Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
60 MINUTES
Barack Obama (JAP) gives examples of the online savvy of ISIS
— Some mild laughs here and there, but this cold opening is mostly dragging. Feels like the typical tepid, dull, overly-talky political humor that Jim Downey used to regularly write in his past-his-prime later years at SNL, even though he officially left the show over a year before this. (He was credited as a guest writer in the preceding episode this season, which had a cut-after-dress-rehearsal Obama cold opening that tonight’s different Obama cold opening has repurposed some lines for, but Downey’s not credited as a guest writer in this episode.)
— Overall, this season so far is 0-for-2 in good cold openings.
STARS: **
OPENING MONTAGE
— The overhead shot of 30 Rockefeller Plaza with the G.E. sign in plain view (first screencap below), which was shown between the musical guest and host portions of this new opening montage in the preceding week’s season premiere, has been replaced tonight with a long shot of New York City (second screencap below). I recall hearing that the reason for this change is because of a G.E./Comcast sign changeover at 30 Rock.
— I forgot to mention this in my review of the preceding episode when bringing up the fact that Darrell Hammond has taken over as SNL’s new announcer, but Darrell’s announcing sounds very low-key in these early episodes compared to how he would sound in later seasons. I remember some online SNL fans back at this time saying Darrell’s announcing is too unexciting. I assume that, at some point, someone at SNL must’ve had a talk with Darrell, telling him he needs to up the energy.
MONOLOGUE
SAS sits on audience member’s lap & takes questions from her younger self
— Some pretty funny jokes from Sarah Silverman in the first few minutes of this monologue, and I loved the cue card bit, but I’m even more excited by the great turn this has now taken with Sarah actually going into the audience and sitting in an audience member’s lap while having a conversation with her. I know that this audience member must be a plant, but this is being executed perfectly, as the back-and-forths between Sarah and her are actually coming off very natural, and Sarah has fantastic remarks to what the audience member says. This is also a fun use of Sarah’s usual laid-back style.
— Ah, there’s Sarah finally mentioning her previous stint as an SNL featured player. Initially, it was kinda disappointing that she didn’t bring it up at the beginning of this monologue, but now we see she was saving it for this portion of the monologue.
— Oh, I absolutely LOVE this sequence with Sarah taking questions from clips of herself as an audience member in season 19’s frequent questions-from-the-audience monologues, made even funnier by how 2014 Sarah is playing it completely straight by giving a serious answer to 1993/94 Sarah’s specific questions that are comically shown out of their original context (e.g. her “Are you going to be doing a solo album now that you’ve left Wilson Phillips?” question originally asked to Rosie O’Donnell, and her “What did you feed the dinosaurs?” question originally asked to Jeff Goldblum). I also find it interesting seeing the 20-year difference in both SNL’s visual quality and Sarah’s looks. I’m amazed at how little Sarah has aged in 20 years.
— Aw, a missed opportunity not to include a clip of Sarah from Charlton Heston’s season 19 questions-from-the-audience monologue, where Sarah is dressed as an ape (screencap a little below) and asks Heston, “Are you some kind of talking mu-tant?” Imagine how truly hilarious it would’ve been to see a clip of that being shown out of context in this 2014 monologue. And I would’ve loved to have seen 2014 Sarah’s serious answer to the “Are you some kind of talking mu-tant?” question.
— Overall, this is one of my personal favorite monologues from recent years.
STARS: *****
THE FAULT IN OUR STARS 2: THE EBOLA IN OUR EVERYTHING
(TAK)’s love for (SAS) is tested by Ebola
— A great reveal that the illness the lead female character in this Fault In Our Stars sequel has is Ebola. Taran’s reaction to that reveal is hilarious.
— Lots of solid scenes between Sarah and Taran after the Ebola reveal.
— Funny Terrance Howard impression from Kenan.
— Given our current times, the then-topical Ebola premise still comes off rather relatable to today.
STARS: ****
HEAVEN
in Heaven, just-arrived Joan Rivers (SAS) roasts other dead celebrities
a photo of Joan Rivers marks her passing
— A promising concept and setting, having the then-recently-deceased Joan Rivers give a comedy roast of other dead celebrities.
— Funny cutaways to Bobby as a hysterically-laughing Ben Franklin.
— Interesting seeing Adam Levine and Kyle sitting next to each other here, as I’ve always noticed somewhat of a facial resemblance between them.
— Yikes, Sarah is stumbling over her punchlines left and right throughout this sketch, which is hurting a lot of the humor, given the fact that she has most of the comedic lines in this sketch.
— I’m not crazy about Kate’s Lucille Ball impression. She seems really miscast in this role.
STARS: **
WHITES
whites will enjoy time remaining until they’re dethroned by demographics
— The recently-demoted-from-the-cast Mike O’Brien casually appearing with the rest of the cast in this. I’m guessing he wrote this commercial himself.
— Speaking of appearing with the rest of the cast, Sarah is blending in well with the cast here, as if she was back to being a cast member again.
— A hilarious and biting concept.
— During the whites’ expressed desire for “four more white presidents”, Beck gets a great laugh with his lighthearted “Even if they have to be girls.”
— I love the part with the voice-over saying “It’s all yours, Mexicans!” while we see an again-lighthearted Beck acting like he’s going to hand a Mexican man a globe, only to playfully yank it away from, then puts his arm around the Mexican man’s shoulder in a friendly manner.
— Overall, perfect execution of this brilliant premise. If this was indeed a Mike O’Brien-written piece, then he has succeeded once again with yet another fantastic pre-tape.
STARS: *****
FORGOTTEN TV GEMS
backstabbing is absent from Supportive Women soap opera
— A rare non-Cinema Classics appearance from Kenan’s Reese De’What character. Also a rare glasses-less appearance from him.
— The usual funny story from Kenan’s De’What about a rude thing he once told his wife.
— Pretty funny kind-hearted twist that Cecily and Sarah’s initially-tense soap opera scene takes.
— Taran’s basically playing the same type of “straight man character making an uncomfortable face” role he played in the Ebola commercial earlier tonight.
— The second and third scene in this sketch is basically repeating the basic joke of the first scene, but the execution is okay, especially the third scene.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Animals”
WEEKEND UPDATE
Al Sharpton (KET) has ideas to counteract Secret Service ineptitude
COJ & MIC each identify phrases that are inappropriate for them to use
to feminist musical duo Garage (KAM) & Her (SAS), everything is “a woman”
— Ah, the very first time that a Jost/Che Update features one of the anchors going off on a stand-up-style rant about a news story after delivering a traditional Update joke about said story. That’s one of my absolute favorite aspects of the Jost/Che era of Update, and Michael’s rant here is very good.
— Michael’s delivery of general Update jokes, while still not at the familiar stage it would eventually go on to be, is getting closer and closer to it tonight.
— The usual “Kenan’s Al Sharpton misreads something” gags, but sue me, it always gets a cheap chuckle from me.
— Like Michael, Colin’s Update delivery is also improving and getting closer and closer to the delivery we’re now familiar with.
— Honestly, I was pushing it in my last review prior to this, where I proudly declared that the jokes in the inaugural Jost/Che Update thankfully don’t have that corny, tame Seth Meyers feel from the last few seasons of Update. I think I was just overexcited by the new feel of that inaugural Jost/Che Update in general that it blinded me to any Seth similarities in the jokes. However, even if it is true that some of that Seth Meyers influence has carried over into a lot of the jokes in these early-era Jost/Che Updates (a carry-over that thankfully wouldn’t last forever, as we know now, as Colin and Michael would gradually develop their own style of jokes over time), to me, Colin and Michael’s delivery is selling them so much better than Seth’s delivery ever did.
— Much like his “and all the ass” punchline about Derek Jeter’s MLB career stats in the preceding episode’s Update, Michael’s hilarious punchline about Jimmy Carter snorting peanut dust off a hooker’s ass is an early instance of what would go on to be known as a trademark Che-like joke.
— Ah, our very first interaction piece between Colin and Michael, with Colin asking Michael if it’s okay for him to say words like “bae” and “in da club”. This is a solid segment, especially Michael using “Thank you for your help, officer” as an example of things black people can’t say, and him telling Colin he ruined the term “cray-cray” for everybody.
— Good to see Sarah appearing with a current cast member in an Update commentary, once again making Sarah come off like she’s a cast member once again.
— Meh, Sarah and Kate’s song is falling kinda flat for me.
STARS: ***½
RIVER CRUISE
(CES), (SAZ), (SAS) are stuck doing “Proud Mary” on a Nebraska steamboat
— Oh, here’s a sketch would gain notoriety right after its original airing. There were huge accusations from some Groundlings comedians that SNL stole this sketch from them almost entirely verbatim without permission, and an online video of the original Groundlings version of the sketch was offered as full proof that, yes, this SNL sketch was indeed plagiarized. I believe it would be revealed that the culprits of this plagiarism were James Anderson and/or Kent Sublette (can’t remember if it was just one of them or both), both of whom I believe are Groundlings alums and are also two of my absolute least favorite writers in SNL history (the latter of which I’ve certainly made no secret of in my reviews). IIRC, this Sarah Silverman episode would also never get an NBC re-airing, and there’s been speculation on SNL boards that the reason for that is possibly because of the controversy over the plagiarism of this sketch. (Then again, I think I recall that this episode in general was pretty poorly-received by SNL fans at the time, so that might also have something to do with the lack of an NBC rerun.)
— And in case there was any doubt that this is indeed a James Anderson and/or Kent Sublette sketch, the writing style of Kenan’s opening speech is FILLED with known Anderson-isms, especially Kenan happily exclaiming “Yerm!” instead of “Yum!” Silly word substitutions in the style of “yerm” or “cornel of kern” (the latter being from a season 44 Steve Carell sketch that infamously went horribly awry) have been a staple of James Anderson-written sketches for years.
— Good to see Sasheer finally getting a lead role after being horribly underused in the season premiere and being overshadowed by the not-yet-a-cast-member Leslie Jones, but damn, why does it have to be in this, of all sketches?
— Blah, the mid-song stories from each of the ladies are all falling flat with me so far.
— I do kinda like Sarah’s “90 months” bit just now, but it’s not enough to get a laugh from me, and the rest of her story is falling just as flat with me as the other ladies’ stories are.
— Oof, the audience is absolutely DEAD during practically this whole sketch, and I don’t blame them one bit.
— There’s Kenan doing his Deandre Cole entrance dance from the What Up With That sketches.
— Overall, this was AWFUL. Anderson and/or Sublette really had to resort to stealing this weak material?!? That’s fucking sad, and just furthers the ire I’ve always had towards those two as writers. And history has shown that those two are perfectly capable of writing horrible sketches on their own without resorting to plagiarism.
STARS: *
HOME FROM VACATION
in a car, (BOM)’s surprise proposal to (SAS) goes awry; Adam Levine cameo
— Hilarious reveal of a shocked Bobby slowly rising from behind the backseat of the car immediately after overhearing Sarah’s confession to Taran that she cheated on Bobby, then we get another hilarious reveal right afterwards that Bobby happens to have an open engagement ring box in his hand, as he was planning on springing a surprise proposal on Sarah.
— I love Bobby’s angry delivery of “Gross! You grew?!? Shut your mouth!”
— All the surprise twists, as well as the way some portions of this sketch are intentionally being played in an uncomfortable manner, are reminiscent of that excellent and underrated Wedding sketch from the preceding season’s Andrew Garfield episode. Much like that Wedding sketch, this appears to be a Chris Kelly/Sarah Schneider-written piece. I notice that a number of Kelly/Schneider sketches around this time are great at having lots of surprise twists, such as their fantastic Cartoon Catchphrase sketch from the preceding season’s Kerry Washington episode.
— Pretty funny sequence with how all the radio stations that Taran turns to are playing songs about cheating in a relationship, even if that gag feels a little cliched.
— Hmm, Adam Levine’s entrance, which was supposed to a funny appearing-out-of-nowhere gag, came off awkwardly-executed.
— More great angry line deliveries from Bobby.
— Ugh, in addition to how awkward his entrance came off, Adam Levine’s delivery of some of his lines is weak, reminding me of what a bad and unlikable host I found him to be back in season 38.
— Pretty funny gag with Levine getting hit by a truck off-camera and then flying over the hood of the car. The little “Whoooa!” heard from him as a dummy of his body is thrown over the car hood somehow added to the humor.
— Something about the whole “Let’s all go to Pizza Hut!” conversation the characters have at the conclusion of this sketch really rubbed me the wrong way. Feels like SNL was going out of their way to shill for Pizza Hut. Maybe I’m looking too much into that, but either way, it was a bad and out-of-place way to end a sketch like this.
— Overall, a great first half, but this sketch somewhat fell apart in the second half, despite still having some merits. This sketch as a whole, while not bad, doesn’t hold a candle to the aforementioned Wedding sketch with Andrew Garfield.
STARS: ***
POEM
love-hate triangle (SAS), (KYM), (BEB) duos finish each other’s sentences
— Very funny turn with how the “two people finish each other’s sentences while realizing they’re soulmates” romcom trope that was initially shown happening between Sarah and Kyle now happens between Kyle and a bully, played by Beck. The specific, immature threats that Kyle and Beck are romantically saying in unison are also hilarious.
— Funny montage of Beck’s bully character doing horrible, violent things to Kyle, made even funnier by the uncharacteristically tender music & filming effect used for that montage.
— I love the little detail of Kyle making a quick, disgusted, subtle “Urgh!” vocalization after revealing he was forced by Beck to eat “stinky stew supreme”.
— Satisfying turn at the end with Beck’s bully character getting his comeuppance.
— I recall hearing that Nick Rutherford (the member of Beck and Kyle’s original Good Neighbor group who SNL initially passed on when hiring the rest of Good Neighbor, then got hired this season as a writer) is the person driving a car both times a character in this short gets run over by a car while stuffed in a garbage can. You can see a brief glimpse of Nick in the driver’s seat (screencap below).
STARS: ****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Maps”
VITAMIX
(VAB)’s pricey Vitamix blender puts her friend (SAS) on the defensive
— Even though it wasn’t even intended to be comedic (I assume), I laughed at Vanessa’s smiley delivery of “Well…it’s up there” when asked how much the Vitamix blender costs. She has a way of selling little lines like that so well.
— A good increasing negative tension between Vanessa and Sarah’s characters, even if I’m a little confused about where this sketch is trying to go.
— Yeah, more and more, I’m having very mixed feelings towards this sketch. I now “get” the tone this sketch is going for, but something about the execution feels a little ehh, which is a shame, because I am liking aspects of Vanessa and Sarah’s performances.
STARS: **½
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Not as weak as I had remembered, but this episode as a whole was still nothing to write home about. Despite a few strong highlights (two of which received a perfect five-star rating from me), 1) this episode felt like it never fully took off, 2) almost half of the segments were forgettable, and, 3) even though this episode was an improvement over the season premiere, something about this season is still kinda giving off that fairly rough vibe that it had in the premiere. To say nothing of that terrible River Cruise sketch, which is bad enough on its own even without having any knowledge of the plagiarism controversy.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Whites
Monologue
Poem
The Fault In Our Stars 2: The Ebola In Our Everything
Weekend Update
Home From Vacation
Forgotten TV Gems
Vitamix
Heaven
60 Minutes
River Cruise
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Chris Pratt)
a step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Bill Hader