Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
CHINA PRESS CONFERENCE
Hu Jintao (WLF) expects to be screwed by debtor Barack Obama (FRA)
— Some funny sarcastic comments from Will as Hu Jintao, translated into English by Nasim.
— The out-of-nowhere sardonic “I like to be kissed when SOMEONE IS DOING SEX TO ME!!!” bit cracked me up, especially with how unexpected it was.
— Blah, now they’re overdoing the hell out of the “DOING SEX TO ME!!!” outbursts.
— Boy, this cold opening is going on freakin’ FOREVER, with increasingly less laughs along the way. Any of the goodwill I had towards it earlier on has been long forgotten and tarnished by this point.
STARS: *½
MONOLOGUE
host performs “Make ‘Em Laugh” from Singin’ In The Rain
— Joseph Gordon-Levitt, regarding plans for his monologue: “I figured, why not open with a big number?” Normally, that would have me groaning out loud, but I’m aware in hindsight what an epic monologue this turns out to be.
— I like the running bit with Joseph’s “If you haven’t seen it, your girlfriend/grandma has” whenever he mentions a movie.
— We’re early on into Joseph’s “Make ‘Em Laugh” performance, and it’s already coming off very solid and committed.
— When Joseph asks Bobby if he can believe SNL is letting him perform “Make ‘Em Laugh”, I love Bobby’s sarcastic “No, I can’t believe it” response. I’d like to think that’s a self-deprecating dig at SNL’s over-reliance on musical monologues.
— Very funny running gag with the slaps/punches Bobby randomly gives Joseph.
— Joseph’s already-great “Make ‘Em Laugh” performance is now getting full-on amazing, as he’s doing a whole bunch of great physical actions during it.
— Now he’s doing VERY impressive backflips off of walls, on live TV! I remember how absolutely shocked and impressed I was by this when this originally aired, and I’m still impressed today.
— Love the way the performance ended.
— An absolutely fantastic overall monologue, and with this one piece alone, Joseph Gordon-Levitt has proven he will be miles better of a host than the infamous preceding host – January Jones.
STARS: *****
PALIN 2012
Democrats’ recut 2012 trailer gives vision of disastrous Palin presidency
— A surprising return of the “An SNL Trailer Re-Cut” segment, several years after the Apocalypto one. This ends up being the final one.
— Funny idea to mix a hypothetical future Sarah Palin presidency with apocalyptic footage from the movie 2012. This is being executed well.
— “From the mind of Keith Olbermann…”
— Hilarious reveal of Glenn Beck being vice president.
STARS: ***½
SECRET WORD
actress Mindy Grayson (KRW) is useless on classic game show
— The debut of a sketch I’ve always despised.
— Part of Kristen’s opening line is a delighted “LOOK AT ME!!!”, a line that perfectly sums up so many of the badly-written attention-starved characters Kristen’s been given over the years of her SNL tenure. Only three seconds into the debut of this particular Secret Word character of Kristen’s, and I already hate the character.
— Given how underused Will has been in this final season of his, it feels sad seeing him relegated to playing a boring straight man to a bad Kristen Wiig character.
— A very weak and one-note gag with Kristen’s character always immediately revealing the exact same secret word (drape) she’s supposed to give hints of.
— I like Bill’s goofy-voiced aggravated delivery of “D’ohhhhh boyyyyy”.
— Another funny line from Bill, with him hesitantly and passive aggressively telling Kristen’s character, “I’ll…tell ya…when…to start”, after she tries to start one of the rounds herself. Bill’s providing my only real laughs of this sketch, though I do like Joseph’s characterization of his Latin crooner character.
STARS: *½
TWO WORLDS COLLIDE FT. REBA MCENTIRE
ANS loves man pretending to be Reba McEntire (KET)
— Yet ANOTHER highly-acclaimed and well-remembered music video from Lonely Island, who have been on a hot streak with these music videos lately.
— The idea of Kenan, of all people, randomly playing Reba McEntire is fucking priceless.
— I guess I could say my usual “Kenan In A Dress alert”, but at least this short is putting the Kenan In A Dress trope to good use. This is also putting Kenan’s penchant for bug-eyed mugging to good use, given the fact that he’s imitating Reba here.
— I love Kenan’s goofy redneck-voiced singing, and it’s a funny contrast to Andy’s typical hardcore rapping.
— When this originally aired, back in the days when I couldn’t stand Kenan and viewed him as one of the weakest links of this cast, I was impressed by him in this short and felt it was by far one of the better things he had ever done on SNL. Looking back on this short years later, especially after I’ve softened a lot on Kenan and gained a lot of respect for him, I now view this short as a continuation of Kenan’s growth arc that officially started with the What Up With That debut earlier this season.
— Kenan throughout this short: “Ahhhh’m Reba!”
— Even the juvenile and crude conceit with “Reba” secretly being a man is absolutely working for me in this context.
STARS: ****½
THE MELLOW SHOW WITH JACK JOHNSON
Ozzy Osbourne (Dave Matthews) now likes to take it easy
— The somewhat surprising return of a one-off sketch from two seasons prior.
— Kinda interesting now having Bill’s Dave Matthews be the co-host of tonight’s Mellow Show installment, after he was just a guest in the previous installment.
— I like the random statements of mellow-centric things Andy’s Jack Johnson says into the camera (e.g. “Ultimate frisbee”) as a non-sequitur. I can’t remember if he did the same thing in the first installment of this sketch.
— Andy and Bill giving each other a foot-five, ala a high-five, was hilarious. You can also tell Andy is holding back a laugh afterwards.
— Pretty good Jason Mraz impression from Joseph.
— A fairly memorable Ozzy Osbourne impression from the real Dave Matthews.
— Our obligatory tongue-in-cheek bit with Dave Matthews, while in character as Ozzy, insulting Bill’s Dave Matthews. I don’t mind the sometimes-groanworthy “celebrity confronts a cast member impersonating them” trope as much when the celebrity is playing another celebrity, such as here.
STARS: ***
WHAT UP WITH THAT?
panelists spectate; Al Gore & Mindy Kaling cameos
— I see SNL ain’t wasting any time, as they’ve brought back What Up With That a mere THREE EPISODES after its debut.
— This is following the exact same same formula as the first installment of this sketch, but it’s certainly still loads of fun.
— Awww, yeah! Here comes Jason and his red tracksuited dancing!
— I love Andy suddenly jumping into the scene as a dancing hip-hop clown. His dancing is very funny.
— Absolutely hilarious inclusion of Bobby as a tap-dancing Jake “The Snake” Roberts.
— The camera hasn’t been showing Jason’s epic dancing quite as much as usual tonight.
— Kenan’s final lyric about having “the egg burp” is cracking me up.
STARS: ****½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “You & Me”
WEEKEND UPDATE
to effect environmental change, Al Gore [real] will start acting crazy
— Another appearance tonight from Al Gore, who’s always fun on SNL.
— A good laugh from Gore bluntly revealing his backup plan: “I’m gonna start acting crazy.”
— I like Gore’s various insane-but-oddly-clever ideas.
— Great sarcastic comment from Gore about his “excitement” over having a bully pulpit on a fourth-place network.
— I really like Seth’s delivery of his George W. Bush joke.
— Wow, an actual fairly short Update with only one guest commentary! Feels incredibly rare to see a one-guest Update in the solo Seth Meyers era of Update. Wish it happened far more often.
STARS: ***½
DYSFUNCTIONAL THANKSGIVING DINNER
family tensions have everyone on-edge at contentious Thanksgiving dinner
— Oh, no, what are you doing, SNL?!? The Dysfunctional Christmas Dinner sketch from the preceding season’s Hugh Laurie episode was a near-classic the first time, but it has no business being made into a recurring sketch. It’s not at all something that’ll work nearly as well in a rehash. On top of that, you’re going to re-cast Abby into the general role that the recently-fired Casey Wilson played in the first installment, an installment of which Casey HERSELF co-wrote (with Kristen), by the way? Really, SNL?
— When I first reviewed this sketch in my original 2009 review of this episode (link here), I went into a HUGE rant, where my point was basically “What was the point of SNL firing Casey Wilson and Michaela Watkins if the show’s going to continue doing sketches Casey and Michaela were prominent in, and re-casting roles of theirs?” I was also upset over SNL’s decision to continue doing the Casey Wilson-co-written Dysfunctional Christmas Dinner sketch AFTER Casey’s firing, as it seemed like a slap in the face to her.
— In my current review, I’ll try to judge this sketch with a less-bitter mindset, but I still can’t help but feel it will pale badly in comparison to the almost-untouchable Dysfunctional Christmas Dinner sketch.
— Kristen has the ability to get laughs just from simply sipping a drink and eating from her fork in a subtly-tense manner.
— So far, despite some laughs I’m getting, this has been such a carbon copy of the original Dysfunctional Christmas Dinner sketch. The “Sit down, Judith!” running bit in particular is not working as well as last time, and it feels like they’re relying a little too heavily on it this time.
— Now they’re even copying the bit where the tense family suddenly unites by singing together. Doesn’t even make much sense to me in this Thanksgiving-related context, whereas the family singing together on Christmas was far more fitting.
— Overall, while I admit this rehashed sketch was not quite as worthless as I previously made it out to be in my afore-linked 2009 review, I still didn’t enjoy the sketch much. Too much unnecessary and inferior copying of the first installment of this sketch.
STARS: **
WOMAN TO WOMAN
insensitive sub Rodger Brush (FRA) is ill-suited adviser
— The debut of these Rodger Brush sketches starring Fred.
— Back in the original era, SNL had a Gilda Radner-starring recurring talk show sketch with this same title (Woman To Woman).
— A fairly funny reveal of Fred as a bald, overweight, brash-looking man sitting in for the female host of this tender female-oriented advice show.
— Ugh, only two minutes into this sketch, and I’ve already gotten extremely sick of the redundant running bit with Fred asking the female guests to speak louder.
— The joke of Fred’s bad, generic advice to the guests is another thing in this sketch that’s getting old fast.
— Though he has no comedic lines, Joseph’s performance is very solid.
— Overall, ugh. Not a good sketch at all, and I dread having to cover subsequent installments of this sketch.
STARS: *½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Shake Me Like A Monkey”
SAY ANYTHING
Lloyd Dobler’s (host) “In Your Eyes” boombox strategy bemuses (JAS)
— Between the spoof of the movie 2012 earlier tonight and now a Say Anything spoof, John Cusack’s filmography is getting a real workout in tonight’s episode.
— When Jason initially walks on and sees Joseph standing in a bold, still position while holding up a boombox, I got a big laugh from Jason just responding to that with a hesitant-but-accepting “Alright…” and then immediately exiting the shot.
— Interesting concept for a Say Anything spoof, and I like this idea of Jason as a random character interrupting an iconic movie scene. (Now that I write that, it almost sounds like something that could’ve been made into a solid recurring sketch, with Jason interrupting an iconic scene from a different movie each time.) This is a great showcase for Jason’s general performance style.
— A funny “This kid loves cassettes” comment from Jason when Joseph takes a break from holding up a boombox to speak into a tape recorder.
— The “Genesis is back together!” ending was hilarious.
— Overall, a strong Jason Sudeikis showcase.
STARS: ****
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A mixed episode. To me, this episode feels better than it actually is, due to how solid, fun, energetic, and likable of a host Joseph Gordon-Levitt was, and how he had a monologue for the ages. He was EXACTLY the type of host SNL needed after January Jones’ horribly-received hosting stint. However, when I think back on the quality of tonight’s episode itself, I’m recalling quite a number of things I didn’t like. We also got the debuts of two awful recurring sketches: Secret Word and Rodger Brush (no surprise that one of them stars Kristen Wiig and the other one stars Fred Armisen, because, as I’ve mentioned in a somewhat recent review, a number of online SNL fans seem to consider those two performers to be the usual culprits of the worst sketches from these 2009-2012 years), two sketches that we’ll be seeing too often within these next few seasons. However, tonight had some pretty good things and a few VERY strong pieces, balancing this out to an overall fairly-watchable-though-shaky episode.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Monologue
Two Worlds Collide ft. Reba McEntire
What Up With That?
Say Anything
Palin 2012
Weekend Update
The Mellow Show with Jack Johnson
Dysfunctional Thanksgiving Dinner
China Press Conference
Woman To Woman
Secret Word
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (January Jones)
a definite step up (needless to say)
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Blake Lively
Letting Nasim say LFNY gave us the first big clue that show was starting to favor her over Jenny.
The monologue is great, Bobby does well with his part but Joe throwing himself into Make ‘Em Laugh is a sight to be seen.
Lots of these Secret Word sketches just wash over me because you know what is going to happen. To me, there are more annoying Wiig characters than Mindy. I found a bit more enjoyment in them when they developed Lyle Round in later installments but honestly, my favorite Secret Word is from Kristen Wiig / The xx in 2016.
The Reba Digital Short is one of my favorites for Kenan’s performance. Kenan & Andy is an underrated duo in this era. The story behind it is that at the beginning of the season Kenan told Seth and Bryan Tucker like a dozen ideas he had over the summer and they approved of two of them. One was “A talk show host obsessed with his show’s theme song” (The WUWT sketch in this episode sticks the same formula but still works for me) and the other idea was “A black guy tries to convince people he’s Reba McEntire” They tried that premise in the Ryan Reynolds episode but it got cut so they changed it to nobody believes he is Reba except Andy which yields a funnier result IMO.
Both Dysfunctional Dinner sketches were in their respective holiday specials although I think that the Christmas one with Hugh Laurie was taken out a year or two ago.
Rodger Brush is one of three Fred characters I can’t stand along with Garth and Regine, just ridiculously self-indulgent.
Gonna link the AV Club review here for this reason, the opening is the most AV Club review that the AV Club has ever AV Clubbed. “Grade B”
First line: “Best Episode Ever?”
https://tv.avclub.com/saturday-night-live-joseph-gordon-levitt-dave-matthews-1798207521
That monologue is so strong it makes some of the weaker sketches (and there are several) easier to take. It’s definitely in my top 10 for SNL monologues.
Hello Ruby. I may be Leaving out Several Monologues, But I Think The FUNNIEST Monologue Is 2020’s John Mulaney’s Monologue ! THIS One IS THE Most AMAZING Monologue ! Maybe, They TIE For The Best Monologue ! !
I remember thinking the Fred talk show was a funny idea as a one time thing but then it kept coming back and was the exact same thing every time. In the solo Seth era, they were pretty lazy when it came to recurring characters, literally just re-doing the same thing everytime like it was made for people who weren’t regular viewers.
This is a wonderful monologue, my favorite musical monologue alongside Danny DeVito’s brilliant double act with Rob Schneider. And also a reason why SNL should not have overused this concept – this monologue is night and day to that lackluster waste they threw at Dwayne Johnson some months earlier.
Joseph has such high energy (so much so that Mindy Kaling, getting her one moment on the stage, seems taken aback) that you’d almost think he’s used better in this episode than he is. Aside from the monologue, the only sketch I think gives him a chance to attempt a performance (not straight man or one-note accent/impression) is Woman to Woman, which is probably why I don’t dislike it as much as I might otherwise (even if it is very repetitive and exhausting in that specific Fred way.
Oddly enough, Al Gore, in his extended cameo, gets funnier material. I guess because they knew he had good delivery and because (I assume) Jim Downey enjoyed writing for him. Al is a consistent highlight any time he pops up – makes you wonder what might have been if he’d done some extended cameos in 2000 (beyond the Presidential Bash appearance).
Speaking of Downey, this cold open, similar to an endless (if well-performed) anti-union sketch coming in Gaby Sidebe’s episode, just feels like Downey wanting to have a big ole rant. I suppose I should praise passion rather than the lackluster and very corporate approach of the Jost/Che era, but just because it may be enjoyable for the writer doesn’t mean it brings much for the viewer. Nasim having to replace Maya Rudolph in her thankless role as Woman of Many Races is just a bit depressing, and there is no real reason why we even need the translator aspect. Will screaming the sex line once was a surprise laugh, but when it gets to the point where he has to keep sticking out his ass, then it’s telling viewers you don’t trust them to be amused. It’s a lovely moment, seeing Will and Nasim, two very special cast members who are passing in the night and both work to make anything they get seem better, saying LFNY together, but…not this way, please!
As @Jack says above, my favorite Secret Word is probably the very last (I enjoy the way they handle the host changeover, and Kristen’s performance is finely tuned), but I don’t ever dislike this sketch as much as some do. With that said, I do completely understand why many hate it, and this one isn’t especially good (there’s one coming up with Emma Stone that I prefer, as she’s given a better role than Joseph is). The only real highlight here is that at times Jenny Slate reminds me of Gilda.
Dave Matthews is a delight in the Jack Johnson sketch, keeping it from slumbering away (unless you like feet, I suppose). Made me wish he had been asked to host in his heyday.
The Reba digital short borders on guilty pleasure status for me, but it’s a lot of fun. Andy really GOES for it, which he doesn’t get to do in these too often, and Kenan plays such a ridiculous concept perfectly right.
The repetition of WUWT isn’t a small criticism (indeed I had almost forgotten about this installment while typing), but Kenan and the supporting cast still manage to make each one hum along. By this point the cast feels less and less together for me, so I like seeing this real ensemble piece – Kenan is the star, but it wouldn’t work without everyone doing their best. I’m also enjoying the slow build toward Bill’s Lindsey getting so fed up with never being called on.
The dinner sketch is a disappointing and unnecessary reprisal (and the audience also doesn’t seem that into it this time around), but what stands out for me most is how out of place Abby is as the mother. They have to repeatedly remind us she is playing the mother, but no matter how many times they do, I just don’t believe it. Another peril of having such a young female cast.
Jason is great in the Say Anything sketch, and it’s nice to see a reminder of his rapport with Kristen. I would have trimmed this a little, but there’s a lot to like – Jason coming back at the end with “Sussudio” blasting is priceless.
I was reading a blog which had promos for Joseph (sadly not available now) and it claimed Jake Gylenhaal was going to host the next episode. Was there ever any talk of that at the time? It was dated November 18th. When was Blake’s hosting announced?
This digital short is one that Andy often cites as one of his favourites, and is certainly an underrated short. Like John said above, it’s fun seeing Andy just really GO for it. Andy and Seth have also talked about it on a podcast where they laugh over how ridiculous it is that Andy is playing himself, working at SNL, and yet Kenan is not Kenan, he’s just some dude.
I try to have a lot of sympathy for SNL doing recurring characters, because of how difficult a job writing there seems to be (based mostly on schedule) but I truly just don’t enjoy the secret word sketches. My first viewing of these episodes was the massively condensed versions you can get on amazon, without any copywritten music or sketches they decide are not worth showing, and it honestly felt like every other sketch was a secret word one – because they always made it in the 30-50 minute condensed episode. (I since have found a way to watch episodes in full, thankfully)
Speaking briefly about the SNL schedule. I’m a British fan of SNL, and have done enough reading and watching of SNL lore to understand the process of how it’s created and why it’s like that. However, whenever I mention it to other British people who are not SNL fans, they just can’t comprehend why the show is created in such a stressful and convoluted way. I get a lot of ‘why write the show in the middle of the night? Why not write a week ahead, or come in at 9am and work a normal work day? Why does it have to be live? Why do they only rehearse a couple of times? Why not use teleprompters?’. I think SNL is such an American institution, that perhaps everyone just understands ‘that’s just how SNL is’, but when you tell someone who hasn’t grown up with the institution of SNL about how it works – they think it’s the most ridiculous thing, and can’t understand why it hasn’t been modernised! I’m not sure what my point is really, and Americans are welcome to correct me if they too find that non SNL fans can’t understand the process of creating the show, but I do kind of love how ridiculous it all is. The last minute element adds to the enjoyment of the show to me.
I think most people are confused about why the show still has the production schedule it does.
Frankly, given the much more cohesive and complex nature of British sketch shows (the ones I’ve seen, anyway), I’m surprised that all people have questions about is the schedule.
Haha, people do also have questions about the quality of sketches, I think the sort of mainstream notion of ‘SNL isn’t funny’ has carried over – but honestly most people don’t know any SNL sketches, so don’t have a lot to question. Unless they were massive (the lonely island’s bigger songs are known, but more as their own entity rather than an SNL thing), or very relevant in a political way, people won’t know it in my experience. An example – recently my parents were talking about Wayne’s World (the movie) and didn’t know it was based off SNL sketches until I told them.
I talk with someone in the UK sometimes, about other shows, and they are (last I know anyway) able to enjoy SNL, at least the recent episodes which ran in the UK. Beyond SNL being so different and so much more poorly focused than a lot of UK sketch comedy (especially older comedy), there’s how infrequently the show has run over there. I do get the feeling that there is much less sketch comedy on UK television in recent years (although I may be wrong).
Probably the most intersection I’ve seen in recent years was when some keyboard warriors claimed Phoebe Waller-Bridge and SNL were classist and mocking of poor people because of the Love Island pre-tape in her episode (an argument that would have made more sense to me if Love Island was not full of wealthy people [including the children of famous television and film actors]).
Not surprisingly, James Anderson co-wrote Secret Word (with Kent Sublette and Kristen) and Rodger Brush (with Fred). There’s another Anderson/Armisen collaboration coming up in a few episodes that was also written with John Mulaney; you’ll know which one it is when you get to it.
Lemme guess…is it Riley?
Yep.
does anyone know if the recut trailer in this episode was a lonely island thing like the first one was? The Apocalypto one is on their website, but this one isn’t which suggests it wasn’t them – it seems to political for them anyway.
I am not looking forward to the reprise of this cold open in Year 36.
Yeah Hello Stuart From TV.com. Guess What ! JIM CARREY WILL Play Joe Biden ! Maya Rudolph Will Be Kamala Harris !
I AM Sorry ! I Was Talking About Season 46 Which Will Start On October 3 2020 !
I mainly remember Joseph Gordon Levitt’s wonderful tribute to the Donald O’Connor number in Singin’ in the Rain. I also like the Secret Word sketches, repetitious though they are. Wiig’s character is not so annoying to me here. I feel the same about What Up with That?…
The word is drape, not grape.
Stooge, is there a sketch called Gator World?!
There’s no Gator World sketch in the aired version of this particular episode, nor in the aired version of any other episode that I know of. I Googled “Gator World SNL” just now and the only relevant result I found was a report someone did of the dress rehearsal of the season 34 Zac Efron episode (https://ehs-wildcats.livejournal.com/129855.html), which includes a description of a Gator World sketch that got cut from the live show.
When you gave the link to your original review of this episode, I noticed in your long rant about Michaela and Casey’s firings that you predicted that Nasim would take over the Arianna Huffington role, which she actually did