Tag: Miley Cyrus

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

THE MILLENNIALS
entitled twentysomethings are heroes of workplace drama

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

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

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

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

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

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Twinkle Song”

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

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

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

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

GOODNIGHTS

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

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

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

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

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Amy Schumer

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

VMAS BACKSTAGE
backstage at the 2013 VMAs, host’s new image has former self (VAB) leery

— I don’t like how the typical pointless, unnecessary audience applause that always follows the first line delivered at the beginning of a cold opening (which has become a regular thing for SNL since sometime around the mid-2000s) forced Kenan to awkwardly repeat his “raccoon meat” line to Noel.
— Our obligatory spoof of Miley Cyrus’ VMAs incident. At least this means we’re not getting a political cold opening in this episode.
— Not a bad premise, and at least it’s a way to use Vanessa’s Miley impression without doing another Miley Cyrus Show sketch.
— A decent and well-timed part with both Mileys reciting the exact same speech in unison, which also reminds me of when Calista Flockhart and Rachel Dratch’s Ally McBeal did that in Flockhart’s season 26 monologue.
— Taran’s Robin Thicke, to Miley: “You ready to start grabbin’ at my junk while I half-sing?”
— Comically emotional outbursts from a teary-eyed Bobby never fail to kill.
— Good lines from Jay’s Will Smith.
STARS: ***

MONOLOGUE
for her SNL gig, host nixes Hannah Montana, twerking, BOM’s wrecking ball

— Pretty much immediately in this monologue, Miley promises no twerking tonight. Hmm, we’ll see.
— Uh…okay at Miley’s point-blank reveal that Hannah Montana was murdered.
— Hilarious cutaway to a shot of Bobby ready to do a Wrecking Ball spoof, only to be told there won’t be one.
— Wow, this monologue is over already? This was seriously only about a minute-and-a-half long. Easily one of the shortest monologues in recent years.
STARS: **½

FIFTY SHADES OF GREY AUDITIONS
screen tests for Fifty Shades Of Grey movie feature unkinky celebrities

— I love Noel’s Emma Stone impression.
— Taran’s Christoph Waltz impression is priceless, made even funnier by the fact that Taran presumably developed this impression from having worked with Waltz for a week earlier this same calendar year (2013) when Waltz hosted SNL. I always like when someone on SNL does an impression of a then-recent host or musical guest.
— Feels odd seeing Beck do a Philip Seymour Hoffman impression, because 1) that was one of the signature impressions of the recently-departed-from-SNL Jason Sudeikis, and 2) Hoffman would sadly end up passing away just a few months after this episode.
— Very strange how Aidy’s Rebel Wilson “impression” features her doing and saying nothing, aside from occasionally muttering half-audible “Yeah…”s. The Kristen Stewart impression that Noel did earlier in this pre-tape also featured her doing and saying nothing, but that was clearly the point of that impression. Aidy’s Rebel Wilson doing and saying nothing just shows that both Aidy and SNL were presumably aware that Aidy must not have been able to do a good Rebel Wilson impression and was seemingly only cast in the role because of her size.
— As usual for SNL’s screen test pre-tapes, this is lots of fun, even if nothing will ever match the Star Wars screen test pre-tapes from 1997.
STARS: ****

GIRLFRIENDS TALK SHOW
hip-hop wannabe (host) draws Kyra’s attention

— I’m not caring at all for Miley’s performance here.
— Geez, only one sketch into tonight’s episode, and Miley ALREADY breaks her promise of “no twerking tonight”.
— As usual, Aidy has the funniest moments here, especially her comments about consoling a divorcee, and the part with her making up a song.
— Another funny “My boyfriend’s crazy” story from Cecily.
STARS: ***

WE DID STOP
John Boehner (TAK) & Michele Bachmann (host) in “We Did Stop” music video

— The first of many music videos in this SNL season.
— Very fun idea to do a topical government shutdown-related spoof of Miley’s “We Can’t Stop”. I’ve never seen the music video for that song of Miley’s, but that’s not hurting my enjoyment of this spoof at all.
— Taran is a riot in his John Boehner performance here. He has an endless amount of funny moments all throughout this music video, and is displaying lots of Will Ferrell-esque fearlessness.
— Lots of fun visuals throughout this.
— Great shot of Jay’s President Obama peeking through the window with a worried look on his face.
STARS: ****

PIERS MORGAN LIVE
many Hillary Clinton biopics are in development

— Taran’s Piers Morgan: “Good evening, I’m Piers Morgan, and if I were in a cartoon, I would be the voice of a fancy hedgehog.”
— Feels odd seeing Nasim’s Arianna Huffington appearing outside of Weekend Update for once. By the way, it’s good to see Nasim getting some noteworthy roles tonight after being almost non-existent in the preceding week’s season premiere.
— Holy hell! I (and I’m sure just about everybody else) completely forgot until now that Beck played Bill Clinton once, early in his SNL tenure. Wow. It feels utterly bizarre seeing a post-1995 episode have anyone other than Darrell Hammond play Bill Clinton. This reminds me of that forgotten-among-SNL-fans one time in 2005 when George Bush Sr. was played by Fred Armisen (doing an actual accurate impression) instead of Dana Carvey.
— Beck’s not doing the best Bill Clinton I’ve ever seen, but man, it’s such an interesting novelty seeing him do this impression.
— An even more noteworthy moment right now, as we get the debut of Kate’s Hillary Clinton impression, though the only reason she’s playing her in this specific sketch is because this sketch has several different women portraying Hillary in separate biopic spoofs. Vanessa is technically still SNL’s regular Hillary impersonator at this point, and would remain so until the following season, where Kate officially takes over the impression.
— I could do without Nasim’s Huffington constantly calling Taran’s Morgan flirty pet names, as it’s just a rehash of when she does that towards Seth in her Weekend Update appearances.
— The concept of having various women portray Hillary Clinton in individually-themed biopic spoofs is pretty fun, and reminds me of how the season 18 Danny DeVito episode had a very fun running theme where, throughout the episode, each female cast member played Amy Fisher in individually-themed TV movie spoofs. I kinda wish these Hillary spoofs were done in the same manner as those Amy Fisher spoofs, with each spoof airing as its own individual sketch in separate parts of the show.
— Good bit at the end regarding Taran-as-Morgan’s accent being fake.
STARS: ***½

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Wrecking Ball”

WEEKEND UPDATE
SEM & CES group government shutdown constituencies into Winners & Losers

Connecticut mom Pat Lynhart (KAM) loves being wild in Grand Theft Auto V

lip-smacking Shannon Sharpe (JAP) gets hyperbolic about NFL happenings

Jacob won’t deviate from script presenting Shabbat origin & light comedy

— Aww, they’re back to using a burgundy color motif for this season’s Update graphics. I preferred the new blue color motif they used in the preceding week’s season premiere. Why’d they change it back to burgundy after only one episode?
— Much like in the preceding episode, I’m still very iffy on Cecily’s general delivery of Update jokes. However, I absolutely loved her sly delivery of “That’s good weed” at the end of her weed-on-the-bus joke.
— Hmm, Cecily getting involved in a Winners/Losers segment, a segment that Seth usually does by himself.
— An overall good Winners/Losers segment tonight, and Cecily surprisingly fit well into it. I wonder why her delivery worked well there, but not so much when telling regular Update jokes.
— Kate is fantastic in this Grand Theft Auto commentary. When this originally aired, I was so wowed by her performance in this. Unfortunately, it would later become rather cliche to see Kate play this type of hardass, which kinda takes away the novelty of this Grand Theft Auto commentary of hers. It’s definitely still working for me, though.
— The goofy voice, constant lip-licking, and general gestures that Jay’s doing as Shannon Sharpe are cracking me up (and, yes, the real Shannon Sharpe’s voice truly does sound like that), and he has some funny lines here.
— I can’t put my finger on it, but there’s a certain something Cecily keeps doing at the end of a lot of her jokes that I dislike.
— Blah, the same-old same-old Jacob routine that, while it worked in his first Update commentary, never changes in his subsequent Update commentaries and gets increasingly old with each passing appearance. And, as I said in my review of the last Jacob commentary prior to tonight’s, I’m starting to really hate the constant (and I mean CONSTANT) gag within every one of his commentaries in which he never responds to Seth’s questions and instead just goes back to reading from his speech.
— Oh, we actually get something different for once in a Jacob commentary, with his endearingly nervous, unsure reaction when meeting Seth’s new co-anchor, Cecily. Although this moment is only brief, it’s a nice change of routine for this Jacob character.
STARS: **½

CHEER SQUAD
during practice, (host) sees fellow cheerleaders abducted by alien (KET)

— A laugh from the “I like to cheer – deal with it, dad!” lyric at the end of Taran’s cheer.
— Aww, the copy I’m currently watching of this episode must be the West Coast airing, as it’s missing a really bad technical error that happened during the live East Coast airing. (My memory of the technical error is fuzzy, but from what I recall, at one certain point of this sketch when the camera was on a close-up of Miley, the camera started glitching, making the screen flicker a green color, which forced SNL’s control room operators to hastily cut to a different camera, which then accidentally revealed an SNL stagehand on the set applying Nasim and Noel’s wires that will be lifting them in the air later in the sketch.) Call me crazy, but I was kinda looking forward to seeing that gaffe again. From what I recall of this sketch, the technical error was the only interesting thing in what was a painfully unfunny sketch.
— So far, I’m not caring at all for where this sketch in general is going, though, contrary to my negative memory of it, this sketch actually has a few amusing lines, mostly from Taran. Not enough to save this sketch, though.
— Now we get an alien appearance? Yeah, this sketch is NOT working for me.
— The whole bit with Kenan’s alien character announcing his demands in the style of a cheerleader-esque cheer is awful.
— A blah ending.
STARS: *½

MORNIN’ MIAMI
anchors (host), (BOM), (KAM) parcel jollity for Mornin’ Miami promo shoot

— A good laugh from the first instance of Miley, Bobby, and Kate following the director saying “Cut” by immediately slamming their coffee mugs down onto the table, dropping their cheery facades, and angrily sitting in miserable silence.
— The promos are increasingly hilarious and random, particularly the ones that Kate’s doing, as her delivery of them is great.
— Despite the constant repetition of the aforementioned gag with Miley, Bobby, and Kate sitting in miserable silence in between promos, it works as an amusing contrast to their cheery attitudes during their bizarre promos.
— During one of the “sitting in miserable silence” sequences, I love Bobby immediately cutting off Kate’s singing of “I’ll Stand By You” by telling her “Oh, shut it!”
— A particular funny promo from Kate about a racist foley artist
— Hilarious ending reveal of Bobby’s character’s “B.F.” nickname standing for Bitch Fantastic.
STARS: ****

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “We Can’t Stop”

POETRY CLASS
Miss Meadows (VAB) tries fueling high schoolers’ interest in poetry

— Good delivery from Mike on his “I have a job interview, thank Christ” line.
— Funny little mumbling Vanessa’s lightly doing at the end of her sentences. Not sure what to make of that loud, sharp sound she occasionally makes, though.
— Okay, I’m starting to find Vanessa’s odd characterization in general here to be cute and likable, even the aforementioned loud, sharp sound she occasionally makes.
— Some laughs from Kenan’s “Where my weed at?” poem.
STARS: ***

MILEY SEX TAPE
KYM’s unfounded hesitancy costs him perfect girlfriend host

— Ah, our very first Beck/Kyle short!
— I wonder if it’s intentional to have Bobby basically be a Nick Rutherford (the Good Neighbor member who SNL initially didn’t hire with his partners Beck and Kyle) surrogate here, given the fact that, at this early stage of their SNL tenures, Beck and Kyle were probably still so used to having Rutherford teamed up with them. I also wonder if they put Bobby in this role because they figured having a recognizable cast member like Bobby in a co-starring would help this inaugural SNL short of theirs make it on the air.
— This inaugural Beck/Kyle SNL short is displaying the usual quirky and fun brand of Good Neighbor-style humor, and I really like the fast-pacing of the gags in this. A pretty solid way to introduce Beck and Kyle’s humor to general SNL audiences.
STARS: ****

GOODNIGHTS

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IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Although not as strong as the season premiere, this was a pretty good episode, and had a few great highs. I wasn’t too thrilled with Miley Cyrus’ performance as a host in this episode. There was too much of a same-iness to some of the obnoxious roles she played, and I felt she both came off more likable and blended in with the show better in her previous hosting stint.

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

RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
We Did Stop
Mornin’ Miami
Fifty Shades Of Grey Auditions
Miley Sex Tape
Piers Morgan Live
VMAs Backstage
Girlfriends Talk Show
Poetry Class
Weekend Update
Monologue
Cheer Squad

HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Tina Fey)
a step down

My full set of screencaps for this episode is here

TOMORROW
Former one-time host Bruce Willis makes his return 24 years after his previous hosting stint