Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars
A MESSAGE FROM HILLARY CLINTON
driven Hillary Clinton (KAM) is unconcerned about email scandal threat
— The official debut of Kate’s Hillary Clinton impression, a role that was last regularly played by the still-on-the-show-at-this-point Vanessa Bayer. We previously got a sample of Kate’s Hillary in a sketch where several women played Hillary in separate, different-themed biopics (Kate played a Breaking Bad-themed version of Hillary in that).
— There’s the very first display of what’s now known as Kate-as-Hillary’s trademark laugh (“Ha-HAAAAAAA!”). That Hillary laugh of Kate’s always gets me.
— Right out of the gate, Kate is fantastic in her Hillary portrayal here, and is coming off so at ease, likable, and effortlessly funny in her execution of this material. No slight intended towards Vanessa, who’s obviously a great performer in general, but Kate’s Hillary is definitely a gigantic step up from Vanessa’s version.
— This cold opening’s material itself is only pretty funny for the most part, though there are a few strong bits, like the displayed email that Hillary sent to her husband Bill.
STARS: ***½
MONOLOGUE
Kellam Hemsworth (KET) joins brothers host, Liam, Luke [real] onstage
— Liam Hemsworth makes his second monologue cameo this season alone.
— A cheap laugh from the initial sight of Kenan entering as one of the Hemsworth brothers.
— The second consecutive “audience interaction” monologue. I’m getting season 19 vibes. Where’s Sarah Silverman when you need her?
— A decent performance from Kate, but I could’ve done without her working in a variation of her “Ha-HAAAAA!” laugh from the Hillary cold opening. That almost makes her come off like a one-trick pony, though I know she’s not. Also, now that I think of it, she’s always done a similar laugh in the Sheila Sovage sketches.
STARS: ***
AMERICAN EXPRESS
American Express member host had an easy path to Hollywood success
— An okay spoof of the real American Express commercial(s) of this kind that aired around this time.
— I particularly like the line from Chris Hemsworth about the hardships of stumbling around Hollywood for days.
— This is the kind of thing that normally might come off as too genuinely self-indulgent and ego-stroking under certain types of hosts, but Chris Hemsworth manages to come off likable in this.
STARS: ***
BROTHER 2 BROTHER
twins Marky (TAK) & Matty (host) are easy to identify
— I wonder if this is a Mikey Day-written sketch, knowing how skilled he is at writing accurate spoofs of children’s entertainment, which the first half of this sketch certainly is.
— A pretty good laugh from Cecily’s overly detailed and self-esteem-damaging descriptions to Taran’s character of the differences between him and his twin brother, while Taran’s character stands there with a forced smile, constantly trying to change the subject.
— Aidy (in her only appearance all night, by the way) getting into the pointing-out-the-differences-between-the-twin-brothers act is also pretty funny.
— A good line with Taran’s character desperately blurting out “My dick’s bigger!”
— An audio gaffe, as the ending theme music fails to play during the closing title sequence. It’s pretty funny, though, hearing nothing but Taran’s off-camera sobbing while the closing title sequence is playing.
STARS: ***½
EMPIRE
out-of-place white character (host) brings diversity
— Che in a sketch!
— An okay premise of Chris as a new, out-of-place white character on Empire.
— I can’t speak to the accuracy of the specific Empire-isms being spoofed in this commercial, but they’re still coming off decently funny even without me having much familiarity with the real show.
— I got a laugh from the way Chris walks backwards out of the room after cheerfully walking in with balloons and immediately witnessing a violent confrontation.
STARS: ***
SPACESHIP
spaceship is saved when chicken captain sacrifices herself via microwave
— Uh…..what a concept.
— I’m starting to get an I Married A Monkey vibe from Cecily’s interaction with the chicken.
— Chris’ ad-libs when trying to get the chicken to look at him during his romantic speech to her are giving me even further I Married A Monkey vibes. I’m strangely enjoying this, probably because of how much I typically liked the I Married A Monkey sketches and how they got mileage out of SNL’s live format. While Chris Hemsworth is no Tim Kazurinsky, he (and Cecily, too) is selling this well with how perfectly straight he’s playing his interactions with the chicken.
— Even the microwave gag is working for me.
— Kenan gets a good moment at the very end.
— Overall, probably one of the better James Anderson/Kent Sublette-written sketches from around this time.
STARS: ***½
THE IGGY AZALEA SHOW
Iggy Azalea’s (KAM) rap appropriation bugs Azealia Banks (SAZ)
— Boy, that is some unconvincing-looking butt padding Kate’s wearing as Iggy Azalea. Looks more like she’s hiding Tupperware inside the back of her pants.
— So far, this sketch hasn’t been doing it for me. Your standard boring, uncreative “celebrity-hosted talk show” sketch that SNL relies too often on, and rarely works for me in recent eras like this. Did they only come up with the idea for this particular sketch because Chris is Australian, like Iggy Azalea?
— I am starting to kinda like Sasheer’s cranky performance, which is more than I can say for anything else in this dull sketch.
STARS: *½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Homegrown”
WEEKEND UPDATE
whether via foot or subway, getting around Manhattan frustrates LEJ
COJ & MIC trade jokes on Ben Carson’s “homosexuality is a choice” quote
telling a penis-size joke meant for MIC backfires on COJ
The Girl You Wish You Hadn’t Started A Conversation With At A Party is superior & wrong
— I sometimes try to guess from what Colin says in his commentary intro if he’s introducing a Leslie Jones commentary, and this time, I was finally correct.
— I love Colin’s “Good transition” ad-lib to Leslie at one point of her commentary.
— Some of the usual funny loud outbursts from Leslie here, and I love her delivery of “Did rat feces dust…just fly…into my MOUTH?!?”
— I like Leslie demonstrating her intimidating “Compton stare”.
— A surprisingly good Valley Girl imitation from Leslie.
— When Colin responds to a shocking story of Leslie’s by saying “Daaaaaamn!” in an urban manner, I got a pretty good laugh from Leslie immediately telling him, “Shut up! Don’t you EVER say that again!”
— Hilarious comment from Michael, after Leslie’s commentary ended with her expressing sadness over losing her ability to scare people: “She still scares the HELL outta me.”
— Oh, are we doing the “Update anchor(s) tells the same joke multiple times in a row, with a different punchline each time” gag from the Meyers/Poehler and solo Meyers eras of Update?
— Yep, we are! As much as I’d don’t like how some of the lesser aspects of the solo Meyers, Meyers/Strong, and Strong/Jost eras of Update have carried over into the early Jost/Che era, I’m always a sucker for the “Update anchor(s) tells the same joke multiple times in a row, with a different punchline each time” routine. It never fails to be damn fun.
— Michael is even stumblier tonight than he usually is in these early Updates of his, though it’s not hurting this Update for me.
— The bit with Michael letting Colin take his next joke is, in hindsight, a precursor to the famous and well-loved joke-swapping routine that would later become a tradition of Jost/Che Updates in either every Christmas episode or season finale. (I can’t remember which, as it’s been a few years since I’ve last seen a new episode. Do they do the joke-swapping thing in both the Christmas episode and season finale? Or is the season finale when they do their favorite jokes that were previously cut after dress rehearsal?)
— A priceless and very memorable gaffe during the “Colin reads a joke that was written for Michael” segment, where Colin accidentally misreads “3.6 inches” as “36 inches” when telling us the average length of a male’s flaccid penis. An off-camera, loudly-laughing Michael delivers a solid ad-lib during this: “See? My jokes ARE harder to read!”
— Man, tonight’s whole “Colin tells a joke originally written for Michael” segment is freakin’ classic, partly helped by Colin’s gaffe. This segment is an important moment, as it’s one of the very first (if not THE first) official things that solidifies the success of the Jost/Che teaming. I can definitely see why this bit would end up turning into an annual “Colin and Michael swap jokes” routine.
— Girl At A Party: “If you took all the homeless men in the world and stacked them on top of each other…(*makes a ‘fwoosh’-type vocalization*) Jenga, Michael. JENGA.”
— Girl At A Party, on her spring break plans, after Michael shares his run-of-the-mill spring break plans: “(sternly) I’m bringing democracy to Syria! Via Instagram!”
— Overall, the best Jost/Che-era Update to air up to this point, and probably remains one of their best-ever Updates to this day in 2021. This is also the first time in what feels like ages that I’m giving a Weekend Update this high of a rating. (I wonder if the Norm Macdonald era of Update was the last one to receive this rating.)
STARS: ****½
ACTION NEWS 7 SPECIAL REPORT
media hound Thor (host) is jubilant following Avengers’ defeat of Ultron
— For some reason, it feels kinda funny seeing Cecily playing a very normal, straitlaced, professional character immediately after seeing her play her Girl At A Party character at the end of Update. That Girl At A Party voice gets so in my head that it was kinda jarring immediately going from that to hearing her speak in a normal voice.
— Not all that crazy about this concept itself, as it seems pretty corny. However, Chris is fun and likable here, and is executing this decently enough.
— Judging from that voice he’s using and that cocky gum-chewing he’s doing, Taran seems to think he’s playing Burt Reynolds instead of Iron Man. I do like his performance here, though.
— Something about Pete’s concerned delivery of “I think I ate a guy!” made me laugh even harder than it was probably intended to.
— There’s something I find unintentionally funny about how SNL didn’t even commit to that “dumping a bucket of Gatorade all over Nick Fury” gag. First of all, there was only a tiny amount of Gatorade in that huge bucket, yet Jay’s Fury reacted like he got a TON of Gatorade dumped on him. On top of that, that “Gatorade” was clearly just plain water. SNL didn’t even bother using a colored liquid. Something about all of this cheapness is strangely amusing to me. Maybe SNL’s live constraints prevents them from being able to dump a large amount of liquid on a performer, which would explain the absurdly tiny amount of water dumped on Jay in this sketch. Oh, but then again, that Whale Park sketch with Chris Farley, people. And probably lots of other live sketches I’m forgetting that had a performer getting doused with a huge amount of liquid.
— I love Bobby’s pained reaction after being high-fived by Thor.
STARS: ***
MOVIE SET
acting coach from The Jeffersons (KET) elicits cartoonish takes in drama
— Meh, a showcase of the typical hammy tendencies and odd word pronunciations that are a frequent staple of both the writing of James Anderson & Kent Sublette and Kenan’s performances earlier in his SNL tenure (before he became a more grounded performer and toned his hammier tendencies down to a degree).
— I don’t get why they’re using The Jeffersons as the show where Kenan’s character originally taught these silly double take techniques. Since when was The Jeffersons ever known for having over-the-top, cartoonish double takes?
— Ah, never mind. It’s just now been revealed that Kenan’s character was an acting coach on The Jeffersons for only one day.
— A few of Kenan’s double take demonstrations are admittedly making me chuckle, but Kate and Chris’ double takes are not working much for me.
STARS: **
REALITY HOUSE
reality show manufactures conflict among housemates (KYM), (BEB), (host)
— Beck has been pretty invisible tonight. I almost thought this was the first time we’ve seen him all night, until I remembered his small, forgettable appearance as Captain America.
— A funny and very random reveal that this normal scenario is actually a typical reality show, complete with confessionals.
— This is nailing so many reality show tropes, in such a humorous way. I’m loving this, particularly the way such mundane things are causing typical reality show drama and tension.
— I like how this is now even featuring an elimination sequence, ala The Bachelor and other dating reality shows.
— A very funny sudden angry, violent outburst from Beck and Kyle at the end.
STARS: ****½
MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & Chris Cornell [real] perform “Heavy Is The Head”
DOLCE & GABBANA
(host) & vacuous ex-porn stars endorse Dolce & Gabbana
— The last two prior installments of this usually-strong recurring sketch were disappointingly lackluster. Hopefully, it returns to form here.
— Vanessa: “We’re not porn stars anymore, but that doesn’t mean we can’t smell a great deal when we snort it off a mirror.”
— Vanessa: “Adios, a-sea-ghost.” Cecily: “(said like ‘arrivederci’) I-reamed-a-donkey!”
— Vanessa: “What’s that thing you press it and it sprays out?” Cecily: “Prostate.” Vanessa: “No, no, but…it holds all the liquid.” Cecily: “Mouth.” Vanessa: “Bottle.” Cecily: “Oh, right, bottle.”
— I just now realized how odd it is that Cecily’s Girl At A Party character and these ex-porn starts characters are appearing in the same episode (can’t remember if that happened before or not), as both recurring pieces rely on malaprop-filled one-liners, and I think Colin is the writer behind both recurring pieces.
— Overall, while still not reaching the glory days this recurring sketch used to have, this was definitely an improvement over its last two prior installments.
STARS: ***
GOODNIGHTS
IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— An average episode. Not many things to praise as particularly strong, but not many things to complain about either. Chris Hemsworth was a better host than I would’ve expected. While far from being the funniest host, he had a total ease as a performer that made him come off likable, and his charm helped elevate some of the iffier premises he was given. A welcome contrast to what an awkward, iffy, and lacking-in-confidence host Dakota Johnson was in the preceding episode. I can see why SNL brings Chris back as a host later this same calendar year.
MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS
RATED SEGMENTS RANKED FROM BEST TO WORST
Weekend Update
Reality House
A Message From Hillary Clinton
Brother 2 Brother
Spaceship
Empire
American Express
Action News 7 Special Report
Monologue
Movie Set
The Iggy Azalea Show
HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Dakota Johnson)
a step up
My full set of screencaps for this episode is here
TOMORROW
Dwayne Johnson
Imagine Hillary won the 2016 election, then won again on her re-election in 2020 for a total of 8 year-term as POTUS . I wonder if Kate would stay on the show until 2025.
I think much of Kate’s reason for staying was Ghostbusters severely underperforming at the box office. In a world where the movie had done better and led to a stronger film career for her, my guess is win or lose, she would have left after season 42 and done cameos if possible.
They make Kenan’s acting coach character recurring, which is bad enough on its own because it was never a great character, but they waste some pretty good hosts with him. It’s one thing to use it for a bad host, as a way to get them out of their heads or something, but when you use it with someone like Amy Poehler, a sketch comedy professional, it just seems kinda stupid.
I believe we have Gemma debuting next episode. Which was another Anderlette creation.
From my memory, the next episode is really good. I’m pretty sure there’s one awful sketch that leans way too heavily into gay panic humor, but there’s also the debut of Gemma (who I don’t love later on but do enjoy there, especially due to the Rock’s performance, by FAR the best host at playing one of Gemma’s sleazy boyfriends), the Bambi trailer and the classic Wrestling Promo sketch.
Recently saw the Rock say he brought his own writer(s) for this next episode. Believe Brian Gewirtz was def. one of them. Rock, his writers, and Bobby wrote the promo sketch I believe.
Considering how insane and unstable Azalea Banks is, and how the writers only wrote her as a boring straight man, guessing the writers of that sketch had never actually heard of her until the Iggy drama and didn’t bother doing any actual research on her.
She still had a long way to go at this point, but I’d agree they probably didn’t know her. She could provide a sketch show endless material (I can see Kim Wayans playing her on ILC), but she would also tear SNL apart on social media…
Kate’s “money ass” song is fun and also surprisingly catchy. The only good part of that whole thing.
The main debut of Kate’s Hillary, which only really picks up steam when the Hillary vs. Bernie saga begins. Up to that point you have a mildly entertaining, mildly annoying nod to the Hillary cliches of 25 years (power-mad, cold, etc.). In another world, this would be remembered as a fun, if not overly original impression, rather than all the surrounding angst about the portrayal of Hillary and whether it cost her her election, and so on.
Chris Hemsworth is very likeable and very smooth, but for the most part, they never quite get the material for him right. The attempts at having him as OTT in the acting coach and Avengers sketches are mostly just irritating (I guess third time is the charm as the Scarjo Black Widow pretape is the first time they manage to get some good laughs out of the Avengers), while other moments, like the pre-tape about how difficult life had been for him, are too laid-back to register. His best leading role is in the space chicken sketch – he grounds a ridiculous idea and also believably interacts with the chicken (like when he asks her to look at him). Even the end, with Cecily saying with just the right amount of edge that they are going to eat the chicken because it will taste delicious and was a bitch to her, works.
Cecily and Taran also have absolute pitch-perfect timing in the Brother 2 Brother sketch, bouncing off each other in a way many can’t, building up to a strong finish. Easily one of Taran’s best moments in his last few seasons, and one of those few which seems tailored to his specific voice and talents.
A few seasons after this, SNL would start parodying multiple shows in a single package, so as to not spend too much time on one joke. I wish they had tried this approach here, as the Empire parody goes on and on, not helped by most of the cast being poorly suited to their roles (aside from Kenan). I notice in this period Sasheer is repeatedly cast in “sassy” type roles which she looks uncomfortable in and never carries off. I wonder if that is one of the reasons she felt unhappy at the show.
The House is a welcome shift away from a lot of the rest – such a solid mockery of all the overly scripted reality shows out there. Beck and Kyle have just the right way of using their unique comic voices in a way that still fits SNL’s standards. I think the later editions stripped back the approach quite a bit, but I’m still glad I could be there.
Promos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=balq-rBqcDg
I remember people REALLY Hating the Space Chicken sketch when it first came on (not even because anderlette wrote it, it was just head-scratchingly dumb by any other standards); but like many things in hindsight, I can see why people eventually warmed up to it…it was just “Silly”.
Ha, I just now caught a very embarrassing typo in my “Something about Pete’s concerned delivery of “I think I ate a guy!” made me even harder than it was probably intended to” statement. Yikes. Hopefully, you readers realized I meant to type “made me LAUGH even harder than it was probably intended to”. My apologies for the unfortunate imagery my typo planted in your mind.
Ha, amazing. I didn’t notice and now I’m sad I couldn’t have had some fun with that. “You know, Stooge is a nice guy and a tremendous SNL reviewer, but I can’t say I’m too crazy about his insatiable sexual attraction to cannibals.”
Wow, haha, I didn’t catch that either. So… good thing, I guess?
On the plus side, maybe you accidentally attracted some readers who are into Necrophilia.
RIP Chris Cornell. Gone but not forgotten.
Brother 2 Brother seemed like a Mirror Image ripoff. When the show first aired it had one of the actual Amex ads of the time, with Mindy Kaling relating her struggle in show business as a South Asian woman. The joke was that it wasn’t so hard for a handsome white male.
A thoroughly, almost aggressively mediocre episode. Loved Space Chicken, and I always love Reality House and Jeffersons Acting Coach. But we’ve seen hosts with actual comedic sensibilities NAIL those recurring spots, whereas Hemsworth just struck me as some guy trying to keep up.
Where we differ most, @Stooge, is that Brother 2 Brother is painfully unfunny for me. Like much of this episode, it seems like little more than an opportunity to flatter Hemsworth’s looks at the expense of anything funny or nuanced happening. I got a small chuckle from Taran’s “My dick’s bigger!” blurt, as I thought it would end the sketch with some hint of irony. But no, we get IMMEDIATE clarification that’s not the case, and we instead close by running a terrible joke in circles.
Margot Robbie’s episode suffered from the same issue – a lazy attempt to just turn “host is crazy hot” into a handful of thin-premise sketches. She at least showed some charm and likability, though, whereas Hemsworth could be replaced in reruns by a cardboard cutout and I doubt I’d notice.