Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
CHARLIE ROSE
torture consultants (BOM) & (KYM) take pride in evils
— Some funny opening lines from Taran, who’s doing a decent Charlie Rose impression.
— Great bit from Bobby and Kyle’s torture consultants about them being Time Warner Cable’s customer service.
— Very solid performances from Bobby and Kyle throughout this.
— We get a lot of other hilarious reveals of famous annoyances that Bobby and Kyle’s torture consultants are the ones behind.
— I love Bobby’s “It sure ducking was” comment about him and Kyle being the creators of autocorrect.
— For what initially seemed like an unexciting setting for a cold opening, this has turned out to not only be very funny, but have a great flow and a fun spirit.
STARS: ****
MONOLOGUE
fellow British celebs Maggie Smith (KAM) & Alan Rickman (TAK) know host
— Right out the gate in this monologue, Martin Freeman’s delivery and comedic style has that refreshing, fast-paced, and charming English wit, which is encouraging.
— Good laughs from Taran’s Alan Rickman voice.
— A short and sweet monologue.
STARS: ***½
SUMP’N CLAUS
Sump’n Claus (KET) has cash for those on Santa’s (BOM) naughty list
— A very fun concept for a music video, and a perfect use of Kenan, who’s selling this material to absolute perfection.
— Good bit with Martin losing his temper in his office.
— I love the increasingly drawn-out pauses right before each time Kenan’s Sump’n Claus sings “Everybody gettin’ sump’n!”
— Throughout this short, Martin’s looking quite like another famous Martin: Martin Short.
STARS: ****½
WEDDING OBJECTIONS
everyone at the wedding of odd couple (host) & (LEJ) raises objections
— A good use of the extreme size difference between Martin and Leslie, having them play a loving couple being wed. I’m also loving the extreme differences between their personalities and backgrounds.
— Great reveal of Vanessa being Martin’s wife.
— Kenan’s “He just adopted the Wu-Tang Clan!” line was very funny.
— Solid line from Taran comparing the fragility of Martin’s reconstructed penis to a late-stage Jenga tower.
— Kate is killing it in this sketch, especially her disclosing that she has no idea who the bride or groom are – she just happened to be walking by this church, caught a brief glimpse of the couple getting married, and something told her “GET IN THERE AND SHUT! IT! DOWN!”
STARS: ****
THE OFFICE: MIDDLE EARTH
Bilbo (host) & Gollum (TAK) are paper salesmen
— A very promising concept, doing a hybrid of the two things Martin’s most famous for.
— I am loving Bobby’s performance as a Gandalf/Ricky Gervais hybrid. He’s hilarious here. Even the little detail of that beard stroke he did in one of his confessional shots had me in stitches.
— Yet another very funny vocal impression from Taran, this time of Gollum. His voice is absolutely slaying me.
— Such a spot-on and fantastic spoof of the The Office’s style.
— The little pratfall that Bobby (playing dual roles here) does at the end cracked me up.
— Overall, simply perfect.
STARS: *****
RIGHT SIDE OF THE BED WITH GRACELYNN AND CORY
(host) endures endless morning show segment teases
— Ohho, no. I completely forgot that this episode featured the debut of this, a recurring sketch that I’ve never liked. (*sigh*) For the second time this season, leave it to writers James Anderson & Kent Sublette to ruin an episode’s perfect streak of segments ranging pretty solid to excellent.
— An early display of SNL’s habit of randomly casting Kate as male celebrities/politicians for no apparent reason. (Her two drag roles in the preceding week’s James Franco episode, Justin Bieber and Kevin McAllister, at least made sense, as she was playing a short young adult and a prepubescent boy, respectively).
— Closest to a laugh I’ve gotten from this entire thing was from Martin awkwardly being made to dance next to Aidy, who has just disclosed very sad personal news about herself.
STARS: *½
ST. JOSEPH’S CHRISTMAS MASS SPECTACULAR
Christmas mass spectacular features liturgical tropes
— I think this counts as the first of a few of these occasionally-appearing pre-tapes presenting tropes from a boring traditional event in a specific upbeat style.
— This spoof is not only very true to life and relatable, but it’s hilarious, and every performer is nailing their respective roles.
— Nice to see tonight’s strong-so-far episode rebound very well after a slight setback with the Right Side of the Bed sketch.
STARS: ****½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Boom Clap”
WEEKEND UPDATE
lacking African-American emojis, SAZ creatively employs other symbols
A One Dimensional Female Character From A Male Driven Comedy (CES) follows comedy arc
Jacob talks about Hanukkah & thanks Derek Jeter for his service
— Some very strong jokes from Michael early on in tonight’s Update.
— Wow. Sasheer with her own Update commentary? As HERSELF??? Well, this is new. And it’s certainly nice to see her getting a big showcase as herself, given how very underused she is.
— Oh, now I remember this emoji commentary of Sasheer’s. I used to mis-remember this as happening later in Sasheer’s SNL tenure.
— Sasheer’s overall commentary was very good, had some solid racial commentary, and refreshingly felt very different for an Update commentary.
— Michael’s ballsy “foot race” joke about FDR had me howling.
— The first appearance of Cecily’s A One Dimensional Female Character From A Male Driven Comedy, making this the second long-named character Cecily has played on Update.
— A spot-on characterization from Cecily here, being an accurate and funny spoof of this archetype. Her interaction with a confused Colin, however, reminds me a little too much of Vanessa’s interaction with a confused Michael in Vanessa’s romantic comedy commentary from earlier this season.
— Our first of, I think, multiple instances of Colin mining laughs out of his own childhood photo. I also love Michael’s very loud off-camera laugh while that photo is shown.
— Blah, another Jacob commentary. However, at least 1) Jacob’s last commentary prior to this shook a few things up, and 2) this is his first appearance in this new Update era.
— Unfortunately, it turns out that tonight’s Jacob commentary is going in the same-old same-old direction these Jacob commentaries always go, with no shake-ups this time. I also feel that, despite his efforts, Michael is too bland a straight man to Jacob, and isn’t bringing the fun and endearing chemistry that Cecily previously had with Jacob in his last commentary prior to this episode (probably the ONLY time you’ll hear me say Cecily was better at something as an Update anchor than Michael is).
STARS: ***½
ASSEMBLY LINE
Gordon (TAK) is slow to grasp simple duties of a ketchup assembly line
— Interesting characterization from Taran.
— An oddly charming gaffe when Martin initially uses the British pronunciation of “lever”, before correcting himself by re-stating the word in the American accent he’s supposed to be speaking in.
— A simple premise, but simple in a refreshing way, as it’s giving this sketch an old-school feel.
— A silly but decent ending.
STARS: ***½
HOLIDAY GIG
sax player’s (host) conflict with (TAK) leaks into Treece Henderson’s (KET) gig
— The first installment of these occasionally-appearing Treece Henderson sketches (so occasional, that the second installment isn’t until THREE YEARS after this).
— Kenan’s increasingly over-the-top, crazed “Tweedle-do-twee! Tweedle-do-twow!” singing (the most identifiable aspect of this soon-to-be recurring Treece Henderson character) is cracking me up.
— Where the heck is this sketch going? This has that bad, questionable, hard-to-figure feel that a lot of James Anderson/Kent Sublette sketches suffer from. Leave it to TWO Anderson/Sublette sketches to ruin the otherwise perfect flow of an episode.
— There’s Kenan killing it with another funny delivery in this sketch, with the way he pronounces “Red boooootssss”
— A very amusing scene-stealing appearance from Taran, and I like his silly dancing at the end.
— An overall baffling sketch, but with a decent amount of redeeming factors that almost made this sketch passable.
STARS: **½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Break the Rules”
WATERBED WAREHOUSE
Waterbed Warehouse owner’s (host) wife (AIB) embraces company mascot role
— I remember an online SNL fan pointing out that Martin looked and acted very Buck Henry-esque in this sketch. I definitely see it, and I love that, given what an excellent host Buck always was, and how much I miss getting to review his hosting stints.
— I absolutely love Aidy’s occasional singing of the lyric “Our waterbeds are the beeeeeeeeest!”, which has stuck in my memory over the years.
— This is the type of questionable sketch concept that Aidy is probably one of the very few people who can sell. I try to imagine Kristen Wiig doing this same sketch in her later seasons, and I groan, as it would’ve come off way too typical of the annoying, hammy, badly-written, “Look at me!”-type of sketches the writers stuck Kristen with way too often. But when this sketch is given to a certain performer like Aidy who we’re not overly used to seeing do this type of material, it absolutely works and comes off very fun and charming.
— Speaking of imagining other cast members playing Aidy’s role in this sketch, the Martin Freeman/Buck Henry comparison mentioned earlier makes me imagine that, if this sketch were done in SNL’s original era and Buck had appeared in Martin’s role, I can easily picture Gilda Radner in Aidy’s role.
— Taran has had an EXTREMELY busy night, appearing in practically every single sketch, rather reminiscent of Will Ferrell at his most dominant. Jay, on the other hand, makes his ONLY live appearance of the entire night here, in a brief, shirtless walk-on in which he has no lines. I remember thinking, when this originally aired, that he looked visibly upset in this sketch over the fact that this was the only live role he got all night, but I’m not getting an upset vibe from him in my current viewing.
STARS: ****
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very strong episode, almost rivaling the incredible Woody Harrelson episode from earlier this season. SNL was firing on pretty much all cylinders in tonight’s episode, minus two James Anderson/Kent Sublette-written missteps (one of which still had its moments).
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
The Office: Middle Earth
St. Joseph’s Christmas Mass Spectacular
Sump’n Claus
Wedding Objections
Charlie Rose
Waterbed Warehouse
Assembly Line
Monologue
Weekend Update
Holiday Gig
Right Side of the Bed with Gracelynn and Cory
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (James Franco)
a big step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Amy Adams hosts the Christmas episode