on Santa’s lap. Quite Will Ferrell-esque.
— Some funny political satire from Will-as-Bush’s line comparing the recalling of defective Xbox 360s to his refusing to recall his defective policy in Iraq.
STARS: ***
MONOLOGUE
host sings his King Kong song, which didn’t make it into the movie
— I see we’re getting a typical fun Jack Black musical number.
— The lyrics of this King Kong song are fantastic and hilarious, and the melody is epic.
STARS: ****½
STUART LITTLE MOUSE REMOVAL KIT
Stuart Little Mouse Removal Kit tempts rodents to drive out of your house
— An amusing and creative concept for a mouse trap commercial.
— Lots of great and fun little details to the extensive Stuart Little mouse trap.
— A very good ending with the mouse car unexpectedly blowing up after it leaves the house.
STARS: ****½
THE WIND
at Sbarro, shoppers suffer gusts of cold wind due to near-to-door table
— I recall a few online SNL fans back at this time in 2005 unfavorably comparing this sketch to the notorious Hot Plates sketch from the preceding season. I’ve personally never considered this sketch to be as bad as Hot Plates, but we’ll see during this current viewing of mine.
— Fred’s hobo character angrily hissing at Jack cracked me up.
— A good aggressive “SON OF A BITCH!” delivery from Rachel, who’s apparently channeling the spirit of Chris Farley.
— I’m not caring too much for the wind gags, though the execution of this is still coming off more enjoyable and much less cringeworthingly corny than the dreaded Hot Plates. The performances from Jack and the cast are also helping made this sketch a little fun.
— Funny lines from a shaken-up Kenan right before his exit.
— They botched the gag where a dummy of Rachel is supposed to drop from above after the wind blows Rachel high up in the air. Not sure what exactly went wrong with the gag, but after it got botched, Rachel can be seen walking over a dummy of herself lying on the floor (on the right corner of the below screencap), a dummy that was never seen before in the sketch, all the while Amy is genuinely laughing her ass off at this blooper.
SNL would later show the dress rehearsal version of this sketch in reruns, in which the Rachel’s-dummy-falling-from-above gag is executed properly, complete with a comical loud “thud” sound effect when Rachel’s falling dummy lands on the floor.
— The “Happy Holidays From The Weather Channel” twist ending felt unnecessary. SNL sometimes has a bad habit of throwing in that type of dumb twist ending in sketches.
STARS: **½
APPALACHIAN EMERGENCY ROOM
(musical guest) & Johnny Knoxville [real] ail
— Amy’s usual “And now, another episode of Appalachian Emergency Room” opening voice-over in these sketches has been updated in tonight’s installment to include her following up her afore-quoted intro line with a cheery utterance of “Christmastime!”, which strangely amused me, for some reason.
— Great walk-on from Neil Young as Amy and Darrell’s druggie son, who they’ve often mentioned in past installments of this sketch.
— Amy’s character in this recurring sketch always delivers her exit line in a very funny manner while walking away, but we get a particularly hilarious delivery from her during her exit in tonight’s installment.
— Ha, did I just hear Seth say “Tiny Nations” as one of the two names he called out for Jason and Bill’s characters?
— Pretty solid bit with the the huge jart stuck in Jason’s head.
— A hilarious dirty gag with the watermelon still staying attached to Chris’ crotch after he lets go of it (I also love Seth’s reaction to that), which feels like both a callback to a gag Chris did in Heather Graham’s monologue from season 25 and a precursor to a certain famous Digital Short from the Justin Timberlake-hosted Christmas episode an exact year from tonight’s episode.
— Jack: “I’m your medical ball of clay. MOLD ME.” That is such a perfectly Jack Black-ish line that you’d think he wrote it himself.
— Johnny Knoxville’s cameo as himself as one of the patients is both very funny and strangely very fitting for this sketch. I also love how he implies during his exit that he’s all too familiar with this hospital’s rooms. A perfect way to end what was EASILY the best installment of Appalachian Emergency Room.
STARS: ****
TV FUNHOUSE
“Christmastime For The Jews” by RBS- gentile absence brings opportunities
— Right out of the gate, I’m immediately getting such an epic feel from this cartoon.
— Hilarious subject matter for this well-animated black-and-white stop motion cartoon.
— Not only a very funny song, but it’s strangely beautiful-sounding, no doubt helped by being sung by Darlene Love, who’s being utilized to perfection here.
— A particularly funny bit about Jews going to sleep with Daily Show reruns in their heads.
— Even the closing credits of this are great, with the special Darlene Love-sung Christmas-themed TV Funhouse jingle.
— Overall, a true classic.
— The fact that this cartoon is immediately followed by a live shot of Darlene Love singing with the SNL Band further adds to the epic feel of both this cartoon and this episode in general.
STARS: *****
CHANNEL 5 PHOTO SHOOT
TV news team member (host) points out unfairness at publicity photo shoot
— A very simplistic premise, but it’s being executed decently.
— A laugh from Chris’ pointing towards Jack actually being a thumbs-down.
— Even when playing the simple straight role of a director, Jason is coming off so charismatic and fun here.
STARS: ***
LAZY SUNDAY
CHP & ANS rap about a trip to see The Chronicles Of Narnia
— Ohho, yes. HERE WE GO, FOLKS.
— A hilarious reveal of The Chronicles of Narnia being the movie that Andy and Chris are rapping to each other over the phone about going to see together.
— This is SO wall-to-wall with individual hilarious moments and perfect little details that I cannot even begin to single out my favorite moment. Andy and Chris’ furious hardcore and masterful rapping about such silly, non-hardcore things, the onscreen graphics of objects related to the lyrics, the brief cutaways to Andy and Chris individually staring into the camera while doing cupcake-related things in such a dead-serious style (such as chomping hard into a cupcake, or holding up an open box of cupcakes in a gansta manner), the words “SNACK-ATTACK!” showing up in big onscreen letters as it’s being yelled by Andy and Chris, the stop motion effect of Andy and Chris traveling from one end of the street to the other, the gunshot sound effect at the very end as the camera is pulling back on Andy and Chris…man, this Digital Short is top-to-bottom PERFECTION.
— When this short originally aired, not only was I absolutely amazed at what I was witnessing from this very unexpected piece, but both my face and throat actually hurt from how hard and for how long I was laughing all throughout it. There would be a special moment in another sketch later in this episode that would make my face and throat further hurt from extremely heavy laughter, a special moment that I’ll point out when we arrive there.
— Needless to say, this short would end up being a truly groundbreaking moment for SNL, and a huge turning point in the history of the show. What can be said about how much this absolutely blew up online, back in the days before the idea of an SNL piece going “viral” was even a thing? (Lazy Sunday went SO viral that even people who hadn’t watched SNL in years became aware of the short. I remember this finally made me proud to admit to non-SNL viewers that I was a diehard fan of the show, after the preceding season made me embarrassed to admit that.) What can be said about how this famously put the already-existing-but-not-yet-huge YouTube on the map, which would thus also lead to a trend of average joes on YouTube filming their own recreations of Lazy Sunday? What can be said about the huge press SNL received from this, easily the most press they had gotten in years? What can be said about how this would be such a major turning point for the then-struggling newbie Andy and would lead to him having a hugely popular 7-year tenure on the show. And finally, of course, what can be said about how much this would forever change so many things for SNL, finally bringing them into the virtual age and also leading to them embracing more pre-taped shorts and music video content, which continues to this day?
STARS: *****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “It’s A Dream”
WEEKEND UPDATE
Skull Island tourism board members (KET) & (TRM) downplay giant fauna
AMP & TIF list icky properties of 15 year-old boys they find irresistible
— Well, here to piss all over the natural high this episode has put me in so far…
— Ha, Tracy Morgan out of nowhere, randomly paired with Kenan in an Update commentary as African tourism board members. There’s actually a backstory to this random casting. Tracy’s role was written for Finesse, and Finesse played it in dress rehearsal, but because Tracy made a backstage visit to SNL sometime that evening before the live show, they wanted to give him a part in the show, so they yanked Finesse from his role in this Update commentary and placed Tracy in it, leaving Finesse with practically NOTHING tonight (more on that later in my review of a certain sketch towards the end of this episode).
— Tracy’s exclamation of “LIES!” in an African accent has me laughing out loud.
— Not only is Kenan noticeably stifling his laughter throughout this commentary whenever Tracy speaks (particularly during one moment where Tracy pauses for an awkwardly long time before delivering a line), but Kenan can also be seen mouthing some of Tracy’s lines. All of this is obviously because Kenan must not have rehearsed this piece with Tracy beforehand, given how Tracy was thrown into the role at the last minute.
— As bad as I feel for the struggling Finesse getting a rare big role yanked away from him at the last minute, I’m trying to imagine what this Update commentary would’ve been like with him and Kenan, and it would’ve been NOTHING. Tracy’s performance and delivery are adding the only real comedy to be found in this whole piece.
— For once, Tina and Amy do an Update piece together that’s actually making me laugh, with the segment in which they lovingly go on and on about the “irresistible” things about 15-year-old boys.
— Boy, I’d love to see how viewers today would react to Amy’s joke about the symbol for transsexual bathrooms.
— An actual fairly short Fey/Poehler Update, thankfully.
STARS: **
A VERY DOWNER CHRISTMAS
young Debbie Downer saps Santa’s (host) jollity when he visits her house
— After the refreshing Steve Carell installment of this sketch earlier this season, we get another much-needed change of pace for Debbie Downer, this time with us seeing her as a little girl on Christmas Eve.
— Oh, I absolutely LOVE the new Grinch-esque Debbie Downer opening title sequence.
— At one point during the aforementioned Grinch-esque opening title sequence, the singing narrator mentions he’d rather have his face shredded by an eel than listen to Debbie Downer. When this episode originally aired, I left on my TV’s closed-captioning, and I noticed that the singing narrator’s aforementioned line in this sketch about “having my face shredded by an eel” was written in the closed-captioning as “having my nards shredded by an eel”. The people who do on-the-fly closed-captioning for live SNL episodes reportedly rely on a script they’re provided of the dress rehearsal versions of sketches, in an attempt to try to keep the live closed-captioning from lagging behind the dialogue too badly. So judging from this odd “nards shredded by an eel” inconsistency in the closed-captioning, I take it SNL changed the line in this sketch from “nards shredded by an eel” to a much more innocent “face shredded by an eel” right before airtime. Why, though? The original line, while naughty, doesn’t seem like something NBC’s censors would come down hard on SNL for in the year 2005. This also reminds me that there was another odd inconsistency in the closed-captioning for this episode: at the beginning of Weekend Update when Tina was delivering the first joke, the captioning for that joke instead captioned a COMPLETELY different joke that was nowhere to be heard from Tina nor Amy at any point in tonight’s Update. Must’ve been a joke that got cut after dress rehearsal. (From what my very faint memory of the captioned joke recalls, the punchline of it involved a mention of someone farting and saying “Smell my democracy”. I kid you not, folks.)
— This sketch is such an improvement over typical Debbie Downer fare. Even Debbie’s typical depressing one-liners are actually making me laugh in tonight’s installment. The fun atmosphere and change of pace are helping this a lot.
— I loved Jack-as-Santa asking a very puzzled “Is that even a thing???” after Debbie says she has juvenile sciatica.
— Funny bit with Jack acting like he’s going to use the cup of scotch to dip his cookie into, only for him to immediately throw the cookie away without eating it and then he downs the cup of scotch.
— They’ve even shaken things up with the usual tired feline AIDS routine, by having Debbie instead mention her cat’s mange.
— Great bit with Santa giving Debbie a calendar of medical oddities as her Christmas gift, which she, of course, is delighted by.
STARS: ****
DESERTED MOON
stranded in space, (host) rebuffs advances of hermaphrodite alien (ANS)
— This is a re-done version of a sketch that Lonely Island originally did in an un-aired FOX pilot around 2004/early 2005, a pilot for a Lonely Island-starring sketch comedy show called (I think) Awesometown, which FOX ended up passing on. The pilot would later be put online. In the Awesometown version of this Deserted Moon sketch, Jorma Taccone played the role that Jack Black is playing in tonight’s version.
— Andy’s stock continues to quickly rise tonight, as he FINALLY gets his very first lead role in a live sketch (unless I’m forgetting something…oh, and Update commentaries and pre-taped commercials don’t count in this case; I’m only talking about live sketches).
— Andy’s voice and delivery throughout this sketch is kinda reminding me of Ashton Kutcher.
— I like the structure of this sketch, with this sketch being divided up into little scenes, each separated by an exterior shot of the planet while a fun outer space-type music sting plays.
— Despite the homoerotic and hermaphrodite aspect of this premise, this sketch thankfully isn’t coming off as the typical hacky and unflattering gay material that dominated the preceding season. I could do without Andy’s decision to play his character with a stereotypical gay lisp, though.
— Funny interplay between Andy and Jack throughout this.
— I particularly like the part with Andy opening the front of his space suit with his back to the camera and Jack reacting in horror to the unseen-to-us monstrosity he’s witnessing.
— Andy’s character, while drunk on Space Wine, ending one scene by drunkenly saying “Space Wine!” to himself is strangely both a very Andy Samberg-esque moment AND a very Ashton Kutcher-esque moment.
— A genuine gaffe from Andy in which, as he tells Jack “I’m all you’ve got!” while pounding his hand on the glass top of the spaceship to emphasize his point, which is supposed to unwittingly fix the broken spaceship, he accidentally dislodges the glass top. Jack makes a fantastic ad-lib in response to this blooper: “You broke it…but you also fixed it!”
— The ending text crawl epilogue is slightly different from the one in the aforementioned original version of this sketch in the Awesometown pilot.
STARS: ***
TWO A-HOLES BUYING A CHRISTMAS TREE
Christmas tree seller (host) fields A-holes’ (JAS) & (KRW) dumb requests
— Our very first Two A-Holes sketch.
— I am loving this characterization from both Jason and Kristen, and we’re getting a great display of both performers’ chemistry with each other.
— So many laughs from so many of the asinine statements from the Two A-Holes. Jack is also portraying his character’s growing frustration towards them very well.
— There’s Finesse’s awkward performance as a hot dog vendor that I mentioned in my review of Weekend Update from this season’s premiere. It turns out he’s not coming off QUITE as awkward and halting in this sketch as I had remembered, but you can still sadly sense a little bit of genuine frustration, disappointment, and dispirited-ness in the poor guy’s performance (and no, it’s not just him acting in character in response to the Two A-Holes’ oddness), presumably not only because his ONLY appearance of the night happens to be in such a small, non-comedic role at the very end of a sketch airing near the very end of an episode that has so many big and soon-to-be-legendary moments that he didn’t get to be a part of, but also because he must’ve been especially bummed that this is all he was left with tonight after his ONE big piece with Kenan on Weekend Update ended up getting re-cast at the last minute, with his role being given to an impromptu special guest.
STARS: ****
SPELLING BEE
spelling bee loser (WLF) inspires song by Tenacious D
— Here comes a well-loved Will Forte masterpiece.
— The VERY soft-spoken voice Will is speaking into the microphone with is freakin’ slaying me.
— After asking Chris’ moderator character for various things like the origin of the word he has to spell, I love Will flat-out asking “Could you spell the word please.” Chris also responds to that with a perfectly deadpan and subtly irritated “No.”
— And there it goes: Will’s absolutely classic and priceless one-minute-long (I’m guesstimating) misspelling of the word “business”, including a portion in which he repeats the letter “q” non-stop for a good while (complete with a perfectly-timed brief break in which he looks upwards in a pensive manner before continuing with the non-stop “q”s). This whole “business” misspelling is not only fucking hilarious, but it’s very impressive and daring on Will’s part, which are just some of the reasons why he’s such an epic performer in general.
— Will’s misspelling of “business” is the moment I was talking about in my Lazy Sunday review when I said this episode had another moment that made both my face and throat hurt so much from laughing so hard for so long when this episode originally aired. In fact, both Lazy Sunday and Will’s misspelling in this Spelling Bee sketch are easily two of the hardest I’ve EVER laughed while watching SNL, and for that reason, I will cherish those two moments forever.
— A perfect follow-up to Will’s epic misspelling, with Chris leaning into the microphone and saying a very dry and deadpan “Wrong.” Though that was just a simple little moment, it was such a good display of Chris’ always-excellent straight man skills.
— I know some people don’t like the turn this sketch takes with this randomly becoming a Tenacious D musical number, but I consider it to be an extra treat from this already-fantastic sketch, even though this sketch would’ve still stood as a classic had it abruptly ended after Chris’ aforementioned deadpan delivery of the line “Wrong.”
— Excellent touch at the end with the camera zooming in on Will’s face as he stares into the camera with a stone-faced, melancholy look (the last above screencap for this sketch).
STARS: *****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “He Was The King”
GOODNIGHTS
host, TRM, cast members end the show from Rockefeller Center skating rink
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— An all-time classic and important episode in SNL history. So many memorable and legendary pieces in this episode, including one particularly groundbreaking piece (Lazy Sunday). And even a lot of the stuff that’s not considered a classic were strong, including much-better-than-usual installments of Appalachian Emergency Room and Debbie Downer. The whole night also had a magic feel in the air, even during some of the lesser segments of this episode. This fantastic episode, especially the aforementioned way both Lazy Sunday and Will Forte’s one-minute-long misspelling of “business” in the Spelling Bee sketch gave me some of the hardest laughs I’ve EVER gotten from SNL, coupled with the fact that this was the third consecutive episode that I liked this season, made it 100% official to me on the night this episode originally aired that SNL was BACK after the dire three-year slump they were in before this season.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Alec Baldwin)
a step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
We enter the year 2006, with future five-timer Scarlett Johansson making her hosting debut
Aside from Neil Young (I like Neil but…damn, those performances were snoozy) this is pretty much a perfect episode for me. Even stuff that normally doesn’t work like Appalachian ER and Debbie Downer get better than average installments here.
The Wind and Deserted Moon both give me early ’90s SNL vibes. For The Wind, it’s because it reminds me of how they would really get a lot of use out of a single practical effect for a sketch in those days. And Deserted Moon feels kinda like a high-tier S20 sketch in the way it’s structured, with the constant transitions, the hermaphrodite jokes, and the ending text crawl (it’s a good sketch, though.)
The people I was watching this episode with recently said that Channel 5 Photoshoot felt a bit Mr. Show-ish. It’s fitting considering Jack was a featured player on there for a couple seasons.
The way Lazy Sunday popularized YouTube and was a defining point for a new generation’s sense of humor still makes it hard for me to fathom that it came out of SNL. When I first saw the early Lonely Island material, I thought it was its own sketch show. The fact that something so new and weird and popular with young people came out of a 30+ year old network show is pretty incredible to me.
The video probably ages a little weird because of how lo-fi and simplistic it is. If you showed it to your average internet-savvy kid nowadays, they most likely wouldn’t see what the big deal is. But when I watch it, it’s easy for me to go back to a headspace where it was super cool and funny and fresh. The whole DIY nature of it is half the appeal for me too. It’s great that people loved recreating it and that it inspired people to make videos of a similar ilk.
And rapping about cupcakes and Narnia was pretty cool and unexpected in the mid-to-late ’00s, but like all comedic trends, it eventually gets old. The SNL of today does the “mundane/random arbitrary thing raps” premise a LOT and it comes off the exact opposite way that Lazy Sunday does: the new raps just come off tryhard and tired to me.
The last time they most clearly went to the mundane rap concept (the “Hobbies” song with Melissa Villasenor and Emma Stone) was one of the more interesting to me as the point seemed to be that rapping about boring things doesn’t make them any less boring. It sort of serves as a tying of the bow on this concept, as I don’t feel like they’ve done it as much since (although I’ve probably forgotten some).
Tucci gang, Tucci gang, Tucci gang
Also (I’m commenting a lot for this one, heh) I fully believe that the Tenacious D song at the end of Spelling Bee is perfect for it. The way it immediately transitions into the song and then ends with that dark zoom in on Will’s face just makes it feel so much more epic and fleshed out. I can’t imagine S28-S30 pulling off ANYTHING that perfect and “complete” feeling.
IMO, Will spelling out ‘business’ is his all-time best moment on SNL. The way the audience laughs, stops laughing, and then laughs again HARDER as he keeps going is outstanding. It’s always great when SNL comes at you with that surprisingly amazing 10-to-1.
One of my absolute favourite episodes of SNL. I had started watching during season 29, but because the quality of the show had been getting so bad, like Stooge mentionned I was embarrassed to admit I was becoming such a fan. I already the knew that the cast you watched in high school would always be your favourite, and now I could be proud to say that this would be my cast.
Lazy Sunday. What more is there to say? It’s not my favourite digital short but it is a classic and ensured that there would be lots more where that came from.
Christmas Time For The Jews is a holiday classic. My family and I laugh at it every year without fail. The fact it’s Darlene Love singing really makes it epic.
And of course there is Spelling Bee, which is in my top ten sketches and is my favourite Forte moment. I’ve watched it hundreds of times and it never fails to make me laugh. The way Forte commands the audience (as Ruby describes) is nothing short of breathtaking. He just goes on and on and never ever even cracks a smile. Imagine Fallon and Sanz trying this. I also love pointing out that this sketch stars Parnell and Forte, the two castmembers who I believe never ever broke on the show.
And with this episode SNL would never be the same ever again. Lazy Sunday changed the show for the better as it gave SNL a much needed momentum after three disappointing seasons. It inspired Lorne Michaels to embrace digital content and solidify the show as part of the internet age. This is why I call this 7 to 8 year period the digital short era because of its importance to the show’s history. it would also lead to michaels to hiring new cast members who were popular on the internet (like Beck and Kyle who were from good neighbor whose videos even made it to college humor). Lazy Sunday also helped put a little known video site called Youtube on the map. The week the sketch aired, the website’s traffic was up by 83% and the video had 5 million viewers by the end of 2005. This all helped YouTube gain mainstream attention and it led to them being bought by Google in 2006 for a billion dollars. Today Youtube is the second most viewed site in the world only behind google with more than 5 billion views a day and new content being uploaded every minute. the website now averages $14 billion in annual revenues for google and its parent company Alphabet. All of this wouldn’t have happen if it weren’t for Lazy Sunday and Saturday Night Live.
What a great episode–tons of classic stuff. I swear I watched this episode live, though, and I don’t remember that wind sketch–I agree it has an early ’90s feel to the proceedings.
Just like how I always link Seth-Amy in my mind, I also always link Jason-Kristen–the latter two had interesting chemistry both as young a-hole types but also as like slightly off middle-aged people. The A-Holes were arguably my favorite Wiig recurring piece–I wonder who wrote those sketches because at some point, they just abruptly stopped, even though I think they still had some mileage left. Having worked in office/reception jobs before, Wiig’s character is scarily accurate in terms of people who wandered in, looking for a bathroom or coffee or other irrelevant things.
I agree about your observation of SNL’s “twist endings,” which I almost never find funny. The current era does this a lot–I really hated, for example, how the Terrazano’s sketch with Ryan Gosling revealed at the end it was a Domino’s commercial.
I do feel bad for Finesse, but, sad to say, there isn’t much in his SNL tenure or post-SNL tenure to indicate that his talents were being truly wasted. SNL does have a poor track record with black cast members, though.
Eddie Murphy excepted which happened during Lorne’s five-year-hiatus…
Jason, Kristen, and John Lutz wrote the Two A-holes sketches. Lutz also wrote the Stuart Little commercial.
Black, Higgins, and Erik Kenward wrote the monologue.
James Anderson and Emily Spivey wrote the wind sketch.
I think the first half of Spelling Bee was a Forte “trunk piece” from Groundlings, wasn’t it?
Thanks for the information about the writers. Emily Spivey wrote several of those offbeat conceptual pieces – I guess that’s why we don’t get them much after she leaves.
It’s a shame Kristen and Jason went from working so heavily together to having separate spheres on the show by their later seasons. I find a lot of Kristen’s solo stuff and her stuff with Fred to be cold and at times actively alienating of the audience, even if that wasn’t intended (for her solo stuff, anyway). She and Jason have a much more vibrant connection to viewers, even in a sketch where they are both meant to play vacuous assholes.
I was just going to point that out, John. Funny how Kristen and Jason work together so much early on but barely interact at all after that until Wiig leaves in 2012
When I talked to Forte and Jorma at a live Q&A screening of the Macgruber movie a decade ago, they both told me that the spelling bee sketch and the first MacGruber runner were the first things they had to keep pitching at least five times before they each got on the air.
Mainly remember Johnny Knoxville, Christmastime for the Jews (funny how, among the “Seinfeld” cast, only Jerry and Jason Alexander had previously hosted “SNL” while Michael Richards was replaced by Nancy Kerrigan and this show’s alum Julia Louis-Dreyfus would eventually appear later in the season. Richards will probably never appear mainly because of a racist monologue he did years later…), Tina and Amy’s teasing 15-year-olds, Will’s incorrect spelling, and, of course, Lazy Sunday. I laughed a little but I was mostly impressed by how technically well done it was. It was Andy’s big break and it’s probably what Parnell will be most remembered for. For some reason, I don’t really remember Tracy Morgan’s appearance but if I ever watch the rerun, my memories will be reignited possibly. But too bad for Finesse because of that…
A game changer for sure.
Also, this episode feels like an unofficial end of the Tina Fey era .
Still a half season for her to go in charge but obviously the show was going in a new direction and vision
Lots of great things about this episode, and they’ve pretty much all already been said. But I had completely forgotten that the two a-holes also made their debut in the middle there. IMO they were the best recurring characters from this era. Wiig was so great when she first started out. I could have watched her and Sudeikis playing off each other forever, they had such amazing chemistry together in their primes.
Also, good riddance to the end of the Tina Fey era. She did so much damage to this franchise.
I found that 30 Rock was a good venue for Fey in that her excesses as a head writer (obsessive focus with dumb pop culture, especially TV, and lack of interest in slice-of-life, relatable things) didn’t hurt and were actually positives for that show.
Wiig was incredible from season 31 to 34 and then after that things took a turn. Her and Sudeikis were always great together though. I remember her farewell and how devastated he looked. You could tell they had a special bond as actors.
Even though the past few seasons turned to crap under Tina’s watch, I would say she did a lot of good too. She was the first female writer after all and she went to bat for many women writers and castmembers on the show. That’s an improvement on how women were treated in the early 90’s. Not to say she was an effective head writer overall though. The hacky pop-culture centered humour badly dated her era and she let a lot of shit on the air. Judging from 30 Rock and her alter-ego Liz Lemon, even she probably knew this.
All that is to say, she is a great writer who wrote some all time classics and she would go on to be one of my favourite hosts and an excellent sketch actor in her own right. Not to mention a certain political impression of hers…
Tina’s pushing for more female writers and cast members was definitely key to health of the show, which more than ever before her arrival had suffered from the idea of only three female cast members being deemed acceptable (imagine a Nancy Walls/Ana/Molly/Cheri group, maybe with Paula Pell thrown in too). And she’s also a good sketch writer and sketch performer. She had two (some would say three) good seasons as a headwriter. I think because her tenure is so overhyped and her Update has aged so horribly that it’s easier (I do that a lot myself…) to remember the more negative aspects, especially in terms of long-term effects on the show.
I think the media overhypes Tina’s actual tenure. Look at all time lists and she gets put in the top ten which is ridiculous! Everything they base for the ranking is also from AFTER she was an actual employee and you are right about her Update tenure John. So overhyped and has dated so badly. I think she really flourished after being on the show (30 Rock, Sarah Palin etc.)
Stooge do you have the West Coast live airing by chance? I have the East Cost/Central live airing (which I watched live) and there is a technical error going to commercial after Lazy Sunday. Instead of the SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE logo appearing on the video bumper, you see the lower third key for Kenan and Tracy’s WU commentary which quickly disappears and is replaced with Neal Young’s bumper photo. I don’t see this in your screen captures. All of this might be the reason you see the “Previously Recorded” disclaimer.
Was Horatio out this week? I didn’t see him in anything.
I’m always a sucker for the skating goodnights. Nice we got one in a transition season as it adds to the poignancy.
Jack Black’s only hosting gigs were all in the Fey era, but this is the one that does feel, as Strummer said above, like the shift from her era. His hosting style here feels markedly different from his last two, where, similar to many of the hosts of this era, he has some standout moments but also gets a lot of generic roles that he just makes his own. His performance here reminds me of the more dominant role hosts have played in other periods of the show (including the last few years). Pretty much everything he’s in feels like his voice and his style, whether it was intended that way or not. And his performances throughout are very strong and layered (especially in the Enemy Mine homage) without overshadowing the cast members. I’m sorry this was his last hosting stint. At least it was a fun way to go, and he has a fun MG stint coming up in the next season.
I thought I read that Will tried to get the spelling bee sketch on for years but I’m not sure. It’s just an absolute beauty, and also shows the bond Will had (and generally always had) with the audience – with some cast members it might have died as it tests them so much and they have to wait for that payoff. The wait is definitely worth it.
Christimastime with the Jews is a classic, and I’m glad it’s still repeated in the Best Of Christmas SNL even today. Seeing Darlene Love there singing with the band, which is sort of out of practice by 2005, makes it even better.
Lazy Sunday, what can you say that hasn’t already been said? I’ll just say that what I appreciate most about this is the passing-the-torch element with Andy and Chris. There had been rapping on SNL before, of course, some that sort of tried different things but quickly vanished (like the “Wrapping Rapping” bit with Damon and Danitra), but most of the time it was done in a way where the joke was the rapping was bad and silly (like Jim Belushi’s white guy raps), or hoary, hacky material (“Peace, We Outta Here”). Chris is the one who, unintentionally, first shifted that axis with his Update segments – he was a pretty good rapper and the joke was the surprise of that and contrasting his skills to his general image. With that shift, we were able to get to Andy, only with the rapping contrasted to his goofy, endearing “son’s best friend on a sitcom” type energy. The Lonely Island would have been a success somewhere, with or without SNL, but I don’t think they would have had as much of an opening with this segment without Chris. I’m glad they’ve continued to invite him back over the years. As SNL has grown older and more and more consumed with itself and its own history, we’ve had more and more of these moments of foreshadowing, most not planned, but this is probably the one that stays with me most.
Lonely Island was such a multi-faceted machine of musical and comedy material in those 7 years (even if I think some of the last 2-3 or so delved too much into celebrity cameos and just felt flavorless) that the show has never really replaced them, and seems to have wisely decided not to try. Instead their output is split into several different categories: the goofy or “weird” Internet comedy type of material (often with Kyle), the “adorable/sweet kid talking about silly things or focusing on pop culture of the moment” (Pete), and then the more genuine music element (Chris Redd gets that in the last few years). And there are also past digital shorts which wouldn’t have happened without Lonely Island paving the way, like the fun musical pieces in the early and mid ’10s (Do It On My Twin Bed, Backhome Ballers, Teacher Snow Day, etc.). I know the show had pre-tapes 20 years before the Lonely Island, under Ebersol, but I do think they had a key influence on Lorne’s embracing of the form, and that’s only become more and more true. So here’s to Akiva, Andy, and Jorma, for so much they did and they never could have imagined since.
Here is a Parnell interview not long after Lazy Sunday (they even point out all the tedious perv roles he played on SNL by this point).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdRXR5_gY50
And our next episode will have another host with far more involvement in SNL history than expected, and on top of that, Fly High Duluth – I could watch that one over and over (and have…).
The best episode after Ferrell left (up to that point) and maybe the best of the 2000s. This episode was a game-changer, and the beginning of the end for Tina Fey (come on guys, she had her moments), Horatio Sanz (for better), and Finesse Mitchell (or worse). Even the weaker sketches were just fine.
Like most of the comments already said, “Lazy Sunday” helped move Saturday Night Live into the 21st century and away from the post-Ferrell dreck.
In hindsight, the sketch is also a nice little time capsule of the mid-2000s.
Nerdcore rap, the use of flip phones, references to Yahoo! Maps, MapQuest, The Notebook and the Chronicles of Narnia, a film I have never seen, but will always remind me of this now-classic sketch.
We’ve reached the middle of the 31st season and the quality of the show has noticeably improved for the better after a meandering few years. Besides the addition of four strong featured players (the strongest group of new additions since maybe Carvey, Hartman, and Hooks arrived I’m comfortable with saying) the same core cast and writing staff from those meandering few years returned for another season.
In your opinion, what’s the general consensus for the upswing in quality?
I think it’s that Seth was concentrating more on writing, Tina was perhaps concentrating less (due to the baby), and the new additions not only breathed in fresh life to the writer’s room, they also gelled really well with some of the players who had been around for a while (Armisen, Amy, even Horatio). Even Darrell seems to have a little more interest compared to the past couple years. I do wish Parnell had been given more to do, though.
Here’s the original Awesometown version of the alien sketch if anyone wants to see it: https://youtu.be/eh2ld_Vt_eQ?t=304
The whole pilot’s worth a watch. Jack Black himself cameos in the opening sketch, so he must have been aware of, in not friendly with, the Lonely Island guys before they were on the show (I also think the show was a Channel 101 production, which is Dan Harmon’s production company, and Jack and Dan are friends and Jack had made stuff for the company before, so that’s probably how he got involved in the first place). Makes sense their breakthrough would be in his episode.
Maya has said before she was watching Two A-Holes live at home and immediately wanted to get back and play with Kristen.
@John, Will had submitted the Spelling Bee sketch 5 times before this episode. He said he thinks what got it through in this episode was that he gave the host something to do, as previously the sketch had always just been Forte and Parnell with no musical interlude. Glad it didn’t get picked until this episode, the song is such a great part of the sketch.
Backstory to the Appalachian ER sketch regarding Bill. Just before his entrance, Bill started experiencing a blinding, migraine with aura. Jason had to give him his line before going out as Bill could not see, also leading him on and off stage.
I really love hearing how sympathetic his mates were to Bill’s anxiety issues, and I love that Bill is so open about them.
Anyway, yea, this episode is a total all-timer, probably in the top 15 if not top 10 ever, and certainly one of the show’s most important. Few episodes are as definitive a sign post for a new era of the show.
I absolutely love the Sbarro’s sketch – I think I gave it a very high **** 1/2 when I first reviewed it. Not sure if I’d go quite as high today, but it’s still one of my favorite Dratch pieces.