October 3, 2015 – Miley Cyrus (S41 E1)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

A MESSAGE FROM DONALD & MELANIA TRUMP
Donald (TAK) & Melania (CES) Trump defend his campaign trail statements

— The debut of Taran’s short-lived and now-forgotten Donald Trump impression. Because of how short-lived and now-forgotten it is, it feels very surreal to review it now.
— Also the debut of Cecily’s Melania Trump impression.
— I have very mixed feelings on Taran’s Trump impression so far in this cold opening. I definitely see what he’s going for in the Trump voice and mannerisms, and he’s nailing certain aspects of that, but his normal voice is sticking out way too much in his Trump voice, and in general, I’m just kind of having a hard time buying him as Trump. He just feels miscast to me in this role.
— I feel unsure of how to react to some of Taran-as-Trump’s comical lines, probably due to hindsight in regards to Trump’s notorious presidency. I’m actually getting more laughs from Cecily’s Melania in this.
— Okay, I got a laugh just now from Taran’s Trump saying “Clearly I don’t hate immigrants” while discreetly pointing towards Cecily’s Melania.
STARS: **½

OPENING MONTAGE
— Same montage from the preceding season.
— The “40” from the preceding season’s SNL logo (as a commemoration of SNL’s milestone 40th season) has been removed.
— Beck Bennett, Colin Jost, Kyle Mooney, and Sasheer Zamata have been promoted from featured players to repertory players.
— Jon Rudnitsky has been added to the cast.

MONOLOGUE
host sings “My Way” as ephemeral summer 2015 personalities say goodbye

— Maybe it’s just me, but something about Miley Cyrus’ familiar voice is coming off even more raspy-sounding than usual tonight, which is saying something.
— A unique monologue concept, having Miley sing a song comically honoring people who made the news in the summer while we see cast members playing each of those newsmakers one-by-one. I’m finding this to be a lot of fun, and a creative way for SNL to address big news stories they missed over the summer.
— Took me a second just now to remember who Kim Davis is. Boy, am I glad to have forgotten about that woman.
— I love how even the usually Update-only Colin and Michael are appearing in this full-cast monologue. Speaking of Colin, he’s hilarious as one of the Entourage guys in this monologue. Seeing him, of all people, mugging the camera with goony, wiseguy-type facial expressions (complete with his tongue hanging out of his mouth) is inherently priceless (screencap below).

Also, seeing Colin and Jon Rudnitsky standing side-by-side here, I notice they look like they could be brothers. Their faces eerily look EXACTLY THE SAME in this monologue.
— A funny random re-appearance of Aidy’s Kim Davis during Sasheer’s Lenny Kravitz scene.
— I absolutely love Bobby’s whole bit here, with him initially playing Jared Fogle and making cheesy, lighthearted facial expressions into the camera, then Bobby turns his back to the camera, simply removes his glasses, and re-faces the camera while making a stern, intimidating facial expression as we’re told he’s now playing Josh Duggar. Bobby pulled that off perfectly.
— Never mind what I said about this being a full-cast monologue, as I just realized Leslie is nowhere to be seen anywhere in this. Aw, they couldn’t find a summer newsmaker role for her to play?
STARS: ****

ABILIFY FOR PEOPLE WHO THINK THEY CAN BE PRESIDENT
medication awakens GOP hopefuls

— Funny reveal of Taran and Cecily playing Rick Santorum and his wife, after this initially seemed like it was going to just be a normal medication commercial featuring average joes.
— Feels odd seeing Miley in this particular commercial.
— A promising topical concept for a commercial, and the execution of it is decent.
— Bobby as Mike Huckabee: “One time during a debate, I cut Donald Trump off and I said, ‘No, you listen!’ What was I thinking??? That’s our future president! (*audience reacts by laughing uproariously over the mere outlandish, implausible idea of Trump EVER becoming president*)” Uh, needless to say, hoooooooooo, boy.
STARS: ***

50’S DANCE
at a 1955 homecoming dance, (JOR) & anachronistic bad girl (host) pair up

— Jon Rudnitsky ALREADY getting a co-starring role in the post-monologue lead-off sketch of his first episode. Enjoy it while it lasts, Jon, ’cause that good airtime sure ain’t lasting long.
— Ugh, this sketch. I mentioned in my negative review of the Booty Rap sketch from the preceding season’s premiere that there’s a similar bad sketch in the following season’s premiere. This is the sketch I was talking about.
— Another ugh, this time at the following incredibly corny, tongue-in-cheek exchange between Taran and Cecily in regards to Miley’s character: “She’s from Montana, right?” “I don’t think she’s been ‘from Montana’ in a long time.”
— We at least get a funny Kenan walk-on to somewhat salvage this bad sketch.
— Licked by Miley Cyrus in your very first actual sketch on SNL. At least Jon can cross that off his checklist.
STARS: *½

BAR TALK
Hillary Clinton (KAM) tells her troubles to bartender (Hillary Clinton)

— Oh, I had forgotten that this sketch is in this episode. For a “Hillary Clinton impersonator meets the real Hillary Clinton” sketch, I’ve always actually really liked this one and found it to be far superior to the Amy Poehler version of this concept when Hillary previously cameod in season 33.
— One of the reasons why this sketch works much better for me than the aforementioned Amy Poehler sketch is that, instead of playing herself, the real Hillary plays a character when interacting with her impersonator.
— Something about most of the camera angles during Taran’s small appearance look odd and sloppy.
— Very sharp humor and reality subtext with Kate, while in character, harping on the fact that Hillary could’ve supported gay marriage sooner.
— The real Hillary is coming off as a great sport here, and she’s performing well for a non-actor.
— I love the dopey-voiced Trump impression Hillary does.
— Uh-oh. That part with Kate’s Hillary saying she wants Trump to win the primaries just so she can easily destroy him in the election afterwards and mount his hair in the Oval Office. For anyone keeping count, this is #2 of this episode’s “Trump will NEVER be president” jokes. I’d better get used to those jokes for a while. I remember them being particularly prevalent in the first few episodes of the following season (e.g. a certain poorly-aged small portion of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s monologue).
— I love Darrell-Hammond-as-Bill-Clinton’s horrified line when seeing both Kate’s Hillary and the real Hillary: “Oh my god, they’re multiplyin’!”
— Even Kate and Hillary’s “Lean On Me” duet is very charming, as you can tell they’re both having a blast, which is infectious. And given the fact that “Lean On Me” was my graduation song, that song holds a special place in my heart.
— Great ending.
STARS: ****½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Karen Don’t Be Sad”

WEEKEND UPDATE
Pope Francis (KYM) uses hip lingo to describe his partying in the USA

PED admits he’s ignorant of politics & the race for president

LEJ gives first-hand experience of the effect of texting on relationships

— The burgundy color motif of the preceding season’s Update graphics has been changed to blue in this season premiere. We’ll see how long this lasts, as I recall the season 39 premiere also updating the preceding burgundy color motif to a blue one before immediately going back to the burgundy one for the remainder of that season.
— I love Colin’s breakdown on how boring the upcoming democratic debate is going to be.
— Michael has a solid breakdown of his own about the Pope and Kim Davis.
— Hmm, I see they’re still using the burgundy color motif for the chyron of Update guests’ names. I guess it’s only the Update photo graphics that have a blue color motif this season.
— Kinda funny seeing Kyle play the Pope in two separate segments tonight.
— Kyle’s ridiculous “hip” portrayal of the Pope is pretty funny, though I notice Kyle randomly slipped into his Bruce Chandling character when saying “major snooze”.
— Ehhh, after a promising start, I’m not sure where the heck this Pope commentary of Kyle’s is going, especially when he’s making those emoji faces. Apparently, the audience feels the same way as me, as they seem confused and their laughter at this material is mild at best.
— Man, I should’ve been prepared for the ENDLESS amount of Donald Trump mentions throughout this entire season premiere. These endless Trump mentions also serve as a very unfortunate reminder of the horror that awaits me three episodes from now (hint: the host of that episode).
— Lots of wild cheers from the audience at the beginning of Pete’s commentary.
— Very funny comment from Pete about his racist grandpa’s feelings about Colin and Michael, respectively. We also get a hilarious cutaway to Colin giving the camera a cheesy thumbs-up and smile (the third-to-last above screencap for this Update) in response to being told that Pete’s racist grandpa is a huge Colin Jost fan.
— Interesting analogy Pete makes between Trump and Sanjaya from American Idol, in that they both only made it far into the competition they each were in because they were initially considered by a lot of people to be a “joke contestant” who folks thought would be funny to vote for to see them undeservedly survive the competition week after week, until people eventually came to the panicked realization that they’ve made it too far into the competition over much more worthy contenders.
— Nice to see that both Pete AND Leslie are each doing a commentary in tonight’s season premiere Update, much like the preceding season premiere’s Update.
— As usual in her Update commentaries, Leslie is absolutely killing it here, and is great at getting the audience both hyped up and on her side.
STARS: ****

THE MILLENNIALS
entitled twentysomethings are heroes of workplace drama

— A very blah sketch so far. I’m all for a comedic takedown of this specific type of millennial, but the result of this particular spoof isn’t doing it for me. I don’t know why exactly this isn’t working, but it just isn’t.
— I finally got a laugh just now, from a deadpan Taran and Kenan encouraging Jon Rudnitsky’s suicide-threatening millennial character to go through with his suicide after his fellow millennials all beg him not to do it.
STARS: *½

KATZ’ DELICATASSEN
(LEJ)’s orgasms are strangely specific in the When Harry Met Sally diner

— Funny running gag regarding Vanessa’s character’s pride over her Billy Crystal impression.
— A good Leslie showcase. Her insane and overly-specific orgasm demonstrations are cracking me up, especially in how they tell a story.
— A hilarious initial cutaway to Kate, and I also got a good laugh from her subsequently saying the famous “I’ll have what she’s having” line from When Harry Met Sally. I didn’t care for her line after that, though.
— I love Cecily’s delivery of her confused “…..I’m not the waiter” line to Kate.
STARS: ***½

THE SQUAD
movie depicts a post-apocalyptic world ruled by Taylor Swift

— Clearly a variation of the highly-acclaimed Beygency short, mixed together with the also-well-received Swiftamine commercial. I have very little recollection of this Squad short, which suggests it’s nowhere near as epic as The Beygency. We’ll see, though. I’m going into my current viewing of it with an open mind.
— Kenan is very solid in his first scene.
— A pretty good amount of little laughs throughout this short, and this short is very well-filmed and performed. However, this indeed feels like it’s trying way too hard to be the new Beygency for my likes, and is coming off very inferior to that. Had this preceded The Beygency, I’d probably be much higher on this.
STARS: ***

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Twinkle Song”

AMERICAN VOICES
late-night talk show pioneer (LEJ) didn’t let racism go unchallenged

— Wow, a huge night for Leslie, who’s been getting tons of showcases in this season premiere. Makes me feel less bad about her being left out of this episode’s otherwise-full-cast monologue.
— On an opposite note – poor, poor Sasheer. You’d be forgiven for forgetting she was even still in the cast by this point of this episode, as I myself honestly started to. And her appearance in this particular sketch is only a dull straight role where she just sets up comedic scenes starring the more standout black female performer in this season’s cast: Leslie. And keep in mind this is Sasheer’s first episode as a repertory player, and Leslie’s still only a featured player.
— Adding to my sympathy for Sasheer, I can’t help but detect an undertone of genuine hurt and sadness in her in this sketch, like she’s fully aware she’s being overshadowed by Leslie and has come to the depressing realization that her own airtime is probably never getting any better than this. Maybe it’s just me, but she’s coming off very distracted in her performance in this sketch, and her smile seems so forced. It hurts me to watch her in this sketch.
— Moving on, I really like the concept of Leslie playing an oppressed 1950s black female talk show host.
— A clip within a clip? (I’m referring to the movie clip Miley’s Hayley Mills throws to in the clip of her interview on Leslie’s character’s talk show.)
— During the tense moment between Miley’s Hayley Mills and Leslie, I absolutely love Kenan nervously telling someone to his side, “Do me a favor – make sure my car runnin’.”
— Wait, what?!? That comical “Please Stand By” bit is the end of the sketch? The hell kind of ending was that? It legitimately felt like this sketch got cut off too early by accident or something. Is the show just starting to run long? There’s still a pre-taped short left before the show ends, but maybe SNL cut this American Voices sketch off early so they could have enough time to fit the pre-taped short in.
STARS: ***

MILEY WEDDING TAPE
KYM resists the charmed life that results from his marriage to host

— A sequel to the Miley Sex Tape short from Miley’s season 39 episode. I like how this has become a recurring thing when she hosts.
— Beck has noticeably lost a lot of weight over the summer. He looks so lean in this short compared to how he looked in his preceding two seasons on the show.
— I love Kyle’s goofy impression of Miley’s voice.
— I strangely got a big laugh from Kyle’s very dumb and random “Miley Siiiggghhh-rus…like it’s a sigh” comment. As expected, the audience had no idea how to react to that comment.
— Much like in the aforementioned Miley Sex Tape short, I’m enjoying the insanely rapid speed that Kyle and Miley’s married life is progressing. I especially like the funeral ending, complete with an old lady playing an elderly version of Miley.
STARS: ****

GOODNIGHTS

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A good season premiere. A few strong highlights, a lot of pretty good segments, and only a few lowlights to complain about. I also found Miley Cyrus more tolerable and likable here than in her season 39 hosting stint, probably because she took a backseat tonight by not being the main focus for most of the show, and, aside from the 50’s Dance sketch, there was less of her “rebellious, in-your-face” persona from her 2013 twerking phase.

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

RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Bar Talk
Monologue
Miley Wedding Tape
Weekend Update
Katz’ Delicatassen
Abilify For People Who Think They Can Be President
American Voices
The Squad
A Message From Donald & Melania Trump
50s Dance / The Millennials (tie)

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING SEASON (2014-15)
about the same

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Amy Schumer