February 16, 2013 – Christoph Waltz / Alabama Shakes (S38 E14)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

CARNIVAL CRUISE SHIP TRIUMPH
Carnival Triumph crew members try to buoy spirits during dire cruise

— Refreshing to see two consecutive episodes with a non-political cold opening.
— Jason and Cecily (interesting pairing, by the way) are great as the overly cheery crew members desperately attempting to lift everybody’s spirits during this troubled cruise.
— Jay’s “There’s dookies on the walls!” outbursts during his mental breakdown is very funny.
— Good bit regarding the unfortunate stories Jason and Cecily read from the newspaper.
— I love Kenan’s off-camera yell of “Turn us all into chickens!”
— Hilarious bit with Bobby’s monkey having gotten eaten, inducing an absolutely priceless emotional outburst from Bobby.
— Even Fred’s over-the-top performance is perfect here, as is the eventual reveal that he’s the ship’s captain.
— Very strong cold opening overall. One of my favorite cold openings of this season.
STARS: ****½

OPENING MONTAGE
— As usual, the cast announcements are done by a pre-recorded Don Pardo (he officially stopped announcing live after season 35). However, by the time we get to the musical guest/host announcements tonight, Don’s voice is suddenly replaced by the voice of Bill Hader imitating him (and not very well) for the remainder of the opening montage. Very sloppy. Did SNL seriously expect us NOT to notice the sudden drastic, jarring change in announcer voices during the last quarter of the opening montage? Why didn’t they just have Bill do the announcements for the entire montage instead of just the musical guest and host portion?
— The reason for Don’s absence tonight is because he injured himself at his home (I think I recall hearing he fell down the stairs). This injury puts him out of work for this and the following two episodes.

MONOLOGUE
host weathers German characters & sings “Smile, Darn Ya, Smile!” variant

— A funny “Who’s on first?” spoof from Kate and Bobby’s German stereotype characters.
— I love Taran’s walk-on as Casual Hitler.
— Christoph Waltz, just now: “Just let me sing a song.” Me: (*groan*) And after a somewhat promising first half of this monologue, too.
— Ironic how the last two episodes prior to this, which were both hosted by singers (Adam Levine, Justin Bieber), didn’t have a musical monologue, but tonight’s actor-hosted episode does have one.
— Ugh, and here comes several cast members playing backup dancers, one of my least favorite tropes of a typical musical monologue, which itself is one of my least favorite tropes.
STARS: **½

WHAT HAVE YOU BECOME?
game show contestants win painful self-awareness

— Awkward audio gaffe when the sound of an audience shouting the game show’s title doesn’t play until the “come!” part of “What Have You Become!”
— Good premise for a game show sketch.
— I love Aidy initially going against the premise of this game show by not having the required emotional breakdown when asked “What have you become?”, then suddenly having the emotional breakdown after the happy facade she puts on. You know, until covering this season, I had remembered Aidy having a slightly rough and invisible first season, though with some flashes of promise here and there. The summer after this season ended, there were even some online SNL fans who said they wouldn’t be surprised if Aidy didn’t make it to the next season. (Imagine an alternate universe in which Aidy ended up a one-season wonder and Tim Robinson is currently in his 9th season as a cast member, as of 2020.) But re-watching this season lately, I’ve been discovering that 1) aside from the first few episodes, Aidy hasn’t been struggling for airtime anywhere near as much as I had remembered, and 2) there’s been a lot of really good moments from her where she already feels kinda fully-formed. Maybe part of that is hindsight, knowing the solid cast member she’d go on to be after having her breakout season the following year (which is where I originally started really liking her, particularly after that Cartoon Catchphrase game show sketch from that season’s Kerry Washington episode).
— Solid turn with an elderly relative of each contestant being brought out to question them further.
— There’s that always-funny Cowardly Lion-esque deep-voiced crying from Bill in yet another sketch.
— Yet another great turn in this sketch, with Christoph having a reflection of his own life after Aidy sternly asks him what has he become. I also love Christoph’s imitation of his mother insisting on him becoming a game show host.
STARS: ****

PAPAL SECURITIES
Papal Securities gives Pope Benedict (host) exclusive retirement advice

— Good casting of Christoph here.
— Funny shot of Christoph-as-the-Pope’s groceries falling through the bottom of his grocery bags.
— I love the “No other testimonials available” part while the camera just shows an empty chair.
— Fun montage of Christoph as the Pope happily doing everyday things.
— An overall quiet but solid and well-done little commercial.
STARS: ****

TIPPY
at a party, Tippy (NAP) fails to get in sync with conversational rhythm

— As I mentioned in my review of the season 21 Laura Leighton episode (link here), Nasim would later do a sketch that feels suspiciously similar to the Party sketch that Cheri Oteri starred in (as a now-obscure character named Roberta) in that Leighton episode. Well, we’ve now arrived at the Nasim sketch in question. Also, odd how this is the second consecutive episode in which Nasim reminds me of Cheri, as Nasim gave a rather Oteri-esque performance in the preceding episode’s Principal Frye sketch.
— As I’m watching this sketch now, I’m not finding it to be quite as similar to Cheri’s Party sketch as I used to feel. The structure and format of both sketches are basically the same, but, aside from the social awkwardness, the characterization Nasim’s using for her Tippy character here is different enough from Cheri’s Roberta. In fact, this Tippy character feels far more like an adult version of Nasim’s own Bedelia character.
— Despite how derivative and one-note this character feels, Nasim has some funny lines throughout this sketch, and she’s always really good at playing characters like this.
STARS: ***

DJESUS UNCROSSED
Quentin Tarantino’s latest movie has Biblical revenge

— A classic.
— I love how the cross tied to Djesus’ back actually adds to his badass look and demeanor.
— Such a fantastic and ballsy premise, and excellent execution of it.
— Fred: “(*exclaiming in an aghast manner*) Jesus H. Christ!” Djesus: “The ‘h’ is silent. (*proceeds to immediately split Fred’s head open in half with one clean swipe of his sword*)”
— An absolutely spot-on and well-done parody of violent Quentin Tarantino movies.
— Djesus: “When you get to heaven, say hi to my dad.”
— One of the critic reviews we’re shown: “I never knew how much Jesus used the n-word.”
STARS: *****

NOW IS THE TIME FOR A TICKLE FIGHT, HE HE!
sexy singing sibling trio comprises (KET), (JAP), dorky & adopted (host)

— Christoph is very fun as the out-of-place third JaMarcus brother.
— Some laughs from how the listed-off song titles make it obvious which of the JaMarcus brothers came up with which.
— Throughout this sketch, Kenan is clearly very amused by Christoph’s performance.
— The “He He!” at the end of the CD title that’s revealed towards the end of the sketch made me laugh.
— Solid ending line, with Taran’s slyly-delivered “I couldn’t get a boner right now if I tried.”
STARS: ***½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Hold On”

WEEKEND UPDATE
State Of The Union rebuttal redux finds Marco Rubio (TAK) still thirsty

Olya Povlatsky (KAM) wishes she’d been hit by the Chelyabinsk meteor

Stephen A. Smith (JAP) claims personal insight into the Lakers’ prospects

— The exaggeratedly gaspy, dry voice Taran’s Marco Rubio suddenly speaks in when in need of water is absolutely PRICELESS.
— Taran’s commentary continues to be a very funny spoof of Marco Rubio’s infamous rebuttal speech from that week.
— Taran is so damn good here. As I said about some other Taran-starring things before, I remember it was stuff like this that made me so excited at the time for Taran to be the future of SNL, as I was under the impression back then that he’d go on to eventually carry the show as the Will Ferrell-esque leader of the cast.
— The debut of Kate’s Olya Povlatsky. I’m kinda surprised to see this, as I misremembered this character debuting the following season.
— Kate is solid in her performance as this character, and has some good lines.
— Meh, Kate’s Olya Povlatsky commentary is now devolving into jokes about her country being years behind on American pop culture, a tired, overused, and hacky SNL trope.
— Seth’s interjections during the Povlatsky commentary are quite annoying. At one point, he also noticeably reacted too early to an answer she gave him.
— Blah, another Stephen A. Smith commentary. Didn’t care for this the first time.
— Shortly after reviewing the previous Stephen A. Smith commentary that Jay did earlier this season, I actually checked out a few YouTube clips of the real Stephen A. Smith (I’m more familiar with him as just a frequently-used meme nowadays), and he really does go off on over-the-top screamy rants like this. However, that doesn’t automatically make Jay’s imitation funny. (In fact, I find Smith’s actual rants funnier.) And these commentaries that Jay does as him are way too one-note.
— I did get a chuckle just now from the way Jay said, during an aside to Seth, “–by professional terrorists…or dominatrix, you know, you know.”
— There goes Jay’s penchant for both flubbing his lines AND cracking up at himself.
STARS: ***

LOVING COUPLE
(host)’s friends find his affectionate new girlfriend Regine off-putting

— (*sigh*) All I’ve got to say about initially seeing the return of Fred’s absolutely dreadful Regine character is that there’s thankfully only three more months this season until Fred finally gets the hell off the show.
— This sketch is using the exact same straight men from the previous Regine sketch (Bill, Vanessa, Aidy, and Tim), yet they all act like this is the first time they’re meeting Regine. It’s always a pet peeve of mine when recurring sketches in the late 2000s/early 2010s years do stuff like this, such as how the same straight men characters that appear in every single one of Kristen Wiig’s Sexy Shana sketches always act like they haven’t already been through what they’re experiencing from her.
— Ugh, cue the usual “Watch her face while I (insert sensual action here)” bits, which, as I said in my review of the first installment of this sketch, are just an excuse for Fred to obnoxiously mug in the worst way possible and try to crack up his scene partners, mainly Bill.
— A rare instance of breaking from Vanessa (who notably was the only performer to keep a straight face in the Super Showcase sketch from the preceding season’s Maya Rudolph episode.)
— Ugh, now cue the other trademark of this sketch. with Fred spreading his legs and letting us see up his skirt, which has actually become a trademark for Fred’s drag roles in general lately.
— Aaaaaand now cue our usual season 38 instance of Fallon/Sanz-esque self-indulgent cracking up between Fred and Bill. Yeah, just end this mess of a sketch already before my brain melts completely.
STARS: *

FOX & FRIENDS
Barack Obama is panned while Ted Nugent (BIH) is acclaimed

— Very unusual how this recurring sketch is airing so late in the show. The same thing happened in the preceding episode, where the Miley Cyrus Show sketch was surprisingly buried fairly late in the show. Back at this time in 2013, I took these things as one of many signs that SNL was (refreshingly) trying to downplay recurring sketches this season.
— Bobby’s Brian Kilmeade, on why he didn’t watch the State Of The Union address: “There was a bee in my apartment, and it turned into this whole thing, so…”
— A good laugh from the fake “hidden message” in the backwards-played video clip from Obama’s State Of The Union.
— Pretty funny bit from Bill’s Ted Nugent on how to spot a crazy person. The rest of his interview, however, isn’t standing out much to me.
— Bobby’s Kilmeade: “One time in fifth grade, I ate a seahorse. They still won’t let me back into THAT aquarium.”
— I’m not 100% sure, but I think I recall hearing Fred’s role was played by Christoph in dress rehearsal. With Christoph not being in the live version of this sketch, that makes this a rare post-2010 sketch that doesn’t have the host in it.
— Didn’t they already use “Bruno Mars is from Earth” in a list of fact corrections in a previous Fox & Friends sketch?
STARS: ***½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Always Alright”

SECRET ADMIRER LETTER
(CES) misses obvious signs co-worker (host) is her creepy secret admirer

— Christoph looks so Christopher Walken-esque here (I swear I remember once seeing Walken in that exact same wig/glasses combo during a sketch), and even the voice, foreign accent, and delivery he’s using sounds just like a character voice Walken would use in a sketch.
— A very solid straight man performance from Cecily here.
— Christoph, to Kenan, on one of the creepy things Cecily received: “Ben, I’m looking at you on this one.” Kenan: “And I’m lookin’ right back at you, buddy.”
— I’m really liking this Walken-esque creepy, oddball character for Christoph. I wish he was utilized in that type of role more often tonight, given the potential he had to be a Walken/John Malkovich/Steve Buscemi-type “lovable creep” host in general.
STARS: ****

GOODNIGHTS

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A (mostly) consistent episode, and the first solid episode of the 2013 half of this season. A very welcome sight after this was preceded by two mediocre episodes with less-than-stellar non-actor hosts. Aside from that Regine dreck and the second half of the monologue, every single segment tonight worked for me, and several of them were strong, one being an all-time favorite of mine (Djesus Uncrossed).

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

RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Djesus Uncrossed
Carnival Cruise Ship Triumph
Papal Securities
What Have You Become?
Secret Admirer Letter
Fox & Friends
Now Is The Time For A Tickle Fight, He He!
Tippy
Weekend Update
Monologue
Loving Couple

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Justin Bieber)
a big step up

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Kevin Hart