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Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
AFFORDABLE CARE ACT
Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul) helps Barack Obama (JAP) promote Obamacare
— Great bit from Aidy.
— New cast member Beck Bennett gets the somewhat rare honor of appearing in his first episode before being announced in the episode’s opening montage.
— Hilarious lines from Bobby regarding his good-for-nothing son, played by Beck.
— A funny topical spoof of Ted Cruz’s then-recent Green Eggs & Ham speech.
— Lots of funny walk-ons from the cast all throughout this. This feels like an even more fun variation of the Obama sequester press conference cold opening from the preceding season’s Kevin Hart episode.
— Now we get a solid appearance from Aaron Paul as his Breaking Bad character, just one day before the highly-anticipated Breaking Bad series finale.
STARS: ***½
OPENING MONTAGE
— Same montage from the preceding season.
— After I had gotten so used to Fred Armisen being the first-announced cast member in every single opening montage since season 30, it feels unusual seeing anyone else now be the first-announced cast member.
— Aidy Bryant, Kate McKinnon, and Cecily Strong have been promoted from featured players to repertory players. Aidy and Cecily’s promotions are particularly noteworthy, because they were promoted after only one season as featured players, which has been a rarity since the early 2000s.
— The photo of Cecily from the preceding season’s opening montage (first screencap below) has now been changed to a new photo (second screencap below).
— Beck Bennett, John Milhiser, Kyle Mooney, Mike O’Brien, Noel Wells, and Brooks Wheelan have all been added to the cast tonight, in the largest simultaneous influx of new cast members that the beginning of an SNL season has experienced since the big overhaul the show went through in 1995.
MONOLOGUE
TIF hazes new cast members BEB, JOM, KYM, MOB, NOW, BRW via dance routine
— I love the tongue-in-cheek bit regarding Tina Fey’s non-existent recurring characters.
— When talking about SNL’s hiring of six new cast members, Tina notably calls this a “rebuilding year”. Hmm. Interesting hearing that in hindsight, now being aware of how this season goes and how SNL’s original intention to transition into a new era that heavily features these six newbies sadly ends up not going the way SNL fans at the time hoped and assumed it would.
— I absolutely love that this monologue is focusing on the new cast members.
— Pretty fun seeing old clips of Tina and her female castmates doing humiliating dances in hosts’ monologues back in the early 2000s, as well as a bonus clip of Will Ferrell tap-dancing in Katie Holmes’ season 26 monologue. Interestingly, the Bernie Mac clip (the seventh above screencap for this monologue) clearly does not come from the aired version of that episode. I went into much more detail about this in my review of Bernie Mac’s monologue, seen here.
— Even though I’m aware it really rubs some SNL fans the wrong way, I’m enjoying the dumb dances Tina’s making the six new cast members do, and I personally feel that both Tina and SNL mean well in their good-natured “humiliating” and “hazing” of the newbies. I do have to admit, though, the fact that almost all of these newbies would end up getting severely underused over the course of this season and then get fired after the season sadly casts a pall over this monologue in hindsight for me, and makes it not hold up quite as well for me. A shame, given the fact that I remember absolutely loving this monologue when it originally aired, as I obviously wasn’t aware back then of how the newbies’ SNL tenures would turn out. I remember this monologue gave me so much hope for them.
— Some great moves from Beck.
— Tina, after the newbies’ dance number: “Congratulations, you’re done for the night.” Oh, Tina, you have no idea idea how true that statement would turn out to be in subsequent episodes this season, regarding the extreme under-utilization the newbies will find themselves facing, and how they’ll indeed be “done for the night” in each episode after doing very little in it.
STARS: ***
GIRLS
Albanian (TIF) rebuffs First World problems of Hannah (NOW) & other Girls
— I’ve never watched Girls, but I’m familiar enough with Lena Dunham’s voice to find Noel Wells’ impression of her to be pretty spot-on and fun, and the other female cast members are also fun in their performances as Girls characters. Given how, when it was initially announced Noel was joining SNL, some SNL fans who were familiar with her pre-SNL online work heavily hyped her skills as a celebrity impressionist, it’s nice to see Noel immediately getting a showcase for her impression skills tonight.
— Making this already-fun Girls spoof even better is the added-in Albanian character played by Tina, who’s absolutely perfect in this role.
— I got a particularly good laugh from Tina asking if she can eat the donut from Vanessa’s character’s head, referring to the odd-looking bun her hair is in.
STARS: ****
AIRPORT
(TAK) & (TIF) give special passengers priority during airplane boarding
— Love the “children traveling with small parents” bit, getting good mileage out of the huge size difference between John Milhiser and Brooks Wheelan.
— Very fun structure to this sketch, with lots of very amusing quick walk-ons from various cast members, much like the cold opening.
— Bobby’s mere facial expression as the “farter” is a riot; the kind of gag he’s always perfect at selling.
STARS: ****
NEW CAST MEMBER OR ARCADE FIRE?
KYM, NOW, MOB mistaken for musical guest
— Wow, yet ANOTHER segment tonight focused on the group of new cast members.
— Despite the fact that I’m aware of the fate that this season’s newbies would sadly end up suffering after tonight’s episode, I still absolutely love the meta concept of this game show sketch.
— A rarity at the time for Kenan to play a game show host, which is obviously being done tonight in light of Bill Hader’s departure. Game show host would end up becoming a fairly frequent role for Kenan after this.
— Was Kyle Mooney supposed to initially walk in the wrong direction when making his exit, or was that a real gaffe? I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the latter, remembering how green Kyle comes off as a live performer in this first season of his.
— Nasim makes her second of only two measly appearances tonight, both of them being extremely brief walk-ons that you’d be forgiven for completely missing because you blinked. In her walk-on in this particular sketch, she doesn’t even have any lines, and in the sketch she did have a line in during her walk-on (the Airport sketch), it was just her mumbling foreign gibberish.
— I admit to laughing at Kenan always scolding the newbies whenever any of them they try to say something or do a funny bit of business without having earned that right (as Kenan claims), even though, again, that pall that I mentioned in the monologue is looming.
— I love Tina’s various descriptions of Win Butler’s look, including “hipster Paul Bunyan” and “Civil War re-enactor.”
— When Kenan mentioned that a friend of Tina’s will be brought in as her lifeline, I was worried it would turn out to be YET ANOTHER Amy Poehler cameo, but thankfully, it’s just Lorne.
— A good laugh from Lorne guessing that, out of Win Butler and Mike O’Brien, the new cast member is actually “the black one”, Kenan, which leaves Kenan utterly shocked and upset.
— Kenan: “Well, the show is over.” Tina: “Oh, do I win anything?” Kenan: “Don’t you have enough?!?”
STARS: ****
E-METH
electronic pipe delivers methamphetamine but not social acceptance
— Funny concept.
— I love the visual of Kate laying in a bathtub in the middle of the road.
— Priceless bit with Taran casually yanking out one of his teeth to show us how perfectly white it is.
— Hilarious scene with Kenan chasing a half-naked Brooks Wheelan all around the living room.
— Solid ending appearance from Aaron Paul once again playing his Jesse Pinkman role.
STARS: ****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Reflektor”
WEEKEND UPDATE
Weekend Update veteran TIF gives tips to new newsreader CES
hacky veteran stand-up Bruce Chandling (KYM) plies well-worn material
Drunk Uncle bewails back-to-school season with Meth Nephew (Aaron Paul)
— Cecily has become the new co-anchor to the on-his-way-out Seth, as an attempt to transition into a new Cecily Strong-led era of Update, an attempt that, as we know now, ends up going about as well as this general season’s aforementioned attempt at a “rebuilding” year.
— After the previous Update opening title sequence & theme song was used for so many years (2006-2013), it feels refreshing to finally get a new one.
— Even the color motif of the Update graphics is different this season, now being blue instead of burgundy.
— Boy, as I expected, it feels so odd seeing someone new delivering Update jokes after I had gotten so used to Seth doing that for so many endless seasons.
— I have very mixed feelings towards Cecily’s delivery of Update jokes so far. There’s somewhat of a straitlaced professionalism to her Update delivery that feels natural for this venue, but there’s also something in her delivery that feels wrong for Update.
— A good laugh from Tina sheepishly wheeling back out of the shot when the female Update anchor who she assumed Cecily was about to praise as an inspiration turns out to be Jane Curtin instead of her.
— Pretty solid bit with the very tense, prisoner-esque advice Tina gives to Cecily in regards to anchoring Update.
— Blah, I didn’t like Cecily’s big smile after her somewhat-cringey sushi joke. That smile also reminded me way too much of how annoyingly, over-the-top cutesy Amy Poehler came off in her very first Update.
— Seth and Cecily’s respective delivery styles of their Update jokes aren’t meshing together well. Part of that could be because, obviously, 1) you have a very established anchor who’s delivery style we had become accustomed to for years now being paired with the delivery style of a brand-new Update co-anchor who had displayed no prior on-air chemistry with the established anchor, and 2) this is only Cecily’s first Update, and thus, it’s understandable that things aren’t immediately meshing. I’d be more forgiving of that lack of immediate meshing if I knew Cecily would eventually grow into a solid and long-lasting anchor, but that doesn’t turn out to be the case at all.
— Great to see Kyle Mooney already getting his own Update piece, doing his Bruce Chandling character from his pre-SNL days.
— Fun performance from Kyle, and his intentionally bad, hacky stand-up comedy here is reminiscent of how strong early-era Fred Armisen used to be at pulling off anti-comedy pieces on Update (before he made that stale).
— Solid turn with Kyle’s Bruce Chandling suddenly getting depressed when reflecting on how he occasionally gets turned down after certain auditions. Actual character depth on display here, which feels rare for a recent SNL era like this.
— I actually really like Cecily’s performance during the O.J. Simpson bit she and Seth did together just now, especially her delivery of the line “You stay strong, Juice.”
— I howled at Drunk Uncle’s “Someone’s gotta watch the white sports, Seth” line.
— With Drunk Uncle’s memorable “They’re all just twerkin’ 9 to 5” line, SNL gets in their very first mention of “twerking”, the then-hot word that had recently become widespread thanks to, IIRC, Miley Cyrus’ infamous VMAs performance that summer.
— Drunk Uncle: “(singing) Bluurrred liiiiines. (speaking) The only blurred line *I* know is our border with Meh-hee-co [Mexico].”
— Yet ANOTHER fun appearance from Aaron Paul tonight, this time as Drunk Uncle’s Meth Nephew.
STARS: **½
CINEMA CLASSICS
clips from 1940 movie reveal influence of taxidermist
— The debut of both Cinema Classics and Kenan’s Reese De’What character.
— Kenan has noticeably been given quite a number of important utility roles tonight, obviously because of the departure of utility veterans Bill Hader and Jason Sudeikis. With the way Kenan’s been utilized in tonight’s episode, SNL is immediately making it clear who they’ll now be leaning on as the new utility player of the show.
— Dumb conceit with all of the taxidermy animals slowly taking over the movie scenes, but this dumbness is actually kinda working for me.
— The visual of a taxidermy animal driving the car that Tina, Taran, and Aidy are in is making me laugh more than I ever would’ve expected.
— Kenan is very solid here, especially the occasional comments that his Reese De’What character is making about his wife’s weight.
STARS: ***
RICK’S MODEL T’S
(MOB) & mad wife (TIF) sell Model Ts in world’s first used-car commercial
— The second consecutive sketch tonight set in an older time period.
— Mike: “Lots of firsts here today, folks.” Throwing in some reality subtext, are we, SNL?
— Hmm, not too sure Mike’s delivery is working me. And I’m not finding the old-timey salesman delivery he’s attempting to be very convincing.
— I do at least like the running bit with Mike excitedly only listing off one thing when touting his car dealership (e.g. “This car’s got everything: seats………….!”)
— Tina’s demented one-liners are great.
— Yeah, the more and more this sketch is going on, the more and more Mike’s delivery is sounding awkward. There’s this slow, unsure, halting style to his line readings that keeps kinda taking me out of the sketch. Our first sign of how ill-fitting Mike would often come off as a live performer this season. This sketch is still pretty enjoyable, but this solid material isn’t coming off as strong as it would’ve under a performer more comfortable-seeming on live TV. For example, Bill Hader, given how fantastic he always is at playing old-timey roles, would’ve absolutely killed it in this role of Mike’s had this sketch been done when Bill was still a cast member.
STARS: ***
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Afterlife”
MANOLO BLAHNIK
(TIF) & vacuous ex-porn stars endorse Manolo Blahnik shoes
— Feels a little odd seeing this recurring sketch appearing in two consecutive episodes. Granted, there was a whole summer break in between the preceding episode and this episode, but since I watch these episodes in chronological order on a day-to-day basis, it feels like SNL literally just did this sketch.
— Cecily: “You’ll feel like you’re riding in a glass blumpkin.”
— I love Vanessa’ delivery of “What the heck???” when telling us the reaction she once had to finding out her butt was amputated.
— Cecily: “I thought I got banged into a solar eclipse. But I was really just locked in a trunk lookin’ through the keyhole.”
— Vanessa, regarding getting banged by rapping gerbils in the back of a Kia: “I think some of them were people. Ya live and ya learn.”
— Tina, at the end of her message to her 8th grade gym teacher: “P.S.: I saw you on House Hunters, you picked the wrong house, bitch.”
— How did they go through this entire sketch WITHOUT having one of the “Manolo Blahnik” mispronunciations be “Mayim Bialik”? It writes itself, people!
— Overall, while this was still solid, this wasn’t quite as strong as these sketches usually are. This had a slow first minute-and-a-half or so.
STARS: ****
GOODNIGHTS
— Tina mentions that the network is letting them go long and Arcade Fire is about to do a show. Indeed, an Arcade Fire special (which, IIRC, was kinda like a concert, plus some interspersed comedy segments starring famous comedians like Zach Galifianakis and Aziz Ansari) immediately followed the original airing of this episode. Reruns of this SNL episode show the dress rehearsal version of these goodnights, because it features no mention from Tina of the Arcade Fire special, which reruns of this SNL episode obviously aren’t followed by.
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very solid and promising season premiere. Aside from Weekend Update, I liked every segment in this episode, and gave out a lot of four-star ratings, especially in the pre-Update half of the show. I remember how, when this originally aired, seeing so many new cast members peppered all throughout this season premiere gave the show such an exciting, fresh feel. Very sad how that ends up being a huge misnomer for how the rest of this season goes for the newbies. The strength of this episode in general also ends up being a huge misnomer for this season, as I recall this season going on to be dull and bland, with little-to-no standout strong episodes besides the one I just reviewed. We’ll see if that opinion of mine changes on my re-watch of this season.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Airport
Girls
e-meth
New Cast Member Or Arcade Fire?
Manolo Blahnik
Affordable Care Act
Rick’s Model T’s
Cinema Classics
Monologue
Weekend Update
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING SEASON (2012-13)
about the same
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Miley Cyrus