Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
COLD OPENING
Hands Across America participants won’t let one-legged runner (RAQ) pass
— After not laughing much for the first minute or so of this, I’m liking Randy’s sudden entrance as a one-legged runner.
— Randy introduces himself as Kevin Brennan, which also happens to be name of a future SNL writer from season 25 who would do occasional A. Whitney Brown-esque political commentaries on Weekend Update.
— I like the running theme with a different person responding “What, those bums?” when being told Hands Across America is supporting the homeless.
— Randy’s overall presence added some laughs, but his scene ended really poorly and awkwardly.
STARS: **
OPENING MONTAGE
— For the first (and last, obviously, since this is the season finale) time this season, Al Franken is credited as a featured player.
— Damon Wayans is back as a featured player! Despite being fired two months earlier for an incident in the Griffin Dunne episode, Damon was brought back by Lorne tonight for one night only, to perform some stand-up. In the “Live from New York” book, Damon theorizes that the reason he was allowed back is because “(paraphrased) deep down inside, Lorne loves a rebel.”
MONOLOGUE
backstage, Billy tells Mephistopheles (JOL) & Anjelica that he’s changed
— Anjelica’s joke about the Academy Award “curse” leading to her hosting SNL tonight appears to be yet another self-deprecating joke about SNL’s poor quality this season.
— Throughout his talk with Billy Martin, Anthony annoyingly keeps clearing his throat. I’ve noticed in the last handful of episodes that he has a bad habit of doing this throughout sketches.
— Out of the two performers on my screen right now, it says something that the one with zero acting experience (Billy Martin) is coming off more comfortable on camera than the one who’s an actual actor and paid cast member of a sketch comedy show (Anthony Michael Hall).
— For some reason, I liked Billy going “You again?” upon seeing an evilly-laughing Mephistopheles show up.
— Overall, a decent set-up to tonight’s running storyline between Billy and Mephistopheles.
STARS: ***
THE PEOPLE’S SECOND CHOICE AWARDS
Ed McMahon helps honor runners-up
— Bah, this isn’t funny to me. Just a long screen crawl of many celebrity names, with not enough funny ones thrown in.
— Okay, I kinda got a laugh just now from one of the sponsors being “Big boned girls who don’t speak much at first”, accompanied by a picture of two girls.
STARS: *½
MOMENTS OF DOUBT
(RAQ) & (Anjelica) silently worry about uncertainties
— I like Anjelica’s random thought about if she put the car keys in the ceramic chicken.
— The dog’s obviously-fake bark provided a laugh.
— Overall, I kinda liked the format of this sketch, but felt the inner thoughts should’ve been funnier.
STARS: **
GLAMOROUS DRINKING
a sketch pulled from last week’s show excessively glamorizes drinking
liquor council spokesman’s (RAQ) rebuttal- drink a lot, but not too much
— Interesting intro from Lorne.
— I kinda like the detail of Billy’s oversized drinking glass.
— This sketch hasn’t been working too much for me so far. While I’m liking the idea of the comically absurd levels of alcohol glorification seen throughout the piece, I feel the sketch is coming off fairly dull.
— Okay, I’m interested in this sudden turn, with Randy as a spokesperson for the National Council of Liquor and Spirits offering a rebuttal to the sketch.
— I’m getting some pretty good laughs from Randy’s lines, especially him advising us to “drink, drink, drink, and then just before it gets really bad, stop…. and then maybe start drinking again.” Funny dialogue here, helped even more by Randy’s usual reliable delivery.
STARS: **½
ACTORS ON FILM
Jimmy Chance & Ashley Ashley extol the virtues of Top Gun
— The return of this unnecessary recurring sketch that should’ve been left a one-off in the George Wendt/Francis Ford Coppola episode.
— That’s it? The sketch is over? This didn’t work for me AT ALL. I enjoyed the first appearance of these characters in the aforementioned Wendt/Coppola episode, and though they suffered diminishing returns in their second appearance in the Oprah Winfrey episode, I still got some laughs there (mostly just from Robert). But this third appearance completely washed over me. I didn’t even get so much as a chuckle from this.
STARS: *
HALLMARK
Maerose Prizzi (Anjelica) reads some Hallmark Organized Crime Cards
— I think I recall hearing this is a character Anjelica previously played in a movie, but I can’t remember which movie it is.
— An overall simple but pretty funny sketch with some laughs from the mafia greeting cards that Anjelica read off.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs medley including “Let’s Take It To The Stage”
WEEKEND UPDATE
ALF gives an update on his decade & asks viewers to go see his new movie
AWB talks about the ill-educated, flag-waving class of 1986
Weekend Update Dancers & Father Guido Sarducci honor Statue of Liberty
— Dennis mentions that 6 years ago behind this very desk, Al Franken declared the 80s the Al Franken decade (actually, that happened 7 years ago, not 6, but that’s a nitpick), which leads us into an appearance from the man himself.
— Good to see the return of the old running gag with Al periodically saying “me – Al Franken” while a graphic of his name is displayed.
— A laugh from how the naked pictures of Al’s children have censor bars over private areas. Also, one of the pictures is of Al’s then-baby son Joe, who we’ll be meeting on the show three years later in the final episode of 1989, in a memorable Update commentary where Al passes the Al Franken Decade torch and declares the then-approaching 90s the Joe Franken Decade.
— Now Al has gotten to the main point of his commentary, which is just him plugging his and Tom Davis’ upcoming movie One More Saturday Night. Some laughs over Al going into excessive and desperate detail on which theaters are showing the movie. Feels a little weird watching this in retrospect, though, knowing what a flop the movie would end up being.
— I really liked A. Whitney’s line about illiterates who can’t read USA Today, which makes him wonder “Maybe they’re the ones who are writing it.”
— A. Whitney’s overall commentary had some really witty backhanded comments about the intelligence level of the graduating Class of ’86.
— After a two-episode break, we get an unwelcome return of the Weekend Update Dancers, in what will thankfully end up being their final appearance ever. This time, they’re changing things up by rhythmically acting out a Father Guido Sarducci-read story about the Statue of Liberty.
— Hey, this Weekend Update Dancers appearance is actually kinda making me chuckle in a weird way, just for the humorous incongruity between their dancing and Guido Sarducci’s narration.
— Funny post-Weekend Update Dancers visual of Dennis in that headdress.
— I liked the “knock knock” bit Dennis did to commemorate the end of this season. Stuff like this shows why I’m so glad he made Weekend Update fun again this season, after the dire condition it was in the previous five seasons.
STARS: ***
LESBIAN PICK-UPS
both (JOC) & her fiance (RDJ) are picked up by lesbians in a bar
— Nora plays her very first of what I recall being quite a number of lesbian roles over the course of her SNL tenure.
— I’m getting some good laughs from Nora’s confident determination in proving to Joan she’s just as good for her as any man is.
— Pretty funny turn with Joan easily being persuaded in going home with Nora.
— I had liked where this was going, but it petered out for me during the whole bit with Robert and Anjelica. Cute ending, though, with them romantically slow-dancing their way off the set.
— I think portions of this sketch is replaced with the dress rehearsal version in reruns. I’m reviewing the live version of this episode, but from my recollection of the rerun version, there was an abrupt cut in this sketch during Robert’s reaction to finding out his girlfriend walked off with a lesbian, as if something was inserted from dress rehearsal around that time.
STARS: **½
BOCCE BALL MY WAY
Father Guido Sarducci shows how in instructional video
— Fairly funny premise with Father Guido Sarducci hosting an instructional bocce ball videotape. And there’s something about the words “bocce ball” that just sound funny in Sarducci’s accent and voice.
— Wait, that’s it??? It’s over already? Nothing even happened in this! Okay, the scrolled list of topics covered on the tape was kinda amusing, but this overall piece could’ve been pretty funny if it actually went somewhere.
STARS: *½
BACKSTAGE
Mephistopheles tries to intimidate Billy & tempts him with alcohol
— For the second time this season, a non-Tommy Flanagan recurring character of Jon’s briefly breaks out into a Tommy Flanagan voice when telling a lie. Hmm. But, hey, to be honest, I’d take this over a full-fledged appearance of the overused Flanagan.
— Haha, when trying to tempt Billy, Mephistopheles mentions how “glamorous” liquor is, as an amusing callback to the Glamorous Drinking sketch from earlier tonight.
— Boy, this ended awkwardly as HELL. Something seemed to go wrong after Mephistopheles exited the scene. Anthony showed up afterwards to literally do NOTHING but awkwardly pause as if he or Billy forgot what to do next, and then the sketch just ended. What the hell? I guess that’s what happens when you do a live scene where the only two performers are a non-actor and an 18-year-old non-comedian.
— Speaking of Anthony, are these backstage sketches the ONLY things he’s going to be in tonight? He hasn’t appeared in character during any actual sketches in this episode. I should be thankful for that.
STARS: ***
DAMON WAYANS
DAW does stand-up about racism & how he won childhood insult contests
— During her intro, it sounds like Anjelica butchered the pronunciation of “Wayans”. Reminds me of Betty Thomas messing up Joel Hodgson’s last name when introducing his stand-up segment in the season 9 finale.
— Great to see Damon back on SNL. Also, his grown-out hairstyle here looks better than the shorter, receding hairstyle he had throughout the season.
— The watermelon bit was hilarious, and I loved Damon’s white redneck imitation.
— He mentions growing up with a clubbed foot and having to wear orthopedic shoes, which reminds me of an autobiographical animated series he would later star in during the mid-90s titled Waynehead, which aired on the WB network. (Any other 90s kids besides me remember that show?) The show was about Damon’s childhood in the inner city, and he was memorably always shown wearing a big-ol’ black shoe with a metallic brace due to his clubbed foot.
— I liked Damon enacting his child self telling his mother that his orthopedic shoes “look like Herman Munster shoes, mama.”
— I feel bad for laughing at his imitation of a mentally-handicapped bully, because it’s very un-PC by today’s standards.
— Great ending to the “dirty dozens insult contest” portion, where Damon delivers a hilarious and impressively wordy, long-winded, run-on insult without messing up.
— Overall, a very solid stand-up segment from Damon as expected.
STARS: ****
BOOK MINUTE
(DAV) reads real-life nursery rhymes for inner-city children
— I love Danitra’s character name in this: Aquanetta Feinstein.
— Good premise with Danitra presenting her own nursery rhymes for inner-city children.
— Some of these cruel nursery rhymes are really funny, especially the “Humpty Dumpy Dead” one.
— This ended on kind of a weak note with the repetitive string of “now he dead” endings to various stories.
— Overall, despite the weak ending, this was a pretty solid sketch and Danitra always seems to excel in these one-person talking-to-the-camera sketches.
STARS: ***½
MOVIE THEATRE
loud talk of Patti LaBelle (TES) & aunt (DAV) irks moviegoers
— I groaned SO LOUD at Terry’s entrance as a blackface Patti LaBelle.
— Earlier this season, I excused Terry’s previous appearance in blackface drag when he played Diana Ross in that Pee-Wee Herman Thanksgiving Special sketch, but THIS is way too damn much. His Patti LaBelle characterization is racially stereotypical as all hell, and if his make-up were any darker, it would LITERALLY be the color black.
— Also, why place this sketch immediately after two solo performance pieces each starring a black cast member (Damon’s stand-up segment and Danitra’s Book Minute sketch)?
— Oh, geez, as if this sketch hadn’t ALREADY lost me, now we’re resorting to the “black people being loud in a movie theater” trope, one of the most cliched, unfunniest, hackiest comedy premises imaginable.
— I also don’t feel too comfortable with this general premise of white people being annoyed by the behavior of black people. I can’t help but see unfortunate implications there, which is made even worse by the fact that one of said black characters is played by a white performer.
— Overall, ugh, this sketch was fucking TERRIBLE in every way possible. Hands down, one of the worst sketches of the whole season, which is really saying something considering the quality of this year.
— I’d like to think that even Billy Crystal would shake his head at this sketch, but nah, that’s probably giving him too much credit.
STARS: *
MY FRIEND
LOM fires Billy after he shows up drunk for a Colonel Sanders sketch
— I like the mysteriousness of Joan’s many descriptions of her friend.
— Funny Colonel Sanders reveal. Billy looks completely unrecognizable in that costume. I can only tell it’s him by the voice.
— Good breaking-the-fourth-wall twist with Billy being drunk and causing the sketch to get derailed.
— An upset Lorne enters the scene, calls Billy out on his unprofessionalism, and fires him on the spot. I can’t help but picture this being exactly what it looked like (only with R-rated language) when Lorne fired Damon Wayans on the spot in real life after Damon’s impromptu “gay cop” routine earlier this season.
— The repeated joke throughout tonight’s episode with Mephistopheles laughing himself into a coughing fit is getting old, and is another cliched joke that’s been done to death in comedy.
— Pretty solid sketch as a whole, and another nice continuation of tonight’s running storyline.
STARS: ***½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs medley including “Do Fries Go With That Shake”
FIRE / GOODNIGHTS
Billy creates a cliffhanger by setting season-ending cast party ablaze
— Okay, here comes the most famous part of the episode, and one of the most famous parts of the whole season.
— LOL at some of these cast members being so pumped for next season, when you know in retrospect that most of them ain’t gonna be there.
— Hilarious reveal with Billy outside the cast’s room, setting it on fire.
— Oh, here comes what is by far the most well-remembered part of this whole piece…
— And there it is: upon realizing that if Billy sets the cast on fire, they wont be able to do the show next season, Lorne enters the smoky room as if he’s going to rescue the whole cast, only to exit a few seconds later with season 11 savior Jon Lovitz as the only person he’s brought out, telling him “Go down to my limo, sit there and wait for me”, and then Lorne just lets the rest of the cast continue to burn in the room! Mean but classic.
— Haha, and then to add a cherry on top of the cake, Lorne leads SNL’s writers into the burning room. The writers here are portrayed as the same three comically preppy, mega-whitebread characters who showed up as the writers in the That Black Girl piece from the Francis Ford Coppola episode earlier this season.
— I’m getting some unintentional amusement from the cheesiness of the really cheap-looking fire graphic that’s being superimposed onto the bottom half of the screen.
— Right now, in the live version I’m reviewing of this episode, there’s a big difference from the rerun version: when the camera cuts to Anjelica Huston and the musical guest all on the home base stage ready to start the goodnights, you can hear VERY LOUD mic’ed running footsteps coming from off-camera, which is actually a delayed Billy Martin rushing towards the home base stage to make his entrance. Billy’s delayed entrance and overly-loud mic’ed footsteps result in a very long awkward pause from a nervously-laughing Anjelica, who then proceeds to comically ad-lib a “cut” gesture to someone off-camera. Billy then finally shows up in burnt, smoky clothing.
— Love the classic visual of the cast burning in the smoky, fiery room while text is displayed onscreen asking “Who will survive? Who will perish? Tune in October 11th”
— Good touch with a question mark being added at the end of every single name in the scrolling ending credits.
— Funny seeing the cast ham it up among the smoke and flames.
— Overall, what an amazing, unique way to end a season, while also acknowledging the troubles of this particular season.
STARS: *****
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS:
— The Billy Martin/Mephistopheles running storyline was fun, and we got an absolutely classic conclusion with the cast being set on fire as a season-ending cliffhanger. However, other than those, plus Danitra Vance’s Book Minute sketch and Damon Wayans’ stand-up routine, this episode was actually a little on the underwhelming side. A lot of sketches were just meh and fell pretty flat with me, and then there was that horrid Patti LaBelle sketch. For this season’s standards, however, tonight was probably one of the more passable episodes by default.
— Needless to say, most of the cast ended up getting dumped over the summer. The only cast members who would be brought back next season are Jon Lovitz (of course), Nora Dunn, Dennis Miller, and featured player A. Whitney Brown. I’d say Lorne definitely made the right call bringing back those four. Jon and Dennis in particular had a very strong year and probably made lots of viewers back then hopeful for SNL’s future.
— Going through the departed cast members one-by-one, in order from my least favorite to most favorite:
-
- Anthony Michael Hall being brought in as an SNL cast member was a mistake, plain and simple. He turned out to be an extremely ill fit for the show, came off green as a live performer, gave us lots of awkward moments, had a bad tendency to mug the camera and overact, and had one horrible excuse for a recurring character (Craig Sundberg, Idiot Savant). While Anthony had a few okay-ish moments here and there, they were nowhere near good enough to redeem him. He, hands down, gets my vote for one of SNL’s worst cast members of all-time.
- Robert Downey wasn’t much better, but he did have his occasional moments where he actually showed potential and cracked me up. I especially liked his two big showcases in the George Wendt/Francis Ford Coppola episode, particularly the bizarrely-funny Confrontational Suitcase Monologue piece.
- Joan Cusack was a little better than I expected her to be. While I can’t think of many times she actually made me laugh, and she had a bad tendency to sometimes rely on a mentally-challenged-sounding slow delivery as a strange acting choice, she was usually always pretty good at the thankless task of playing normal, straight roles in sketches. She also showed a few flashes of charm, especially in the Unconditional Love sketch from the Tony Danza episode. Still, I can’t really say I would’ve wanted a second season of her, especially if it would’ve prevented the hiring of Jan Hooks.
- Terry Sweeney often provided some pretty good laughs for me, though his tendency to constantly do drag could be a bit much the times he played multiple women in a single episode. Despite being reliable for some laughs, I don’t think I would’ve wanted Terry to come back next season. His seemingly very limited range might’ve gotten old in a second season or so.
- Danitra Vance wasn’t used too much, but she was usually always very solid whenever she was given a chance to shine. I especially enjoyed so many of her solo pieces throughout the year. It’s too bad her dyslexia issues made it difficult for SNL to write for her, because out of all the fired cast members this season, she’s the only one who I actually would’ve wanted to come back next season (not counting Damon Wayans, as he was already fired earlier in the season and was only brought back in tonight’s season finale as a one-time thing).
- Randy Quaid had a really good year. In my past viewings of this season when I was younger, I used to unfairly dismiss him as a poor man’s predecessor to Phil Hartman (much like how Michael McKean is always dismissed as a poor man’s successor to Phil Hartman). However, watching and reviewing this season these last few weeks has given me a whole new appreciation for Randy’s SNL stint. He was a very solid and underrated utility player this season, was reliable even in some of the weaker sketches of the year, and was usually always good for providing laughs in comedic roles. All that being said, I wouldn’t have wanted him to come back next season. Why? Simply because we wouldn’t have gotten Phil Hartman. Sure Randy was a strong leader this season, but when it comes to doing utility work on SNL, NOBODY compares to Phil.
— Season 11 as a whole lived up to its poor reputation, even if I didn’t find its quality to be QUITE as horrible as legend has it. There was a noticeably higher number of weak sketches than a typical SNL season, as well as a lacking number of truly strong sketches. The first several months of the season, however, were mostly up-and-down rather than flat-out bad, and surprisingly had a slightly higher number of good episodes than poor ones. For a while, that made me start to wonder if this season isn’t all that deserving of its reputation as one of the Infamous Three Seasons of SNL. However, a turning point occurred with the mid-season Jerry Hall episode, which started a string of weak episodes that made me feel I had officially reached the true badness of season 11. The season never fully recovered after that. There were very few good episodes in the last few months of the season. Aside from the experimental George Wendt/Francis Ford Coppola epic, even the better episodes from the last few months of the season weren’t too great. On the other hand, aside from Teri Garr, the worst episodes of this entire overall season were merely bad; not frustratingly awful like the worst episodes of the two other Infamous Three Seasons (seasons 6 and 20). In fact, if I were to rank the Infamous Three Seasons from least worst to absolute worst, my personal ranking would be: season 11, season 6, season 20. This may be subject to change when I eventually review season 20.
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Jimmy Breslin):
— a moderate step up
HOW THIS OVERALL SEASON STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING SEASON (1984-85):
— a big step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW:
A retooled season of SNL debuts with a fantastic cast of mostly-new hires, kicking off an era that turns out to be a huge renaissance for SNL