Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
CHRISTMAS EVE IN WASHINGTON D.C.
on Christmas Eve, Democrats dream of better headlines in the year to come
— An interesting and refreshingly out-of-the-ordinary concept to this political cold opening.
— A definitive Vanessa Bayer face, with the funny gleeful, open-mouthed, glass-fogging smile her Hillary Clinton makes in reaction to the pantsuits headline she imagines.
— A really bad technical gaffe happens at the very beginning of the Joe Biden scene, where the camera accidentally cuts to a black screen with a graphic of Biden’s name displayed on the bottom of it.
— The look on Jason-as-Joe-Biden’s face is freakin’ PRICELESS, as are the insane headlines he imagines.
STARS: ***½
MONOLOGUE
host & Cookie Monster (David Rudman) sing “Silver Bells”
— Jeff Bridges brings up that his last hosting stint was all the way back in 1983, then does the cliched and tired “I guess I did a pretty good job, considering how fast they had me back” joke.
— I absolutely could’ve sworn I remembered this monologue showing a photo of Jeff and his brother Beau from the episode they co-hosted in 1983. I was looking forward to seeing that photo in my current viewing of this monologue, but it’s nowhere to be seen. Odd. Why’d my memory play tricks on me?
— A Cookie Monster appearance, referencing his then-well-publicized bid to host SNL.
— Jeff and Cookie Monster’s “Silver Bells” duet is certainly charming, but there’s absolutely nothing else to say about this, and, at the risk of coming off heartless, I’m kinda bored watching this. Maybe I’d like this duet more if this season wasn’t oversaturated with musical monologues.
STARS: **½
A MESSAGE FROM MARK ZUCKERBERG / A MESSAGE FROM JULIAN ASSANGE
Julian Assange (BIH) compares WikiLeaks to Mark Zuckerberg’s (ANS) site
— Ha, for the third and final consecutive week, a sketch gets interrupted by a message from Bill’s Julian Assange. Like I mentioned in my last episode review, it’s a huge rarity in recent decades for SNL to have a running gag that stretches over several consecutive episodes.
— It definitely bears mentioning that Bill actually has an on-air panic attack while performing this sketch. He talks about it in this interview (the link takes you directly to the portion of the interview where he talks about the panic attack). I’ll have to pay attention to if there are any visible signs of his panic attack in this sketch.
— Okay, I think I can see where Bill’s panic attack starts, as I’ve noticed that he’s suddenly coming off a little more…I dunno, self-conscious in the middle of his speech right now. It’s hard to describe, but something about his tone and demeanor has slightly changed in the middle of his speech. However, this panic attack is certainly not as noticeable as Bill was probably worried it came off to us viewers. I do notice that he seems to be really overdoing the laugh-evilly-while-sipping-his-wine move all throughout this sketch, which could possibly be a sign of him trying to hide his panic attack. After all, he does say in the afore-linked interview that he held a wine glass in front of his mouth for most of the sketch to hide his panic attack, though that’s not quite accurate to what I’m watching in the sketch.
— Overall, kinda meh for a Julian Assange interruption piece. While not too bad, this didn’t work nearly as well as the last two Assange interruption pieces from the preceding two episodes. Maybe me scrutinizing Bill’s performance so intensely to find signs of his panic attack took me out of the comedy of the sketch, but I think it’s more that SNL has milked these Assange interruption pieces for all they’re worth these past three episodes, to the degree that there wasn’t much left for them to say in this final one.
STARS: **½
THE MILEY CYRUS SHOW
Nick Nolte’s (host) media scandal was meatier than Miley Cyrus’ (VAB)
— Hate to say it, but the lines given to Billy Ray Cyrus in these sketches are getting old, despite Jason’s always-fun portrayal of him.
— They’re completely wasting Jeff in this sketch.
— Overall, as you can see, there wasn’t much at all to say about this installment. Much like the preceding Julian Assange sketch, this was a little on the meh side, in that it wasn’t bad, but felt too by-the-numbers for a Miley Cyrus Show sketch.
STARS: ***
I JUST HAD SEX
ANS, Jorma Taccone & Akon [real] revel in coitus
— Good to see an epic music video Digital Short in the Christmas episode, especially since it used to be a (short-lived) tradition in the Lonely Island’s earlier SNL seasons to do an epic music video Digital Short in every Christmas episode (Lazy Sunday and Dick In A Box).
— As usual for these epic Lonely Island music videos, the concept of this is very funny.
— Great visual quality of some of the scenery, especially the parts with Andy, Jorma Taccone, and Akon on the roof of a building.
— A pretty funny random John MacEnroe cameo.
— A particularly funny part with Jorma’s “I think she might’ve been a racist” lyric as we’re shown him staring at a KKK hood in his girl’s bedroom.
— A strong ending visual of Andy, Jorma, and Akon’s crotch fireworks.
STARS: ****
LARRY KING LIVE
Jermaine Jackson (KET) & other D-listers on the show’s finale
— With the mention of the final episode of Larry King Live, that thankfully means this is the final installment of this sketch I have to suffer through, as I never cared for the Larry King sketches that star Fred.
— A laugh from the mere look of Kenan’s Jermaine Jackson. His voice is amusing me as well.
— Another laugh from Fred’s Larry King describing Jeff-as-Dog-The-Bounty-Hunter’s crying as being “like a Sasquatch who found a dead bird and just doesn’t understand”.
— Not much exciting discussions going on in this sketch.
— Ugh at that lame, unnecessary farting line.
— Such a poor ending.
— This overall sketch had a few mild laughs early on, but slowly died a really bad death as it went along.
STARS: *½
CRUNKMAS KARNIVAL!
Under-Underground Crunkmas Karnival features music, risks, nigh-unknowns
— A pre-taped sequel to the first pre-taped Under-Underground commercial.
— The usual hilarious Ass Dan “In Memoriam” bit.
— What the hell is with that annoying and unfunny high-pitched sound Jay keeps making between each sentence of his? Reminds me of him making that annoying and unfunny sharp inhale sound between each of his sentences in the preceding episode’s Principal Frye sketch. I like Jay, but lately, he’s been displaying some bad tendencies he has as a performer.
— Like last time, there’s so many laughs from all the mentions of random, insane festival events and band names. I particularly like the part about the Growing Pains cast “reunion” with just the mom.
— Very funny ending with the mention of this festival taking place at the Metrodome, as tonight’s episode is airing several days after the infamous Metrodome roof collapse incident.
STARS: ****½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guests perform “No Love”
WEEKEND UPDATE
Michael Steele’s (KET) bid for RNC reelection shows he can’t take a hint
weatherman Brad Pitt (TAK) punctuates his forecast with phonemes
Stefon, Snooki (BOM), David Paterson (FRA) sing “O Christmas Tree”
— From my past viewings, I have absolutely no memory of this Michael Steele commentary of Kenan’s.
— Okay, after watching this Steele commentary again just now, I can see why I don’t remember it. It was completely forgettable, despite a pretty funny performance from Kenan.
— The debut of Taran’s Brad Pitt impression.
— I have no idea what to make of those “Bdaaaah!” exclamations Taran’s Pitt keeps making, nor do I know what it’s supposed to be a dig at, as Pitt isn’t known for saying that (is he?). I remember one person on an SNL message board asking at this time, “Is he supposed to be saying ‘bad’???” Also, I can’t help but notice how Tony Danza-esque Taran’s “Bdaaaah!”s sound (not that Danza’s known for saying that either).
— As this Brad Pitt commentary goes on, despite my continued bafflement over the “Bdaaaah!” exclamations, there is something about Taran’s general portrayal of Pitt that I find pretty fun.
— The Harvard bit is another instance of Seth taking delight in doing a character voice during an Update joke, feeling like a nice throwback to the days when he regularly appeared in sketches.
— Seth calls Scarlett Johansson and Ryan Reynolds’ separation unfortunate “since they’re probably the only ones who had a chance with either of them.” Ohhhho, the irony on SNL’s part. Little did SNL know which of their own writers at the time would later get married to Scarlett. The fact that this joke of Seth’s came IMMEDIATELY after the aforementioned Harvard bit is even more of an odd and funny coincidence, given the fact that Scarlett’s future husband in question, Colin Jost, graduated from Harvard, and I’d like to think he’s the one who wrote Seth’s Harvard bit.
— Ah, a change of pace for Update, with us getting a Christmas song from Weekend Update favorites Snooki, Stefon, and Gov. David Paterson. I always like when SNL does something that groups together Weekend Update “all-stars”, such as in the Neil Diamond musical number that Will Ferrell and the real Neil Diamond did with then-Update staples Gay Hitler, Drunk Girl, and Geraldo Rivera at the end of the Weekend Update from Will’s final episode as a cast member.
STARS: ***
THIS YOU CALL A WONDERFUL LIFE?!
Jewish version of It’s A Wonderful Life was full of arguing & complaining
— Pretty funny premise of a Jewish version of It’s A Wonderful Life.
— Good to see Jason’s Jimmy Stewart impression appearing in something more promising than that notorious Rear Window sketch with January Jones.
— Much like in the cold opening earlier in this episode, we get another bad technical gaffe: when the guests are showing that they’ve brought food, the camera cuts to a close-up of THE FREAKIN’ FLOOR by mistake (screencap below). Ha, how in the world did that happen?
— Fourth episode in a row with then-writer Mike O’Brien making an onscreen appearance. I remember thinking at the time that they must’ve been grooming him to become a featured player soon. He would end up not becoming a featured player until three years later.
— Geez, until he showed up just now, I forgot Jeff Bridges was even tonight’s host. He’s appeared so little tonight, including in this sketch, with him being relegated to only making an appearance at the end of this.
— Ha, during the “Cast of Characters” shown in the ending credits, “Moishe Samberg” is credited as playing himself. That’s a callback to the memorable (and polarizing, like pretty much everything involving Justin Timberlake on SNL) Immigrant Tale sketch from Justin Timberlake’s season 34 episode, where Justin played his own ancestor at Ellis Island and Andy made an appearance at the end as an ancestor of his own named Moishe Samberg.
STARS: ***
JEFF’D
host nips his good-natured pranks on fellow actors in the bud
— Finally, a sketch with Jeff Bridges front-and-center as the star.
— Blah, the premise of a prankster pulling very tame pranks and then having a friendly conversation with the prank victim is way too derivative of a radio show sketch SNL did two seasons prior with Tim McGraw.
— At least Andy’s Billy Bob Thornton impression always amuses me.
— I kinda like the turn with Andy’s BBT pulling a gun on Jeff when finding out he’s been pranked. But, damn, the audience is dead during this scene. In fact, they’ve been pretty quiet during this sketch in general. Can’t blame them there, though, as I haven’t been enjoying the non-BBT portions of this sketch myself.
STARS: *½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
Eminem performs “Won’t Back Down”
Lil Wayne performs “6’7”
GENERAL STORE
in the Old West, gift-wrapping pioneers (host) & (KRW) faze shopgoers
— I know it’s not right to judge a non-recurring sketch just from its first 30 seconds, but damn, it’s very clear from the introduction of Kristen and Jeff’s characters that I’m in for a bad campy sketch.
— While it’s kind of a novelty seeing Jeff Bridges play a silly effeminate character, that doesn’t automatically make this sketch good, especially not in an era like this that relies too heavily on campy gay stereotypes as a comedic crutch.
— Ugh, I hate the “Just make your face like this” routine that Kristen and Jeff keep doing. A typical badly-written and unfunny Wiig mugfest.
— At least we get a fun performance from Jason as an Old West bandit.
STARS: *½
A HOLIDAY MESSAGE FROM THE KARDASHIANS
Kim (NAP), Kourtney (VAB), Khloe (ABE) Kardashian deliver holiday message
— It feels like Abby’s been getting more airtime than usual tonight.
— I like how this is taking place on SNL’s home base stage, as it makes this feel like the type of miscellaneous piece that would usually take place on the home base stage in the 70s and 80s.
— Nasim-as-Kim-Kardashian’s “I got a Roleeeeeex” line has been the only real laugh I got out of this so far.
— Overall, nothing special at all, despite my appreciation for the setting.
STARS: **
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A blah Christmas episode. The post-Weekend Update half of this episode was especially weak, with the only good piece in that half (This You Call A Wonderful Life) being completely average and unmemorable. I also wasn’t crazy about how they underused Jeff Bridges in this episode, and didn’t exactly give him the best material in the stuff he was in.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Crunkmas Karnival!
I Just Had Sex
Christmas Eve In Washington D.C.
The Miley Cyrus Show
This You Call A Wonderful Life?!
Weekend Update
A Message From Mark Zuckerberg / A Message From Julian Assange
Monologue
A Holiday Message From The Kardashians
Larry King Live
Jeff’d
General Store
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Paul Rudd)
a big step down
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
We enter the year 2011, with host Jim Carrey