Author: Stooge

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December 17, 2016 – Casey Affleck / Chance the Rapper (S42 E10)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

TRUMP CHRISTMAS
Vladimir Putin (BEB) and Rex Tillerson (John Goodman) pay Donald Trump (Alec Baldwin) a Christmas visit

— This is the fourth consecutive cold opening with Kate playing Kellyanne Conway. I remember once wondering if that was Kate’s consolation prize for Hillary Clinton losing the election.
— Something about Cecily’s Melania Trump voice sounds a bit different than usual tonight. Like the voice is a bit higher-pitched or more quivery or something.
— Cecily’s Melania: “If a person you did not know came from a foreign country and just started flattering you, what would you do?” Alec’s Donald Trump: “Marry them.” Oh, gee, didn’t see THAT punchline comin’ from a mile away. [/end sarcasm]
— John Goodman looking thinner than he ever has on SNL previously.
— I guess John playing Rex Tillerson could be considered the beginning of the trend of Trump’s cabinet members being played on SNL by non-cast members, a trend that I despise with the heat of a thousand suns. (*sigh*) This is gonna be a long four years.
— Even though the lines he’s been given here aren’t up to much, John’s performance is such a blast here, which is much needed, given how weak this cold opening has been. John’s fun performance is giving this a bit of a boost.
STARS: **


MONOLOGUE
Alec Baldwin & John Goodman [real] celebrate Christmas with host

— When Casey Affleck enters after being announced by Darrell Hammond, stagehands can be seen onstage seemingly still cleaning up some leftover things from the removal of the cold opening’s set, before quickly getting out of Casey’s way. A very rare sight in a monologue.
— I just now realized that it feels a little odd seeing John Goodman thinner than Alec Baldwin for once in their SNL appearances together.
— An okay bit with Alec and John in the background constantly exiting the scene immediately after entering, in response to something an unaware Casey says.
— A decent fake-out with Casey making it seem like this is turning into yet another musical monologue, only for him to immediately put a stop to that.
— This monologue is starting to feel too wandering and unfocused.
— The timing seemed completely off during the last minute of this monologue, though Alec busting out laughing about it at the end added a bit of a charm to it.
STARS: **½


DUNKIN’ DONUTS
real customer Donny (host) is a loitering Southie hoodlum

— This is getting great mileage out of Casey’s Boston roots. IIRC, this ends up being easily his best performance of the whole episode.
— The “smoking outside the store” bit is very funny.
— A hilarious sudden wild turn with the roughhousing between Casey and Mikey. I especially love Casey’s delivery of “Cut’cha naaaiiils, for God’s sake!”
— Excellent ending with Casey rudely throwing Mikey’s cup of coffee all over Alex’s car windshield.
— I recall hearing that SNL would do some kind of variation of this commercial with Bill Burr in the current 46th season, but I haven’t seen it myself yet.
STARS: ****½


ROBOT PRESENTATION
(host) is puzzled by salience of androids’ (BEB) & (KYM) homosexuality

— Fred Armisen for no reason, ladies and gentlemen.
— Yet another robot sketch in this era.
— Despite all of the “It’s 2016, times have changed” acknowledgments from Fred and Kate’s characters in regards to Beck’s gay robot character, I’m still mildly getting a bad season 30 (a season filled with dreadful gay stereotype sketches) vibe from this sketch. And if this sketch is trying to be some kind of clever attempt at spoofing modern woke culture, it doesn’t know how to properly go about it. On top of that, this sketch is just plain unfunny.
— I did get a laugh just now from Aidy’s “I…I don’t wanna get involved in this” line.
— Now Kyle’s appearance as another stereotypical gay robot is adding further to the mild season 30 vibe I’m getting from this sketch.
STARS: *½


JINGLE BARACK
(KET), (musical guest), Darryl McDaniels [real] rap about Obama Christmas

— A great use of Chance the Rapper, who’s showing early signs of the solid host he’ll be later on.
— A very fun and catchy Run DMC “Christmas In Hollis” spoof.
— Odd how this is the second consecutive segment tonight with Beck and Kyle paired together as gay characters. Plus, there was that moment they had together at the end of the preceding episode’s Hook A Hunk sketch.
— The breakdancing Jesus bit is hilarious.
— Nice to see Darryl McDaniels participate in this.
— I love Leslie’s scene.
— I’m finding this to be a much better way to say goodbye to Barack Obama’s presidency than…well, let’s just say a certain Cecily/Sasheer musical piece from a little later this season.
STARS: ****


CHRISTMAS MIRACLE
Ms. Rafferty’s Santa-free trip to the North Pole lacked Christmas magic

— (*sigh*) Cue my usual comments about how this sketch should’ve stayed a one-and-done classic, as it doesn’t work as a recurring sketch.
— Kate’s delivery as this character is still on-point, but it still isn’t stopping the template of her lines from feeling increasingly and tiredly by-the-numbers with each passing installment of this sketch. Her anal/vaginal rhyming euphemisms have especially gotten tired to me. In general, I’m becoming increasingly numb to the usual humor in this recurring sketch.
— At least tonight’s installment has a very different ending, with Mikey’s appearance as “Shart”.
STARS: **


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & Noname [real] perform “Finish Line / Drown”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Vladimir Putin’s Two Best Friends From Growing Up badmouth him some more via sotto voce

— (*The Two Best Friends From Growing Up characters appear, Stooge instantly shatters into a million pieces*)
— Given how far better I find Michael to be as an Update anchor than I found Seth Meyers to be, it kinda hurts seeing Michael doing Seth’s lame and endless utterances of “I can barely hear you” to the Two Best Friends, and the equally-lame “Update anchor joins in on the ‘quietly badmouthing someone’ gimmick” routine.
— Michael, after his touchy joke about feminists typically placing the white woman in the front: “I can hear the keyboards.”
— Ah, as a Christmas treat, Colin and Michael are doing their “favorite jokes that previously got cut after dress earlier this season” routine, which used to be a season finale tradition. Colin and Michael’s famous joke-swapping routine is what they usually do in Christmas episodes (or, in season 41’s case, Thanksgiving), but I guess this season, they’re saving the joke-swap for the season finale, maybe?
— The favorite cut jokes from Colin and Michael tonight are mostly okay, but not particularly great.
— A rare Jost/Che Update that doesn’t end with a guest commentary.
STARS: ***½


NEW YORK NOW
Long Island staging of Nativity play is all low-brow humor

— (*Stooge sees Sasheer and Vanessa’s characters introducing themselves as Sara Hors [“Hors” pronounced “whores”] and Jen Jen Binks*) Oh, gee, I wonder which two writers penned this sketch. [/end sarcasm]
— (*sigh*) There’s a way to pull off intentionally hacky humor, and this sketch ABSOLUTELY AIN’T IT.
— Not even Chance the Rapper could save the lame writing he was given in his scene here, though he still came off charismatic as usual.
— When Mikey entered, I initially thought for a quick second that that was Pete, before remembering Pete’s in rehab at this time.
— Overall, a complete waste of time.
STARS: *


HILLARY ACTUALLY
Hillary Clinton (KAM) peddles 12th Amendment defiance a la Love Actually

— A laugh from Kate’s Hillary Clinton speeding through some of the cards when Cecily gestures that she’s in a hurry.
— I’m not finding this to be quite as strong as I remember finding it when it originally aired, but it’s still fine to me, and certain parts also have a nice charm to them.
— A good laugh from how, when Kate’s Hillary is showing names of non-politician celebrities who Cecily could vote for over Trump, “The Rock” is followed by “A Rock”.
— I like Kate’s Hillary having separate cards for each “Ha” of her laugh.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & Francis & The Lights [real] perform “Same Drugs”


MRS. CLAUS AND THE CHRISTMAS FEAST
(host) & fellow masochistic elves seek discipline from Mrs. Claus (AIB)

— Ohho, no.
— Man, did James Anderson and Kent Sublette write 70% of this episode?
— Between Kate’s Ms. Rafferty sketch and this, I remember thinking to myself when this episode originally aired, “Hey, Lorne, Ryan Gosling called. He wants his episode back.”
— Odd delivery choice that Casey has chosen for this particular character.
— Overall, even more insufferable than usual. I probably only found this installment to be even worse than previous ones because tonight’s episode has featured some really bad stuff, and it’s taking its toll on me by this point of the episode.
STARS: *


CHRISTMAS BAR
in a bar, knife fight participants & respondents are shy & self-effacing

— Kyle and Vanessa always make a charming pair.
— I love Kyle’s character voice here. I’m getting kind of a Dana Carvey vibe from Kyle’s performance at times here.
— Casey’s character’s random passing mention of his little deaf sister was pretty funny.
— A good sudden turn with Kyle pulling out a knife on Casey while still acting like a nice, shy guy.
— I’m liking the progression to this, with how every character who walks on is speaking in the same distinct manner Kyle is. There’s a nice and funny charm to that (I’m saying “charm” too much in this episode review), and gives this sketch a timeless feel.
STARS: ***½


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— The first weak episode of the season. There were a number of things that I flat-out did not like in this episode, as well as a number of bad recurring stuff. There were still some good things, but very little of it stood out as strong, none of which happen to be actual live sketches. Not even Weekend Update was as strong as it usually is in the Jost/Che era, though a lot of that was thanks to how much that insufferable, overlong Two Best Friends From Growing Up commentary dragged things down and hurt my enthusiasm.


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


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Dunkin’ Donuts
Jingle Barack
Hillary Actually
Christmas Bar
Weekend Update
Monologue
Christmas Miracle
Trump Christmas
Robot Presentation
New York Now
Mrs. Claus and the Christmas Feast


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (John Cena)
a fairly big step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
We enter the year 2017, with host Felicity Jones

Posted on

December 10, 2016 – John Cena / Maren Morris (S42 E9)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER
Walter White (Bryan Cranston) is Donald Trump’s drug enforcement nominee

— A laugh from the explanation Kate’s Kellyanne Conway gives on just how Trump is draining the swamp.
— Bryan Cranston is performing as well as always, but I’m not crazy about the writing he’s been given here. I also find it to be a very questionable decision on SNL’s part to make Walter White pro-Trump.
— I did like the line just now, where, after Walter White explained he’ll have less competition now that the wall that Trump promised to build will result in nothing coming in from Mexico, Beck’s Jake Tapper asks “You mean jobs?” and Walter responds “……….Sure.”
— Wow, surprised by how short this overall cold opening was. Nice to at least have a break from Alec Baldwin’s Trump impression, but I still didn’t care for this cold opening.
STARS: **


OPENING MONTAGE
— Yikes, a huge and bizarre gaffe where, immediately after this opening montage starts playing, it suddenly gets cut off for a few seconds by a real commercial. Apparently, this wasn’t just a local affiliate issue, as I think I recall SNL fans from various states complained about the same thing happening.


MONOLOGUE
BOM, LEJ, KET challenge host in the style of wrestling opponents

— John Cena immediately coming off charming and composed.
— I like the sudden wrestling turn that Bobby’s Santa scene takes.
— I just realized how nice it is seeing Bobby get the spotlight as himself here, given his very reduced airtime this season.
— Man, the pure, raw energy that both Leslie and the audience bring at the beginning of Leslie’s scene is nothing short of fantastic, and sums up so much of Leslie’s appeal as a cast member.
— I love that Leslie’s “wrestling character” is just her as herself, and her reveal of that is followed by an awesome pre-taped wrestler intro clip of her. That was good enough to potentially become her new intro shot in SNL’s regular opening montage.
— Pretty funny visual of Kenan sneaking behind John with a folding chair.
STARS: ***½


HOOK A HUNK
bachelors are ignored when contestant (CES) falls for (host)

— This SNL era seems to do a lot of Dating Game-esque sketches like this: the one with Woody Harrelson, the one with Russell Crowe, and two from the following season with Charles Barkley and Bill Hader, respectively. I may have forgotten one or two.
— A decently funny conceit with how Cecily’s interplay with this dating show’s host is immediately having the type of romantic chemistry that she should be having with the contestants.
— I like how the Cecily/John romantic interactions are now taking a mock-dramatic turn, while the contestants try to remain unfazed and cheesily answer unasked questions that a bachelorette would typically ask in a show like this.
— Charming turn with Kyle and Beck bonding with each other when coming to terms with the fact that Cecily’s not going to give any of the contestants attention. I especially like the light, friendly punch to the arm Kyle gives Beck.
— I got a pretty good laugh from Mikey awkwardly asking, “Uh, so…should I just go, or…?” during the Cecily/John and Beck/Kyle make-out sessions.
STARS: ***½


THE KARATE TEEN
martial arts bully (host) destroys underdog (MID)

— John’s douchey, whiny-voiced delivery throughout this short is hilarious.
— A great and impressive visual effect of Mikey getting punched through four walls.
— An okay conceit to this short, though this feels like it would’ve been more fitting if it aired later in the episode.
— A very weak ending.
STARS: ***


SCIENCE PRESENTATION
Alabama football player’s (host) bad science project is graded leniently

— Aidy’s voice sounds very hoarse here.
— John’s banana’s presentation is very funny, especially him passing off an orange as a “round banana”.
— The overly lenient attitudes the teachers have towards John’s ridiculously simplistic science presentations are pretty funny.
— Good part with Kenan having to be held back from physically attacking Mikey, just because Mikey called out the unfair biased treatment John is receiving.
STARS: ***½


DYKE & FATS SAVE CHRISTMAS
Dyke & Fats rescue kidnapped Santa & take offense to their chief (host)

— Very surprising that they’re doing a second installment of this after THREE SEASONS.
— Showing how long it had been since the previous Dyke & Fats short, even the visual quality of the retro 1970s screen filter they’re using here looks different from the one in the first installment of this short.
— Good gags in the long opening credits sequence, even if these gags don’t measure up to the ones from the first installment of this short.
— I was about to say that the ending twist was very weak compared to the one from the first installment, but Aidy’s comical overacting when repeatedly yelling “WE’RE PAST THAT!!!” tickled the hell out of me.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “My Church”


WEEKEND UPDATE
distressed Angela Merkel (KAM) feels isolated by shifting political tides

Cathy Anne sounds off about fake news, the alt-right, social media

 

— Yeesh, an uncharacteristically very lame opening joke from Michael.
— After a slow start, this Update has really taken off.
— Kate’s always pretty fun as Angela Merkel, and she has a lot of great lines here. This is one of her better commentaries.
— I always enjoy Kate-as-Merkel’s pining for Barack Obama.
— Colin, after the audience’s “Ohhhhhh” reaction to his joke about how Hillary Clinton could’ve suffered the same fate of South Korea’s impeached female president: “Cool! Well, it’s dress rehearsal!”
— Love Colin’s Tracy Morgan pet reindeer joke.
— Good to see Cathy Anne return to her new home: Weekend Update. Such a better place for her than sketches.
— A funny visual of Cathy Anne’s extreme psoriasis.
— Cathy Anne, on how McDonald’s needs to stop calling themselves McCafe: “I’m not here for a fancy clappuccino, I’m here cuz I burned some bridges at Wendy’s!”
— Cathy Anne, when saying Trump should get off the internet for a few days: “I know he’s watchin’!” IIRC, that line is referring to how Trump infamously tweeted a complaint about the preceding SNL episode’s “Trump retweeting average joes” cold opening right after it aired.
STARS: ****


WHERE’D YOUR MONEY GO?
pro athletes on game show have no self-control

 

— It’s already inherently funny and fitting having Kenan’s Charles Barkley host this particular game show, given the subject matter.
— Kenan’s Barkley, on John’s Rob Gronkowski: “You’re like if Dave & Busters was a person.” Very spot-on comment.
— Alex looks completely unrecognizable in this sketch. In fact, if I didn’t know that was him, I’d swear that was Justin Timberlake. Alex looks eerily Timberlake-esque to me behind those sunglasses and fake beard.
— I love Kenan’s way of always saying “scenario” as “scenarioooooo” (my writing-out of it doesn’t do it justice).
— Bobby is providing some good laughs as John Daly, especially him answering the “buy a cheetah” scenario with “I’ll buy that son of a bitch, he can be buddies with my shark.”
— Another good moment from Bobby’s Daly, with him promoting his brand of an alcoholic sports drink by saying: “Smirnoff Sport: it’s just blue vodka.”
— John has some good lines himself throughout this sketch, and his performance is fun as hell. Alex, on the other hand, is unfortunately saddled with the weakest material out of the three contestants, which is a shame, as this is the first (or one of the first) big comedic role Alex has ever gotten on SNL, and that’s also why it’s a shame that he looks so unrecognizable in it.
STARS: ***½


THE OFFICE TREE
ledge-hanging (AIB)’s co-workers are unhelpful during Christmas party

— Aidy’s voice still sounding very hoarse.
— Interesting seeing a rare(?) use of a stunt double in a live sketch. (I’m referring to the part where Aidy falls out of the window. At least I *think* that was a stunt double, judging from how long the camera held on the other characters before cutting back to “Aidy” falling out of the window.)
— Speaking of rarities in live sketches, I’m not sure if the occasional overhead shots of Aidy are live or pre-taped, but if they’re live, they’re an interesting and very unique camera angle for a live sketch in this era.
— Having Aidy panickedly yell most of her lines in this sketch seems like a questionable decision from SNL, given how hoarse her voice is tonight. Maybe she blew her voice out in rehearsals of this sketch.
— I’m finding the main comedic conceit of this sketch to be a little on the “ehhh” side. I think I’m more interested in this sketch for the aforementioned rare aspects than for the actual comedy.
— Decent ending.
STARS: **½


THROUGH DONALD’S EYES
Donald Trump’s first-person view is very selfish

— An absolutely fascinating approach to this Trump spoof, and I like how it has the aura of a weird, freaky dream sequence, even if that wasn’t the intention.
— A particularly classic visual of the mirror reflection of John Cena as Trump with giant hands.
— Excellent theme with how everyone from Trump’s point of view is speaking in broken sentences. I particularly love it in Bobby’s “Thing you promised” speech.
— A good ending with Trump’s self-dancing sequence.
— Overall, one of the absolute best (if not THE absolute best) Trump spoofs in this era, far better than SNL’s regular Trump spoofs would end up becoming after this point of the season. I almost wish the approach in this short could’ve become SNL’s regular approach to spoofing Trump these next four years (kinda like those first-person perspective Hail To The Chief sketches that Joe Piscopo used to do as Ronald Reagan) if they weren’t going to have an actual cast member play Trump.
— I’m not 100% sure, but I think I recall hearing that this short was written by Julio Torres. If so, man, he’s been having one of the most incredible starts an SNL writer has ever had. The number of segments he’s had so far this season that I’ve given a five or four-and-a-half-star rating to is astounding.
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “80s Mercedes”


EROTIC BOOKSTORE
bookstore workers (AIB) & (host) behave like romance novel characters

— I initially had mixed feelings for Aidy and John’s romance novel-like mock-passionate conversations in the back of the bookstore, but their dialogue has grown on me BIG TIME as this sketch has progressed. There are so many hilarious and well-delivered lines between Aidy and John here, such as John’s “I am a dirt man who knows only SEX!” line, Aidy’s mention of her “tiny pink nips”, and John’s “I’ll grab your ghost butt with my ten-pound hands!” line.
— I love Kenan’s very trademark Kenan-like deep-voiced outburst of “GET…THE…BOOK! GET THE DAMN BOOK!”
— Kenan is probably the only person who could’ve sold the corny ending.
STARS: ****½


UNITED STATES OF TALENT
brothers’ (host) & (MID) owl just craps & barfs

— Cecily and Beck’s character names on the bottom of screen seem to be displayed in the wrong order. (seen in the first above screencap for this sketch)
— The fact that there’s oddly only one celebrity judge in this America’s Got Talent-like show makes me wonder if this sketch was the victim of last-minute trimming for time reasons, and was originally supposed to feature three or four judges. If so, I wonder if the last-minute trimming and hasty approach to this sketch is the cause of that aforementioned technical error with Cecily and Beck’s character names.
— Blah, even for the low standards of pooping/vomiting gags, this is weak.
— They’re relying VERY heavily on Kenan to provide all the laughs in the post-pooping/vomiting portion of this sketch, but, as reliable as he usually is by this point of his tenure, not even he can put over the lines he’s been given here. Also, I wonder if the reason he has such a heavy amount of lines in this portion of the sketch is because his lines were possibly originally meant to be divided between three or four celebrity judge characters instead of just one.
— Cecily’s straitlaced, professional delivery of “got ass in its brains” made me laugh.
STARS: *½


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Yet another good season 42 episode. The first half of this episode didn’t contain any standout segments though was still fine, but starting with Weekend Update, this episode had a few strong segments. As expected, John Cena was a pretty fun host.


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


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Through Donald’s Eyes
Erotic Bookstore
Weekend Update
Dyke & Fats Save Christmas
Where’d Your Money Go?
Science Presentation
Monologue
Hook A Hunk
The Karate Teen
The Office Tree
The Lead with Jake Tapper
United States of Talent


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Emma Stone)
a slight step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Casey Affleck hosts the Christmas episode

Posted on

December 3, 2016 – Emma Stone / Shawn Mendes (S42 E8)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

RETWEETS
Donald Trump (Alec Baldwin) retweets nobodies during security briefing

— Interesting seeing a cold opening start as just a regular, non-political scene inside a school, which is so rare for cold openings in recent eras like this. Predictably, though, this still ends up turning into a political cold opening.
— Aidy is rather stumbly here.
— Yet another poorly-aged SNL portrayal of Kellyanne Conway as the sympathizing voice of reason of the Trump camp.
— I love Melissa’s delivery of “That’s psycho! You’re only gonna attract psychos!”
— The mere look of Bobby’s character is hilarious.
— The Trump portions of this cold opening are getting a little old for me. I guess this counts as the first Alec-Baldwin-as-Trump cold opening that I’m not too crazy about.
— Alex, to Alec’s Trump: “Your inauguration is just seven weeks away.” Kenan: “(shouting) AAAAH! (speaking) Sorry. I just hadn’t heard that put in weeks before.”
— The debut of Grim Reaper Steve Bannon, played by a well-disguised Mikey.
STARS: **½


MONOLOGUE
backstage, host’s interactions with cast members bring high school to mind

— The brief sighting of Leslie and Kyle being affectionate with each other backstage is excellent continuity from the first Leslie/Kyle short that aired a few episodes prior.
— An interesting factoid that Emma Stone and Aidy actually went to the same high school together back in the day.
— Vanessa again playing against type as a mean girl really well.
— Bobby is absolutely spot-on as a typical high school jock from movies.
— When this monologue originally aired, I remember that Emma referring to Bobby as her old fling from her last hosting stint in 2011 made me realize that Bobby, Vanessa, and Kenan were the only cast members from Emma’s November 2011 episode who were still on the show at this point in December 2016, which then made me realize how drastically this cast had changed over the course of just five years. Sadly, you can’t say the same for the five (well, four-and-a-half) years that have passed since December 2016, as a majority of this 2016 cast is still on the show today in March 2021.
STARS: ***½


THEATER SHOWCASE
Student Theater Showcase performers miss the point on social issues

— This ends up being the final installment of this recurring sketch.
— There’s Mikey basically filling in the role that Taran Killam used to play in this recurring sketch. Speaking of Mikey, he noticeably has a lot of black eyeliner on in this sketch, left over from his portrayal of Grim Reaper Steve Bannon in the cold opening.
— Vanessa, on one of the bad scenes in this play: “That one kinda made a good point, though.” Kenan: “They can NEVER know you said that.”
— Kenan, on Aidy’s (very funny) overly pro-AIDS speech: “She overshot the runway at the end there.”
— Hilarious how the theater showcase characters awkwardly shoehorned the word “basketball” into the “gay son” scene in this play.
STARS: ****


THE CHRISTMAS CANDLE
(host), (KAM), (AIB) sing the praises of a miraculously regiftable candle

— A well-loved piece among viewers.
— A funny simplistic and relatable concept, and it’s being executed very well in this format.
— I’m enjoying the 1994 look to all of the characters.
— Aidy’s mock-passionate facial expressions while singing are cracking me up.
— Speaking of Aidy, I absolutely LOVE the melody of her big solo right now.
— My strong feelings for this short are the same strong feelings that I wish I could have for Wishin’ Boot (pun not intended). Not sure why this Candle short works so well for me, whereas I merely find Wishin’ Boot to just be fine.
STARS: ****½


POSTERS
Krissy Knox (host) & other poster models teach math to highschooler (PED)

 

— Mikey is both funny and spot-on as a typical “cool” skiier.
— I really like Kate delivery of “I’m maaaade of math!”
— Interesting character voice from Emma.
— After Kenan first spoke to Pete, what in the WORLD was with Pete’s extremely long, awkward pause when he was supposed to say a line? At first, he smirked out of character like he was going to crack up at Kenan, which, okay, I get, as Pete sometimes has trouble keeping a straight face in sketches by this point of his tenure (it gets worse a little later in his tenure, IIRC), but then, even after his smirk dissolves, he just inexplicably remains silent for a few seconds, leading to very awkward dead air, before he FINALLY says his next line. What happened? Speaking of which, this reminds me that this ends up being the last episode before Pete goes to rehab, causing him to completely miss the next two episodes. I can’t help but wonder if there’s some kind of connection between his aforementioned inexplicable long, bizarre pause in this sketch and his need to go to rehab sometime after this episode aired, but I’m sure I’m looking too much into it.
— Also, when Pete finally says his line after that long, bizarre pause he made, he says Kenan’s character’s name, but I for the life of me cannot understand WHAT the name was that he said. “Walm P”? Is that it? That CAN’T be the name, as it makes no sense, but that’s the best I could make out from Pete’s delivery of it. I’m apparently not the only one who couldn’t understand the name Pete said there, as SNL Archives’ page for this sketch doesn’t even state Kenan’s character’s name, and instead just lists him as “comedian”.
— At one brief point of this sketch, Emma’s voice here strangely sounds just like Vanessa’s Laura Parsons character.
— Not only am I finding Emma’s character funny, but there’s an odd likability I’m also finding to her, annoying voice and all. I’ve never seen Emma’s season 44 episode, which has a second installment of this sketch, but I’ve heard some really negative things about Emma’s performance in that second installment. I guess I’ll see what all of the fuss is about when I reach that episode in this project, but I will say that it does seem very unnecessary for SNL to even do a second installment of this sketch.
STARS: ***½


THE HUNT FOR HIL
Hillary Clinton (KAM) is elusive in the Chappaqua woods

— A very funny concept, and the treatment of a woods-wandering Hillary Clinton as a Bigfoot-like creature is providing some good laughs.
— I like Beck doing a Hillary-like laugh as a “call” to summon her.
— The extremely bright blue eye contacts Kenan’s wearing are a nice touch to his spiritual character.
STARS: ****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Mercy”


WEEKEND UPDATE
treating Donald Trump’s tweets as weather forecast desensationalizes them

LEJ coaches men to be sexually confident & not worry about penis size

Jennifer Aniston [real] & Friends segues disrupt VAB’s Rachel Green spoof

— As soon as Colin said, during his introduction of the next guest commentary, “Women in long-term relationships are more likely to experience a decrease in sexual satisfaction”, I knew that meant Leslie was about to show up.
— A very funny comment from Leslie calling herself a Hung-Like-A-Horse Whisperer.
— Leslie, when trying to make innuendos: “Do not promise me a rack of ribs…and then show up with a little penis.”
— Another overall fantastic Update commentary from Leslie.
— I like how the “…starring Kevin James!” punchline about a wacky animal-involved news story has become a recurring punchline for Michael. At least I *think* Michael previously used that punchline in an earlier episode.
— Oh, right, this second Rachel From Friends commentary of Vanessa’s has an appearance from Jennifer Aniston later on.
— So far, this Rachel commentary is going in the exact same direction as her previous one, complete with Colin having the exact same puzzled reactions to the sudden scene segues. Thankfully, my goodwill towards Vanessa’s spot-on Rachel impression is keeping me entertained, despite the rehashed material.
— And there’s Jennifer Aniston, doing one of those “sneaker-upper” cameos that I typically run hot-and-cold on. This ends up being one of the better instances of it, again mostly because of my goodwill towards Vanessa’s Rachel impression.
— Heh, Vanessa’s Rachel impression is so damn good that she even outshines Aniston herself when they’re both doing the Rachel voice together.
STARS: ****


CLEANING CREW
office cleaning women (LEJ), (host), (CES) perform naughty Santa songs

— Surprisingly, this is Cecily’s first and only appearance in this entire episode.
— Another interesting character voice from Emma, who’s deep-voiced foreign accent here is pretty funny.
— Meh, I’m not caring for the comedic conceit of the Santa songs the ladies are performing. This is boring to me.
— We at least get a funny cutaway reveal of kids being in the room after the raunchy Santa song the cleaning ladies performed.
— Now we get an even funnier cutaway reveal of a deadpan Melissa being with the kids.
— That ending felt very empty.
STARS: **


PALEY CENTER EVENT
on an actress panel, Debette Goldry describes old-school extreme sexism

— Nice seeing Leslie playing herself in this sketch.
— Oh, wait, turns out all of the interviewees (except Kate) are playing themselves in this sketch.
— Like the previous installment of this sketch, Kate’s Debette Goldry has a lot of funny disclosures about the treatment of actresses back in the day, especially the story about a monkey with a tray of opium, and the story about women literally being treated as props on movie sets.
— Heh, I think Kate accidentally spit on Jennifer Aniston just now, judging from Jennifer’s reaction.
— Sasheer has some really good reactions to Kate’s Debette. I especially like Sasheer responding to Debette’s FDR story by calmly saying “That…that felt like the end of that” and changing the subject.
— Debette, when asked what part of her body is she referring to when she mentioned her toot: “I’ll give you two guesses, and they’re both right.”
STARS: ****


WELLS FOR BOYS
Fisher-Price’s wells are for sensitive boys not made of snips & snails

— A beloved Julio Torres classic.
— Emma’s interplay and bonding with her sensitive son is fantastic.
— The tone of and approach to this subject matter is simply perfect.
— Great touch with the accessories this toy comes with: a balcony and a shattered mirror.
— A distracting gaffe, where the SNL Band can be heard prematurely playing the show to commercial in the middle of this fake ad, before the band abruptly stops when realizing their mistake.
— Excellent delivery from Emma when angrily telling off her other son.
— Great tagline from Cecily (in yet another instance of her doing excellent voice-over work in a commercial) about not just getting your sensitive son Barbie dolls.
— Overall, just as much of a masterpiece as I had remembered.
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Treat You Better”


THE NATIVITY
insensitive Joseph (KYM) besets postpartum Mary (host) with visitors

— I have mixed feelings so far on this concept of a modernized, relatable portrayal of Mary in a nativity sketch. Part of me finds it funny, but the other part of me finds it a bit corny.
— Okay, after about two minutes, the concept has grown on me.
— The audience seems distracted by the llama.
— After I’ve come around on this sketch, that ending brought back the bad corny feel I got from this sketch earlier.
STARS: ***


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A pretty solid episode, and, as usual for this era, there were also some very memorable, well-liked, standout pre-taped segments. Emma Stone feels more and more like an SNL natural with each passing hosting stint of hers, and came off in this particular episode like someone who I can actually picture being a regular cast member.


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


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Wells For Boys
The Christmas Candle
Theater Showcase
Weekend Update
Paley Center Event
The Hunt For Hil
Posters
Monologue
The Nativity
Retweets
Cleaning Crew


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Kristen Wiig)
a slight step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
John Cena

Posted on

November 19, 2016 – Kristen Wiig / The xx (S42 E7)

(Before you read this review, please read this comment I left in the comments section of the preceding episode, regarding political discussion in the comments section of this site, if you haven’t already. And also please read this follow-up comment I left in response to someone’s reply. Thank you.)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

TRUMP NATIONAL GOLF CLUB
Donald Trump (Alec Baldwin) drops promises & spurns Mitt Romney (JAS)

— (*sigh*) It’s after the election, and Alec Baldwin is STILL playing Donald Trump. I think this is where my slow burn towards Alec’s Trump impression might begin in my reviews. I was tolerant of that impression when reviewing the pre-election portion of this season, but there’s no way Alec’s Trump was ever meant to last beyond that portion, nor should it have. SNL should’ve had a back-up plan for an ACTUAL CAST MEMBER to officially take over the Trump role, if not by this point of the season (since I understand that SNL, given how sure they were that Trump would lose the election, may not have had enough time between Trump’s election win and this episode to re-cast the role), then AT LEAST by Trump’s inauguration two months later. Plus, I can’t help but feel that the Alec/Kate Times Square pre-tape from two episodes prior to this would’ve been a very fitting final appearance for Alec’s Trump, and I get the feeling that was SNL’s intention at the time. Maybe I’ll wait until the Trump inauguration point of this season before I slowly start unleashing my saltiness towards Alec’s Trump performances.
— A huge laugh from Alec’s Trump panickedly Googling “What is ISIS?”
— Bobby’s role here reminds me of the one he would soon play in the Through Donald’s Eyes pre-tape from this season’s John Cena episode.
— The briefness of the Trump/Mitt Romney meeting was very funny.
— Alec’s Trump, to Beck’s Mike Pence: “I love you, Mike. You’re the reason I’ll never get impeached.” Well…….
— Overall, not bad, and it turns out that my goodwill towards Alec’s Trump is still somewhat here by this point.
STARS: ***


MONOLOGUE
Thanksgiving song of KRW, WLF, Steve Martin [real] has some inaccuracies

— So far, some funny oddball one-liners from Kristen Wiig, who’s delivering them in a comically deadpan manner. This is the RIGHT use of her talents, unlike the way SNL usually utilized her talents in her later seasons in the cast.
— A cute appearance from Melissa.
— A nice way to use what appears to be the entire cast (and more, including who I’m assuming are writers).
— Kristen’s song is solid, has a lot of funny silly lyrics, and the melody is damn catchy.
— Will Forte! I don’t know if it’s wrong that I’m more excited to see him than I am to see Steve Martin (not that I have a problem with Steve, but it’s more rare to see a Forte cameo, and I’m such a huge champion of him), but I am. Also very nice to hear a well-deserved big round of audience applause for Will, even if he followed it with a scripted-though-very-funny “Huh. Less applause than Steve Martin, gonna remember that.”
— The cutaway to an audience member’s head exploding (in reaction to a mind-blowing fact Kristen shared about Thanksgiving) cracked me up, due to how out-of-nowhere it came.
STARS: ****


THE BUBBLE
exclusive community The Bubble contains those avoiding Donald Trump’s USA

— I strangely have no memory of this, but from all of the glowing things I’ve heard some SNL fans say about it recently, I should remember this.
— Nice pairing of Kyle and Sasheer in rare spokesperson roles.
— So far, 1) a very solid and smart premise, 2) an instance of SNL actually spoofing liberals, and 3) the execution is excellent.
— A great grimace that Melissa makes when drinking the raw milk.
— A big laugh from the dollar bill with Bernie Sanders’ face on it.
— A hilarious facial expression from Sasheer after Kyle says “We don’t see color here…but we celebrate it”.
STARS: *****


SECRET WORD
Mindy Grayson & Italian bombshell (CES) flub the clues

— OH. NO. The return of…this. Boy, I didn’t realize how good I had it not having to regularly review this wretched recurring sketch anymore after season 37.
— Ugh at that “Choad” gag, regarding the surname of Kenan’s character. It’s also the second time that writer James Anderson used the term “Choad” (I’d really rather not explain what it means) as a character’s surname (the previous instance was in the Los Angeles Face sketch from the season 30 Hilary Swank episode).
— A funny taped message from Bill Hader’s Lyle Round character, giving a comically brief, blunt explanation for why he’s not hosting this show anymore.
— Oh, I hate seeing poor Melissa stuck playing this dreaded straight man role to Kristen’s Mindy Grayson character.
— (*groan*) Cue all of the “blurting out the secret word” gags. At this point of SNL’s run, it had been 7 years since this recurring sketch debuted, and they NEVER changed the main gag of these damn sketches. I didn’t laugh at the “blurting out the secret word” gag the first time, so how am I supposed to laugh at it in the bazillionth rendition of it?
— Kenan is at least doing a very good job in this role of the new Secret Word host.
— (*groans louder*) And now cue all of the songs that Mindy Grayson breaks out into.
STARS: *½


ANDERSON COOPER 360
pundits get caught in loops a la Westworld

— Alex’s Anderson Cooper, during his intros of the panelists: “CNN chief political correspondent Dana Bash.” Kristen’s Dana Bash: “It’s ‘Danna’…for some reason.”
— I’m liking the progression to this, with how the panelists are repeating the same conversation in an endless loop in an increasingly frenzied manner. This reminds me of that underrated, forgotten sketch from the season 30 Luke Wilson episode, where Wilson, Seth Meyers, and Kenan played businessmen repeating a conversation on an endless loop while getting increasingly drunk, with the wording of that conversation being increasingly boorish and inappropriate in each round. I liked that sketch better than this Anderson Cooper one, but this is still fine.
— Just like the previous time he played Anderson Cooper earlier this season, Alex is rather stumbly, flubbing a few lines lines. [ADDENDUM: Oh, the irony of me flubbing that of all sentences.]
— A funny reveal of the panelists and Alex’s Cooper all being malfunctioning robots.
— The Westworld twist at the end reminds me of the X-Files twist at the end of the Totino’s Pizza Rolls commercial from the preceding season’s Larry David episode.
STARS: ***½


TARGET
Target offers a respite from your family during the holiday season

— A very good premise, with the comically upbeat presentation of the simple-but-relatable concept of going to a Target parking lot just to unwind from holiday stress. Feels like a companion piece to that Your Hometown commercial from season 38.
— Given the host of tonight’s episode, it’s funny that a Target segment is appearing in this episode and DOESN’T feature a certain odd-voiced clerk from the host’s repertoire of recurring characters.
STARS: ****


QVC AUDITIONS
rival neighbors (CES) & (KRW) make competing audition tapes to be on QVC

— The Wiig/Strong ham-off sketch that I’m sure writers James Anderson and/or Kent Sublette were eagerly waiting YEARS to do. That’s not me automatically dismissing this sketch, though.
— Interesting structure to this sketch.
— I’m actually enjoying the escalation to this, and, while it had the potential to be annoying, the hammy, back-and-forth shoutfest between Cecily and Kristen during their confrontation is strangely fun. Even their goofy southern accents, a staple of bad Anderson/Sublette-written sketches, aren’t bothering me in this.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “On Hold”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Thanksgiving will be PED’s venue to release anger induced by Donald Trump

Willie fondly recalls atrocious occurrences from Thanksgivings past

— So many great points that Colin and Michael are making about president-elect Trump.
— The usual good commentary from Pete, even if some of the points he’s making here seem like clapter-bait.
— Good ending to Pete’s commentary, in regards to making political remarks at the Thanksgiving table.
— Kenan’s Willie character is as hilarious as always, even if he doesn’t have any lines tonight that I feel like quoting in my review.
STARS: ****


THANKSGIVING PARADE
Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons crowd penthouse apartment window

— Funny visual of the performers as giant balloons outside of the window.
— A pretty good laugh from how unsettlingly close the creepy balloons are getting to the main characters’ window.
— This sketch now gets even funnier with Bobby popping up as a scary-looking clown.
— A good dark bit regarding Kristen Chenowith.
STARS: ***½


WHISKERS R’ WE
Barbara & new bae (KRW) promote Thanksgiving Catacopia

— (*sigh*) You know how tired I am of this recurring sketch, blah blah blah.
— Is it intentional for Kristen to be speaking in the exact same voice Kate is?
— I did laugh at one line about the ghost cat: “If she appears in your mirror, it’s over.”
— For once this season, Bobby is actually making a lot of appearances. This is also the second consecutive sketch that he steals.
STARS: **


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “I Dare You”


SURPRISE
surprise-loving Sue can’t wait to see unannounced military homecoming

— Oh, no. But at least, unlike Secret Word, this sketch was never overused back in the day. (I think I remember pointing out that this sketch seemed to only appear once a season after it debuted, plus it completely skipped season 36). Still not looking forward to sitting through another installment of this sketch, though, given how I’ve never been a fan of it.
— Wait, Leslie’s in this? Heh, oh, you just KNOW she’s gonna crack up at Kristen at some point of this sketch.
— As expected, this sketch is hitting all of its old beats from back in the day. Yawn. If it weren’t for the newer cast members being in this, I’d swear I’m watching a repeat of an earlier installment of this sketch.
— Yep, as predicted, there’s Leslie fighting to keep a straight face. It is kind of a novelty seeing a former cast member who Leslie was never in the cast with (though they did work together in Ghostbusters) be the one who makes Leslie break, instead of it being someone like Kate as usual.
STARS: **


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A good episode, and a big improvement over the previous episode that Kristen Wiig hosted. Despite some weak recurring sketches tonight and the fact that the show ended on kind of a bummer note with two sketches that I didn’t care for, this episode gave us a lot of good material, some very strong pre-tapes, and a better use of Kristen than her previous episode had.


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


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
The Bubble
Target
Monologue
Weekend Update
Anderson Cooper 360
QVC Auditions
Thanksgiving Parade
Trump National Golf Club
Whiskers R’ We
Surprise
Secret Word


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Dave Chappelle)
a big step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Emma Stone

Posted on

Politicial discussion in the comments section of this site

NOTE: This post is a comment I originally left in the comments section of my most recent review of the Dave Chappelle / A Tribe Called Quest episode. I’m re-posting it here in case there are any people who haven’t read it in the Chappelle episode comment section. Also, the comments section of this re-post is closed. If you have any response to what you’re about to read, please respond to the original post of it here, and as I said there, watch yourself in how you respond.

Commenters, cool it with the heated political discussion and ranting. While it hasn’t gotten TOO out of hand so far, I really don’t like the direction it’s going in. This is exactly why I was dreading reaching the Trump era of SNL in my reviews. The last thing I want is for the comments section of my blog to turn into what commenter Anthony Peter Coleman called “a political hellscape like the rest of the internet”. (And don’t worry, Vax Novier, your rant alone wasn’t what bothered me, it’s only the combination of it with all of the other heated political ranting in this episode’s comments section that feels very unpleasant to read altogether). It’s already an extremely demanding, exhausting process for me to churn these reviews out on a daily basis. Please don’t make me even MORE stressed out by having to deal with the comments section of my reviews turning into heated, toxic political discussions. This is absolutely NOT the place for that. And if you appreciate my reviews and respect how pleasant the comments section of this blog typically is, then please lead by example and do not continue any kind of heated political discourse here nor in the comments sections of any of my other reviews.

Oh, and for people complaining that I didn’t give the cold opening a rating, it’s a rule that I don’t give a rating to this specific type of somber, non-comedic cold opening addressing something major in the news (e.g. the post 9/11 cold opening, the post-Sandy Hook cold opening). Plain and simple. If you’ve been following this blog for a good while, you should’ve already known that. And if you’re mad because my review didn’t match your opinion that the Hallelujah cold opening deserves a one-star rating, GET OVER IT. Also, watch what you say to me. Reading comments like “Not a ratable segment, my ass” and “Give it *” really pisses me off. Friendly debating over an opinion of mine is absolutely fine, but you do NOT get to rudely demand what rating I give a segment. This is my blog, show me some damn respect. And at the end of the day, these are just dumb little episode reviews I do of a silly show. *I* don’t even take my reviews all that seriously, and neither should you.

If any, and I mean ANY kind of tension or unpleasantry continues in the comments section of this particular episode (including in response to this comment of mine), I’m closing the comments section for this episode, period. And from here on out, if any commenter goes off on any kind of unpleasant political rant in the comments section any other episode, that rant WILL be deleted.

[ADDENDUM (3/10/21): Please read this follow-up comment I made, in response to someone’s reply.]

Posted on

November 12, 2016 – Dave Chappelle / A Tribe Called Quest (S42 E6)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

HALLELUJAH
untriumphant Hillary Clinton (KAM) plays piano & sings “Hallelujah”

— (*sigh*) Welp, here we go.
— When this originally aired, I remember being surprised SNL felt that Trump’s election win, as unfortunate as it was, warranted such a somber, joke-less cold opening, but I also found it to be really classy and I appreciated that classiness, and I also found Kate’s performance to be absolutely beautiful and captivating. In fact, the tender side that Kate showed of herself here only added to the “We are watching a legend in the making” viewpoint that I generally had about Kate back in these 2014-2017 years, and I also remember feeling that this cold opening added perfectly to the overall very important, special feel of this episode in general. However, my positive feelings towards this cold opening would go on to gradually change to a more negative one over the course of the next few years, possibly because of me being influenced by what I’ve heard a large number of other SNL fans negatively say about it. That being said, I’m going into my current viewing of this with somewhat of a clean slate, just to see how I’ll react to it.
— I’m aware that this might be an unpopular opinion, but in my current viewing of this cold opening so far, I’m not exactly hating it, and I’m still finding Kate’s performance to be beautiful and moving.
— I remember once reading a suggestion from some SNL fans that, if Kate had done this same cold opening while dressed as herself instead of as Hillary Clinton, people who are bothered by this opening would give this more of a pass. Interesting to think about, but I’m not sure how I feel about that suggestion. Plus, it’s kinda hard for me to picture Kate saying the famous ending message of this cold opening (“I’m not giving up…and neither should you”) as herself instead of as Hillary.
STARS: N/A (not a ratable segment)


MONOLOGUE
host does stand-up about angry whites, shootings, the presidency

— A nice long, very extended ovation that the audience gives Dave Chappelle at the beginning.
— Given the mood of the nation at the time, it’s very refreshing to have Dave to add his trademark brand of humor to the situation.
— I love how Dave’s even getting hilarious-but-tasteful humor out of really sensitive subjects like the Pulse Nightclub shooting and the story Dave tells about grabbing a handful of a housekeeper’s pussy while staying at the Trump Hotel this week (I also love Dave’s “Sorry about that, Lorne” addendum to the latter story).
— The zoo bit is particularly hilarious.
— I really like how the long pauses Dave always makes before jumping to another topic, as well as how he’s slowly pacing back and forth around the stage throughout this monologue, are giving this the feel of a legitimate stand-up special you’d see Dave do on cable. It also gives this monologue a bit of the feel of something you’d see in the earliest days of SNL’s original era. In fact, certain aspects of this episode in general, including the tone of and approach to this monologue, has always reminded me a little of the Richard Pryor episode from season 1, another important, memorable episode, much like this one.
— I really like the occasional serious, joke-less parts of this monologue, especially the history Dave tells of black people in the White House.
— Even Dave’s “I’m gonna give [Trump] a chance” announcement at the end doesn’t hurt this monologue for me, because, as poorly as it’s aged, Dave meant well at the time.
— An overall very lengthy monologue, but every minute of it was worth it to me.
STARS: *****


ELECTION NIGHT
unlike their white friends, (host) & (CSR) take election result in stride

— A very strong structure to this sketch’s format.
— Dave is fantastic as the only voice of reason in this group watching the election results. I especially love his facial expression after Beck’s “Florida’s goin’ blue. (*holds up his wine glass for a toast*) To Latinos!” line.
— Great progression to this, with the white characters increasingly stretching their reasoning for why Hillary is losing more and more states, as their mood slowly deflates while it becomes more and more obvious that Trump’s going to win the election.
— What’s with Chris Rock’s delivery? He seems like this is his very first time reading these lines, judging from the distractingly slow manner he’s reading them off the cue cards, and the fact that he keeps cracking up. Was he added to this sketch at literally the last minute? All that being said, he’s still making me laugh a lot here, and is still nailing his punchlines.
— Dave, after a distressed Aidy asks what’s going to happen to undocumented immigrants: “Come on, man, you act like everyone tryin’ to pick their own strawberries.”
— Perfect ending with Dave and Chris’ characters sharing a big, hearty, knowing laugh together after Beck cries out, “God, this is the most shameful thing America has ever done!”
STARS: *****


WALKING DEAD CHAPPELLE’S SHOW
host introduces clip featuring the return of Chappelle’s Show characters

The Walking Dead- Beautiful (Donnell Rawlings) & others fear Negan (host)

— Wow, a sketch starting out with a person introducing it on the home base stage (ala what Dave used to regularly do on Chappelle’s Show). You pretty much never that by this point of SNL’s run. That’s another thing about this episode that feels a little like a throwback to the earliest days of SNL’s original era.
— A very fun idea to this short, and a creative way to reprise Dave’s beloved Chappelle’s Show characters. This is a blast.
— Great, seamless editing to this, given how Dave is playing almost all of the characters.
— A very fitting and clever choice to make Dave’s Clayton Bigsby character a Trump supporter.
— Love the “Note to self: remind me to try crack!” line.
— Great sequence with Tyrone Biggums’ severed head giving a mock-inspirational speech to us.
STARS: ****½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “We The People”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Ruth Bader Ginsburg (KAM) is digging in to protect her Supreme Court spot

   

— Ah, here we are. For obvious reasons, Colin and Michael are DEFINITELY going to have lots of interesting things to say tonight.
— When Michael started his opening election-related joke by saying, “Well…it’s official…”, I was hoping it would go in a similar direction to Norm Macdonald’s legendary “Well, it’s official: murder is now legal in the state of California” joke from the beginning of the first Update after the O.J. Simpson verdict, but Michael’s joke unfortunately ended up going in a completely different, less-funny direction, though still had a good punchline.
— Colin: “America is like Leslie Jones: addicted to white guys.”
— A noteworthy moment with Michael’s classic “Che, I’m Mexican! / Che, I’m Puerto Rican!” flub. Priceless. Colin also gets in some great ad-libbing about that afterwards.
— So far, Colin and Michael are not disappointing me with the election-related jokes tonight.
— Another freakin’ fantastic ad-lib from Colin tonight, where, after Michael follows a Chris Christie slam from Colin by ad-libbing “You know you still gotta drive to New Jersey, right?”, Colin ad-libs “I just won’t take the bridge!”
— I’m not finding myself too excited about seeing another Ruth Bader Ginsburg commentary from Kate, as they’re usually so by-the-numbers and I’m worried it’ll slow down the momentum of this extremely strong Update.
— Okay, Kate’s RBG did get a big laugh from me just now when “taking her vitamins”. I also really like the ad-libbing between her and Colin afterwards. (Man, this Update is filled with terrific ad-libs.)
— Blah, cue all the “You just got Ginsburned” dance breaks that are always a chore for me to sit through.
— That Colin Kaepernick “slam” from Kate’s RBG wasn’t anywhere near good nor biting enough to even warrant a “Ginsburned” dance break.
— I do love Kate-as-RBG’s Mike Pence slams right now.
— I’m pretty disappointed that they ended tonight’s Update with the RBG commentary. I’m also surprised that this Update had only one guest commentary, though I do like how this Update focused mostly on Colin and Michael giving their take on the election results. I kinda feel that SNL should’ve had this be a rare commentary-less Update. If they did, this might’ve been the very first Update to receive a perfect five-star rating from me.
STARS: ****½


JHERI’S PLACE / INSIDE SNL
unruly hair of Jheri’s Place employees makes it a health inspector target

host & cast members address Jheri’s Place fiasco in post-sketch press conference

 

— When this originally aired, I cringed so much at that extremely awkward gaffe from Leslie early on in this sketch, thinking it was real and another moment like what notoriously happened with her in that season 40 sketch with her and Chris Rock as the arguing married couple. I ended up being relieved to eventually see that her “gaffe” in this Jheri’s Place sketch was part of the script.
— Kyle’s horrible accent is cracking me up.
— Oh, I absolutely LOVE the turn this sketch takes with the sports-like “post-sketch conference” occurring after the disastrous Jheri’s Place sketch. A terrific meta turn.
— It’s sad how rare it’s starting to become to see Bobby this season, given the fact that he’s, you know, STILL IN THE CAST, and still has quite a bit left to offer, unlike most cast members when they reach their 9th season.
— Leslie, in her defense of her flub during the Jheri’s Place sketch: “Look – SNL knew what they was gettin’ into when they hired me.”
— I also love Leslie’s “We talkin’ ’bout cue cards right now?!?” rant, which is even funnier when you’re aware that it’s spoofing Allen Iverson’s famous “We in here talkin’ ’bout practice?!?” rant from a press conference.
— Dave, on how he thought putting on the jheri curl wig would’ve been enough for him to sell the sketch: “I really thought I was gonna be the next David S. Pumpkins.”
— Mikey: “(very smugly) Uh, any questions for me – Mikey Day???” Reporters: “……….” Bobby, as one of the reporters: “No. (*immediately moves on to the next question*)”
— Kenan, right before angrily storming off of this press conference: “Live from New York, ya’ll can kiss my ass!”
— Nice touch ending this sketch with a slow-motion replay of Leslie’s flub, spoofing how sports broadcasts often precede a commercial break by showing a slow-motion replay of an athlete either scoring a point or making a blunder.
STARS: *****


KIDS TALK POLITICS
host’s daughter Sonal [real] drops some Trump truth

— Wow, I strangely forgot all about this segment until now. And I thought I had remembered every single segment from this memorable episode.
— An interesting use of Vanessa.
— Some funny lines from the last child, Dave’s daughter, especially what she says about cats.
— Cute how you can see a strong facial resemblance between Dave and his daughter.
— I’m surprised by how short this was, but that’s not a complaint. I’m glad this got in, told its joke, and didn’t belabor the point.
STARS: ***½


LAST CALL
union of Sheila Sovage & (host) is too much for bartender Anfernee (KET)

— A very rare instance of this recurring sketch NOT being the final sketch of the night.
— I laughed SO damn hard at one reaction shot of Kenan responding to a particularly disgusting comment of Kate’s by just sternly staring at her silently for a few seconds, then holding up a yellow card and angrily saying “Yellow card!”
— Dave, on what the sex position “66” is: “That’s you facing away from me while I just work on myself.”
— Some other great reaction shots from Kenan throughout this.
— Dave: “You gave me a hard-off.” I liked that line better when Tim Meadows said it in that lesbians sketch from the season 25 Joshua Jackson episode.
— The “gross make-out” sessions of each installment of this recurring sketch are starting to get a little old for me, but the one in tonight’s sketch gets saved by the hilarious “Bellagio” effect that Dave and Kate do with the drink dispensers during their making-out. I can’t blame Kenan for cracking up at that.
— We finally find out the name of Kenan’s bartender character in this recurring sketch: Anfernee. Lots of SNL episode guides, including SNL Archives, claim Kenan’s character name is actually Anthony, but I definitely heard the name Anfernee come from Kenan’s mouth in this sketch (and, yes, Anfernee’s a real name, if anyone’s wondering). I stand corrected if anyone can prove me wrong.
— Meh, that gun ending was trying too hard to top the previous endings of this recurring sketch, and didn’t succeed.
STARS: ****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest, Busta Rhymes, Consequence [real] sing “The Space Program”


LOVE AND LESLIE
backstage romance helps LEJ gain a relationship & KYM lose his virginity

— The debut of the series of Leslie/Kyle relationship shorts, which I’ve always been a huge fan of.
— A legitimately touching beginning with a tender Leslie expressing unhappiness over how difficult it is for her to find a man, and how much that hurts.
— Interesting seeing several photos of Leslie when she was younger.
— A very funny reveal of Kyle, of all people, being Leslie’s mysterious new man.
— Interesting how this short is done in the same style as the strong Kyle Vs. Kanye short from the preceding season.
— A very funny sudden brief appearance from Lorne, just showing up to say in a confessional that it’s important for Kyle to lose his virginity.
— Now this already-fantastic short gets even funnier when Kyle brings up his feelings about the Leslie/Colin story arc from Weekend Update, complete with a highlight reel being shown of some of those Leslie/Colin moments.
— Excellent ending with Dave’s reaction to finding out Leslie and Kyle had just had sex in his dressing room. By the way, this has to be by far the episode with the most uses of the word “goddamn”. Also BY FAR the episode with the most uses of the N-word (though it’s not used in this particular short).
STARS: *****


FOOTBALL PARTY
43-year-old (host) lives with his mom (LEJ) & is still breastfeeding

— After not making any live appearances in the preceding two episodes, Pete finally makes one tonight, only for it to just be a straight man role in the final sketch of the night. Ironically, he got more airtime in previous seasons as a featured player than he’s been getting this season as a repertory player so far.
— A good laugh from the sudden breastfeeding reveal.
— I like Kyle as the only one of Dave’s friends who isn’t weirded-out by the breastfeeding thing.
— This episode in general is so damn strong that even this dumb, thin sketch is absolutely working for me, whereas I probably wouldn’t have been so big on it had it appeared in a lesser episode. Every time I worry that the main joke of this sketch might start to get old, there’s a silly charm that keeps bringing me back stronger than ever. Even the breaking from some of the performers and the accidental glimpse of the bottle that Leslie is spraying milk from is actually adding a lot to the fun, silly nature of this sketch.
— Poor, poor Sasheer, making her only appearance of such a significant episode in a measly small, non-comedic walk-on role towards the end of the final sketch of the night.
STARS: ****


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Not only an absolutely phenomenal, all-timer episode, but a very important and meaningful one in relation to current events and the mood of the nation that week. A Tribe Called Quest’s epic musical performances also added to the important, meaningful, current events-driven feel of the episode. Hell, even the drawn-out manner in which Dave Chappelle delivered his goodnights speech had a meaningful feel that added to the “This is a really special, history-in-the-making episode I’m watching” vibe that I remember getting from this episode when it originally aired. And as expected, Dave Chappelle was a fantastic host, especially for what was hyped at the time as his big comeback.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
(Much like some particularly terrific episodes I’ve reviewed lately, there are way too many things to pick for this episode’s “Best Of”, so I’ll narrow it down to what I feel are the particularly best highlights)

 


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Jheri’s Place / Inside SNL
Election Night
Monologue
Love and Leslie
Walking Dead Chappelle’s Show
Weekend Update
Last Call
Football Party
Kids Talk Politics


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Benedict Cumberbatch)
a big step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Kristen Wiig

Posted on

November 5, 2016 – Benedict Cumberbatch / Solange (S42 E5)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT
Alec Baldwin [real] & KAM drop Trump-Clinton skit for Times Square recess

— Something about the timing seems a bit off at certain parts of this cold opening so far.
— A pretty funny reaction Alec Baldwin’s Donald Trump has to finding out that people read his tweets.
— At least this cold opening is acknowledging how support for Hillary Clinton has actually been dropping lately. I know that still didn’t prepare SNL for the voting results the following week.
— A decent running gag with how, much to Kate-as-Hillary’s chagrin, Cecily’s Erin Burnett keeps returning to the topic of Hillary’s emails even after seeing outright proof of Trump being in cahoots with certain organizations.
— Pretty good bit with Kate-as-Hillary’s long listing-off of things that Trump has ruined (e.g. tic-tacs, father-daughter dances, the word “great”, men).
— This cold opening is starting to feel like it’s being stretched a little too thin.
— Whoa, a sudden fourth-wall break with Alec and Kate both “dropping character” in the middle of their Trump/Hillary ranting to each other, and acknowledging how sick they are of portraying the gross negativity of this election.
— Oh, I really like this fun turn with pre-taped footage of Alec and Kate spreading joy around Times Square, and hugging the type of people who the respective presidential candidate they portray would never hug. Yes, this has undoubtedly aged oddly, given the following week’s voting results and the ensuing national unrest, as well as the ensuing cold opening SNL would do that weekend (hint: hallelujah), but even in hindsight, the softy in me can still smile at this beautifully-shot, good-natured, joyful Times Square sequence, and I’m always a sucker for SNL doing outside-the-box things like pre-taping an extensive outdoors sequence for a political cold opening.
STARS: ***½


MONOLOGUE
self-effacing host struggles to brag in “Theme From Shaft”-inspired song

— A harmless-enough musical monologue, and Benedict Cumberbatch’s delivery of this Shaft-esque number is charming and fun.
— Leslie gets most of the laughs here, especially her “Cumber-bitches” name for Benedict’s fangirls.
STARS: ***


THE KOOHL TOILET
you can be cool while shattering 1984 on Kohler’s backward-facing toilet

— Cheap but big laughs from this concept so far.
— I’m really liking Mikey’s acting here as the stern Big Brother-esque leader.
— Benedict’s suave execution of this is very good.
STARS: ****


WHY IS BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH HOT?
game show helps jealous BEB find answer to the title above

— Ooh, I’m really liking this change of pace with all of the performers playing themselves in a game show sketch.
— I like how this sketch now gets even more meta with Benedict saying he doesn’t remember this sketch being at the table read.
— Great reveal of this game show’s title. This sketch’s concept is very solid, and something about the meta-ness makes me picture this sketch appearing in the Ebersol era, though I’m not sure why.
— Vanessa is hilarious in her gleeful, fangirl-y description of what she likes about Benedict.
— Beck is perfect in his performance as the lead.
— Good turn at the end with Beck himself being charmed by Benedict.
STARS: ****


OFFICE HOURS
professor’s (host) anxiety doesn’t weigh on pool boy Chad

— These Chad shorts have officially become recurring.
— This is going in the same direction as the previous Chad short, but the comedic contrast between the host’s dramatic, heartfelt monologues and Chad’s dumb one-or-two-word sentences is still working, as is the fact that they refreshingly changed the setting from the previous Chad short.
— I got a laugh from Chad giggling “Huhhuh, taint” in response to Benedict saying the word “tainted”.
— Even the brief fart gag is funny.
STARS: ***½


SURPRISE BACHELORETTE PARTY
surprise bachelorette party continues after killing elderly honoree (AIB)

— The mere look of Mikey and Benedict’s construction worker-dressed strippers when they first enter is making me laugh.
— Pretty good conceit with everybody’s obliviousness to Aidy clearly being dead, and I like the dark tone that kinda gives this sketch.
— Convincing “dead body” acting from Aidy, which I’m sure is difficult to pull off when you have all the things happening to you that Aidy has in this sketch.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Cranes in the Sky”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Church Lady gives her thoughts on presidential election & homosexuality

BIM, Anthony Rizzo, David Ross, Dexter Fowler [real] sing “Go Cubs Go”

— Michael’s comments about the KKK newspaper had me howling, especially him saying he can’t wait to see their sports section.
— An interesting mock-inspirational unity speech (complete with background music) that Colin and Michael give about these last days before the election.
— Church Lady! On Update!!
— When Church Lady claims Colin is a homosexual like everyone else in Hollywood, I laughed at an offended Colin asking the audience “Why are you laughing???”
— Looks like they didn’t have a punchline written for Colin correcting Church Lady on her statement that Jim Parsons, Neil Patrick Harris, and Nathan Lane are the only straight actors left today, forcing Dana to throw in an ad-lib after an awkward brief stretch of silence.
— Church Lady is working well in the Update setting, and I love her busting Colin’s chops.
— In response to the audience’s tepid laughter at Church Lady’s West Hollywood joke, Dana makes the same “Too soon?” ad-lib that he made in the preceding season’s surprise Church Chat cold opening when a joke there got a tepid audience reaction.
— Even the song that Church Lady breaks out into is okay, and is accompanied by some funny related photos.
— How do you NOT end tonight’s Update with the Church Lady commentary???
— (*The Chicago Cubs and Bill Motherfucking Murray pop up*) Ohhhhh, so that’s why SNL didn’t end tonight’s Update with the Church Lady commentary.
— Between Church Lady and this Cubs/Bill Murray bit, this is a star-studded Update.
— A fun and charming “Go, Cubs, Go” number from the Cubs and Bill, and I like how it’s an out-of-the-ordinary way to close out a Jost/Che-era Update.
— A nice touch to end this Update with a shot of the Cubs Win Flag (the last above screencap for this Update).
STARS: ****


GEMMA & RICKY
Gemma & magician boyfriend (host) provide unsolicited entertainment

— (*groan*)
— Are we supposed to believe that EVERYONE who Kenan’s character once met years ago runs back into him while dating Gemma???
— Benedict is at least spot-on as this type of supposedly-cool modern magician. That’s the only positive I can find in this sketch, and that still ain’t much of a positive.
— An awkward brief stretch of silence before the sketch-ending audience applause.
STARS: *½


CRIMINAL MASTERMIND
action hero (BEB) readily solves criminal mastermind’s (host) riddles

— This role of a criminal mastermind is a fitting use of Benedict’s accent.
— Interestingly, something about Kyle’s delivery when he’s making awkward, dumb suggestions to Benedict’s riddles is very reminiscent of Chris Farley whenever he played this type of role of someone making unsure, dumb suggestions.
— Something about the ending felt a bit abrupt and unsatisfying, not that I wanted to see footage of the children’s school blowing up, as that would’ve been a bummer of a visual to close a sketch on.
— Not much to say about this overall sketch itself, but it was decent, even if I kinda felt like a little something (besides a good ending) was missing from the execution of this good concept.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Don’t Touch My Hair”


MEETING WITH MR. SHAW
(host) speaks for philanthropist Mr. Shaw, who is an eagle head in a suit

— I really like this silly, absurdist concept.
— The way Benedict is playing this silly material so straight and dignified is helping this work so well.
— Solid bit with the celebrity photos.
— I love how, after Benedict has been fired by Mr. Shaw and says he’ll collect his things, he quickly returns with just a soccer ball and a single flipper.
— Vanessa’s mock-cutesy delivery of “Oh, Mr. Shaw!” made me laugh a lot.
STARS: ****


IN MEMORIAM
a photo of stagehand John Homer marks his passing


GOODNIGHTS

— I love how not only is the Mr. Shaw statue from the last sketch present onstage during these goodnights, but Pete and Bobby can be seen gleefully hugging it for these entire goodnights (you can partially see that on the right side of the last above screencap for these goodnights).
— Speaking of Pete, this is the second consecutive episode in which he only appeared in a pre-taped short (not counting the goodnights). And I just now realized that Bobby didn’t make any appearances tonight AT ALL, live or pre-taped (again not counting the goodnights). Yet another sign of how invisible Bobby unfortunately is in this final season of his. Does he and Pete being shut out of this episode have anything to do with why they chose to gleefully hug the Mr. Shaw statue for the entire duration of these goodnights?

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— An overall pretty good, quiet little episode. A little better than I had remembered. In hindsight, this quiet little episode kinda feels like the calm before the storm, considering what was in store for the nation the following Tuesday.


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


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Why Is Benedict Cumberbatch Hot?
Weekend Update
Meeting With Mr. Shaw
The Koohl Toilet
Surprise Bachelorette Party
Erin Burnett Outfront
Office Hours
Criminal Mastermind
Monologue
Gemma & Ricky


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Tom Hanks)
a step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Dave Chappelle hosts the first episode after the election

Posted on

October 22, 2016 – Tom Hanks / Lady Gaga (S42 E4)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

THE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE
Donald Trump (Alec Baldwin) & Hillary Clinton (KAM) debate one last time

— Nice seeing Tom Hanks moderate this debate.
— Just realized how interesting it is seeing Tom Hanks and Alec Baldwin, two SNL hosting legends, in the same sketch.
— A big laugh from Alec-as-Donald-Trump’s sudden, uncalled-for exclamation of “They’re ripping babies out of vaginas!”, spoofing something Trump infamously said at the real debate.
— Kate’s Hillary Clinton, on her and Alec’s Trump: “What two better people are there to talk about women’s issues: me, a woman who has had a child and has taken birth control, and him, a man who is a child and who’s face is birth control.”
— Love the “Trump Bingo” card that Kate’s Hillary holds up.
— The “Alright, settle down, entire planet” line (in response to the whole world laughing at Alec-as-Trump’s claim that nobody has more respect for women than him) is such a fitting line for Tom Hanks, who’s delivery just has a way of selling lines that are written the specific way this particular line was.
— An okay meta moment with Alec’s Trump calling one of his celebrity supporters, Stephen Baldwin, the best Baldwin brother.
STARS: ***½


MONOLOGUE
America’s Dad host gives country a confidence boost via a father-son chat

— Ah, so nice to see Tom entering through the home base stage’s door for his first time in 10 years.
— Feels odd hearing Tom say this is his 9th time hosting, because, even though I just pointed out this is his first hosting stint in 10 years, it feels like he’s hosted much more than 9 times. (I somewhat feel a similar way about Christopher Walken.) You’d kinda expect him to have Steve Martin/Alec Baldwin/John Goodman numbers in terms of amount of hosting stints, but maybe that just shows what a damn strong and memorable host he is that it feels like he’s hosted more times than he has.
— Very solid concept of Tom giving America a chat as “America’s Dad”, in response to him being named that by a magazine. This also, in an unintentional way, feels like a nice progression to Tom’s season 14 monologue, which was based on a magazine calling him the nicest guy in Hollywood.
— A lot of funny and warm things being said by Tom here. I especially love the little line about America having a summer birthday.
STARS: ****


BLACK JEOPARDY!
Trump voter (host) finds common ground with contestants

— Here’s a beloved classic, and the zenith of this recurring sketch.
— Feels a little odd seeing this recurring sketch without Jay Pharoah for once, but it’s nice seeing Leslie now being one of the contestants.
— A great initial reveal of Tom’s character.
— An absolutely fantastic change to this recurring sketch’s formula, with how Tom’s character is surprisingly-but-reasonably fitting in perfectly with Black Jeopardy’s sensibilities. And the bonding between him and Kenan is so damn great and charming.
— Tom, to his fellow contestants and Kenan: “You people are fun. (*pauses after realizing that sounded offensive*) Can I say that?” Kenan: “(after a long pause) We’ll give you a pass this time.”
— A particularly hilarious answer Tom gives to the “Skinny women can do this for you” question: “What is, ‘not a damn thing’?”
— A great little detail of how the sound effect signal to start the next segment is the sound of a broom hitting the ceiling below this show.
— A priceless turn this sketch takes at the end, with the knowing uncomfortable silence that follows Kenan revealing that the next subject they’ll have to talk about is Lives That Matter. I also love Kenan’s line to Tom after that silence: “Well, it was good while it lasted, Doug.”
STARS: *****


HALLOWEEN SHOW
(MEV) & parents (host) & (CES) demo Halloween block party musical routine

— I’m not caring for ANY of the random humor in the first minute of this sketch. As I said in a previous review, writers James Anderson and Kent Sublette are so bad at attempting random, absurdist humor, usually my favorite type of comedy.
— At least this Anderson/Sublette-written musical number sketch isn’t one of their interminable number of “Come on, join in, you know this song!” sketches (e.g. Debra’s Time). However, this sketch still has too much of the general aura from those sketches, and regardless, I’m still finding this musical number to be an absolute chore to sit through.
— Given her very distinct voice, Melissa has an impressively beautiful and pleasant singing voice (what little we hear of it solo in this sketch). I actually didn’t even catch that in the Crucible Cast Party short from two episodes prior.
— Blah at the turn with the guests admitting they actually liked the musical number that Tom, Cecily, and Melissa have just finished performing, despite the constant cutaways we previously saw of those guests’ frozen puzzled facial reactions (which itself a tired, overused gag) throughout the song.
STARS: *


BROKEN
CBS hopes depressing “comedy” will earn awards consideration

— Another instance of Vanessa’s presence in a segment reminding me “Oh, that’s right, she’s still on the show this season.”
— Out of all the segments in this episode, this is one that I had completely forgotten about.
— Cecily’s mock-dramatic angry outburst at Tom made me laugh out loud. She’s always great at doing that kind of acting.
— A very funny, spot-on, and well-executed bleak, melodramatic tone to this commercial, made even funnier by the conceit of CBS trying to present it as if it’s a wacky comedy show. I’m surprised that I had no prior memory of this commercial, given how damn strong it is.
STARS: ****½


HAUNTED ELEVATOR
unscary David S. Pumpkins (host) is an enigmatic haunted house attraction

— Needless to say, an extremely famous sketch that would go on to become very iconic.
— Am I crazy, or does that suspiciously sound JUST LIKE the then-recently-fired Taran Killam doing the voice-over at the beginning of this sketch? It sounds way too much like his familiar voice to NOT be him. Was this sketch originally cut after dress rehearsal from a previous season or something (perhaps the season 41 Tracy Morgan episode, which was that season’s Halloween episode……wow, imagine the David S. Pumpkins character being played by Tracy), and SNL possibly reused Taran’s voice-over from it? After all, that Chris Farley-starring Dante sketch from the season 20 Bob Saget episode had a “new” voice-over from the no-longer-on-the-show Phil Hartman, because the sketch originally got cut after dress rehearsal from the season 19 Nancy Kerrigan episode, back when Phil was still on the show. (Then again, Phil wasn’t fired, unlike Taran, so it IS rather odd that SNL would use a recently-fired cast member’s voice-over from a previously-cut sketch. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s another example of that happening, though.)
— Beck and Kate play their second married couple for the second consecutive live sketch tonight. Kinda funny to imagine that Beck and Kate’s characters in both sketches are the same, even though I know that’s not SNL’s intention.
— A hilarious introduction to Tom’s David S. Pumpkins character in his first scene.
— Very funny and infectious silly dancing from Mikey and Bobby, who are making a solid pair here, which makes me kinda wish we saw them teamed up more often this season.
— I’m getting so many laughs from a perplexed Beck and Kate’s deconstruction of the concept of David S. Pumpkins (Beck is particularly great at that), even if Kenan previously did a similar thing in the preceding season’s Kevin Roberts sketch.
— Speaking of Kenan, he’s excellent in his role in this David S. Pumpkins sketch.
— Beck: “And the skeletons aaarrrreee….?” Mikey and Bobby as the skeletons: “…PART OF IT!”
— Tom’s David S. Pumpkins, in his usual catchphrase: “Any questions?!?” Beck: “Yes, several! I am so in the weeds with David Pumpkins!”
— Great fake-out with how Leslie’s scene ends up suddenly turning into a continuation of the whole David S. Pumpkins bit. Also, that gleeful look on Leslie’s face while she’s dancing with her chainsaw raised in the air is a riot.
— Beck: “Why did you go all in on David Pumpkins?!?” Kenan: “Hey, look – it’s 100 Floors Of Frights, they not all gonna be winners!”
— This sketch is all of the right kinds of silly, stupid fun, and has so many lines that I find quotable. While I can understand why some people find this sketch to be overrated (hell, I myself didn’t like this sketch when it originally aired, as I found it to be trying way too hard to recapture the magic of the Kevin Roberts sketch, and I didn’t like how it instantly became much more popular with viewers than Kevin Roberts ever did. It took me months to come around on David S. Pumpkins.), and while I do prefer Kevin Roberts, I definitely feel David S. Pumpkins is a perfect sketch.
— A perfect exaggerated startled look on Beck’s face during the freeze-frame at the end (the last above screencap for this sketch).
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & Mark Ronson [real] perform “A-YO”


WEEKEND UPDATE
hacking victim LEJ is unfazed due to her inability to be embarrassed

The Girl You Wish You Hadn’t Started A Conversation With At A Party malaprops vainly

— As usual for the first few minutes of each Update lately, we open tonight’s Update with lots of great long-form ranting from Colin and Michael on the election.
— Rather unrealistic for Colin to claim he had no idea about Leslie getting hacked that summer.
— A very funny, heartening, and empowering speech from Leslie about how internet trolls can’t hurt her. One of her absolute best Update commentaries ever.
— I believe tonight’s Girl At A Party commentary is SNL’s very first mention of the modern term “woke”.
— While I went through tonight’s overall Girl At A Party commentary without finding any lines that I felt like quoting in my review, her commentary was strong as usual.
STARS: ****


COCKPIT
proud Sully Sullenberger (host) balks at being (Alec Baldwin)’s copilot

— Oh, hell yeah. After teasing us with having Tom and Alec in the same cold opening earlier tonight, SNL now gives us an outright pairing of them in the lead roles of this sketch. I’m in SNL Hosting Legends Heaven right now. Kinda reminds me of the joy of seeing Buck Henry and Steve Martin interact with each other in that Rise sketch from the season 5 premiere that Steve hosted.
— I got a big laugh from how, after being told by the control tower through his headset that Alec is the pilot of this flight, Tom’s Sully responds by awkwardly just stating “I’m uh…I’m Sully”, as if that alone will make the control tower change their mind about who should fly this plane.
— I love the dry, professional tone of the acting between Tom and Alec, and Tom in particular is fantastic here.
— Kyle plays his fourth kid character in just these last three episodes ALONE.
— I really like the structure to this sketch, with short scenes in the cockpit being interspersed with exterior shots of the plane in flight.
— Great bit with Tom’s Sully intentionally making the plane go awry so he can “save” it and then brag over the plane’s loudspeaker that “Sully did it again.”
STARS: ****


A GIRL’S HALLOWEEN
night of (AIB), (CES), (VAB) is a drunken disaster

— An entry in this era’s series of shorts that involve cutting back and forth between a tender scene and a related chaotic scene.
— Aidy’s drunken, gleeful delivery of “Awwww, pizza, biiiitch!” at the very end of one scene made me laugh even more than it probably should’ve.
— Out of all this era’s shorts with this “back-and-forth cutting between tender and chaotic scenes” concept, the concept is being pulled off particularly well in tonight’s short.
— The mere visual of Pete (making his first and only appearance all night, by the way) in that full-body green makeup is cracking me up.
— I was about to say this is also the first appearance Bobby has made all night, until I remembered his character in the David S. Pumpkins sketch. Tonight’s episode is another sign of how invisible Bobby is in this final season of his, sadly.
— I love how even Bobby’s character gets involved in the “back-and-forth cutting between tender and chaotic scenes” theme.
— Excellent ending, with the reveal of Pete’s full-body green makeup being all over Aidy’s mouth.
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & Hillary Lindsey [real] perform “Million Reasons”


AMERICA’S FUNNIEST PETS
Joelle, Noelle, Ron Howard (host) voice animals

— This is the second and final installment of this sketch, though this installment changes the original “American’s Funniest Cats” title to “America’s Funniest Pets”.
— The first installment of this sketch was strong, but it doesn’t feel necessary to do a second one, as I don’t see how it will work as well as the first one did.
— Tom’s Ron Howard impression is so much fun, even throwing in a meta, self-deprecating remark at one point about Tom Hanks being a pain in the ass to work with.
— Surprisingly, it actually turns out that Kate and Cecily’s voice-overs in this second installment of this sketch are working just as well for me as they did in the first installment. In fact, of the two installments, I’d actually give the edge to this second one, because I feel that the host portions of this one with Tom are more fun than the host portions of the first one with Adam Driver, even if this second installment doesn’t have Kate and Cecily memorably saying “Boi-oi-oing” throughout the sketch.
— Kate and Cecily’s voice-overs during the “puppy walking on its hind legs in a store” clip are particularly hilarious.
— What was with the awkward, empty, abrupt way this sketch ended? The show ran out of time, I take it?
STARS: ****½


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— An absolutely fantastic episode. Almost the entire episode was comprised of strong segments, including THREE that I gave a perfect five-star rating to (Black Jeopardy, Haunted Elevator, and A Girl’s Halloween). And, after Tom Hanks’ last two episodes prior to this ranged from disappointing (his 1996 episode) to forgettable (his 2006 episode), it’s nice that tonight, SNL gave Tom the strong episode he used to regularly have back in the day. Oh, and he himself was a wonderful host in this episode as always.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
(Much like the preceding season’s Tracy Morgan episode, there are way too many things to pick in this episode, so I’ll narrow it down to what I feel are the particularly best highlights)


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Black Jeopardy!
Haunted Elevator
A Girl’s Halloween
Broken
America’s Funniest Pets
Weekend Update
Monologue
Cockpit
The Presidential Debate
Halloween Show


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Emily Blunt)
a big step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Benedict Cumberbatch hosts the last episode before the election

Posted on

October 15, 2016 – Emily Blunt / Bruno Mars (S42 E3)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

THE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE
Donald Trump (Alec Baldwin) & Hillary Clinton (KAM) debate a la town hall

— Cecily seems to be attempting much more of an actual Martha Raddatz impression than Kate did when she previously played this role in a debate sketch during the election four years prior to this.
— Pretty fun entrance from Kate’s Hillary Clinton and Alec Baldwin’s Donald Trump.
— Alex’s Anderson Cooper: “Do you feel you’re modeling appropriate or positive behavior for today’s youth?” Alec’s Trump: “(bluntly and quickly) No. Next.”
— I like Kate-as-Hillary’s fake-out teary reaction to Alec’s Trump bringing out the mistresses of her husband Bill.
— A decent spoof of the much-talked-about moment from the real debate where Trump creepily loomed behind Hillary while she was speaking at one point.
— Some funny lines from Alec’s Trump, as usual in these early appearances of his.
— Ugh, the Ken Bone part. I never got people’s fascination with this guy at the time, and not even SNL’s spoof here of the media’s glorification of him is doing much for me. Bobby is at least fun in the role, though.
— Alex’s portrayal of Anderson Cooper is coming off much better than Jon Rudnitsky’s infamous take from a year prior, despite Alex flubbing one line early on and pausing a long time before delivering another.
— As usual when looking back at this election season of SNL, I have to ignore a lot of the poorly-aged “Hillary has already won this election” assumptions to enjoy this.
STARS: ***½


MONOLOGUE
host & cast members implore audience to “Get Happy” with cookies & puppies

— An okay idea for a feel-good monologue during rough times. There’s certainly an air of corniness and sappiness here (even if that’s intentional), but it’s countered by my goodwill towards the good-natured intentions, as well the occasional humor thrown in.
— Oddly, Emily Blunt called Pete “Mikey” just now. I think I recall hearing that Melissa McCarthy makes a similar gaffe in her monologue later this same season, where she calls Mikey “Kyle” or something like that (I can’t remember the exact detail), but I myself have no memory of seeing that gaffe of hers.
STARS: ***


ESCORTS
in a hotel room, escorts (host) & (LEJ) lay out their unsexy ground rules

— Yikes. When the characters sit down after Emily and Leslie’s entrance, Alex completely blanked on his line, leading to a few seconds of awkward dead air, and then Emily, the freakin’ HOST, had to say Alex’s line for him to keep the sketch moving, and then, in an apparent ad-lib, she even tells Alex in character to relax. Wow. I like Alex a lot as a cast member, but between his occasional flubbiness in this episode’s cold opening and now this, Alex is definitely showing some “new cast member greenness” signs in this episode. That’s actually interesting to look at in hindsight, knowing how very good he would go on to be on SNL (even if SNL themselves don’t seem to be fully aware of that, from what I hear about how underutilized he’s been in the more current seasons). I’m not sure, but I think the botched portion of this Escorts sketch would later be replaced with the dress rehearsal version in reruns and the online version of this sketch, but I might be wrong.
— A delayed camera cut kinda ruined Emily’s tongue-sticking-out gag.
— A good laugh from Leslie sultrily telling Mikey “I’m gonna rag-doll you, man.” I also like how, in hindsight, that part feels like a precursor to the married couple Leslie and Mikey would play on Update a year or so later.
— Very funny reveal from Leslie that Stewie from Family Guy is the only voice she can do during role-playing.
— This sketch isn’t bad so far, but something about the pacing of it feels a bit sluggish, making this sketch feel a little out of place in the post-monologue lead-off spot.
— Heh, Emily can’t ever seem to say that “Oopsy-doopsy, I muffed it up again!” line without cracking up.
— Good ending.
STARS: ***


MELANIANADE
Donald Trump’s (Alec Baldwin) women channel Beyonce in “Melanianade”

— When this originally aired, I thought for sure that this spoof of Beyonce’s Lemonade was written by Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider, especially since they previously wrote the Beyonce-themed Beygency and The Day Beyonce Turned Black pre-tapes. However, it would end up being revealed that James Anderson and Kent Sublette wrote this, which shocked me, as they didn’t usually attempt stuff like this.
— A very well-filmed, well-performed, and catchy-sounding Lemonade spoof, even if I’ve never seen the actual Lemonade video. However, if this is intended to make me laugh, it ain’t working much so far. Also not helping is the fact that, much like the “A Day Off with Kellyanne Conway” piece from the preceding episode, I can’t get behind SNL’s misguided attempt to make people like Ivanka Trump and Kellyanne come off as victims, and make us root for and feel sympathy for them. I could at least look past that TO AN EXTENT in the aforementioned “A Day Off with Kellyanne Conway” piece, because the humor itself in that was solid, but that isn’t the case in this Melanianade short.
— Okay, the whole bit right now with Beck’s Mike Pence is at least funny.
— Is it wrong that I’m starting to feel that Vanessa looks a little out of place in some sketches this season? Not to the same extent that Bobby seems a little out of place this season, and this certainly doesn’t mean that I’m knocking Vanessa’s (nor Bobby’s) performances this season (and I’m well aware that some of Vanessa’s all-time greatest moments are still to come this season), but I’ve sometimes been having a surprised “Oh, that’s right, she’s still on the show” reaction when seeing her in some segments in my rewatch of this season. Part of that could be because of the then-recent loss of her fellow “Class of 2010” members Taran Killam and Jay Pharoah.
STARS: **


SHORT FILM FESTIVAL
short film festival attendee (VAB) is only person not in cast or crew

— I sometimes get this film festival sketch confused with the one from the season 44 Seth Meyers-hosted episode, even though I can’t remember the premise of that one.
— Hilarious reveal of the cast and crew of the featured short film being the ENTIRE audience, minus Vanessa.
— I love Vanessa’s smiley awkwardness when being the only person to have to ask the cast and crew all the questions. She’s always perfect for this type of role.
— Solid running bit with the cast and crew, one-by-one, having to pass the microphone down the line to the person who’s about to speak.
— Very funny how Vanessa has now gotten to the point where she asks her next question without even getting up, and instead just grabs the microphone stand over to her while she remains seated.
— During the sequence with all the cast and crew, one-by-one, stating that their next project is nothing, I got a laugh from Kate’s announcement being that she’s doing some grocery shopping later tonight.
— Great surprise reveal at the end that Emily was playing herself in this sketch all along.
STARS: ****


CHONK
women’s clothing store Chonk sends mixed messages about female body image

— Surprisingly, this is the first traditional fake ad all season.
— Yet another commercial featuring excellent voice-over work from Cecily. The different comical voices she delivers the word “CHONK!” in throughout this commercial are a riot.
— I really like Sasheer’s puzzled and offended delivery of “Unique?!?” in response to the voice-over’s line about “your unique body”.
— The extremely brief “Lil Chonk” part that Aidy angrily puts a stop to is priceless.
— A hilarious simplistic part with the “Normal Clothes” section for men.
— Overall, it was well worth the somewhat long wait for SNL’s first fake ad of the season, as I found this ad to be perfect.
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “24K Magic”

— One of the absolute most uniquely-structured and fun musical performances in recent years, if not ever.


WEEKEND UPDATE
Olya Povlatsky considers impact of the election on USA-Russia relations

Laura Parsons is aware of the election’s motif of mistreatment of women

— I’ve noticed that one of the changes on Update this season is that neither Colin nor Michael say the usual “Here are tonight’s top stories” during their sign-on, probably because of the new style Update has adopted since the last third of the preceding season, where the first few minutes of every Update feature Colin and Michael taking turns doing long-form rants about one specific topic (usually about Trump). That “long-form rants about one topic” approach is just one of the things that refreshingly separates this Update era from most of the others, and is the style that they should’ve had Colin Quinn regularly do his ENTIRE Updates in back in the day, because, as likable as he always was, his delivery was not suited for the usual Update style of “simple set-up and punchline, move on to the next news story, lather-rinse-repeat”.
— This ends up being Olya Povlatsky’s final appearance on Update, though she has one more appearance in general remaining after this episode, in a Vladmir Putin cold opening later this season.
— I got a huge laugh from Kate’s Olya demonstrating the bizarre, indescribable noise she makes when she wakes up.
— While I’m definitely still enjoying this Olya Povlatsky commentary, I’m starting to think that they chose the right time to retire her from Update, because her routine is feeling quite been-there-done-that tonight.
— Yikes, a huge technical error with the photo graphic next to Colin while he’s doing the Nobel Prize joke. After a few seconds of this technical gaffe, the people in the control room just give up and remove the graphic, leaving no photo next to Colin while he’s still telling the joke (the second-to-last above screencap for this Update).
— Vanessa’s prominence in tonight’s episode is making her feel less out-of-place to me.
— The usual big laughs from Vanessa’s Laura Parsons so far, especially her line about how, in regards to the Donald Trump/Access Hollywood scandal, Billy Bush “might get 10 million dollars…..FROM THIS NETWORK!”
— A hilarious ending to Laura Parsons commentary, with the payoff of her clown story.
STARS: ****


DRIVE-THRU WINDOW
a long limo containing eccentric artists visits a Burger King drive-thru

— When this originally aired, I remember saying that this sketch was basically just the whole cast playing Kevin Roberts-like characters, particularly Mikey, who’s hair and costume here is quite Kevin Roberts-esque. Little did I know at the time that the following week’s episode would have a sketch that would go on to be the most well-known Kevin Roberts-type sketch ever, a certain Halloween-themed one.
— Also when this originally aired, I honestly thought Emily was Kate, until Kate appeared later in this sketch, confusing the hell out of me.
— Speaking of Emily, something about the look of her character seems very familiar, as if SNL previously used that same wig, glasses, and clothing for another character, perhaps one played by Amy Poehler or Kristen Wiig. Can’t put my finger on which character I’m thinking of, though. I don’t think it’s Kristen’s (dreadful) Trina character (a.k.a. the oddball lady who always says “Thomaaaaas!”), though I do see the physical similarities.
— Kenan’s mere look when his window rolled down cracked me up so much. Pete is clearly tickled by it, too.
— Like Kenan, Bobby is also very funny with his characterization, even if this feels like a role that he’s played multiple times before. (Another sign that he’s on his way out.)
— I like Kate and Cecily’s creepy characters oddly requesting “4 foods and a nibble.”
— Something about Beck’s delivery and pronunciation of “Peace!” (sounding kinda like “Payce!”) at the end of his scene tickled me so much.
— The writing of this sketch isn’t up to much, but the performances are making this fun for me.
STARS: ***½


THE SINK
host voices a self-aware & self-critical bathroom fixture

— A very unique use of a host, and this particular instance is very fitting for Emily Blunt.
— I’m loving the tone of this, and the humor is perfect.
— Hilarious interruption with the sink suddenly being used by someone when it was in the middle of its speech to us.
—  A huge laugh from the visual of the comically brief ending credit scroll (the last above screencap).
— Overall, this was oddly brilliant. Yet another creative, very funny, and extremely strong Julio Torres-written pre-tape.
STARS: *****


HONDA ROBOTICS
Honda smartbots (MID) & (host) malfunction while serving hors d’oeuvres

— SNL continues to get mileage out of the vocal modifier that they’ve suddenly been using a lot ever since the homestretch of the preceding season. And as usual, there’s some minor glitches with the vocal modifier, where it briefly stops working and the performer’s natural voice is temporarily heard.
— This era seems to have a lot of robot sketches. The airplane stewardesses one with Scarlett Johansson and Vanessa, the “3D printed man” one with Matthew McConaughey, a sketch from the Casey Affleck episode later this season about stereotypically gay robots that…oof, let’s just say I’m gonna have things to say about THAT sketch, if it’s as bad as I remember.
— Funny back-and-forths between Emily and Kate, and at this point of Kate’s tenure, it’s rare seeing a host make HER crack up, when it’s usually the other way around (e.g. Ryan Gosling, Margot Robbie).
— Solid comical acting from Mikey when his robot character is malfunctioning.
— Emily’s vocal-modified delivery of lines like “mini, ooey-gooey quesadilla” is cracking me up.
STARS: ***½


MELANIA MOMENTS
Melania Trump (CES) yearns for The Prince & The Pauper shot

— Yet another strong and very Deep Thoughts-esque Melania Moments piece.
— I just now noticed that even Beck’s tender voice-over in these Melania Moments pieces sounds rather identical to Jack Handey’s voice in the aforementioned Deep Thoughts.
STARS: ****½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Chunky”


THE GREAT BRITISH BAKE OFF
chavs (host) & (CES) wanted Big Brother gig

— Pretty funny dignified British accents from the supporting performers in this.
— Another “Cecily does an accent” sketch, which would’ve felt right at home in season 39, which felt rampant with those sketches.
— Very accurate crude British accents from Emily and Cecily, though perhaps TOO accurate, as my American ears are having a hard time understanding a lot of the words and British terms they’re saying. I’m still getting some chuckles from their performances and what little I can understand them saying, but I feel like I’m not enjoying this sketch as much as I should be.
STARS: **½


HAMSTERS
(KYM)’s hamsters (BEB), (KAM), (ALM), (host) ape Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?

— An interesting oddball concept.
— Something about the tone of this sketch makes me wonder if Julio Torres wrote or co-wrote this. If so, man, for such a new writer, he’s been killing it this season. I feel like it’s rare in recent seasons like this for a new writer to be so prolific.
— Kate and (especially) Beck’s comically-tense acting is solid.
— A laugh from Emily’s line about a hamster being buried in a New Balance shoebox.
STARS: ***½


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A mostly good episode. After a nothing-too-special first 20 or so minutes, this episode seemed to take off starting with the Short Film Festival sketch.


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

   


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
CHONK
The Sink
Melania Moments
Short Film Festival
Weekend Update
Hamsters
The Presidential Debate
Honda Robotics
Drive-Thru Window
Escorts
Monologue
The Great British Bake Off
Melanianade


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Lin-Manuel Miranda)
a step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
SNL hosting legend Tom Hanks, in his second consecutive hosting stint that has followed a 10-year gap

Posted on

October 8, 2016 – Lin-Manuel Miranda / Twenty One Pilots (S42 E2)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

VICE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE / CNN BREAKING NEWS
Donald Trump (Alec Baldwin) handles Access Hollywood bus remark fallout

— Melissa, in a very meta moment: “I’m the new Hispanic cast member, and tonight, I’ll be playing Asian moderator Elaine Quijano. Because…baby steps.”
— The debut of Beck’s Mike Pence impression.
— An accurate Tim Kaine voice from Mikey, and his delivery is also amusing.
— A funny sudden twist with how a CNN breaking news report about Donald Trump’s Access Hollywood scandal suddenly cuts off the vice presidential debate right after Beck’s Pence claimed Trump never said anything bad about women.
— A laugh from Alec-as-Trump’s “apple-ogize” bit.
— A huge oh-so-wrong laugh from when Alec’s Trump, in regards to his “grab ’em by the pussy” remark, promises women that he can do more than just grab it, clarifying “I can also bop it, twist it, and pull it”. I also like Cecily-as-Brooke-Baldwin’s shuddering reaction to that.
— Another huge oh-so-wrong laugh, this time from Alec’s Trump being heard telling someone he wishes he was Hurricane Matthew, tearing through that “hot Miami pussy”.
— Kate’s Hillary Clinton scene, with her acting like she’s already won the presidency thanks to Trump’s Access Hollywood scandal, is another instance of something with Kate’s Hillary not aging well, due to the outcome of the election, but there’s still some laughs from her here.
— We didn’t need the cut back to Alec’s Trump continuing to speak to someone off-camera at the end of this. It was pointless, there was nothing new to say there, and it ended this cold opening on an awkward note.
STARS: ***½


MONOLOGUE
host performs “My Shot” variant to express his excitement at being on SNL

— Lin-Manuel Miranda is coming off pretty likable here.
— I’m not a fan of musical monologues (though most of the ones in the season that preceded this were actually good), but this one is really fun so far.
— Regarding that “Never gonna be president” part about Trump, I’ll just quote something Michael Che said as Lester Holt in the preceding episode’s cold opening: “Moving right past THAT…”.
— Love the part of the song with Lin namedropping select cast members from various eras in rapid-fire speed, even including then-current cast member Vanessa Bayer. Feels nice hearing her name being mentioned with noteworthy cast members of the past.
— VERY infectious energy in the air when Lin is heading back towards the home base stage near the conclusion of the song. This part is fantastic.
STARS: ****


PINE RIDGE CAMPGROUND
at a campground, overly-amorous siblings (KYM) & (VAB) sing obnoxiously

— Surprisingly, this is Vanessa’s first appearance this season, as she was completely absent in the preceding week’s season premiere. Being shut out of a season premiere is unheard of for a 7-season veteran like her. In hindsight, knowing this ends up being her final season, her absence in the season premiere can be taken as a sign that she’s on her way out.
— The foreign-accented, loud Footloose singing is a pretty different use of Vanessa.
— Kyle’s delivery of “COLD AS HELL!” made me laugh.
— Okay, the repeated foreign-accented, loud Footloose singing is starting to give me a headache.
— I did get a laugh from Cecily’s puzzled delivery of “You-you’re doing impressions now???”
— The incest subplot isn’t working for me.
STARS: *½


CRUCIBLE CAST PARTY
high school theater nerds’ celebration is tame

 

— Can’t say the concept of this particular music video excites me, maybe because I can’t relate to the “theater kids” premise as much as some other viewers might.
— Hmm, the song so far is turning out to have a good charm to it, at least. I’m getting more and more into this.
— Nice to see Melissa grouped with the female cast in a music video like this so early in her run as a cast member.
— I love the melody of the brief portion of the song where Aidy sings about bringing Kyle up to her bedroom.
— From what I gather, some people don’t like the rap break from Lin, but I don’t mind it.
STARS: ***½


SUBSTITUTE TEACHER
students preempt substitute teacher’s (host) attempts at cool pedagogy

— Funny angry ranting from Leslie at the beginning, even if it feels like a very standard role for her.
— Kenan’s “Awww, man” facepalm in reaction to Lin turning a chair backwards and sitting in it while attempting to come off cool made me laugh, because that mirrors exactly how I would react if I were in Kenan’s place in this situation.
— This sketch is slowly starting to lose me. Not sure what about it isn’t working much.
— When this sketch originally aired, I remember assuming Melissa’s natural voice (which some people have called a “froggy voice”) was just her doing a silly character voice, since I wasn’t yet familiar with Melissa at the time. In fact, at the time, I considered Melissa’s “character voice” in this sketch to be very reminiscent of the voice Nasim Pedrad used for both her Bedelia character and her impression of Charlyne Yi. It wasn’t until the following episode, during a Burger King Drive-Thru sketch, that I realized “Holy hell, Melissa’s voice really sounds like that?!?!?” I was shocked that her natural voice sounded so odd. However, over the course of this season, I would gradually go on to find her voice to be one of many endearing things about her. (I do recall hearing someone claim, however, that Melissa stated in an interview that her odd natural voice is actually fake, and that she adopted it so she won’t attract creeps, or something like that.)
STARS: **½


“A DAY OFF” WITH KELLYANNE CONWAY
Kellyanne Conway (KAM) gets no break from spinning Trumpisms

— A good structure and progression to this short.
— I can look past this short’s apparent attempt to make us “sympathize” with Kellyanne Conway, and I can get laughs from how much Kate’s Kellyanne has to increasingly stretch her defending of increasingly ridiculous Trump controversies.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Heathens”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Propecia user PED is willing to choose diminished sex drive over baldness

suburban Philadelphia women (JIF) & (TIF) are in-demand undecided voters

— As expected, Colin and Michael are doing an excellent takedown of Trump’s Access Hollywood scandal.
— I like Pete riffing on Colin’s “wall of hair”.
— An overall surprisingly short but pretty good Pete commentary.
— The set-up of Colin’s Clown Lives Matter joke was funnier than the two actual punchlines Colin had for it. You can tell Colin himself is fully aware of that.
— Random Tina Fey and Jimmy Fallon.
— Is the name of Tina’s character, Denise McDonough, supposed to be some kind of reference to the name of Rachel Dratch’s character (Denise McDenna) in the Boston Teens sketches from back in the day? Tina did co-write those Boston Teens sketches, so…
— Jimmy trying to milk extra laughs from the audience by pausing a long time after his Philly-accented pronunciation of “Benghazi”, I see.
— Jimmy’s trying to milk more laughs, this time by ad-libbing about how bad his attempt at a Philly accent is. That meta ad-lib is actually fun.
— Man, how freakin’ long is this Jimmy/Tina commentary going to go on?!? Tina has some good lines here, but this feels commentary feels ENDLESS, and is dragging down what was shaping up to be a near-perfect Update.
STARS: ****


THE MUSIC MAN
The Wells Fargo Wagon brings bad financial instruments

 

— Bobby is just now making his first appearance of the night. An early display of how little we’ll be seeing him this season, as he’s on his way out, kinda like Vanessa, though to a much larger extent in Bobby’s case.
— I got a laugh from Kyle’s lispy delivery of a stern “Say it to my face, bitch.”
— The general setting of this sketch so far, as well as the musical number, reminds me an awful lot of that weak Loveliest Kingdom sketch from the preceding season’s Tracy Morgan episode.
— At least the comedic conceit of this sketch is turning out to be more high-brow than the juvenile, unfunny turn the aforementioned Loveliest Kingdom sketch took. That being said, I’m still not all that crazy about this sketch. The performances are fine, but the material is meh for me.
— I did like the ending bit with Kyle.
STARS: **


DIEGO CALLS HIS MOM
immigrant Diego (host) relays North Dakota culture shock

   

— One of writer Julio Torres’ most notable pieces, and an excellent example of the refreshing style he brought to SNL.
— A lot of very funny odd cutaway visuals to accompany what Lin is saying over the phone.
— I love this short’s mix of tender melancholy and silly absurdity. This short is pulling that off absolutely beautifully.
— Even the cinematography and visual quality of this short is beautiful, and has some great choices for camera angles.
— The sweet ending actually almost made me tear up.
STARS: *****


STRANGER THINGS
Lucas’ (SAZ) parents (KET) & (LEJ) find the police scary

— Seeing Mikey and Alex playing twins here (the Duffer Brothers) reminds me that I had a hard time telling Mikey and Alex apart in their first episode when it originally aired. That sometimes happens with SNL fans when two or more cast members of the same gender and race join the show together. I remember how so many online SNL fans had such a hard time telling Seth Meyers and Jeff Richards apart when they joined at the beginning of season 27.
— Are lispy kids an intentional theme in tonight’s episode, between Kyle’s character in the Music Man sketch and Lin’s character in this sketch?
— Leslie making her second walk-on tonight playing an angry, yelling character. It’s still getting some laughs from me, though, so I guess I can’t complain.
— Melissa made me laugh out loud in her brief appearance, even if I have no familiarity with what she’s specifically making fun of, as I’ve never watched Stranger Things.
— A cheap laugh from Leslie and Kenan’s reaction to seeing a white cop.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Ride”


MELANIA MOMENTS
Melania Trump (CES) is concerned about the next Mrs. Trump

— Good to see this become recurring.
— Again, I absolutely love how these Melania Moments segments feel like a spiritual successor to Jack Handey’s Deep Thoughts.
— Overall, even funnier than the previous Melania Moments piece from the season premiere. Writer Julio Torres has been having a very strong night, between Diego Calls His Mom and this.
STARS: ****½


A DEGREE OF VALOR
in WWII, wounded (PED) asks (host) to secrete embarrassing personal items

— A TCM and AMC sketch in the same night?
— Meh at the butt plug reveal.
— The further reveals about Pete’s secret belongings aren’t doing much for me either.
— At least this is utilizing Pete in a very different role from what he usually plays. In fact, this is the second consecutive episode where the 10-to-1 segment stars Pete playing against type. He’s done a good job in both roles.
— I did kinda laugh at Mikey’s mock-emotional “He died as he lived – sassy” line.
— The ending with the characters tenderly singing Pete’s jazz song in honor of him after his death was actually fairly charming, before the writers lazily and predictably decided to have Kenan get shot during it. Not needed.
STARS: **


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very average, nothing-special episode as a whole. A letdown after the very strong season premiere, but I still can’t complain too much, as this episode wasn’t too bad in and of itself.


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


RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Diego Calls His Mom
Melania Moments
Monologue
Weekend Update
Vice Presidential Debate
“A Day Off” with Kellyanne Conway
Crucible Cast Party
Stranger Things
Substitute Teacher
A Degree of Valor
The Music Man
Pine Ridge Campground


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Margot Robbie)
a pretty big step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Emily Blunt