Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
BUDDY’S MEMORIAL SERVICE
Bill Clinton (DAH) scores political points at Buddy’s memorial service
— Funny opening C-SPAN mention of the Enron scandal.
— Darrell’s Bill Clinton impression makes its first appearance of the season.
— Amusing cutaways to stock footage of real political figures in the crowd, in reaction to some of the things Darrell’s Clinton is saying. This seems to be in the tradition of SNL’s State of the Union sketches.
— Lots of funny lines from Darrell’s Clinton in regards to Buddy the dog.
STARS: ***½
OPENING MONTAGE
— Will Ferrell has been temporarily removed from the montage tonight, as this is the first of three episodes that he’ll be missing this season while filming the movie Old School. I remember what a stir his removal in tonight’s opening montage caused among unsuspecting online SNL fans at the time, including myself. There were even some online fans that started to wonder if Will flat-out left SNL without getting a sendoff or us being informed of his departure. While we were given a warning in advance earlier in this week regarding Will’s absence, via either an online rumor or an official announcement from NBC (I can’t remember which), I and others certainly weren’t expecting him to be removed from the opening montage. I don’t know about other SNL fans, but I remember *I* had assumed that this episode would have some kind of pre-taped segment (e.g. a commercial or short film) that Will filmed in advance to make up for his live absence tonight, kinda similar to what SNL had Eddie Murphy do in advance for when he had to miss certain episodes in season 9. It was a big surprise to come to the realization that tonight’s episode wouldn’t feature Will in any capacity, something that was hard to take and resulted in this episode having a weird and empty feeling.
— And here’s the other huge shock of tonight’s opening montage: Amy Poehler has been promoted from featured player to repertory player after only half a season. This was something that, like Will’s absence, was rumored online (and definitely not officially announced by NBC) earlier in the week of this episode, but some people, including myself, didn’t think it was true, and we turned out to be wrong. This mid-season promotion for Amy certainly makes sense, considering how experienced, well-known, and revered a comedian and sketch comedy veteran she already was before joining SNL, not to mention how well she had been doing on SNL so far. She’s, I believe, only the third cast member in SNL history to get the honor of being promoted in the middle of their first season, with the first two cast members being Harry Shearer and Eddie Murphy.
MONOLOGUE
based on personal experience, JIF advises host not to re-create himself
— Lots of screaming from teen girls in the audience towards heartthrob Josh Hartnett all throughout this monologue.
— Geez, even SNL’s own heartthrob, Jimmy Fallon, receives teen girl screams from the audience when he walks onstage in this monologue.
— The bizarre photo of Jimmy is fairly funny, at least, which is more than I can say for anything else in this monologue so far.
— Overall, aside from the aforementioned photo, this was a completely nothing monologue. Lots of poor material and incessant teen girl screams. Worst monologue of the season by far up to this point, and doesn’t exactly give me any confidence in tonight’s host.
STARS: *½
WAKE UP WAKEFIELD!
guest who hit a growth spurt (host) excites Megan
— Hmm, most of Wake Up Wakefield’s house band, Jazz Times Ten, is missing tonight, due to a… strep throat epidemic. Uh, oof. Needless to say, it certainly feels odd and kinda uncomfortable hearing that in today’s climate, for obvious reasons.
— A pretty good laugh from how one of Sheldon’s New Years resolutions is to translate The Hobbit into Latin.
— Yeah, all of the things the characters in this sketch keep saying about the strep throat epidemic and all the advice that Horatio’s character is giving on how we can stay safe during this epidemic and stop the epidemic’s spread (e.g. wash your hands thoroughly) has an awful lot of parallels to what we’re currently facing.
— A fairly funny squeaky voice from Josh, at least initially. It’ll probably get old after a while.
— (*sigh*) There goes that screaming from teen girls in the audience again, not only when Josh makes his entrance, but also when Maya’s Megan character compliments Josh’s character on his looks.
— A very funny visual of Josh flipping Sheldon onto the ground. I also like how, when Sheldon stands back up with a wet ink stain bleeding through one of his pockets, he panickedly asks Megan in regards to the stain “Is this blood or pen???”
— (*sigh*) And, of course, Jimmy’s walk-on is welcomed by the same teen girl screams from the audience.
— Josh delivered his final line of this sketch too oddly, causing it to receive uncomfortable silence from the audience.
— An overall lesser installment of this recurring sketch, but still had its moments.
STARS: **½
HELLO STEPSON, NOW LET’S GO TO BED: I WENT TO BED WITH MY STEPSON: THE LARA BENGAL COVINGTON STORY
actress (ANG) overemotes in melodramatic Lifetime Original Movie
— A funny long title, spoofing the titles of typical Lifetime movies.
— This looks like this’ll be a solid Ana Gasteyer showcase, which is refreshing, considering 1) how poorly tonight’s episode has been going so far, and 2) how somewhat invisible Ana has been so far this season.
— (*sigh*) Cue the teen girl screaming from the audience when Josh removes his shirt and reveals a wifebeater under it.
— Eh, it turns out I’m not crazy about this sketch so far, despite a solid performance from Ana.
— Okay, I do love the mirror-smashing sequence. Ana is particularly great there.
STARS: **½
TV FUNHOUSE
“X-Presidents” by RBS- The Ambiguously Gay Duo helps find Osama bin Laden
— Feels kinda odd seeing an X-Presidents cartoon in 2002.
— I like how this edition of X-Presidents is addressing the war on terror.
— Ronald Reagan’s bitter one-liners in these X-Presidents cartoons always slay me. In these past few X-Presidents cartoons, he’s become one of the most consistent sources for laughs.
— Great to see the return of recent X-Presidents inductee Bill Clinton and his ridiculous trademark costume.
— Ronald Reagan, to Bill Clinton: “Maybe if Bin Laden were a fat girl, you might’ve tried to find him.”
— Nice inclusion of Bob Dole as the X-Presidents lowly butler.
— Jimmy Carter, to Ronald Reagan, in regards to the Afghanis: “But I have experience negotiating with this culture.” Ronald Reagan: “I know you do. That’s how I got elected.”
— As a huge Three Stooges fanatic (which anybody who’s known me online for a long time would be aware of), I immediately recognized Reagan’s Afghani gibberish (e.g. “B-I bicky bye, B-O bo”) as a reference to the Three Stooges’ classic Swingin’ The Alphabet song.
— Ha, this has suddenly turned into an Ambiguously Gay Duo/X-Presidents crossover! Random but awesome.
— Very funny suggestive visual of Ace and Gary’s penis-shaped car self-lubricating so it can squeeze into a tight cave hole.
STARS: ****
SHOUT OUT!! SHOW
Grandmaster Freddy (TRM) gives props to everything
— Good to see Tracy starring in his own sketch as a character, after being very underused so far this season and playing nothing but himself for the last few episodes.
— Geez, even freakin’ Kattan is receiving screaming cheers from the teen girls in tonight’s audience. Believe it or not, I do recall being told how, in his earlier seasons, Kattan was the cast member who young female viewers swooned over, before Jimmy joined the cast and stole Kattan’s heartthrob thunder.
— A lot of very stereotypical racial humor here so far, and it’s not exactly making me laugh.
— I do kinda like the part with the out-of-place shout-out from a whitebred middle-aged guy.
— Fitting use of Pink.
— After a very weak first half, this sketch has started picking up with Tracy constantly interrupting Josh’s serious pleading to give inappropriate shout-outs to things like starving children, irregular menstrual cycles, and eating garbage.
— I wonder if this was intended to become a recurring sketch. We end up never seeing it return, which is a good thing, as I’m sure subsequent installments of it would’ve just repeated the same basic jokes, which wouldn’t work well with repetition.
STARS: **½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Get The Party Started”
— Immediately after this performance ends, a “sponsored by Budweiser” ad is played as the camera does a pan shot of the studio (screencap below).
This would go on to be a regular part of the show these next few seasons at the end of each episode’s first musical performance. This kinda gives SNL an “awards show” feel.
WEEKEND UPDATE
verse & sentiment of Maya Angelou’s (TRM) greeting cards don’t match
videophone delay kills timing of comedy routine by (HOS) & (CHK)
— Some pretty tepid audience reactions towards some of Jimmy and Tina’s jokes so far.
— An okay bit with Tina questioning if it’s the 80s again, due to the Middle East currently being a mess and us having a President Bush recently declare “No new taxes”. I also like Jimmy imitating Don Pardo’s voice when announcing the next SNL episode’s (fake) 80s-centric host/musical guest line-up: Molly Ringwald/Simple Minds.
— The juxtaposition between Tracy-as-Maya-Angelou’s deep, wise poems and the greeting cards they’re being used in was funny at first, but it’s a one-joke premise that’s gotten kinda old and one-note after a while.
— Tracy’s getting kinda stumbly with his lines here.
— After a rocky start earlier in this Update, Jimmy and Tina’s jokes are gradually getting better.
— Eh, spoke too soon, as we just now got a very lame joke from Tina about Yves St. Laurent’s glasses and a tepid joke from Jimmy about Argentina pesos.
— Hmm, the name of the fictional comedy team that Horatio and Chris are playing is Henley & Stiles. I remember an online theory at the time that SNL possibly got this comedy team’s name from the names of guests in two back-to-back SNL episodes from the preceding season. You see, that season has two consecutive episodes at one point in which Don Henley is the musical guest in one episode and Julia Stiles is the host in the other episode. There’s a possibility that SNL randomly took the surname of both Don Henley and Julia Stiles to make the fictional comedy team name of Henley & Stiles. If so, that’s a bizarrely interesting move on SNL’s part, but who knows? This whole name connection could just be a coincidence.
— Some laughs from how badly hindered Henley & Stiles’ long-distance comedy routine is due to the long audio delay on Chris’ part.
— Ehh, this Henley & Stiles bit has been going on way too long, even though that’s the point. I’m usually a fan of both slow burn humor and Andy Kaufman-style humor that tests the audience’s patience, but the execution of this Henley & Stiles bit hasn’t been getting many laughs from me.
— There goes that hammy overacting from Horatio again, something that I run hot and cold on (though I run far more cold than hot on it in Horatio’s later seasons). It’s kinda making me laugh here, but I think I’m just desperate for a laugh at this point.
— An overall fairly subpar Fallon/Fey Update.
STARS: **½
HBO FIRST LOOK
George Lucas (DAH) defends Attack Of The Clones casting
— Tracy’s surprisingly been getting lots of airtime tonight. Perhaps this is a byproduct of Will Ferrell’s absence, as well as an early sign of how good Tracy’s airtime is going to be in the upcoming Ferrell-less season 28.
— Seeing Josh and the male cast playing N’Sync reminds me when most of these performers used to play the fictional boy band 7 Degrees Celsius.
— After going two consecutive episodes without having ANY lines, Dean finally speaks again!… only for it to sadly end up being him playing a crude Jar Jar Binks variation who’s only line is “Meesa go pee-pee and poo-poo” while making armpit fart noises. Just embarrassing, unfunny, and juvenile. And, yes, I’m aware that the point was it was intentionally juvenile, but it also wasn’t remotely funny, and I can’t help but find this role demeaning for Dean. Oh, and of course, this ends up being his ONLY appearance of the entire night. My god, his airtime lately has become an absolute joke. Just sad.
— The cutaways to random famous characters and celebrities as the new members of the Jedi Council are kinda funny, but nothing particularly great to me. Odd seeing Rachel as Monica Lewinsky among those random celebrities, but I guess it just feels odd because I’m so used to Molly Shannon being SNL’s resident Lewinsky impersonator.
— I like the understated frustration in Seth’s Ewan McGregor whenever he has to introduce N’Sync.
— Weak way to end this sketch, with the overlong and unfunny N’Sync performance, which just seems to be pandering once again to the screaming teen girls in the audience, who are, of course, eating this portion of the sketch up.
STARS: **
HOLIDAY TRAVEL
flight crew offers lame entertainment to passengers stuck on runway
— As I said earlier, this is Amy’s first episode as a repertory player. So why in the world is she JUST NOW making her first appearance of the night, in one of the last sketches of the episode? Really, SNL? Way to show why you gave her an early promotion. I remember when watching this episode live, how frustrated I got halfway through the episode, wondering where the hell the newly-promoted Amy was.
— Once again, Seth and Amy work perfectly together.
— Tracy’s rare big night continues, as he makes YET ANOTHER noteworthy appearance tonight.
— At least Josh is playing against type here. It doesn’t say much, though, that his best role of the night is playing a character doing corny, bad celebrity impressions.
— Amy and Seth’s cheesy little color commentary throughout Josh’s parade of celebrity impressions is funny.
STARS: ***
MY BEST LIST FOR 2001 BY JACK HANDEY
picks reflect sponsors’ influence
— Ah, a random one-off Jack Handey segment! Hopefully, this is an improvement over his then-current regular My Big Thick Novel segments, which can best be described as “A poor man’s Deep Thoughts, with pretty drawings”.
— I love the vague, narrow categories and the obvious picks for them (e.g. “Best flat Italian pie: pizza pie”).
— Funny turn with how the picks are gradually devolving into nothing but wax-related picks.
— I don’t usually rate random Jack Handey filler segments, but since this particular piece was much longer and more extensive than the usual Handey filler segment…
STARS: ****
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Don’t Let Me Get Me”
THE PLAYBOY CHANNEL
to promote multicultural awareness, the Playboy Channel screens Arab porn
— Rachel and especially Maya are doing a good mockery of typical Playboy bimbos.
— Funny premise of the Playboy Network trying to tackle the seriousness of the war on terror.
— This sketch was cut from the preceding episode, in which Amy’s role was originally played by host Ellen DeGeneres. As good as Amy’s doing in this role, I think I’d rather have seen the Ellen DeGeneres version, as I’m already laughing just imagining Ellen making the same uncomfortable facial expressions that Amy’s making here.
— Some pretty good laughs from the Arab porn, and this is one of those times where Horatio’s hammy overacting works for me. His over-the-top horny reactions to all the “hot face action” he’s witnessing are cracking me up.
STARS: ***
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A weak episode. The show was dominated by sketches that were pretty tepid and underwhelming, and even the times that this episode wasn’t weak rarely rose above average. Josh Hartnett was a bland host as expected, and there aren’t enough words to express how irksome it was hearing all of the screaming from teen girls in the audience throughout the show anytime Josh or any of the teen-friendly established male cast members made an entrance or did anything that could be considered remotely “dreamy”. Will Ferrell’s absence was also felt tonight, and the poor quality of this episode is a worrisome early sign of how much SNL will be struggling the next few seasons after Will’s official departure. Though regarding all of the latter, the odd thing in retrospect is that the remaining two episodes this season that Will is absent in (Jon Stewart and Ian McKellen) both actually end up being very solid, IIRC.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Ellen DeGeneres)
a big step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Jack Black