Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS
self-satisfied Bill Clinton (DAH) says “suck on it” on inauguration night
— We have officially arrived at a new presidency during SNL’s timeline. That’s become a tradition for me to say in my reviews whenever I cover the first presidential cold opening of a president’s first term, as seen with the preceding two presidencies here and here.
— I like Darrell’s Clinton going on about how he’s going to enjoy being a citizen now that his presidency is over.
— Some good laughs from Clinton’s don’t-give-a-fuck “Suck on it” message.
— For the second week in a row, Will’s Bush impression steals a cold opening with a walk-on.
— Funny bit with Bush showing off his Billy Big Mouth Talking Bass, and mentioning that somebody sold it to him for a thousand dollars.
— For some reason, the camera shakes right before Darrell-as-Clinton says “Live from New York…”.
— Speaking of the “Live from New York…”, Darrell’s Clinton sets it up by claiming he’ll be saying it for the last time. That would end up being far from true, as after tonight’s episode, SNL would go on to do quite a number of Clinton cold openings that have Darrell saying LFNY as him, including a cold opening a mere month from now.
— Overall, ehhh. For what was a farewell to the Clinton presidency, a presidency that SNL has gotten a lot of comedy gold out of, this cold opening was kind of a letdown. It wasn’t weak, just unmemorable. How do you NOT end Darrell’s hugely popular run as President Clinton with an epic cold opening?
STARS: ***
OPENING MONTAGE
— Don Pardo accidentally announces Jerry Minor as “Jimmy Minor”. This would later be fixed in reruns.
MONOLOGUE
host has American Beauty-style rose petal fantasies about castmembers
— Feels like been a while since we’ve had this type of backstage monologue.
— Odd how Will is randomly wearing his Spartan Cheerleaders costume at THIS point of his SNL tenure.
— Speaking of retired recurring characters, we now see Molly in her Mary Katherine Gallagher costume during one of the American Beauty-esque fantasy sequences.
— A one-note monologue, though I’m getting a laugh from Lorne’s American Beauty-esque fantasy sequence about Tracy.
STARS: **½
GATORADE LOVE BUCKET
douse celebrants with the Gatorade Love Bucket during off-field events
— A fairly funny premise.
— The scene with Jimmy and Horatio dousing Gatorate all over an old lady and her birthday cake gave me a good laugh.
— Speaking of Jimmy, here’s a screencap of a funny, kinda-freakish-looking closeup of him in this commercial:
— Overall, this commercial was fine, but nothing memorable.
STARS: ***
AIRPORT SECURITY
attitudinal airport security guard Jackie (MAR) heeds bum metal detector
— Maya: “(in a sassy manner) If ya put up a fight, ya ain’t gettin’ on the flight.” That line just made me groan.
— I loved Parnell’s sudden outburst of “DAMMIT!” when the metal detector goes off as he walks through it.
— Oh, god, and now Maya keeps repeating the aforementioned groan-worthy “If ya put up a fight, ya ain’t gettin’ on the flight” line from earlier.
— A hilarious bit with Tracy responding to Parnell’s “I’m not gonna be searched by this man” line with “That’s right, you gonna be searched by THIS man!” as a big intimidating security guard grabs Parnell. Tracy refers to the big guard as Dante, which is interesting, as the guard is played by the same extra who played a character also named Dante in those sketches from the preceding season in which Tracy played a criminal’s mother trying to prove her son’s innocence in court.
— I remember when this sketch originally aired, it was the first time that Jerry Minor had ever made me laugh, as I stated in my original review of this episode back in 2001. I would later go on to gain a much bigger appreciation for Jerry after becoming familiar with his non-SNL work, and I now am able to recognize that he actually did some funny things on SNL prior to this sketch. Not only that, but I don’t even find his character in this sketch all that funny anymore. His character just seems like a lazy gay stereotype.
— Overall, a few laughs, but this was mostly a pretty weak sketch. Before this point, I’ve been enjoying just about all of Maya’s performances so far in this SNL project of mine, but this was the first sketch of hers that left me a little cold.
— This sketch had no business being placed as the lead-off sketch of the night. SNL themselves would apparently agree later on, as the NBC rerun of this episode would move this sketch to a MUCH later spot, somewhere near the end of the episode, IIRC. That NBC rerun also shows the dress rehearsal version of this sketch.
STARS: **
JANET RENO’S DANCE PARTY
Janet Reno [real] crashes final episode
— This sketch makes its return after a long three-and-a-half-year hiatus for one final edition, to mark Janet Reno leaving office with the rest of the Clinton administration.
— Will-as-Janet-Reno’s dancing seems less frantic than usual, and thus, less funny than usual.
— Uh, why is Will’s Reno dancing to songs that are NOT “My Sharona” throughout this sketch? I thought it was established in previous installments that she refuses to dance to any other song besides “My Sharona”.
— Just like old times, we get a walk-on from Darrell’s Clinton, continuing the story arc of Reno’s crush on Clinton.
— I like the slow-motion montage of clips from previous Janet Reno’s Dance Party sketches, though it’s also sadly emphasizing how much tonight’s installment isn’t measuring up to previous installments.
— A pretty good laugh from Will-as-Reno’s onion reveal after she’s initially seen crying after the aforementioned clip show montage.
— Now the real Janet Reno appears, humorously crashing through a wall just like Will’s impression of her.
— Overall, the fun cameo from the real Reno gave this sketch a bit of a boost, but prior to that, this sketch felt kinda off. It didn’t have the same spark that the previous Janet Reno’s Dance Party sketches had. An underwhelming way for this recurring sketch to go out.
STARS: ***
RAP STREET
Aaron Carter (host) is commended for his G-rated rhymes
— This sketch becomes recurring, though this already ends up being the final installment.
— One of the sponsors mentioned at the beginning is “Flaco and Teddy’s Quality Breakdancing Mats”. This seems to be a callback to a sketch from the preceding season’s Freddie Prinze Jr. episode, where two characters named Flacko and Teddy did an ad selling Martin Luther King Day Trees.
— I like how there’s a bit of a change-up to the song that Horatio and Jerry’s characters usually sing.
— Horatio’s fake mustache is noticeably starting to peel off.
— Ha, and Horatio has now begun struggling to keep a straight face after noticing his peeling-off mustache. This is early enough in Horatio’s SNL tenure that I’m not annoyed by his character breaks in this sketch, as it hasn’t become a frequent thing in his performances yet, plus there’s thankfully no Jimmy Fallon in this sketch.
— Very funny ad-libs and gestures from Horatio as he tries to both fix his mustache and deliver his lines while looking casual.
— Ha, quite a sight of Mena as Aaron Carter. Perfect casting there.
— Another funny ad-libbed moment, this time from Horatio and Jerry after Jerry refers to a CD as a “CBD”. A lot of fun ad-libs throughout this sketch.
— Overall, a pretty big improvement over the first installment of this sketch. The lack of Tom Green will do that, but there were some genuinely good moments here, mostly from the unscripted stuff.
STARS: ***½
TV FUNHOUSE
“X-Presidents” by RBS- wannabe member Bill Clinton saves the inauguration
— Our first TV Funhouse in quite a while. The last one was that… (*shudder*) Sex And The Country debacle from the Tom Green episode. After a cartoon like THAT, Smigel has nowhere else to go but up.
— A very funny nonsensical opening speech from President Bush, just being a word salad of famous terms from real Bush speeches (e.g. “compassionate”, “not a divider”, “fuzzy math”).
— Seeing a Janet Reno’s Dance Party sketch and an X-Presidents cartoon in the same episode kinda makes me feel like I’m reviewing season 22 again.
— Reagan’s various bitter, foul-mouthed comments early on in this cartoon are cracking me up.
— I love how the no-longer-president Bill Clinton is joining the X-Presidents. His costume is priceless.
— I like how the villain is a monster made out of uncounted votes from the then-recent 2000 election.
— Funny gag with Katherine Harris being revealed to have been Tom Delay in disguise all along.
— Clinton, when approaching the villain: “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, but I will (*bleep*) you up.”
— A nice change-up to the usual 1970s-esque band numbers at the end of these X-Presidents cartoons, with tonight’s band number being a Boyz II Men takeoff led by Clinton.
STARS: ****
WAKE UP LITTLE SUSIE
movie features (TRM)’s love for comatose (host)
— A funny and pretty solid premise for Tracy.
— Feels a little odd seeing Will’s normal real hair throughout tonight’s sketches, for the first in a long time (though he can be seen with his normal real hair in the goodnights of the last episode). He spent the first half of this season hiding his real hair by wearing wigs in sketches all the time because he was filming the movie Zoolander, which required him to grow his real hair out and dye it an odd light blond color.
— Pretty funny reveal of Mena being in a coma after it’s established that Tracy is supposedly in a relationship with her.
— Good part with Tracy telling a comatose Mena that if she loves him, let her hand fall when he lets go of it, which is made even funnier by a mock-dramatic close-up of Will intensely awaiting the result of this.
— When Mena asks for Edgar after waking up from her coma, I love Tracy responding “Whoa whoa whoa! Who’s Edgar, bitch?!?”
STARS: ***½
WEEKEND UPDATE
TIF delivers subversive Spanish message to rich Republicans’ housekeepers
JIF & TIF engage in boy-band gossip about the 7 Texas prison escapees
federal appointee Jacob Silj is sensitive to being discriminated against
Al Sharpton (JEM) & Jesse Jackson (DAH) croon about latter’s love child
— I’m not sure, but this might be the first Update where Jimmy got to deliver the first joke.
— Speaking of Jimmy, this is surprisingly his only live appearance all night.
— A lot of laughs from Tina’s Spanish message to all of the republicans’ housekeepers who were left at home during Bush’s various inaugural balls this week.
— The punchline of Jimmy’s Jesse Jackson joke being Jackson not being able to think of a word that rhymes with “broken condom” sounds awfully familiar. Was there an Update from an earlier era that used a very similar punchline to a Jesse Jackson joke? Perhaps a Norm Macdonald Update?
— Another use of a drop-down screen behind Jimmy and Tina. Them treating a group of Texas prison escapees like a boy band is cute, but not all that funny to me.
— The side segment with Jimmy imitating President Bush’s bad imitation of Ricky Martin’s dancing at Bush’s inauguration seems kinda pointless.
— Feels a little odd seeing Jacob Silj appearing in a non-Colin Quinn Weekend Update.
— Jacob Silj, in regards to him and other voice immodulation sufferers: “We’re loud, we’re proud, get used to it!”
— The portion of the Silj commentary with us hearing his inner thoughts is kinda funny. At least it’s taking this Jacob Silj commentary into new territory that wasn’t already covered in previous Jacob Silj appearances.
— Tina: “On a humorous note, in front of 5,000 witnesses this week, a circus performer who was trying to shoot an apple off of his wife’s head with a crossbow hit her under the eye and pierced her skull. (*laughs heartily*) Jimmy?”
— Wow, a lot of jokes tonight are getting a fairly tepid audience reaction.
— Darrell and Jerry’s Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton impressions have returned after only a few episodes, with the big news earlier this week of Jackson fathering a lovechild.
— A pretty big night for Jerry Minor, who’s been getting far more airtime and far more comedic roles in tonight’s episode than he usually gets. It’s about time.
— Speaking of Jerry’s boost in airtime tonight, I like how his Sharpton is heavily dominating tonight’s Jackson/Sharpton Update commentary, unlike the last one, where Jerry’s Sharpton was more just a supporting role while Darrell’s Jackson was doing most of the talking.
— Okay, this Jackson/Sharpton commentary is going on a little too long for my likes, but I am enjoying Sharpton’s singing of Outkast’s “Sorry Ms. Jackson” and Limp Bizkit’s “Nookie” during Jackson’s apology message.
— An awkward but unintentionally funny ending of tonight’s Update, with Tina first missing her cue to sign off (or maybe she was expecting Jimmy to sign off first), then proceeding to screw up her sign-off by mistakenly saying “I’m Jimmy Fal–” before correcting herself.
— Overall, some good highlights, but tonight’s Update as a whole felt a little off. The first below average Update of the Fallon/Fey era. Man, what’s going on with tonight’s episode in general?
STARS: **½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Again”
VERONICA & CO.
panelists include boyfriend (WIF) & young model (host)
— Oh, god. I definitely didn’t need to see this sketch become recurring. Mercifully, this ends up being the final installment.
— Hmm, I see they added a new opening credits sequence for this sketch.
— I love the look of Ana’s character in this.
— At least we get the return of Parnell as the Times Square Robot guy, who provided most of my only laughs in the first installment of this sketch.
— I like Ana’s seedy line about how Mena’s foreign child model character is a natural, as she’s “already starving”.
— Surprisingly, not even Will is managing to save this sketch much for me.
— Okay, Will finally got a laugh from me, when he inappropriately asked Mena’s child model character “So if you’re 12 in Serbia, how old does that make you here?”
STARS: **
AUDITION
Kyle & Sean DeMarco win over musical guest with their take on his songs
— Oh, god, the second recurring sketch in a row tonight that I strongly dislike. Tonight’s already-meh episode has REALLY fallen off of a cliff in the post-Update half.
— Man, Kattan is so annoying as this character, especially whenever he gets angry at the musical guests and their assistant.
— Jesus Christ at the DeMarco Brothers’ raunchy “American Woman” interpretation. I actually remember finding that portion of this sketch hilarious when this originally aired, but watching it two decades later, it just comes off desperate to me, and suffers from the “let’s make something homoerotic for a cheap laugh” crutch that this SNL era is way too guilty of relying on (though wait until we get to the 2003-2005 years if you wanna see SNL go REALLY overboard with the “let’s make something homoerotic or flat-out gay for a cheap laugh” crutch).
— I do kinda like the ending with Lenny Kravitz dumping Mena’s character, but maybe I’m just desperate to find SOMETHING to like in this sketch.
STARS: *½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Mr. Cab Driver”
— The show has apparently run long, as after only two minutes of this musical performance, SNL abruptly cuts to a Mena Suvari bumper photo and then a commercial break, before Kravitz has even finished performing.
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A subpar episode. A lot of the show had a forgettable feel, and even usually-reliable things like an early-era Fallon/Fey Update, a Bill Clinton cold opening, and a Janet Reno’s Dance Party sketch weren’t quite up to snuff tonight. The post-Update half of the show was particularly weak, with no redeeming sketches to be found.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Charlie Sheen)
a step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Jennifer Lopez
Next up we have the infamous “xfl show” which would cause a rift between Lorne and Vince McMahon.
I have a vague memory of the second half of this season being pretty boring. Well other than the
Conan episode
Just reading the recap of this episode reminds me that I didn’t like this upcoming era very much. I know it got a lot of good press at the time but I really feel the show gets kind of meh for a while. At least until Will Forte and the Digital Shorts show up and suddenly give it some edginess again.
I remember the melancholy that I felt that we wouldn’t see Darrell doing this amazing impression any longer. How lucky we’ve been to have Darrell pop up as Clinton for the next 20 years!
“Lucky” – thinking about the post-2001 portion of Darrell’s tenure, I don’t often think of the word “lucky.”
There are a lot of things that annoy me about the “lolgay” gimmicks of these years, but one thing that tends to annoy me most of this time period is when there is excessive teasing and teasing, then we get the screeched OMIGODWHATAREWEDOING?!?!!?? Or we get all the gay jokes in Mango yet are repeatedly reminded Mango is actually straight and has a family. It’s as if they wanted to have the gay jokes just to keep us gawking, but also need to make sure we know there is no actual endorsement of homosexuality. It’s bizarre and makes the whole thing more offensive to me, somehow.
Mena is another of those “she hosted?” people for me, but she’s likeable enough, and only annoys me in that all-around-annoying airport security sketch (was that Anderson and Pell?). Playing a coma patient, a fourth-string in a DeMarco sketch, and a model with a few lines doesn’t suggest a great deal of faith in her from the show, but she does a good job with the Rap City sketch.
X-Presidents is great fun (I love that they have W mistaking the swearing-in for being on trial, that the lost Florida ballots are now a swamp monster, Smigel lampshading a clunky ending by essentially making fun of his own ending as it happens – oh and before I read your old review I also thought Carter said “partisan shit” [after a second I realized it was “partisanship”]) and the coma sketch is also that rare and very solid Tracy Morgan showcase, but Rap City is probably my favorite sketch of the night. Sanz and Minor cracking up feels natural (I guess it helps that Minor doesn’t have that frat boy ain’t-I-cute demeanor), and Mena’s Aaron Carter is amusing without going overboard into ham. Considering what’s happened to Lil Bow Wow and Aaron Carter over the years, someone should have listened to these two wise sages…
(kind of funny hearing “Aaron’s Party” on here as some thought the song in the house party pre-tape from Will Ferrell’s most recent episode was very similar to that beat)
It’s a very rare day when an Update segment includes asking for donations to Planned Parenthood and UCLA. Considering the amount of years spent on there telling jokes about the Clintons being murderers, you certainly can’t say that Update was apolitical up to this point, but I do wonder if this may have been one of the reasons the audience seemed a bit thrown. Probably the clunky jokes were the main factor (that bald eagle joke…). Jimmy trying to recreate the W dance number only for the audience to greet him with stonefaces is one of the funnier moments he has as an Update anchor. The energy throughout feels off, although I prefer a shaky edition to how smug and gimmicky their Update would later start to feel. Anyway, Silj and Jackson/Falwell are both fine but tail off at the end.
The best I can say about the Veronica sketch is the moment where Will and Molly are laughing (I know that was probably scripted, not breaking) is one of those little glimpses into the chemistry they shared, or had the potential to share, in a different era that hadn’t pigeonholed the biggest players so early. The rest is…well. I did like the concept of Kattan’s character being there to give normal, boring advice, but Veronica has a normal, boring reaction to it, so the joke doesn’t land. Parnell is barely used and I’m not sure why they even brought his part back.
Weird how dead the audience is for much of the Janet Reno sketch, especially the moments that should have been laugh lines like the volleyball that has “please let us out of the basement” written on it. I think by this time many were probably “over” the Reno joke, and also the dance with Clinton (set to one of my favorite songs no less) may have seemed like the ending, only for it to go on several more minutes. I’m glad they gave a fun and warm sendoff for Reno, instead of trying the whole “face your enemy” bit again. I have to say that I feel like I was overly hard on Will and on these sketches now that I look back – in rewatching with your reviews I’ve realized that much of the vicious material about Reno came from Update. There are some crass moments, of course, that’s how it goes, but overall they were much less ugly than I had remembered them as being.
I wouldn’t say the Will Ferrell house party skit sounded like “Aaron’s Party (Come and Get It).” I remember when it came out, and it wasn’t at all like the one in the sketch.
My only staying recollection of this episode, Ferrell’s Reno capping her Dennis-Miller-like joke with the signature Miller combination “but-I”/high-pitch-blurt-laugh/hair-flick!
RIP Aaron Carter