February 13, 2016 – Melissa McCarthy / Kanye West (S41 E13)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

HILLARY FOR PRESIDENT
Hillary Clinton (KAM) sings “I Can’t Make You Love Me” to Bernie Sanders backers

— Pretty funny turn with how the restaurant patrons’ conversation about how they’re no longer voting for Hillary Clinton is followed by Kate’s Hillary slowly being lowered on a seat from above while singing “I Can’t Make You Love Me”.
— The usual funny addition of Darrell Hammond’s Bill Clinton in these Kate-as-Hillary pieces, and I love him saying to the camera, in regards to him playing the piano, “Guess what? I’m not even playin’ this thing.”
— Funny appearance from Beck as a pathetic Jeb Bush, and him getting called out by the restaurant patrons on what he’s doing.
STARS: ***½

MONOLOGUE
host prematurely celebrates Five-Timer status with “Born To Be Alive” variant

— Interesting conceit of Melissa McCarthy incorrectly claiming this is her fifth time hosting and launching into a celebratory song about now being a Five-Timer.
— Despite my usual fatigue over musical monologues in this era, I’m actually finding this particular song to be pretty fun and catchy. Come to think of it, that’s actually been true for most of this season’s musical monologues.
— There’s Kenan pointing out the inevitable: that this is, in fact, Melissa’s fourth hosting stint, not fifth.
— Pretty funny visual of Melissa’s “4 & One/Sixteenth” glasses after Kenan points out that Melissa’s appearance at SNL’s 40th Anniversary Special doesn’t count as a legitimate full-on hosting stint, but rather just 1/16th of a hosting, if anything.
STARS: ***½

THE DAY BEYONCÉ TURNED BLACK
a post-“Formation” horror film for whites

— A priceless overdramatic reaction white people are shown having to finding out Beyonce is, in fact, black. I particularly love the well-filmed visual of everybody in the streets panicking.
— Love Vanessa’s delivery of “I know he’s black” when Sasheer points out a random black citizen on the street.
— Great exchange between Kate and Kenan.
— Hilarious bit with Cecily nervously rocking back and forth and denying what she hears when it’s revealed on the news that Kerry Washington is also black.
— Great fake-out with a horrified Aidy initially thinking her daughter turned black, only for it to be revealed that that’s Leslie’s daughter. I also love Leslie being offended by Aidy saying a relieved “Thank God!” when seeing that her own daughter hasn’t turned black.
— Strong ending with Kate getting ready to smother her son with a pillow.
— Overall, SNL knocks it out of the park with another brilliant, epic pre-taped Beyonce-themed masterpiece, after their Beygency short from two seasons prior. It’s hard for me to pick which I prefer out of the two shorts, as I love both of them so much, but I think I’d give the edge to this one.
STARS: *****

TEST SCREENING
(host) assaulted fellow audience members in test screening of scary movie

— The pre-taped, night-vision footage is a bit of a refreshing way to change up the overdone “Melissa McCarthy plays a weirdo who other characters react in confusion to” trope that this sketch is relying on.
— Pretty funny reaction shots from Melissa in the pre-taped footage, especially her randomly punching Vanessa in the face, and the whole bit she does with Pete.
— Great shot of Leslie laughing and saying, “Man, this bitch is pissing on herself!”
STARS: ***½

MOVIE NIGHT
awkwardness grows as (PED) & parents (BOM) & (host) watch Terminator sex scene

— Much like Pete’s character in this sketch, I surprisingly had absolutely no prior memory of a sex scene in the first Terminator movie when I first saw this sketch during this episode’s original airing.
— A lot of good laughs from Pete’s way of “lightening up” the awkward situation by blurting out all of the absolutely worst things he could possibly say in this situation.
— Good use of pre-taped audio of characters’ inner thoughts.
— After Bobby’s own inappropriate way of “lightening up” the awkward situation, we get a great cutaway to him with a self-satisfied grin while his inner thought says “Heh heh heh heh, nailed it!”
— Great delivery from Pete on his run of embarrassing statements before his abrupt exit.
— An overall refreshingly relatable and solid sketch.
STARS: ****

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest, Kelly Price, The-Dream, El DeBarge, Young Thug [real] perform “Highlights”

WEEKEND UPDATE
Rachel Green (VAB) is still living in an episode of Friends

Super Bowl MVP Von Miller [real] covers gravitational waves via football

hater of flowers & avocados LEJ lists her perfect man’s characteristics

— For the second consecutive episode, Weekend Update shows clips from a GOP debate that happened just hours prior.
— Good rant from Michael about the “outrage” over Beyonce’s Super Bowl halftime performance.
— Wait, that infamous, controversial “BILL COSBY INNOCENT!!!!!!!” tweet of Kanye West’s was made this same week he was on SNL?!? Wow. For some reason, this also reminds me that he had an angry backstage meltdown between this episode’s dress rehearsal and live show, due to SNL changing up the musical guest stage without asking him first. Audio from that angry meltdown of his would be leaked online shortly after this episode’s original airing. (I think Aidy also disclosed in an interview that there was another off-putting incident with Kanye that same night, where, during the goodnights at dress rehearsal, he tried to bring Kim Kardashian up onstage when she clearly didn’t want to do that, or something like that. Of course, that’s small potatoes compared to what Kanye would do during the goodnights of his following SNL appearance.)
— Ah, Vanessa’s Jennifer Aniston/Rachel Green impression makes its first Update appearance, continuing the amazing season Vanessa’s been having.
— Like the last time Vanessa did this impression (in the Jennifer Aniston Lookalike Contest sketch from a few seasons prior), Vanessa is astonishingly spot-on and funny here.
— Hilarious bit with a Friends-esque scene transition happening right in the middle of Vanessa’s commentary.
— I like Colin pointing out how Vanessa’s Aniston/Green always sounds surprised, and that being followed by her immediately proving his point.
— Despite one flubbed line (which is expected for an athlete), Von Miller is coming off likable enough here.
— Surprised by how short the overall Von Miller commentary ended up being, but that’s probably for the best.
— Another Norm Macdonald-esque O.J.-is-a-murderer joke from Michael.
— Feels like Leslie’s on Update every two episodes this season. I can’t remember the last time prior to this that a cast member regularly appeared this frequently as themselves as a guest correspondent on Update. (I guess A. Whitney Brown in the late 80s?) That’s certainly not a complaint, though, as Leslie always kills it on Update.
— The style of tonight’s Leslie commentary is a very interesting change of pace from her usual commentaries, and an interesting change of pace for Update in general.
— I particularly like the part of Leslie’s commentary with her harping on how she equates flowers with dead bodies.
STARS: ****

PICK-UP ARTIST
in a bar, (host) clumsily practices pick-up techniques on target (KYM)

— Meh, seems like I’m in for exactly the type of “Melissa McCarthy plays a weirdo who other characters react in confusion to” live sketch that the Test Screening sketch earlier tonight was a refreshing change of pace from.
— This sketch seems like it was partially designed to make Leslie crack up. If that’s the case, it’s succeeding with flying colors. Her constant amusement in this is somehow providing most of my only amusement. While I’m not HATING the main Melissa portions of this sketch, they’re not doing much for me.
— Beck made me laugh out loud appearing at the very end of this sketch in a bizarre brief walk-on role that allowed him to ham it up.
STARS: **

KYLE VS. KANYE
KYM’s delusion of rap greatness withstands verbal rout by musical guest

— At first, I thought that this was going to be the debut of the Kyle/Leslie backstage relationship shorts, until I remembered that those don’t debut until the following season’s Dave Chappelle episode. This short I’m currently reviewing is done in the same style as those Kyle/Leslie shorts, though.
— I’m liking how extensive this short is, even going through the lengths of having Kyle film an interview on Today.
— Love seeing the real-life home movies and photos of Kyle rapping and breakdancing when he was much younger.
— I like how Kyle saying he has no idea what he’s doing out there on SNL is accompanied by a clip of him dressed in a cereal box from a sketch in the season 39 Edward Norton episode.
— The sketch that’s shown being rehearsed at one point, where we see a lot of male cast members dressed for what appears to possibly be a wedding, doesn’t make it to the live show.
— Kanye’s extremely deadpan facial expression while speechlessly staring at Kyle awkwardly rapping insults at him is cracking me up.
— Great ending.
STARS: ****

BUS
on a bus, (host) annoys (LEJ) with attempts to be hip to black experience

— Lots of airtime for Leslie tonight, especially in the second half of this episode starting with Update.
— I’m liking how this quirky character of Melissa’s is a lot more subtle, low-key, and realistic than her usual characters in “Melissa McCarthy plays a weirdo who other characters react in confusion to” sketches are.
— Some laughs from Leslie’s desperation to get away from Melissa, even asking the bus driver to just open up the door as the bus is driving on a highway.
— The sudden out-of-left-field turn at the end with this sketch becoming a Speed spoof didn’t do it for me.
STARS: ***½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest, Kelly Price, The-Dream, Kirk Franklin, Chance the Rapper [real] perform “Ultralight Beam”

WHISKERS R’ WE
Barbara & new gal (host) plug Valentine’s Cat Giveaway

— Blah, this again. So tired of this recurring sketch.
— Oh, wow, what a huge surprise: the character played by the female host feels up Kate’s breast while pretending they think they’re petting a cat. We’ve NEVER seen that happen in multiple Whiskers R’ We sketches in the past. [/end sarcasm]
— Quite a lot of O.J.-is-a-murderer jokes throughout tonight’s episode, with this being the third segment tonight to include one.
STARS: **

GOODNIGHTS

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A good episode, and far more consistent than the previous episodes Melissa McCarthy hosted. It also helps that the way she was utilized in this episode felt less redundant than the way she was utilized in her prior episodes.

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

RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
The Day Beyoncé Turned Black
Kyle Vs. Kanye
Movie Night
Weekend Update
Test Screening
Hillary for President
Monologue
Bus
Pick-Up Artist
Whiskers R’ We

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Larry David)
a mild step down

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Jonah Hill. Interestingly, this is his second consecutive hosting stint in which he and Melissa McCarthy host back-to-back episodes.