December 6, 2014 – James Franco / Nicki Minaj (S40 E8)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

POLITICS NATION WITH AL SHARPTON
Al Sharpton (KET) addresses police shootings controversy

— There’s our obligatory joke about Al Sharpton gaining weight, as SNL’s attempt to explain why Kenan is still playing Sharpton after Sharpton’s real-life weight loss.
— A laugh from Jay constantly getting cut off during his interview.
— Of the typical fairly amusing misreadings from Kenan’s Sharpton, I particularly laughed at the “twattered” one.
STARS: ***

MONOLOGUE
Sony Pictures hack released private photos of host & Seth Rogen [real]

 

— Another cameo-based monologue. I guess this particular one is at least fitting, since James Franco previously cameoed in Seth Rogen’s monologue the preceding season.
— Blah at all the juvenile photos of James and Seth. Boring and unfunny. It also reminds me of Luke Wilson’s also-boring-and-unfunny monologue from season 30, where he and Horatio Sanz were the ones showing juvenile drunk photos of themselves.
— That’s the whole monologue? Boof.
STARS: *½

PETER PAN LIVE!
Tonkerbell contends with Captain Hook (host)

— “Peter Pan Live starring Allison Williams and Christopher Walken”? I wonder who’s going to play Walken in this.
— Oh, not this Tonkerbell thing again. I disliked this character enough the first time.
— I did laugh just now at Tonkerbell’s description of her job as a reverse tooth fairy (where she takes a dollar from a child’s bedroom and leaves one off her own teeth).
— They’re giving JAMES FRANCO the Walken impression?!? How do I not remember this from my previous viewing of this episode back when it originally aired?
— Oof, not the best Walken impression I’ve ever seen, and that’s being as kind as I can be. Actually, there’s almost a “So bad, it’s good” quality to his Walken impression, but not quite.
— A very awkward premature cutaway to Tonkbell during Peter Pan and Captain Hook’s stiff swordfight.
— Why is it always Bobby who walks on at the end of these sketches as Tonkerbell’s boyfriend from a cartoon movie?
STARS: *½

STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS
Han Solo (TAK), Princess Leia (BOM), Luke Skywalker (host), Lando Calrissian (KET) are old

— Good to see the return of Taran’s very funny Harrison Ford impression.
— Meh, the opening scene in this pre-tape didn’t turn out to be the best use of Taran’s Ford impression.
— Having a man (Bobby) play an elderly Princess Leia? Why??? This particular sketch doesn’t even seem to warrant a man playing this role. Besides, this season already had a cheap “Princess Leia played by a man in drag” gag with Chris Pratt in the season premiere.
— So far, this is just a lame, half-assed parade of “old people” stereotypes, only presented with flashy Star Wars special effects, as if that automatically makes this tepid humor “better”.
— Overall, I barely cracked a smile at anything in this. Man, between the monologue, the Tonkerbell sketch, and now this, tonight’s episode is ROUGH so far. Certainly moreso than I had remembered.
STARS: *½

JINGLE BALLERZ
Hip Hop Nativity features Kanye West (JAP) as Jesus

— A blooper when James is making his entrance: he accidentally trips over his own cape and almost falls down in a goofy manner that I couldn’t help but laugh at, in spite of myself.
— Kate’s Justin Bieber impression is still pretty funny, though the novelty is clearly wearing off by this point.
— The audience is going NUTS for each time Nicki Minaj (in her first of what will be several sketch appearances tonight) sings a brief musical note as Beyonce.
— Another segment tonight wasting a celebrity impression of Taran’s that’s usually very funny; this time, it’s his Eminem impression.
— Good to see Jay’s Kanye impression going back to being used outside of that Waking Up With Kimye recurring sketch, which quickly got tired.
— Overall, some laughs, but this was extremely forgettable and pretty boring. (*sigh*) Tonight’s episode continues to not do it for me.
STARS: **

GROW-A-GUY
friendless (MOB) germinates a companion (host)

— For the first time, a short film of Mike O’Brien’s opens with a title screen stating “A Mike O’Brien Picture”. Well-deserved, as his SNL shorts prior to this one were all fantastic, and viewers deserve to know the identity of the genius behind those films. It’s also great that SNL is letting him continue doing and starring in these films despite no longer being in the cast by this point.
— A very good offbeat concept of a “Grow-A-Guy”.
— Beck is playing this “low-key douchey friend” role to absolute perfection.
— As usual for Mike’s short films, this is an excellent mix of funny, odd, creative, interesting, and melancholy.
— Solid sequence with each character self-destructing after revealing they’re a Grow-A-Guy.
— Great choice to have a “#growaguy” chyron be displayed onscreen at the end, as a callback to the hashtag discussion earlier in this film.
STARS: *****

MAGIC BRIDGE
bridge troll (host) gets a kiss from (KYM) instead of a riddle solution

— The debut of Cecily’s Cathy Anne character, who would later become one of those recurring Weekend Update characters who some people probably forget actually started out in a sketch or two (some other examples of which include Roseanne Rosannadanna, Stefon, and Jacob the Bar Mitzvah Boy).
— I’m a few minutes into this sketch, and I haven’t gotten a single laugh. The closest to a laugh I got was from Kyle’s delivery of his line, “You’re not kissing her. She’s my fiancee!” Something about his delivery of that line and the way he put emphasis on the word “fiancee” came off Bruce Chandling-esque.
— When this sketch originally aired, I absolutely HATED Cecily’s characterization of Cathy Anne, and dismissed it as yet another bad “Cecily does a ‘funny’ voice” sketch, like that Oliver Twist sketch from the preceding season’s Andrew Garfield episode. I also hated the second sketch appearance that Cathy Anne would later make (in a Cinderella sketch, I think, with Dakota Johnson). I would later go on to like Cathy Anne much better as a Weekend Update correspondent. With that knowledge, re-watching her in this Magic Bridge sketch in hindsight right now is quite bizarre. She’s coming off very out-of-place in this, and it’s wasting her comedic potential.
— (*groan*) Aaaaaaand there goes the ol’ “two men kissing each other for a very cheap, unnecessary laugh” trope. We’re still doing this in 2014, SNL???
— We actually get TWO separate man-on-man-kissing sequences in this sketch. Because, as we all know, men kissing men obviously only gets FUNNIER AND FUNNIER with repetition……..
— Overall, a fucking wretched sketch. And, aside from that fantastic Grow-A-Guy short, tonight’s episode continues to be dire.
STARS: *

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & Skylar Grey [real] perform “Bed Of Lies”

WEEKEND UPDATE
MIC & COJ give their thoughts on non-indictment in Eric Garner death

Anthony Crispino is unduly confident in the quality of his news nuggets

LEJ advises potential dates to bring her marijuana instead of mushrooms

missing backgrounds reframe Kim Kardashian’s (musical guest) nude photos

— Ooh, an early-era interaction piece between Colin and Michael, which is surprisingly somewhat rare in their early Updates.
— Wow, this opening Eric Garner/grand jury conversation between Colin and Michael… It doesn’t even seem to be INTENDED to be funny, and is going more for a “social commentary” tone. There are damn good points being made by Michael about the ridiculousness of the non-indictment in the Eric Garner case, but, man, between the touchiness of that subject, the lack of intended big jokes being made here, and the audience’s tense silence, there’s a haunting feel to this. Perhaps that’s what SNL’s going for.
— Okay, even though Colin and Michael are continuing on their focus of the Eric Garner/grand jury matter, it’s now growing on me, as Colin and Michael are now going more for actual jokes here, and they’re handling the touchiness of this subject decently. I also like how this is breaking up the usual format that Update typically had in the past.
— Feels a little odd seeing Anthony Crispino appearing in this new Update era, in this new Update set, and interacting with Michael instead of Seth Meyers.
— Crispino’s Mariah/Drew Carey bit was very funny.
— An absolutely hilarious bit from Crispino on the big news about “Bing Crosby” being a “rappist”. I also love this exchange between Michael and Crispino during that bit: “I’m not even gonna TOUCH that one.” “Hey, Bing Crosby would, so…”
— When Colin was setting up the next guest commentary by bringing up things like marijuana and 420, I honestly thought he was setting up a Pete Davidson commentary (for obvious reasons). Instead, we get a commentary from the other member of this cast who frequently does Update commentaries as themselves: Leslie Jones. Either way, I’m looking forward to this.
— Leslie: “Man, when I took mushrooms, I talked to Harriet Tubman for two hours.”
— I love Leslie’s humbled delivery of “Have you ever been called a bitch…..by Harriet Tubman???”
— Tonight’s overall Leslie commentary wasn’t quite as hilarious as her previous commentaries, but it still worked.
— Feels weird seeing someone other than Nasim Pedrad play Kim Kardashian . Speaking of Nasim, I feel bad for saying this because I generally like her, but I surprisingly haven’t noticed her absence this season AT ALL until this episode.
— The reveals of the real backgrounds of the racy Kim Kardashian Paper Magazine photos are mildly funny.
STARS: ***

BRAIN SPACE
(PED) can’t remember new password because his brain is full of ephemera

— A fun concept.
— Taran is very funny as the Savage Garden guy.
— Nicki Minaj continues to be prolific in this episode, like she’s an honorary co-host.
— There’s something strangely fitting about the fact that Kate played both Justin Bieber and the Kevin McAllister character from Home Alone in the same episode.
— Wow, fast costume change for Taran, playing two different roles in this live sketch.
— I love James incredulously asking, “Who remembers a Billy Zane line from Titanic?!?”
STARS: ***½

TAD RANKIN
(host) immaturely trashes the 4-year-old to whom he lost mayoral election

— Extremely juvenile writing here, but James’ increasingly frustrated, immature delivery is somehow making it work well. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m cracking up at this sophomoric material.
— Even James starting to break after the “throwing my crapped pants into the woods” bit is funny. It also helps that he gets back into character pretty soon after that breaking of his, instead of letting his breaking take over the remainder of the sketch.
— Blah, the loud cheers from girls in SNL’s audience kinda hurt the gag of James showing off his “cute” facial expression, given the fact that the joke of him doing a “cute” facial expression was that it was a forced, silly, unflattering facial expression.
STARS: ***½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Only” & “All Things Go”

SUNSEEKER YACHTS
(host), (Seth Rogen), vacuous ex-porn stars endorse Sunseeker Yachts

— First time we’ve seen the Ex-Porn Stars all season, which is a sign that they’re apparently being phased out.
— Vanessa: “I’m Brookie.” Cecily: “No, that’s your name.”
— Cecily: “One time, I thought I got banged into a different dimension, like Intersmellar, but I was just stuck in a pull-out couch. I was like, what does ‘pull-out’ mean?”
— This sketch feels rushed. We’re already at the part where the character played by the SNL host (along with Seth Rogen, in tonight’s case) stays in the scene and takes over the commercial? That usually happens much later in each installment of this recurring sketch.
— The whole Franco/Rogen section of this sketch is doing NOTHING for me.
— I didn’t understand what Cecily said during the usual part in this recurring sketch where she and Vanessa’s characters both try to say the same innocent word in unison, only for Cecily’s character’s word to be something dirty and porn-related.
— Overall, a slight improvement over the extremely disappointing and frustrating Andy Samberg/Kristen Wiig installment of this sketch, but that’s still not saying much, as this was still a pale shadow of how strong this recurring sketch usually is. It’s become painfully and sadly obvious that the magic of this once-fantastic recurring sketch is officially gone by this point.
STARS: **½

GOODNIGHTS

---

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A mediocre episode as a whole. The first half was DIRE and disheartening, aside from the Mike O’Brien film and a mildly-funny cold opening. There was an improvement in the second half of this episode, but that half still wasn’t anywhere near strong enough to save this episode as a whole from earning a thumbs-down.

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

RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Grow-A-Guy
Brain Space
Tad Rankin
Weekend Update
Politics Nation with Al Sharpton
Sunseeker Yachts
Jingle Ballerz
Peter Pan Live!
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Monologue
Magic Bridge

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Cameron Diaz)
a slight step down

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Martin Freeman