Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
SNL SPECIAL REPORT
CSR likens Barack Obama vs. Hillary Clinton to black men vs. white women
— Chris Rock! Feels interesting seeing him in this SNL era. Also, him cameoing in a Julia Louis-Dreyfus-hosted episode is strangely fitting, given the fact that, much like Julia, Chris was a cast member for only three seasons, didn’t do much on the show and was overshadowed by certain others in the cast, yet still went on to huge fame afterwards.
— This cold opening was originally a Weekend Update commentary that Chris did in this episode’s dress rehearsal.
— Wow, that comment about Rudy Giuliani’s sanity level was awfully prescient.
— Chris is an absolute riot here, as expected. He’s so damn funny that he’s even getting laughs from potentially touchy comments about the horrible treatment black people used to suffer.
— Hilarious mention of George W. Bush at the end, regarding if America is ready for a black president.
STARS: ****½
MONOLOGUE
JLD blames media for clips that put her in a negative light
— Great to see Julia hosting again so soon after her first hosting stint.
— In the real-life clip of Julia winning an Emmy, former SNL cast member (and Julia’s husband) Brad Hall can be seen congratulating her (the second above screencap for this monologue). Feels kinda nice seeing him on SNL again after so many years, even in this capacity. (I think I heard he could be spotted in the audience of the previous JLD-hosted episode I covered in season 31, but I didn’t catch him.) In Julia’s next SNL monologue from season 41, she shows an old clip of herself from an 80s movie that she (and Brad) was in, and the clip features a decent amount of face time for Brad, and I remember it felt so odd but nice seeing such an obscure Ebersol-era cast member like Brad get THAT amount of face time in an SNL episode from 2016, even if it was just in a clip from an old movie.
— The cutaways to Julia in the audience at the Golden Globes are hilarious. Kinda feels like a spiritual successor to the Golden Globes sketch with Megan Mullally in season 29.
— A huge laugh from Julia’s crotch-flashing scene. That excessive amount of pubic hair especially caught me off-guard.
STARS: ****
OPRAH
(JLD) is a disciple of Rhonda Byrne’s (AMP) book The Secret
— Funny look for Amy here.
— Maya’s Oprah portrayal feels a lot more animated than usual here. Not sure I can say that’s a good thing.
— Julia has some funny lines, but her interview scene is kinda dragging for me.
— Kenan’s Darfur refugee character, when asked how he’s doing: “Well, you know….BAD.”
— Kenan’s portion of this sketch is almost singlehandedly saving this otherwise iffy sketch.
STARS: **½
MONEX
gold bug (KRW) uses Monex to amass her favorite precious metal
— Kristen’s character mentions that this Monex program can be bought on a brochure and VHS tape. Stuff was still being sold on VHS in 2007?
— The framed Goldie Hawn photo in the gold-filled room is a funny gag.
— The part with Kristen resorting to drinking orange juice while wishing she could drink gold is kind of a stretch, because wouldn’t she just get, say, champagne or apple juice if she wanted a gold-colored drink?
— Hmm. I can’t say this commercial is working much for me. A lot of this is just washing over me. I want to say Kristen is at least performing this well, but I’m not even sure how to feel about her performance here.
STARS: **
R.P.S.
(JLD)’s husband (JAS) blames Restless Penis Syndrome for his infidelity
— Funny subversion with Jason’s big reveal to Julia turning out to be him having Restless Penis Syndrome when you think he’s going to reveal he’s having an affair.
— I like Kenan randomly appearing in Jason and Julia’s bedroom as Jason’s doctor.
— Pretty funny turn with Bill doing a PSA for Restless Penis Syndrome right in front of the main characters, which a confused Julia then calls attention to.
STARS: ***½
LA RIVISTA DELLA TELEVISIONE CON VINNY VEDECCI
Vinny Vedecci’s argot foils monolingual JLD
— The debut of these La Rivista Della Televisione sketches, starring a character of Bill’s that debuted in an Italian hotel sketch from the preceding season’s Catherine Zeta-Jones episode.
— I probably said this in my review of the aforementioned Italian hotel sketch, but Bill’s fast-paced Italian gibberish is absolutely fantastic and sounds both funny and convincingly real.
— Funny cutaway to Fred as the producer and Will just silently sitting next to him while eating spaghetti and meatballs. I also like the back-and-forth arguing between Fred and Bill.
— Bill is a blast as this Vinny Vedecci character. And it still feels so rare at this point of Bill’s tenure to see him play the sole lead role in a sketch, so this is very refreshing.
— Great to see Bill work in his Kramer impression on SNL again. I also like him following it up with an intentionally-bad Jerry Seinfeld impression.
— The re-dubbed Old Christine clip is very funny.
— A lot of pretty fun nonsense at the end.
STARS: ****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “You’re All I Have”
WEEKEND UPDATE
Larry Seidlin’s (FRA) Justice Department commentary drifts to a zoo story
AMP drunk dials SEM after doing two shots for St. Patrick’s Day
— Oh no. An Update commentary from Fred as Judge Larry for THE SECOND DAMN EPISODE IN A ROW, and for no good reason this time. This was bad enough the first time.
— Ugh, tonight’s Judge Larry commentary is even more difficult to sit through than the first one, which is certainly saying something. The huge amusement the audience is getting from this makes me feel so lost.
— Okay, I did get a laugh just now from Fred-as-Judge-Larry’s mention of the monkeys “with the plastic asses”, but then even THAT got ruined by him proceeding to repeat it several times afterwards.
— Boy, this Judge Larry bit is so bad and endless. This feels kinda like an unfortunate precursor to Fred’s later, past-his-prime seasons, where he’s given so much free rein to waste all the airtime he wants with unfunny, meandering, self-indulgent bits.
— I love Seth’s Anne Frank joke, as well as his great ad-lib afterwards.
— The extended drunk bit with Seth and Amy is a little weird and much longer than the usual Seth/Amy interaction pieces. I’m not even sure if I like it or not.
STARS: ***
DEEP HOUSE DISH
(MAR), (AMP), (KRW) & (JLD) & (JAS) perform their hits
— Amy continues her streak of appearing as a different singer in every single Deep House Dish that has aired up to this point.
— Hmm, I notice the Kenan/Andy interactions in tonight’s Deep House Dish thankfully don’t have Kenan yelling the usual “Ooh-wee, T’Shane!”………..so far.
— Oh, I love the voice Julia’s using during her post-song interview. I’ve never heard her use that distinct voice before, nor did I know she was capable of talking like that.
— Hmm, a change of pace with Kenan’s character directing a special concerned message to the troubled Britney Spears (or, as Kenan’s character calls, “Britney Spurrs”).
— Oh, god. There goes the obligatory “Ooh-wee, T’Shane!”, after I gave them credit for not using it. At least they waited more than halfway into this sketch to unleash it on us.
— Jason is a blast during his musical performance, especially his dancing. Jason Sudeikis dancing = always fun to watch.
— Overall, slightly better than usual Deep House Dish sketches, even if that’s still faint praise from me.
STARS: **½
CBS CARES
unprofessional boom mic operator Jeff (JAS) bugs JLD during PSA taping
— Another big role tonight for the underused Bill Hader.
— The debut of these sketches with Jason as a douchey crew member and Bill as the director.
— A pretty good cheap laugh from Bill’s name being Mike Underballs.
— I love the negative tension between Jason and Julia. Jason has some great rude, uncalled-for remarks to Julia.
— I love how they keep playing the lighthearted CBS Cares jingle when each take gets ruined, which Bill’s eventually calls his sound crew out on.
— Whenever Bill angrily says the name of Jason’s character, Jeff, I absolutely love how he says it as “JYYYEEEEEEFFFFF!”
— Very funny reveal of the below-the-camera part of Julia’s body that Jason is immaturely placing the boom mic over during the final take.
STARS: ****
HOMEBOTS
lottery winners’ (JAS) & (JLD) robots (WLF) & (FRA) have sex & break down
— Yet another big role for Bill tonight. So glad to see SNL finally giving him lots of airtime for once. Jason’s been getting some pretty strong airtime himself tonight.
— Pretty funny chaos from Robot Will’s actions.
— A very funny and out-of-left field turn with the two robots mentioning their robot genitals when contemplating how Robot Will is going to repay Robot Fred.
— Some good laughs from Julia and Jason trying to start a casual, friendly conversation with a disturbed Bill and Kristen during the loud robot sex noises.
— I love the audience’s groaning over the fluid-y pop sound at the end of the robots’ sex before they break down.
— It feels like Julia has been making quite a number of light stumbles over her lines throughout tonight’s episode.
STARS: ***½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Chasing Cars”
THE SEARCH FOR THE NEXT DOLL
mildly talented (KRW), (MAR), (AMP) want to be the next Pussycat Doll
— The timing in this sketch feels off so far.
— I love the shot of Maya just staring at the camera while doing nothing during the “Not write songs” part advertised in this reality show promo.
— Maya, Amy, and Kristen are all getting some laughs here.
— Pretty funny how the claim-to-fame listed under Andy’s character’s name, McKenzie Jazz, just states “Nobody”. However, a technical error occurs where the graphic of Andy’s character’s name and claim-to-fame is accidentally displayed again for Kenan (as you can see in the last two above screencaps for this sketch). I remember this gaffe made me wonder back at this time in 2007 what Kenan’s character’s name was supposed to be, and whether he was playing a woman or an effeminate man. I had to wait until the NBC rerun of this episode God knows how many months later to find out that the “character” Kenan was playing is actually Lil’ Kim, who, as we know, is a real person. (Oh, that reminds me: Kenan In A Dress alert.) So that makes this YET ANOTHER female celebrity who Kenan has done a terrible and unfunny impression of.
STARS: ***
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— This episode started out strong with the cold opening and monologue, only to end up being an overall average episode. Not bad, and there were a few strong highlights, but the episode as a whole wasn’t all that memorable, and it pales in comparison to Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ fantastic season 31 episode.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Rainn Wilson)
a step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Peyton Manning
The process of companies stopping VHS releases took place at the end of 2006 (the last major studio release being New Line Cinema’s ” A History of Violence”), and while the releases were few and rare, there were a few VHS releases (a release of the Pixar film “Cars” released strictly by-request-only through the online Disney Movie Club, a very few amount of printings for the Fox film “Eragon”, and, though I am still looking for definitive proof, I do recall hearing the last US VHS release overall was a Peppa Pig video that year, although TVtropes claims it was Go Diego Go: Diego Saves Christmas at the end of the previous year.) And in Japan, they lasted through 2009 (the last release there believed to be “Inception”.)
That said, it may be just part of the joke- she wants to waste so little money on the ad, she chooses the pamphlet as the lowest amount of paper, and chooses the cheapest method of media at that point (or at least, what she seems the cheapest), compared to, say, rendering for a DVD or BluRay release. That’s how I choose to see the joke, even if it is not stated outright.
This a such a dumb, nothing observation, but something about this episode feels more like S33 than S32 to me. Bill’s extended airtime, Vinny Vedecci, JEFF!, and The Search for the Next Doll give off that vibe. It might also be because you can see the beginnings of Fred getting self-indulgent, which I associate more with S33 when he introduces Nic Fehn, a character that nearly everyone but me seems to despise.
They burned through a lot of Deep House Dish this season. I don’t dislike it as much as other Anderson sketches, but there wasn’t enough meat on that bone to bring it back so many times. They always come off like he had a ton of different ideas for songs, but none of them were strong enough to stretch into a full-length music video sketch. “OOH-WEE, T-SHANE” definitely gets stuck in the brain, though.
I didn’t know Julia and Brad were married.
They weren’t married when they were in the cast together, but they were dating at the time (they married in 1987, two years after Julia left the show)
My take on the Monex commercial is that it’s such a superficial come-on, Kristen Wiig uses the most spurious connections to gold – see Goldie Hawn during her extended break from acting. Also, the use of the brochure and VHS might be a play on infomercials using the same commercial for years on end, given the “no better time than when this commercial airs” sales pitch. Of course, this over-analyzes an excuse for Wiig to draw out GOHHHHLD a lot.
Given all the puns, I wonder if Colin Jost wrote this. The parody itself is based on a commercial that ran at the time during the peak of Ron Paul fever, probably on CNBC, which also provided Kristen’s upcoming Suze Orman impression. I have a feeling Kristen just loved saying “gold” in that voice over and over and they ran with it.
It seemed like the live audience wasn’t feeling the “Gold” commercial except for the Goldie Hawn gag.
The original cold opening was a straight to camera Bush speech about Darfur which devolves into him talking about what happened in the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament.
This starts a trend of three out of the last four presidential terms where SNL kinda just runs out of steam on an impression (2nd term Bush, 2nd term Obama, and now Trump) and this upcoming election isn’t any better because it’s either find a new Trump or find a regular Biden impressionist which is easier said than done because last season SNL treated the Biden impression like KFC treats casting Colonel Sanders in it’s commercials.
I won’t be surprised if Baldwin keeps staying (hopefully we won’t have to worry about that…), but Jost said in a recent interview they will try harder to write for Biden this next season. I liked the revolving impression aspect, but if they find the right actor (if Sudeikis can’t return or if they actually decide to use their cast) and the writing improves, I won’t mind…
With a few exceptions, I think political material on SNL is better when we don’t have to see the President that much; certainly in this period I can’t name many times past 2002 that seeing W helped with the comedy. It’s almost painful seeing Sudeikis wasted in these cold opens – I think he has about 5-6 and if this one had gone through it would have been another slog to nowhere.
I have such a hard time imagining Chris Rock’s commentary appearing in THIS era of Update. Can you picture transitioning from Rock blistering through that stuff about white women to Amy being in full hee-hee-haa-haa please-like-me-I’m-adorable mode?
For me Rock’s style is, like Sandler’s, at home in the more ramshackle eras and/or eras with sprawling mutated casts. It’s a bit surreal to see him at all in this streamlined period.
I do not remember this episode well–I completely have blanked out on a lot of the sketches, yet I remember some vividly, such as the CBS Cares, Vinny Vedecci, etc. I’m glad JLD got to host twice in rapid order, but I am amused that her most prolific period for hosting was when she was on the mild hit Old Christine and not Seinfeld (0 times) or Veep (just once, I think).
The Jeff/Mike Underballs characters were amusing enough–I don’t think they needed to be brought back, but the LeBron James appearance is probably my favorite, as there’s some real sizzle to Jeff’s mockery.
Not that it really matters, but the timing for the second stint is interesting, as Old Christine took a ratings hit after it was moved from a cushier timeslot and renewal wasn’t assured. Her first hosting stint was so good she didn’t even really “need” another to exorcise old SNL demons, so coming back so quickly for her show (complete with a clip prominently used in a sketch) would make more sense to me if it was to help get her show closer to syndication sales. Whatever the reason, I’m glad she did.
It certainly felt that JLD was going to become a regular host in the rotation at this time but she doesn’t host again for nine years
Ah, Chasing Cars, the song used for every sad TV montage and heartbreaking Youtube fanvid.
Above all else this is a great episode to show all the different talents Sudeikis brought to the cast. We get some fun dancing in Deep House Dish, peak douchebag comedy in the CBS Cares sketch, and another great turn in the “Restless Penis Syndrome” sketch. He has to play a guy who shamelessly works up an elaborate lie to justify his cheating to his wife, yet can’t be such an obvious oily pig that the whole thing becomes impossible to buy. One of the very, very few guys in the cast over the years who could have made this premise work so well. Many would have played it too bro-ish, or too condescending, or too distant – I think only John Belushi at his best could have hit all the beats as well as Jason did. It’s very hard to find a guy who can play so many layers as effortlessly as Jason could.
(is it me or did that sketch remind anyone else of something that would have been done in the Ebersol era?)
Other than, of all things, Deep House Dish, Julia gets nothing that takes her out of a safe range, but she plugs along and helps make for a very solid, easy to enjoy episode. The one exception for me is that Oprah sketch, as Maya is just about intolerable and the whole thing is material Mad TV already did better (Oprah not caring about her guests).
Along with the Jake Gyllenhaal edition, this is fairly easily the best Deep House Dish – the songs are all good-to-great, and the interviews are all entertaining. Seeing JLD cast against type as a ridiculous diva figure, the spat between Jason’s character and “T-Shane,” etc. And while they had to add a joke afterward, it was nice to see James Anderson put in some supportive words for Britney Spears – I was never a big big fan, then or now, but the crass treatment the show gave her in these years feels very small to me (especially since they’d been happy enough to have her on multiple times at her peak of fame). These sketches never rise above “better than expected” but in the end I’d probably still put them above a number of other pieces from this era of the show.
The best I can say about Fred’s mugfest this time is I enjoyed it more than the one in the previous episode. And you can see one of the first real cracks in Seth’s flip persona with the reaction to the Anne Frank joke (it’s not even a bad reaction, from him or the audience…but you can tell deep down he doesn’t ever want to get too into button-pushing). The drunk dialing segment is, well it’s OK, but as with that fart joke segment earlier this season I’m confused about the placement. This would have been a better piece to end Update on, surely.
Vinny Vedecci is my favorite Bill Hader recurrer, so I’m glad these talk show sketches worked so well from the off. Perfect timing and back-and-forth, and even use of cast in supporting roles. It is a bit odd seeing Maya in her version of the role Bobby Moynihan would so memorably play, but she’s more than fine.
I’m sorry Julia didn’t host more in the interim between 2007 and 2016, but at least all her appearances are good to very good and hopefully the same will be true if she ever pops up again.
Promos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-WTMqJpnUY
It would be better if they someone in their cast do a Trump, or bring in someone else, instead of Baldwin. His impression is just getting tiring, and is not as good as 16-17.
I would also like to see a slimmed-down size for the cast for next season given how the show will likely (and unfortunately) continue to rely on celebrities and former cast members to make cameo appearances to take up airtime.
They will have to do most cameos for people who aren’t NY-based via extensive pre-tape, so hopefully that will cut those down (and sans audience we won’t have endless applause breaks at the sight of everyone from Steve Martin to Pamela Sue Martin).
I’m trying to imagine anyone giving applause breaks to Pamela Sue Martin these days…
Hello SNL Lover. IF You are talking about 2020, OR even last Fall which was 2019, They were NOT Just Filling Up Air ! They had Debates and The Impeachment Hearings ! ! IF you are Talking about 2007, Then, that’s Different ! Jody
Suds and Hader are all over this episode, and for Hader this was a badly needed breakout show. On the flip side, I saw some of Maya and Fred’s hammiest work up to this point. Another show where Darrell was totally AWOL, too.
Very little could top Rainn/Fire, but this episode was just fine.
Nice to have seen Julia do a few different characterizations from her previous first stint back though that first stint back was still a little better. And Chris Rock’s commentary was a great way to start the show! Oh, and loved the first “La Rivista Della Televisione”
This is tonight’s Vintage repeat.
Well, now I know why that tree frog joke is so significant in Seth’s Weekend Update. He’s either interrupted or distracted after having an argument with Stefon.
Why didn’t any female cast members appear onstage for the end of the show farewell? It appears like a guy asks a surprised looking Chris Rock. And it looks like Rock says “I don’t know.” They must have been boycotting something. The musical guest maybe? I couldn’t find any info online.