Tag: 2006-07

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January 13, 2007 – Jake Gyllenhaal / The Shins (S32 E10)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

A MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT
George W. Bush’s (JAS) troop surge will send just about everybody to Iraq

— SNL continues to push their new Bush impersonator hard, with this being the FOURTH cold opening featuring him in just the last FIVE episodes. I just wish they’d give him better material.
— A laugh from how Jason-as-Bush’s listing-off of uniform-wearers and regular gun-carriers who he’s sending off to Iraq includes Civil War re-enactors and Allen Iverson.
— Meh, the constant listing-off from Jason’s Bush is getting old.
— Meh again, a tepid punchline at the end of this.
STARS: **


MONOLOGUE
in Dreamgirls garb, host sings “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going”

— I love the gleeful look on Jason’s face in the audience.
— This ends up being Will’s ONLY appearance of this entire episode. IIRC, this is thankfully the last gasp of his frequently-limited airtime this season resulting from him being busy filming The Brothers Solomon. His airtime returns to normal for the remainder of this season.
— The concept of Jake Gyllenhaal stripping down to a dress reminds me an awful lot of Antonio Banderas’ very random monologue from the preceding season, though Jake goes even further with it by putting on an accompanying female wig and busting out a Dreamgirls musical number.
— I normally wouldn’t like a monologue like this, but, much like the aforementioned Antonio Banderas in his monologue, Jake is putting his ALL into this, is selling the hell out of this, and is winning me over.
— I like the addition of Maya, Amy, and Kristen as backup singers, but that may just be because, as I mentioned in my last episode review, I like this season’s underrated Rudolph/Poehler/Wiig female trio whenever they’re paired together.
STARS: ***


DEEP HOUSE DISH
(host) & (AMP), (KRW), (MAR) perform for charity

— Is it just me, or was the Wiig-voiced MTV4 intro longer than it usually is in these Deep House Dish sketches?
— Jake and Amy’s post-song interview is actually funny, especially them admitting the song they performed is their worst song. I also love the humorous accent Jake’s using.
— (*sigh*) The “Ooh-wee, T’Shane” portions of this sketch continue to be unbearable to watch.
— I like Maya’s smooth ad-lib when her earring accidentally falls off.
— Maya’s interview mostly fell flat for me.
STARS: **


BRONX BEAT WITH BETTY & JODI
mercurial New Yorkers Betty (AMP) & Jodi (MAR) flatter (host)

— This sketch makes its debut.
— Despite the cookie-cutter concept of Maya and Amy’s characters and the fact that SNL has certainly had various recurring talk show sketches with this type of character before, I’m enjoying Maya and Amy’s characterizations and interplay with each other. While I had never been a fan of Bronx Beat as a recurring sketch back when this SNL era originally aired, I’m going into this first installment with an open mind during my current viewing.
— I’m getting a lot of laughs from Maya and Amy bombarding Jake with motor-mouthed questions on what nationality he is while complimenting him on his looks.
— I like Maya and Amy randomly deciding to bring Jake back long after his interview has ended, and continue to question and compliment him.
— Overall, judging tonight’s Bronx Beat debut fairly on its own merits without letting my knowledge of this becoming an overused recurring sketch affect my judgment, I cannot deny the fact this was actually a good debut. A charming, likable, funny, well-performed, and enjoyable sketch. It’s a shame if Bronx Beat indeed eventually falls victim to diminishing returns in subsequent installments, like how I remember. (I do recall the Forest Whitaker and Brian Williams ones being charming, though.)
STARS: ***½


TRUMP PRESS CONFERENCE
Donald Trump (DAH) disses Rosie O’Donnell at putative Apprentice presser

— SNL’s doing quite a lot of consecutive segments tonight with no commercial breaks in between. Maya and Amy in particular have A LOT of rapid-fire costume changes to make throughout this episode. Then again, it’s possible that this particular sketch is another instance of a seemingly-live sketch actually being a recording of a sketch that was taped live at dress rehearsal, an odd habit that I mentioned in an earlier review SNL sometimes had in the 2000s.
— This “Trump bashes Rosie O’Donnell at every single turn” premise is blah.
— Yeah, so far, there’s very little to like here.
STARS: *½


COOL FOOD
(host) & (KRW) see anthropomorphic meat at the coolest restaurant in town

— What the hell am I watching? This sure is one corny premise. Feels like something straight out of some kiddie comedy show, which echoes a complaint of mine about another restaurant sketch, Hot Plates, even if this Cool Food sketch is definitely nowhere near as insufferable.
— I can definitely see some people finding this sketch to have a silly charm, and I wish I could feel that way, too, but this just ain’t doing it for me.
— Decent visual effect of a screaming Andy being picked up by a fork.
— An actual pretty funny punchline with Jake’s reveal of him and Kristen having done mushrooms before going to this restaurant.
STARS: **


LASER CATS! 2
feline sci-fi sequel by ANS & BIH further annoys LOM

— Laser Cats has officially become a once-a-year recurring segment.
— Bill, when acting dismissive towards the concept of cats shooting lasers out of their mouth: “That’s kids stuff.” No, Bill, kids stuff would be that Cool Food sketch we saw right before this (minus the drug-related ending).
— Funny little gag with Amy carefully placing her cup down on the table when she’s slowly “fainting”.
— Interesting and fun little detail of a superimposed ping-pong ball during Andy and Bill’s slow-motion ping-pong game.
— I love the cheap use of a copy machine as an identity scanner.
— Great gag with Bill’s Laser Cat reloading by eating cat food from a dish.
— Strong twist ending with how Andy kills the villain.
— A good slight variation of the “Get out” ending with Lorne. I mentioned in my review of the first Laser Cats short that I never liked how they made it a staple of these shorts to ALWAYS end with Lorne telling Andy and Bill to get out, but I’ll try to have more of an open mind towards that in these reviews. The reprisal of the “Get out” gag worked for me tonight, and hopefully it will continue to when I review the subsequent Laser Cats installments.
— Overall, much like the first Laser Cats short, so much silly, dumb fun here (which is pretty much the reaction I wish I could’ve gotten from Cool Food). A blast to watch, and I look forward to seeing our next annual Laser Cats short the following season.
STARS: ****½


STOCK FOOTAGE AWARDS
hackneyed broadcast news b-roll is celebrated

— As usual, I’m wary about SNL doing an award show sketch, given their poor track record with them.
— Kristen’s Jane Pauley: “Good evening, I’m Jane Pauley, and I’m here because Katie Couric didn’t want to be.”
— The premise of this particular award show sketch focusing on the use of b-roll footage in news reports actually seems kinda fun in a strange way. I even like the little detail of the award statuette being a gold-plated VHS tape.
— I like Kristen-as-Pauley and Darrell-as-Dan-Rather’s sour look after fake-laughing at the footage of a squirrel water-skiing.
— I’m kinda surprised this sketch has ended already, but that’s probably a good thing. SNL’s award show sketches tend to go on way too long, and the premise of this particular sketch was kept the correct length, with a decent amount of laughs and without stretching the premise too thin.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Phantom Limb”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Steve Jobs (FRA) touts the iPhone’s myriad unbelievable features

Whitney Houston (MAR) hawks items left over from her storage unit auction

— SNL writer John Lutz makes his way into yet another Weekend Update photo (the second above screencap for this Update). I love how it’s a running gag to use him in humorous Update photos.
— I’m wary of Fred doing another iPod/iPhone commentary, given how weak his last one was the preceding season.
— I like “on/off button” being randomly mentioned among the amazing features of the new iPhone.
— Fred’s overall Steve Jobs commentary tonight was an improvement over his last one.
— A lot of solid jokes between Amy and Seth tonight.
— Uh-oh. Here comes Maya’s Whitney Houston to hurt the momentum of this solid Update. I was not a fan of her last Update commentary at all.
— I did get a laugh from Maya’s Whitney humming the Sanford And Son theme song.
— Maya’s overall Whitney commentary tonight was thankfully not as annoying as her last one, but it still didn’t do much for me.
STARS: ***½


LAW & ORDER MASTER CLASS
(host) learns from acting guru (AMP) who specializes in Law & Order roles

— A pretty funny and promising concept.
— Amy is really solid at imitating how actors playing employees being questioned in a Law & Order scene are always moving around during their dialogue.
— Fun sequence with Jake having to act out various Law & Order scenarios in rapid-fire speed.
— Fred is cracking me up as an out-of-work Sam Waterston impersonator.
— Did I just see someone running through the background during the Sam Waterston impersonator scene? Was that Maya rushing off the set to get ready for the next sketch? (I told you she and Amy have had to do a lot of fast costume changes tonight.)
STARS: ****


WHEELCHAIR DATES
(host) & (MAR) play matchmakers to wheelchair-bound (JAS) & (KRW)

— Funny reveal of the date that the wheelchair-bound Jason has been set up with turning out to be a wheelchair-bound Kristen.
— I like Jake and Maya constantly avoiding trying to point out Jason and Kristen’s wheelchair similarity, and badly trying to act overly oblivious whenever Jason and Kristen call attention to the wheelchairs.
— Lots of funny lines from Jake and Maya. I can see their occasional yelling of their lines coming off annoying to some people, but it’s not bothering me at all.
— I love Maya randomly and uncontrollably blurting out the inappropriate question “HOW DO YOU GO TO THE BATHROOM?!?” towards Jason and Kristen.
— A charming and funny ending.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “New Slang”


KAPLAN, LIEBOWITZ & DOLEMITE
lawyers Kaplan (FRA), Liebowitz (host), Dolemite (KET) will represent you

— Funny random concept of Dolemite being in a law firm trio.
— Amusing little detail with Jake’s lazy eye.
— Wait, this sketch is concluding ALREADY?!? After only about 40 seconds?!? There’s NO WAY it was originally planned to be this brief and pointless. There were barely any jokes even delivered here before the sketch abruptly wrapped up. The show must’ve run long and the writer of this sketch was probably forced to do some last-minute trimming to the script before the sketch went on air (much like what happened with the Wine Tasters sketch from the end of the preceding season’s Antonio Banderas episode, though at least THAT sketch still remained funny even in its trimmed form, which is more than I can say for this Dolemite sketch).
STARS: **


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very average episode. Not much stood out as particularly great and there were some weak spots, but the show did have a good flow and a nice vibe running through the night, which made even some of the weaker sketches have a better atmosphere. Jake Gyllenhaal was a likable and somewhat fun host, and partly attributed to the nice vibe this episode had.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Justin Timberlake)
a slight step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Jeremy Piven

Posted on

December 16, 2006 – Justin Timberlake (S32 E9)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

SANTA’S MY BOYFRIEND
St. Nicholas-smitten AMP, KRW, MAR sing “Santa’s My Boyfriend”

— A nice change of pace for a cold opening.
— A funny and charming reveal that the new boyfriend the ladies are singing about is Santa.
— Fun chemistry between Maya, Amy, and Kristen. Whenever I think of SNL’s short-lived Rudolph/Poehler/Wiig trio of female cast members, this cold opening is always the first thing to pop in my mind. They may not be as acclaimed a female group as the Fey/Dratch/Rudolph/Poehler group, but I like this group, and they would end up being the last female cast for years (at least until Kristen leaves the show) that has any kind of cohesion.
— Very solid song from the ladies, and this is something I can kinda picture appearing in a very early SNL era, such as with Gilda, Jane, and Laraine.
STARS: ****


MONOLOGUE
host, Alvin (BIH), Simon (FRA), Theodore (ANS) sing “The Chipmunk Song”

— Being so used to Justin Timberlake’s hosting stints, it’s hard to believe this is only his second time hosting. He’s already coming off as a comfortable veteran host here.
— A fun and silly concept of Justin singing with Alvin and The Chipmunks, played by the cast.
— Bill constantly alternating between portraying Alvin in a bro-ish way and a conventional way is solid.
— I love Justin’s occasional Dave-esque angry yells of “AAALLLVIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN!!!!”
STARS: ****


COMPETING CHARITIES
singing & dancing mascot & Salvation Army Santa (WLF) compete for change

— Like the first time Justin played this character the last time he hosted, I admire Justin’s fun energy, but I don’t care for the sketch itself. I had remembered tonight’s installment being the best installment of this sketch, but it’s not holding up well for me in my current viewing so far.
— I admit, I am finding Justin’s soup-themed take on Salt-N-Pepa’s “Shoop” catchy.
— Pretty funny line from Justin about how Christmas isn’t about kicking a cup of soup in the “croutons”, after Will has kneed him in the groin.
— I remember a fellow SNL reviewer from back at this time in 2006 (who’s username was “Mike (male)”, I believe) pointing out that Justin was so damn good in this sketch that he was even able to withstand ALL of the props accidentally falling down in the background during his and Will’s duet at the end.
— What was with the awkward look on Justin’s face at the end after he and Will say in unison “Bring it on in to Salvation Army/Homelessville!” He looked like something genuinely might’ve been bothering him, but maybe I’m looking too much into it (as I often tend to do).
— Overall, slightly better than these Dancing Mascot sketches usually are, but that’s still faint praise from me.
STARS: **½


TARGET
Target Lady & stock boy (host) exasperate holiday shoppers (MAR) & (WLF)

— You’d be forgiven for mistakenly thinking as soon as this sketch shows up that this is the Target Lady sketch where Justin plays his memorable “Classic Peg” character, but this is actually a different Target Lady sketch, in which Justin plays a completely different and far-less-remembered character. Justin plays Peg in his next hosting stint in season 34.
— SNL couldn’t even be bothered to put fake blood on Justin’s lip? It seemed silly when the camera cut to a close-up of him with a non-bloody lip after Maya pointed out that his lip is bleeding.
— Not sure how to feel about Justin’s character in this sketch so far. It certainly doesn’t hold a candle to “Classic Peg”, that’s for sure.
— I like Justin’s knowing, foreshadowing delivery of “I hope a third thing doesn’t happen to theeeeeeemmmm” regarding the frequent misfortunes happening to his chapped lips. Otherwise, I’m not caring for the comedic conceit of his character.
— The Target Lady material is getting the usual blah reactions from me. At least we got a long break from this character after her last appearance prior to this (almost an exact year earlier, in the preceding season’s Peter Sarsgaard episode), a long break that I remember lulled me into a false sense of security back at this time, with me assuming SNL had given up on doing these sketches.
STARS: **


DICK IN A BOX
(host) & (ANS) sing about giving a phallic present

— Here comes another all-time very famous and legendary Lonely Island Digital Short.
— Great early 90s R&B look to Andy and Justin’s characters.
— Kristen doing absolutely solid work as usual, even in her silent, simple role of a sensual, sultry girlfriend.
— Hilarious reveal of what’s in the box that Justin gives to Kristen.
— An extremely catchy song. I particularly love the melody of the “See, I’m wiiiise enough to knoooow…” part, which I think is actually a sample from a real song from the early 90s (not sure which song, though).
— Maya’s emotional, heartfelt reaction to her dick-in-a-box gift is very funny.
— Even the little part where a shot of Andy sliding down a banister is played back-and-forth in forwards and reverse is so perfect.
— A particularly hilarious, stand-out part with the steps on how to make a dick in a box (“1: cut a hole in the box… etc.”).
— Another perfect little touch is the false ending, where Andy and Justin are shown on a stage singing the lyric “It’s my (*bleep*) in a box!” in unison, and then they stand in a frozen pose with their arms cheesily up in the air while the music stops, making you assume that’s the end of the short (I know *I* thought so when this short originally aired), only for the music, singing, and dancing to suddenly continue out of nowhere. I love that fake-out.
— Excellent ending with Andy and Justin getting arrested.
— Overall, absolutely perfect and epic, and by far breaks the slump of good-but-not-great Digital Shorts that this season has had. I remember how it was especially exciting to witness this short as it aired live and ALREADY have that feeling that you’re watching something truly special, something that you can tell will be the talk of the town online for the next week or so, especially after having seen how Lazy Sunday got that treatment an exact year prior.
— Until now, I had recently been of the (possibly unpopular) opinion that, as great as this short is, its later sequel, Mother Lovers, is actually superior to it. I’m now re-thinking that opinion, as I ended up enjoying Dick In A Box during this current re-watch more than I expected to. We’ll see how I feel about how the great Mother Lovers stacks up against this when we reach that episode.
STARS: *****


THE BARRY GIBB TALK SHOW
Jimmy Carter (DAH) & others discuss Iraq

— I’m sure to a good number of people, Dick In A Box immediately being followed by Barry Gibb Talk Show is a tremendous one-two punch (hell, just listen to the audience: their exuberant applause as the screen fades to black at the end of Dick In A Box turns into absolutely WILD screaming when the screen then fades in to this Barry Gibb sketch), but for me, the return of Barry Gibb Talk Show hurts the momentum that the show gained with Dick In A Box, as I never cared for Barry Gibb Talk Show as a recurring sketch. I’ve always felt it should’ve just stayed a one-off, as the sketch only worked for me in its debut. However, at least this sketch will keep up the huge energy that’s been in the air tonight.
— Here we have Jimmy Fallon during the odd, awkward, dark stage of his post-SNL career, after his failed attempt to become a movie star, but before his successful attempt to become a late night talk show host.
— I will say that I always love that Barry Gibb Talk Show theme song, at least.
— I got a chuckle from Justin’s Robin Gibb unhappily doing a facepalm in reaction to Kristen-as-Sandra-Day-O’Connor’s corny “Stayin’ Alive” pun.
— There goes Justin’s obligatory character break that happens once in every installment of this sketch, though this particular break was just a very mild and quick smirk.
— Speaking of breaking, I once again give credit to Jimmy for getting so into character as Barry Gibb that he refrains from his usual habit of breaking easily.
— Darrell’s Jimmy Carter routine feels kinda out of place in this sketch.
STARS: **


DRY EYES
game show contestants (host) & (FRA) try to keep from crying

— Unless I’m forgetting something, this is the very first game show host Bill has ever played. As we know now, he would go on to be one of SNL’s best-ever at regularly playing game show hosts.
— I love Bill’s reaction to Fred losing the first round by instantly crying.
— Very funny little part with Justin jovially laughing off Bill disclosing the sad fact that Justin’s father left him at a young age.
— Whenever Justin is fighting to keep from crying, I love the intense, wide-eyed look he stares into the camera with while turning his head slightly to the side (the third-to-last above screencap for this sketch).
— Fred is so good at making comical crying faces.
— What was the point of casting Kristen in the EXTREMELY brief, silent walk-on role as a game show model who walks Fred off of the show? SNL might as well have gotten an extra to play that role.
— The Sad Songs round Justin performs in is pretty solid.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “My Love”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Lou Dobbs (DAH) wants two walls & a trap door built along Mexican border

New Jerseyite same-sex couple’s Christmas wishes have been fulfilled

— Darrell-as-Lou-Dobbs’ line about eating a taco was pretty funny.
— A laugh from Darrell-as-Dobbs’ unconventional concepts regarding a Mexican border wall.
— Darrell’s overall Lou Dobbs commentary was short and sweet.
— Some really solid Update jokes tonight.
— Blah, the return of the Same-Sex New Jersey Couple. Sure, these characters are progressive compared to SNL’s demeaning portrayal of gays prior to this season, but these characters do nothing for me otherwise.
— I remember an SNL reviewer from back at this time in 2006 (I think the same reviewer I mentioned earlier: “Mike (male)”) made a good point when complaining that the fact that the second question Seth asks the Same-Sex New Jersey Couple in their so-called “topical” commentary tonight is a completely off-topic “What are you guys gonna get each other for Christmas?” is proof that SNL was really pushing it bringing these characters back tonight when the writers clearly didn’t have much of a way to tie them to current events this week. Did SNL just desperately want to use that groan-worthy mistletoe gag?
— What was with both Seth and Amy waving goodbye to us in unison in a cheesy, exaggerated manner during their sign-off? Inside joke, I take it?
STARS: ***½


HIP HOP KIDS
beats & dance moves harm chances of escape from mineshaft

— I recall disliking this sketch in my original 2006 review of this episode (link here), to the degree that, on the now-defunct saturday-night-live.com message board where I originally posted that review, a board member who usually really liked my reviews actually called me out on being “way off” on my negative opinion of this Hip Hop Kids sketch (gee, thanks for telling me that MY OPINION is wrong). In fact, I’ve noticed over the years that a lot of people seem to have a high regard for this sketch. I’ll go through this sketch with an open mind this time, in an attempt to see what all the hoopla is about.
— Surprisingly, this is Jason and Kenan’s respective first appearance of the night, and for Jason, it ends up being his ONLY appearance of the night.
— There goes Maya doing that slowly-lean-back-in-a-staccato-manner dance move in yet another sketch.
— Amy: “That’s a stalactite, Jo-Jessica! You gotta recognize your sedimentary rock formations!”
— Oh, I love the voice Jason’s using.
— Jason’s using some of the same dance moves he would later famously use on a regular basis in the future What Up With That sketches.
— I’m already starting to come around on this sketch. I’m finding it fun and amusing, even if I still wouldn’t call it particularly great.
— Second episode in a row with Bill being unrecognizable under make-up he wears as a monster, this time with him being accompanied by an also-unrecognizable Will as a fellow monster.
— What the heck is Amy cracking up at?
— Funny reveal of Amy and Justin having eaten some of their friends.
— Now it’s Justin’s turn to crack up again.
— SNL would strangely and randomly bring this sketch back THREE-AND-A-HALF YEARS LATER, with a completely different and less-fun host (Ryan Phillippe) and with almost all of the characters being replaced with new ones (even Kristen oddly plays a different-named character than the one she plays in the first installment of the sketch). I doubt many people remember that second installment as well as this Timberlake one. The only things I remember about the second installment are Andy playing a voice-of-reason character among the hip hop kids, and then-cast-member Abby Elliott doing a really bad and unconvincing attempt at speaking in an urban voice.
STARS: ***½


ELF AUDITION
(host)’s stepmom Virginiaca tries helping her audition to be a Macy’s elf

— I remember someone (possibly SNL Archives, back when that site used to include tidbit notes for some sketches) pointing out the misspelling of the word “freight” in the sign in the background of this sketch that states “frieght elevator” (the second and third above screencaps for this sketch).
— Speaking of the background, Kenan can unintentionally be seen standing outside of the door entrance, waiting for his cue to enter (the second above screencap for this sketch).
— UGH, the obligatory return of the painfully-unfunny and hacky Starkish– uh, I mean Virginiaca. Ha, that gaffe of me nearly referring to Virginiaca as Starkisha was actually genuine, which just goes to show you how similar those two characters are.
— So I guess we’re supposed to ignore the fact that Virginiaca had a completely different white stepdaughter in the previous installment of this sketch?
— Speaking of Starkisha, the gag with Virginiaca pointlessly using her cellphone to call up the person standing right next to her was actually used before in a Starkisha sketch (the one from the season 30 Paris Hilton episode), further proving my point that there are almost no differences between the Starkisha and Virginiaca sketches, except the fact that the Virginiaca sketches are even worse.
STARS: *


A HOLIDAY MESSAGE FROM NANCY GRACE
Nancy Grace (AMP) is sympathetic to those making false rape accusations

— At least we get a change of pace for Amy’s Nancy Grace, with her being taken out of her TV show.
— Sounds kinda odd hearing the audience very lightly giggling throughout Amy’s serious, non-comedic intro speech about sexual assault. I’m assuming the audience (who has been very energetic tonight in general) is eagerly awaiting the comedic conceit of this sketch.
— Some chuckle-worthy lines from Amy, but something is a little off-putting about this sketch to me. The dour, slow pacing of it, along with the dark (and not the good kind of dark humor that I love) rape-themed subject matter, all feel very odd and out of place in this high-energy, fun-loving Christmas episode.
— I got a laugh from Amy’s threat to pull out the Duke boys’ hearts and eat it.
— Overall, not awful, but I probably would’ve appreciated this sketch more elsewhere. It just felt too wrong, jarring, and momentum-killing for the tone of this episode, especially as the final sketch of the night. How do you close a fun-loving Christmas episode with THIS (the following Timberlake musical performance notwithstanding)?
STARS: **


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “What Goes Around”


BAND SHOT

— The show has apparently had to cut a scheduled sketch at the last minute, as the show comes back from a commercial break just to show the SNL Band playing for a few seconds before the show immediately goes back to another commercial break. At least the rarely-shown-by-this-point SNL Band gets some much-needed airtime, and at least I now know SNL didn’t originally plan on that dour, out-of-place Nancy Grace piece being the final sketch of this otherwise-upbeat Christmas episode. I wonder what cut-at-the-last-minute sketch was scheduled for this spot.


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Not too bad. I don’t find this episode to be anywhere NEAR the classic that a lot of people seem to, but there were a few strong things in the first half of the show (particularly the centerpiece of the show: the priceless and legendary Dick In A Box), and, as I mentioned earlier, almost all of this episode had a fun-loving, upbeat energy (partly helped by Justin Timberlake’s presence), which is nice to see in a Christmas episode, and somewhat helped my mood towards this episode. However, this episode was bogged down by how weak a lot of the recurring stuff was, as well as the odd note the Nancy Grace sketch ended the show on.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Annette Bening)
a slight step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
We enter the year 2007, with host Jake Gyllenhaal

Posted on

December 9, 2006 – Annette Bening / Gwen Stefani, Akon (S32 E8)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

BUSH’S PLAN FOR IRAQ
George W. Bush (JAS) addresses suggestions of Iraq Study Group & others

— Wow, this is the THIRD consecutive cold opening with Jason’s George W. Bush impression. I guess SNL is trying really hard to establish Jason as their new Bush.
— Pretty funny touch with the sly, smug looks Jason’s Bush gives into the camera after each time he reads “Dear Mr. President” at the beginning of each individual letter.
— A laugh from Jason-as-Bush’s line about how velociraptors have been extinct “for, like, 500 years”.
— Meh, the “Bush gives a smug look into the camera after reading the beginning of each letter” gag is getting old, and the audience agrees. Jason had to really exaggerate his third smug look into the camera to milk so much as a tiny chuckle from the audience.
— Three cold openings in and Jason has been coming into his own in the role of Bush, even if he has yet to be given any noteworthy material.
STARS: ***


MONOLOGUE
real estate agents (KRW), (AMP), (MAR) reproach host; Alec Baldwin cameo

— I’m halfway through this monologue, and I can’t find anything to say so far. The “real estate agents are unhappy with Annette Bening’s portrayal of them” premise has started to get old within this.
— An Alec Baldwin cameo, just a few episodes after he hosted, and years before frequent Alec Baldwin cameos would become an annoyance.
— Alec turned out to be only mildly funny in this overall meh monologue. Not even he can save this.
STARS: **


APOCALYPTO
subtitles in Apocalypto trailer show Mel Gibson’s influence on script

— The Lonely Island try their hand at something new, with an “An SNL movie trailer re-cut” segment. I remember thinking back when this originally aired that it was going to become a regular segment. Instead, we end up seeing only one more edition of this segment, and it’s not until THREE SEASONS LATER.
— A cheap and predictable joke, just using infamous anti-Semitic Mel Gibson quotes as subtitles for the Apocalypto trailer, but it’s coming off funny enough here. However, Lonely Island would later do a much better job in their second re-cut movie trailer: Palin 2012.
— The “I smell bagels” subtitle at the end was the funniest part.
STARS: ***


GOOD MORNING: I HATE THIS TOWN
presenters (JAS) & (host) abhor their city

— Meh, not caring for this premise.
— Yeah, two minutes into this, and this is mostly not working for me. What IS working for me is Jason’s solid and fun performance, which is singlehandedly almost completely saving this sketch’s very iffy concept.
STARS: **


TV FUNHOUSE
“Diddy Kiddies” by RBS- young detectives puzzle over what Sean Combs does

— A laugh from the title of this episode being “What Does Diddy Do?, Part 23”.
— A humorous detail with the endless number of singer names credited in two P. Diddy music videos including a few random non-singer celebrities like Dane Cook and Ken Griffey Jr.
— That almost sounds like Lorne doing the voice of the designer.
— Some laughs, but I’m not caring for the pacing of this. Too many dead spots for me, and the premise has gotten boring after a while.
STARS: **


STUDENT-TEACHER ROMANCE
high school teacher’s (host) romantic yen for student (ANS) is unrequited

— Am I watching a prototype of Pete Davidson’s Chad sketches? This sure feels like one. Not only is the premise of this sketch and the dynamic between the two main characters straight out of a Chad sketch, but some of the monotone, brain-dead, one-word sentences that Andy’s teen character responds to Annette’s long-winded dialogue with are “Okay”, which is Chad’s catchphrase. If you told me Andy and Annette have been performing a future Chad script obtained through the magic of time-travel, as crazy as that sounds, I’d probably believe you.
— Annette’s not even trying to make it appear she’s looking anywhere near Andy’s direction as she speaks to him, instead being glued to the cue cards. She’s also a bit stumbly with her lines. If this were pre-taped like the future Chad sketches, Annette would excel in this with her strong acting talent.
— Ugh, now this features Annette pointlessly breaking out into a mock-dramatic musical number. Make it stop!
— Weak ending.
— I’ve never been too big a fan of the Chad sketches (maybe I’ll come around on them when I eventually review them), but they’re so much better than THIS overall sketch. I didn’t find a single redeeming quality in this sketch.
STARS: *


TWO A-HOLES IN A LIVE NATIVITY SCENE
blase A-Holes unconvincingly portray Joseph & Mary in live nativity scene

— I like the reveal of the disjointed one-liners the Two A-Holes are each saying in their respective phone conversation turning out to be delivered to each other, even if I kinda saw it coming after a while.
— Good gag with Annette placing Kristen’s phone into Baby Jesus’ manger so the Two A-Holes will finally look in the correct direction.
— Speaking of people not looking in the correct direction, Annette continues to be glued to the cue cards tonight.
— A very funny line with Kristen telling Annette “You look like Mrs. Brady”. She does have the Carol Brady haircut.
— Solid ending with Jason yelling at the donkey (who he thinks are two little people in a costume) “IT WAS NICE WORKIN’ WITH YOU GUYS! YOU’RE GOOD DUDES!”
— Overall, a nice bounce back for these characters after the slightly-below-par previous installment from the John C. Reilly episode.
STARS: ****


ANGER PROBLEM
fast food manager (FRA) warns (Matthew Fox) & other employees

— This was cut after the preceding episode’s dress rehearsal, which explains why the hell Matthew Fox is randomly in this. I can’t help but imagine what the reaction would be from someone watching this who’s not aware that the preceding episode was hosted by Matthew Fox. I can just picture them wondering to themselves in confusion “Is that the dude from Lost standing in the background? Why in the world did SNL get him to randomly cameo in a small background role as one of the employees in this?” It’s like how I’ve always wondered if viewers who’ve watched Adam Sandler’s second and/or third Denise Show sketches without having seen the first one (where Shannen Doherty, who was hosting SNL that night, played the role of Denise) wondered to themselves why the hell SNL is randomly using a photo of the chick from 90210 for the otherwise-unseen title role of Denise.
— I’m loving Fred’s increasingly funny threats of “(insert number here) seconds, I’m (insert violent action here).” I particularly howled at him telling Amy “20 seconds, my ass…is in your mouth.”
— WTF? The Lost-esque head-explosion/mannequin ending completely…lost me (no lame pun intended), and ended this on a weak note.
— There surprisingly has yet to be a really strong Digital Short up to this point of the season that has knocked it out of the park. There’s also been a strange shortage of Digital Shorts this season so far, with this being only the third one.
STARS: ***½


BUYER BEWARE
paranoid consumer advocates (KET) & (MAR) see scams afoot

— Hmm, the voice Kenan’s using seems like it’ll get grating hearing it from a lead character in a sketch.
— Two mentions in separate sketches tonight of someone waiting in line for a Nintendo Wii.
— Maya’s character is making me laugh.
— Kenan, during a mailbag segment: “I have a letter here from myself……”
— Overall, not bad, despite the dull premise. Kenan’s character voice wasn’t as grating as I was worried it would eventually get, and he had some funny moments. Maya’s performance and one-liners also kept me amused.
— I remember when this originally aired and I didn’t like this sketch (I had an aversion to just about everything starring Kenan around this time, as I was of the opinion back then that he was the weak link of this cast), I was worried this was eventually going to become a recurring sketch, but we end up never seeing it return.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
Gwen Stefani performs “Wind It Up”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Al Gore (DAH) tells about his confusing conversation with Lindsay Lohan

flatulent (KRW) apologizes for stinking up an airplane & Weekend Update

photos of failed hetero unions don’t support WLF’s anti-gay marriage song

— Blah, where is this bit with Darrell-as-Al-Gore’s recounting of his conversation with Lindsay Lohan going?
— Overall, yeah, no real point to that Gore commentary.
— This seems like the type of subtle, awkward character Kristen can sell in spades, despite the dodgy fart-related premise.
— At least SNL refrained from using a fart sound effect when Kristen broke wind.
— The payoff of Kristen’s commentary didn’t work for me.
— Geez, Amy has some real groaners among her Update jokes tonight, even for her standards. Once again, I argue that little-to-nothing has changed with her on Update from the dreadful Fey/Poehler era. I’m still waiting for her to get decent as an anchorperson, and at this point, I’m sadly starting to think it’s never going to happen. I liked her as an anchorperson more when these Poehler/Meyers-era Updates originally aired than I do during my re-watches in this SNL project.
— Hell yeah, another Will Forte Update song!
— Some laughs from Will’s dumb anti-gay marriage preamble to his song.
— I absolutely love the melody of Will’s “Silly Silly Gays” song. Nice touch having Will’s song be assisted by a guitar-playing Fred (making his ONLY live appearance of the night, by the way, and he doesn’t even have any dialogue in it).
— Hilarious turn in Will’s commentary, with him unintentionally displaying photos of failed heterosexual celebrity marriages when trying to support his anti-gay marriage argument. I also love how his panicked reactions to those photos are still being sung in melody to his song.
— There seems to be a theme with lighters throughout tonight’s Update, as Kristen’s character lit a match to try to hide the scent of her fart, Amy used a lighter to light the cellphone she “smoked”, and now Seth is celebrating Will’s song by waving a lit lighter in the air ala a concertgoer.
STARS: **½


MONSTER UNDER THE BED
girl’s (AMP) monster-under-bed claim panics her parents (WLF) & (host)

— I love the turn with Amy’s character’s parents having an extremely paranoid reaction when Amy tells them she thinks a monster is under her bed. Will is particularly fantastic in his insane paranoia here.
— Will’s “friendly shark” analogy was hilarious.
— I love Annette shrieking “YOU IDIOT!” while strangling Amy after Amy reveals she brought chocolate into her room.
— The escalation to this sketch is great.
— Fun appearance from Bill as a jolly, singing monster. Bill is physically unrecognizable under that make-up (the exact same make-up that I believe has been used in various sketches in the past, including one with Will Ferrell as the devil trying to come up with love songs that Garth Brooks can use). You can only tell it’s Bill under that make-up by the voice.
STARS: ****½


VALTREX
Rerun from 11/11/06


AFTER WORK SNACK
Neil, Jean, fellow uptight co-worker Meryl (host) inch toward threesome

— Wow, the second half of this episode starting with Weekend Update has been huge for Will. Very welcome, given how limited his airtime had been lately due to him being busy filming the movie The Brothers Solomon.
— Good to see the return of this very solid, forgotten sketch from the preceding season’s Lindsay Lohan episode.
— Yet another sketch tonight where Annette is blatantly glued to the cue cards. Geez, it’s coming off particularly odd here, even if she is supposed to be playing a socially-awkward character.
— I love the little bit with Kristen taking her time pulling out a plastic bag of tipping change to give a tip to the waiter.
— Another great little Kristen moment, with her very funny line about once doing salsa dancing when under the influence of a very strong ringworm ointment.
— Annette isn’t blending in too well with Will and Kristen’s characterizations here, even if it’s the point that Annette’s character is more self-conscious than Will and Kristen’s characters. Lindsay Lohan did a much better job in her characterization in the first installment of this sketch. Who the hell could’ve ever guessed that a 19-year-old Lindsay Freakin’ Lohan would outdo Annette Bening in her portrayal of a subtle, quirky middle-aged character?
— So many funny little quirks from Will, Kristen, and Annette’s characters here. Too many for me to point out.
— This is using the same surprise twist from the first installment of this sketch, where we suddenly see Will’s character detailing the raunchy night of lovemaking he and his two co-workers have planned with each other, which isn’t a surprise anymore, but is still working for me, especially with the new aspect of constantly using the word “mess” in place of the f-word when talking about sex.
STARS: ****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
Akon performs “I Wanna Love You”


STANFIELD & PARTLOW
lawyers (host) & (BIH) specialize in dowager-to-cat inheritance cases

— Annette botches a line right out of the gate in this.
— Bill’s first brief walk-on was very funny.
— The gag with the customer testimonial just being old black-and-white wacky stock footage of a cat playing ping-pong with a human seemed like it should’ve gotten a bigger laugh than it did.
— All of a sudden, this sketch awkwardly gets cut off mid-progress due to the show running long.
— Overall, not sure how to feel about this sketch as a whole, not just because we DIDN’T get to see the whole sketch, but because, while I liked some moments, some other moments kinda fell flat.
STARS: **½, I guess


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A middling episode. The strong Will Forte-dominated portion bolstered this episode’s quality, but the first half of this episode was, aside from the Two A-Holes sketch, completely unmemorable and contained some really mediocre pieces, and the episode ended on kind of a poor note with the aborted final sketch that wasn’t all that great to begin with. Another reason for me being left with an iffy feeling towards this episode was Annette Bening, who, despite some okay moments, was a much more mediocre host than I ever would’ve expected.
— Am I correct in remembering that this episode never got an NBC rerun? If I am, then I take it as a sign that the people at SNL weren’t too crazy about this episode either.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Matthew Fox)
a step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Justin Timberlake hosts the Christmas episode

Posted on

December 2, 2006 – Matthew Fox / Tenacious D (S32 E7)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

IRAQ PRESS CONFERENCE
Prime Minister al-Maliki (FRA) indicates Iraq is even worse than it seems

— It certainly feels quite odd seeing Will standing across from Jason’s President Bush, considering Jason had recently started replacing Will in that role.
— Oh, god, a translator cold opening? I see Jim Downey strikes once again.
— Yeah, Downey’s dry comedic style is all over Will’s dialogue. This is the type of dryness that worked in spades back in Downey’s prime, but in these later, past-his-prime years of Downey’s tenure, especially in damn translator cold openings, that dry style is often a slog to get through, despite some occasional genuine laughs in tonight’s cold opening, like the flashlights line, and the line about a mouse bomb blowing a guy’s toe off.
STARS: **


MONOLOGUE
floundering Michael Richards (BIH) wants to share SNL gig with host

— The SNL nerd in me has to nitpick how, when talking about his Party Of Five co-stars, Matthew Fox claims Jennifer Love Hewitt hosted before Scott Wolf, when it was actually the other way around.
— I like the dark turn with Matthew detailing the downward spiral he went through just from being the odd man out in terms of Party Of Five stars hosting while that show was still on.
— To nitpick even further, Matthew’s technically not even the odd man out in terms of Party Of Five stars hosting. Lacey Chabert, anyone? Maybe they’re not counting her because of how young she was during Party Of Five’s run (though it’s not like SNL hasn’t had children or especially teens host over the years).
— Pretty fun bit with Matthew’s mention of other members of sitcom ensembles who were the odd man out in terms of hosting SNL.
— A killer impression of Michael-Richards-as-Kramer from Bill, on the heels of Michael Richards’ notorious Laugh Factory incident. I remember Bill later disclosing in an interview that he didn’t even have a Kramer impression in his back pocket before the week of this episode. When this monologue was being concocted, an SNL writer (or someone in the show’s staff) just pointed at Bill and told him “You’re Kramer”, presumably because of Bill’s knack for great celebrity impressions, and the writer was adamant about keeping Bill in the role even after Bill explained he doesn’t have a Kramer impression. Bill then had to study Kramer in a whole bunch of Seinfeld clips in order to get the impression down by that weekend. The fact that he only had a few days to put this Kramer impression together makes it all the more impressive how much he’s nailing it here.
STARS: ***½


SALE MART
overworked & underpaid Sale Mart employees pass savings along to customers

— A big laugh from Kenan’s messed-up teeth.
— This is over already?!? This felt too short, and I had been looking forward to seeing this go further with the humor.
STARS: **½


NANCY GRACE
(KET) & (host) refuse to play the victimization game

— The stock theme music that I mentioned in my review of the previous Nancy Grace sketch this season has been replaced with new music tonight. Odd.
— Kenan’s playing a better political talking head straight man here than he played in the O’Reilly Factor sketch from the preceding episode.
— A clever bit with Amy-as-Nancy-Grace’s whole spiel about how, if Michael Richards sued himself, the case would be called Kramer vs. Kramer.
— A good laugh from Amy-as-Grace’s “The only n-word I would call you is ‘nice’” line to Kenan, as well as Kenan’s reaction to that.
— I like the bit with Amy’s Grace acting out how she would’ve reacted to the O.J. Simpson special if she had watched it.
— The “This pen feels lighter” running bit is a weak variation of the “This chair has been moved” running bit from the first Nancy Grace sketch this season.
— The pacing is badly sluggish during Amy-as-Grace’s interview of Matthew’s character. It’s hurting the momentum of this sketch for me.
STARS: ***


DEEP HOUSE DISH
new sidekick T’Shane (ANS) digs (MAR), (host), (AMP)

— Oh, no. SNL has decided to keep these Deep House Dish sketches going even after Rachel Dratch’s departure.
— A fake-out with an “in memoriam” screen being shown for Rachel’s Tiara Zee character (at least I now know she was born the same year I was: 1984), leading us to initially assume SNL killed her off, only for it to be revealed that she’s just dead to Kenan’s character.
— Andy gets the “honors” of being the new Deep House Dish co-host. All this means is we now get to hear an endless, annoying amount of “Ooh-wee, T-Shane!”s instead of “Ooh-wee, Tiara!”s. Oh, gee, what a huge change-up. At least, unlike Tiara and her alleged boring-ness, T-Shane gets called out by Kenan’s character on differing things each time, not that that’s much funnier.
— Maya makes her very first appearance in a Deep House Dish installment (the previous installments were all when she happened to be absent from SNL for maternal reasons), which seems very fitting, as she was born to play singers in these Deep House Dish sketches, and James Anderson (the writer of these sketches) always seems to love writing musical numbers for Maya.
— I like Matthew just dropping his mic and walking off the stage in an aloof, badass manner at the end of his musical performance.
— Amy continues her streak of appearing as a different singer in every single Deep House Dish up to this point.
— Amy’s Cologne For Christmas song at least has a very catchy beat, I admit.
STARS: **


“LOST” THEORIES
in an elevator, Lost fans (FRA), (AMP), (MAR), (KET), (ANS) accost host

— I love Fred’s little smirk when he recognizes Matthew.
— Fred is always good at getting laughs out of roles like this.
— A lot of entertaining and relatable realism in this sketch so far (realism that the cast is pulling off so well), and a good spoof of the Lost craze among people. Even though I’ve never been a Lost viewer myself, I can still follow and enjoy what this sketch is going for, because having to deal with people following the craze for hot TV shows is always relatable, regardless of what show it is.
— I love Andy just smugly saying “Purgatory” as soon as he recognizes Matthew.
— A laugh from Maya casually deciding to lie down on the elevator floor when she’s embarrassed to find out Matthew is married with two children.
STARS: ****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Kickapoo”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Jesse Jackson (DAH) & Al Sharpton (KET) propose “Kramer” as new N-word

Aunt Linda is perplexed & perturbed by Borat, Casino Royale, Apocalypto

AMP editorializes against recent trend of ladies’ uncovered naughty bits

Whitney Houston (MAR) is flummoxed by a crank phone call

— This is the first Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton joint Update commentary since the days when Jerry Minor regularly played Sharpton in these commentaries. I prefer Jerry’s take.
— Jackson and Sharpton deciding “Kramer” is the new n-word is pretty funny.
— Geez, Aunt Linda has become recurring ALREADY, after debuting only two episodes prior? I found this character decent in her debut, but this doesn’t seem like it will have legs as a recurring bit.
— Yep, just as I was worried, Aunt Linda’s routine is suffering diminishing returns tonight. I’m especially tired of her ratings system gimmick, which is increasingly coming off more corny than genuinely funny.
— Oh, I have good memories of this straight-to-camera editorial Amy’s doing about the then-current trend of young female celebrities “flashing beav” in public. I recall this being one of Amy’s better pieces from her Update tenure.
— Yep, Amy’s editorial is just as solid as I had remembered. I particularly love her comment about how she remembers the days when a “lady garden” was as big as a slice of New York pizza before turning into an upside-down John Waters mustache. I can’t help but feel like this is material that Tina Fey would’ve delivered back in her prime years of Weekend Update (2000-2002), but Amy is performing it well in her own right, and it’s a refreshing change of pace from her usual Update persona.
— Our first Maya-as-Whitney-Houston Update commentary this season, which I recall going on to appear awfully frequently season, much like Aunt Linda.
— The concept of Maya’s Whitney reacting to a prank phone call is pretty funny, but blah, Maya’s execution of it is far more annoying than funny to me.
STARS: ***


MOUNTAIN MAN
AMP, KRW, MAR, Emily Spivey [real] twist script to make host kiss them

— I’m enjoying the exaggerated goofiness of this sketch so far, especially Amy and Kristen’s accents.
— Oh, I’m liking the fourth-wall break with Kristen’s “discreet” directions to Matthew on how to kiss her in this sketch.
— Ah, now this sketch has FULLY broken the fourth wall, with it being acknowledged that this sketch has been “re-written” to have Matthew do and say a whole bunch of sexual things towards Amy and Kristen. I’m loving this meta turn. Feels kinda like it’s in the tradition of those great fourth-wall-breaking Killer Bees sketches from the original SNL era.
— A very funny brief cutaway to SNL writer Emily Spivey, right after we’re told she wrote herself into the scene.
— Oh, now this has gotten even greater with Maya entering as Lorne, which also proves that just about every SNL cast member can do a spot-on Lorne impression.
STARS: ****½


HISTORY BUFF
home from college, math whiz (ANS) comes out to history buff father (WLF)

— Yet another episode this season where Will barely appears in any sketches. Again, I have to ask, is he busy filming a movie?
— I love Will’s character’s habit of quickly spouting off the birth and/or death dates of historical figures he casually brings up.
— Will’s screaming, glass-shattering outburst when Andy reveals he’s a math whiz is classic Forte.
— Kristen’s over-dramatic, horrified reactions to Andy coming out as a math whiz are great, as is how this then turns into Andy and Will both trying to one-up each other by angrily spouting off random math/history facts to each other.
— I like how Matthew’s random entrance as the professor of the history of math is upping the absurdity of this already-delightfully-absurd sketch.
— Will’s tearful reveal that he never learned to count is absolutely priceless.
— When the family wonders “Who was that strange man?” after Matthew’s character has randomly disappeared, I got a big laugh from Will’s line “I don’t know…..but he stole our television.”
— An overall perfectly executed sketch, and one of my all-time favorite oddball Will Forte sketches.
STARS: *****


THE FIRST CHOCOLATE
dramatized theory blames chocolate for downfall of Mayan civilization

— Given the subject matter of the sketch that preceded this, it’s unintentionally funny how this is a History Channel sketch.
— The premise itself is only mildly funny, but Fred is performing this simplistic material really well. Matthew is pretty good here too. The execution of this sketch is giving it a real charm that’s fun.
— Bill’s whole bit was fantastic.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “The Metal”; The Metal (Jason Reed) smites genres

— Oh, this is incredible with how most of the SNL cast is getting involved in this performance, with each cast member representing a different genre of music trying to take down heavy metal. One of the most fun and out-of-the-ordinary musical performances in SNL history.


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A fairly solid episode, bolstered by the very strong post-Weekend Update half, which started off with a fantastic one-two punch of the Mountain Man and History Buff sketches, then gave us the charming First Chocolate sketch, and then finished off the show with an absolutely epic cast-involved Tenacious D musical performance.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS

 


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Ludacris)
a big step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Annette Bening

Posted on

November 18, 2006 – Ludacris (S32 E6)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

A MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT
George W. Bush (JAS) has literally gotten USA into another Vietnam War

— Jason has replaced the still-on-the-show Will Forte as SNL’s latest George W. Bush impersonator, making him the show’s FIFTH Bush impersonator during Bush’s presidency so far. Absolutely insane that SNL has gone through that many Bush impersonators over the course of just SIX YEARS. (Sure, SNL previously rotated a lot of people in the Ronald Reagan role during his presidency in the 80s, but that’s understandable, as SNL’s cast went through many big overhauls during Reagan’s presidency, unlike SNL’s cast during Bush’s presidency.) Tonight’s sudden re-casting of the Bush role after Forte had been SNL’s regular Bush for a few years completely blindsided SNL fans at this time, especially since there was no prior announcement of this re-casting before tonight’s episode originally aired. I remember in the live discussion thread for this episode on the now-defunct saturday-night-live.com message board, as soon as this cold opening first showed Jason as Bush after the typical “And now, a message from the president of the United States” intro, many members of the board, including myself, simultaneously flocked to the live discussion thread to post literally the exact same message: “WTF?!? Sudeikis?!?” Haha, we were absolutely SHOCKED at this re-casting.
— Funny announcement from Jason’s Bush of America now being at war with Vietnam.
— Jason’s Bush portrayal isn’t bad so far.
— Towards the end, this cold opening has started dying with the audience.
— Overall, I wish I had more to say for Jason’s first outing as Bush, but I found this cold opening okay as a whole. Wish it ended better than it did, though.
STARS: ***


OPENING MONTAGE
— Don Pardo once again proves how incredibly old he’s getting, by bizarrely and inexplicably mispronouncing the name Ludacris as “loo-DAY-cris”, not once, but TWICE. Let’s just say this earned about as many “WTF?!?”s in the aforementioned live discussion thread for this episode on the saturday-night-live.com message board as the sudden re-casting of the Bush role did. Also, something funny about Don’s “loo-DAY-cris” mispronunciation is that it rhymes with the correct pronunciation of the name Sudeikis. And know what’s even funnier about THAT? When Jason Sudeikis was just an SNL writer before being added to the cast, I mistakenly assumed his last name was pronounced “SOO-duh-kis”, much like how the name Ludacris is correctly pronounced.


MONOLOGUE
host’s old friend Rick ‘Diculous’ (KET) wants credit for stage name idea

— A mildly funny bit with Ludacris differentiating the use of his stage name and his real name, but nothing special.
— A laugh from the exaggerated size of the antenna on Kenan’s old-school 90s cellphone.
— Not sure what else to say about this monologue. I hate to use the term “only mildly funny” again for this monologue, but I can’t think of a better description of this monologue as a whole.
STARS: **½


YOUNG DOUGLAS: HYPIN’ THE CLASSICS
classic songs get rap complements on hype man Young Douglas’ (host) album

— It almost feels like Ludacris might as well just be playing himself in this sketch instead of a fictional character (even though Ludacris isn’t a hype man). This sketch is still working decently, though.
— The “You’re Beautiful (That Ass!)” duet is very funny.
— A very Kenan Thompson-y gesture with Kenan not even pretending to make his trumpet-blowing look convincing.
STARS: ***


THE BITCHSLAP METHOD
Dr. Bitchslap’s (host) marriage advice infomercial prescribes face swats

— A laugh from Ludacris’ character’s surname being Bitchslap.
— I like Bill as Amy’s now-whipped (or, should I say, now-bitchslapped) husband.
— As Jason’s character is putting his arm around his wife Kristen’s shoulder a little roughly, Kristen’s soft little “Ow” while keeping a nervous smile on her face is the type of thing she’s always great at getting laughs out of.
— The ending showing the various Bitchslap Method books came off a little awkward.
STARS: **½


THE O’REILLY FACTOR
Bill O’Reilly’s (DAH) potential boycott of Def Jam is a hollow threat

— After just using his real voice in previous Bill O’Reilly sketches, which was a surprisingly lazy move for a so-called master of impressions, Darrell finally attempts to actually imitate Bill O’Reilly’s voice tonight. It’s an improvement, but I still prefer Jeff Richards’ take on Bill O’Reilly. Also, too little, too late for Darrell to finally improve his impression of O’Reilly, given the fact that this ends up being the last appearance it ever makes.
— Kenan stretched out his intentionally-awkward, silent reaction to the first ridiculous question from Darrell’s O’Reilly way too long.
— The whole interview portion with Kenan in general is too slow-paced, even if there are some chuckles.
— Pretty funny to see Ludacris playing a professional political talking head, and quite well, might I add.
— I don’t know how to react to the fact that Ludacris, a non-comedian, is giving a FAR better performance in his portion of this sketch than Kenan, a freakin’ sketch comedy veteran, gave in HIS portion of this sketch.
— As usual, some laughs from the mailbag segment.
— Overall, some decent parts, but as a whole, this sketch did NOT do it for me. The laughs were too few and far in between, the sketch’s pacing was weak (especially during Kenan’s performance), and the overall sketch was WAAAAAY too long (it was seriously about EIGHT MINUTES, I shit you not). I am so glad this ends up being the final O’Reilly Factor installment with Darrell.
STARS: **


BOOTY BIDNESS WORKWEAR
host extends naughty slogans to women’s workplace attire

— This is a revamped version of a commercial that had gotten cut from at least one dress rehearsal (if not multiple dress rehearsals) earlier this season.
— Some laughs from the inappropriate sexual-related messages on businesswomen’s suits.
— Ludacris is absolutely perfect as the spokesperson here. I’m guessing the previous version of this commercial that got cut after dress rehearsal didn’t work anywhere near as well without the footage added in of Ludacris.
STARS: ***


BLIZZARD MAN
at a recording session, host ballyhoos Blizzard Man’s (ANS) dorky raps

— Andy’s Blizzard Man character makes its debut.
— I love Andy’s very early 90s look. SNL’s been getting some mileage lately out of early 90s-looking costumes, between Andy’s 1992 exercise gear in the preceding episode’s Out-Of-Breath Jogger From 1992 sketch, Kenan’s early 90s hip-hop outfit in tonight’s monologue, and now Andy’s Blizzard Man costume.
— I love Jason’s intentionally corny delivery of “Now you’re talkin’ my language, Luda!”
— Some really good laughs from Andy’s incredibly cheesy, whitebred raps, especially how it always immediately follows him prefacing the songs by doing actual solid and hardcore hype-man ad-libs into the mic. Very fun performance from Andy here.
— Meh, I could do without this sketch’s choice to do the “the camera cuts to a close-up of each straight man character having a frozen unpleasant facial expression while witnessing something odd the lead comedic character is doing” trope. That makes this feel too much like a damn James Anderson-written sketch, even though he obviously didn’t write this. I will say that I do like the comical intense look on Ludacris’ face (the last above screencap for this sketch) when the camera shows him jamming to Blizzard Man’s corny rapping during the aforementioned sequence showing a close-up of each straight man’s facial reaction.
— Funny twist at the end, with the Billboard chart that Blizzard Man’s song is listed #1 under turning out to be a chart of Least Bought Albums (screencap a little below). Not only that, but there’s an interesting subtle self-reference from Lonely Island: the #2 song on that Billboard chart is from Bing Bong Brothers, which was the name of a fictional R&B group played by Akiva Shaffer and Jorma Taccone in a pre-SNL Lonely Island music video.

STARS: ****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host performs “Money Maker”


WEEKEND UPDATE
John Mark Karr (BIH) claims responsibility for high-profile crimes

AMP & SEM study guest seating chart for Tom Cruise & Katie Holmes wedding

following a weak joke, Bobby Knight (JAS) gets in SEM’s face

to editor (MAR) of a teen magazine, donating food is path to weight loss

— A very weak opening Bush joke from Amy.
— Bill killing it in yet another solo Update commentary this season. His John Mark Karr portrayal and dialogue are a lot of fun and are cracking me up so much.
— A fairly whatever bit with Amy and Seth breaking down who the guests were at Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes’ wedding. Too easy of a joke for my likes.
— Oh, I like this random bit with Jason as Bobby Knight chewing out Seth for his lame Tobey Maguire/Spider Man joke. And I’m always up for a showcase of Jason’s Will Ferrell-esque ability to play intimidating, screaming madmen.
— I could do without Amy’s bad, corny ad-libs after Jason’s Bobby Knight made his exit.
— Maya’s commentary is decent, and I’m enjoying her performance.
STARS: ***


POOL WATCH
urban lifeguard (host) isn’t ready to get in the water

— Lame stereotypical black jokes at the beginning, with the titles of black CW shows.
— Ugh, the screechy voice Maya’s using here is hard on the ears throughout this sketch.
— More weak stereotypical black jokes.
— A laugh from Ludacris wearing swimming trunks under his speedo.
— Believe it or not, Fred’s brief appearance at the end of this sketch as an unconscious body, a role that might as well have been played by an extra, is Fred’s ONLY appearance all night. Jesus Christ. Even odder, in dress rehearsal, Fred’s role was played by Will (who, by the way, has yet to be seen ANYWHERE in tonight’s live episode so far). I assume the reason for this role being re-cast from Will to Fred after dress rehearsal is because SNL felt bad that Fred was left with no appearances after the dress rehearsal cuts were made before the live show. I dunno, part of me feels that an SNL repertory player making their only appearance of an episode in a 5-second non-speaking role as an unconscious body is, in some ways, even more demeaning than making no appearances at all.
STARS: **


HAIR TRANSPLANT
shady plastic surgeon (host) schemes to steal (WLF)’s Elton John hair

— Will finally makes his first (and ONLY) appearance of the whole night. This, coupled with the fact that, earlier in this episode, SNL had unexpectedly re-cast the Bush role (and keep in mind that it wasn’t known yet among SNL fans that Will himself asked to be taken out of the Bush role, and thus, fans incorrectly assumed that Will got the Bush role yanked away from him against his wishes), made a lot of online SNL fans worry about Will’s job security at SNL, fearing he may be in for an upcoming firing at the end of this season. In fact, Will’s airtime has really taken a hit in the first half of this season in general. In a lot of episodes in this half of the season, he typically averages a measly 1-2 appearances per show, though his amount of airtime (thankfully) ends up returning to normal somewhere in the second half of the season, and, as we know now, he doesn’t end up getting fired after this season. I wonder what the reason is for his big decrease in airtime in the first half of this season. Was he busy filming a movie? “The Brothers Solomon”, perhaps?
— Speaking of the worry that a lot of SNL fans had for Will with the combination of his Bush impression suddenly being given to another cast member and Will not appearing in this episode until towards the end, I remember how Will making his entrance in this Hair Transplant sketch with a head bandage made one online SNL fan initially worry for a second that Will’s head bandage was REAL, with that SNL fan mistakenly assuming Will had suffered a head injury earlier that week and that that was the reason for both SNL re-casting the Bush role tonight and Will barely appearing in this episode. An odd misconception. I’m pretty sure if a cast member ever suffered a horrific head injury earlier in the week of an episode, an injury horrific enough to require a head bandage, there’d be an announcement of this injury sometime before the episode would air. I doubt SNL would just have a head-injured cast member waltz onto a sketch wearing their big-ol’ head bandage with no prior warning to us viewers.
— I love Ludacris preparing to jet the hell out of his office right before he reveals Will’s hair transplant.
— Very funny reveal of Will having the hairtop of a black man after the transplant.
— A lot of mentions of Atlanta in tonight’s episode.
— Will is playing his naive straight man character really well. Even just his way of cornily saying in shock “What in sam hill…?!?” when finally seeing his hair transplant made me laugh out loud.
— Hilarious reveal of Ludacris having switched hairtops with Will, just because Ludacris desperately wanted Will’s Elton John-like hair.
— I love the absurdity of this sketch, and Ludacris is proving to be actually really adept at this absurdist material. I would call this another oddball Will Forte sketch, and in some ways, it IS, but this sketch seems to be focusing more on Ludacris than on Will. And even though this sketch has kind of an oddly hollow, quiet, slow atmosphere, making it almost feel like a fugitive from this season’s wretched John C. Reilly episode, it is definitely working for me here.
STARS: ****


LESBIAN CRUISE
captain (host) futilely hopes lesbian cruise will become a porno fantasy

— I like Kristen’s little “Is…is he supposed to be drinking?” when she sees the captain holding up a glass of champagne.
— Not caring for where this sketch is going AT ALL, though Ludacris is, once again tonight, performing this well. Even something about the way he said “Yes, Arizona?” when Amy called his name made me laugh.
STARS: **


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
host & Mary J. Blige [real] perform “Runaway Love”


TWO OLD MEN
in a diner, old guys (DAH) & (host) question the worth of modernity

— Wow, Darrell starring in a non-impression role? AND IN THE 10-TO-1 SKETCH?!? Two huge rarities in one for Darrell.
— I’m liking the premise of this, and Darrell and Ludacris are surprisingly making a good duo, playing off of each other really well.
— The audience is getting lots of amusement from Darrell’s increasingly-hanging-off fake mustache. It’s adding to the fun nature of this sketch.
— A good laugh from Ludacris’ question about why companies can’t combine the “no pee” medicine with the “stiffy” medicine.
— Now Darrell is starting to crack up a little due to his hanging-off mustache, making the audience laugh even more.
— When Darrell is struggling to ask Ludacris “Do you….do you…” while stifling his laughter, Ludacris cuts him off with a fantastic ad-lib: “I know that your damn mustache is hangin’ off, I know that!” Priceless.
— Interestingly, after the aforementioned ad-lib from Ludacris, both he and Darrell, in character, signal for the sketch to end, without Darrell having even gotten to ask Ludacris the question he was supposed to, as if they know they can’t top the unscripted hilarious moment that had just happened. After this signaling from Ludacris and Darrell, the sketch indeed ends. That was odd, but actually kinda cool. I can’t think of many other times in SNL history that a sketch ended in this manner, with performers signaling to the show to cut the sketch off after it peaked with a great ad-lib. The only other instance that comes to mind right now is in a Norm Macdonald Weekend Update from season 22, where, after getting a HUGE audience reaction from an absolutely hilarious and classic ad-lib in which he ate fake vomit on the Update desk left over by Will Ferrell (who had just done an Update commentary reacting to Ellen DeGeneres coming out of the closet), Norm decides not to do the rest of the Update jokes (a photo for the next joke even shows up on the news screen next to him), and instead just says to the camera “Let’s just end it”, and then turns to the other camera and delivers his usual end-of-Update sign-off.
— Very fun closing sketch overall.
STARS: ****


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Meh, a lukewarm episode. Almost completely forgettable. There was still a pretty good number of strong highlights, though. And Ludacris was a fun, likable, and solid host, and made even the weaker material of the night less worse than it otherwise would’ve been, even that bad Lesbian Cruise sketch.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Alec Baldwin)
a big step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Matthew Fox / Tenacious D

Posted on

November 11, 2006 – Alec Baldwin / Christina Aguilera (S32 E5)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

A MESSAGE FROM THE SPEAKER ELECT
Nancy Pelosi’s (KRW) platform confirms worst fears about Democrat control

— Interesting seeing Kristen at this early stage of her SNL tenure front-and-center in an address-to-the-nation cold opening, for her first time ever.
— Kristen’s Nancy Pelosi: “We Americans have always been a religious people, a member on my staff tells me.”
— So many funny announcements from Kristen’s Nancy Pelosi, even the line about gerbils.
— I love Will’s casual, affable delivery while dressed in a ridiculous S&M outfit.
— A very fun spoof of democrats.
STARS: ****


MONOLOGUE
host & 30 Rock co-stars TIF & TRM give their credentials

— As the camera is panning down to the home base stage during Alec Baldwin’s entrance, two people in the floor seats actually give Alec a standing ovation (screencap below).

— I’m getting some laughs from Alec’s smug bragging about how he has no competition in terms of stars on the struggling NBC.
— Tina Fey in her first cameo after leaving the cast.
— Tracy Morgan’s various Star Wars one-liners are funny, especially his very Tracy Morgan-y one-liner “I’m personal friends with Obi-Wan Kenobi.”
— I love Alec imitating Tracy’s voice when saying “And I’m five to infinity!” Alec would later reprise this Tracy Morgan vocal imitation in SNL’s 40th Anniversary Special, when him and Tina do a tribute of sorts to the then-ailing Tracy (this was when he was recovering from his tragic car accident).
STARS: ***½


E-ZDATE.COM
online matchmaker e-zdate.com is a thinly-veiled front for prostitution

— Believe it or not, this is the FIRST pre-taped commercial to air all season. I can’t think of any other seasons before or after this where the first-aired pre-taped commercial was THIS far into the season. I think season 42 comes close; IIRC, the first pre-taped commercial of that season to air, “Chonk”, isn’t until the third episode of the season.
— Kenan’s line about “the behind” being the location he chose to spend his date was hilarious.
— Aside from Kenan’s aforementioned line and another laugh, this overall commercial didn’t do much for me.
STARS: **


BRITNEY’S DIVORCE
Britney Spears’ (AMP) grievances justify her divorce from Kevin Federline

— Well, I see an annoying remnant of the Tina Fey era, in which sketches overly obsessed with celebrity gossip and pop culture are placed upfront in episodes, has manifested itself into the early stages of this new post-Fey era. Yeah, not too thrilled about that.
— Amy-as-Britney’s line about getting “panty crickets” after Kevin Federline met Alyssa Milano was hilarious.
— Funny ending reveal from Britney about leaving her babies in the car for an hour.
— Despite some laughs, I was a little lukewarm on this sketch as a whole, and it probably would’ve worked better for me had it been placed later in the episode.
STARS: **½


SADDAM’S DEFENSE TEAM
condemned Saddam Hussein (host) meets with his lawyers (BIH) & (FRA)

— Alec’s Saddam Hussein impression from Alec’s season 31 episode returns for its final appearance.
— Two sketches IN A ROW that center around a famous person meeting with their lawyer(s)? Feels kinda redundant.
— Only 40 seconds into this sketch, and I’m already VERY sick of all the unfunny pop culture/TV show references Alec’s Saddam is constantly making. SNL has such an annoying habit of having foreign dictators do that.
— I do kinda like the touch of Alec’s Saddam sticking his head back into the room at the very end of this sketch (right as the screen is about to fade to black) to loudly join in on Bill and Fred’s nervous laughter, a move on Alec’s part that I’m assuming is an ad-lib.
— Overall, this sketch did almost NOTHING for me. Between the Britney sketch and this (and even the e-zdate.com commercial), this episode has not been starting off well post-monologue.
STARS: *½


VALTREX
(AMP)’s husband’s (host) Valtrex use calls his fidelity into question

— Wow, two pre-taped commercials early in tonight’s episode. Maybe SNL’s making up for lost time.
— Seeing a medication commercial with Alec paired with a female cast member as his wife reminds me of the Tylenol BM commercial Alec did with Rachel Dratch the preceding season.
— Alec’s trademark delivery is so perfect for this, and the implications of his character’s infidelity are funny.
— Overall, short and sweet.
STARS: ***½


CARPOOL
unlikely conversational missteps plague carpoolers (host) & (KRW)

— A very well-loved sketch.
— Very funny part with Kristen revealing that the Celine Dion song playing on the car radio is a CD, followed by Kristen disclosing to Alec a hilarious dramatic story about once having been rescued by Celine Dion.
— I’m absolutely loving how Alec and Kristen are each being offended by literally every single thing the other says or does, as it brings back a very touchy memory for them. And the escalation of the absurdity to these offenses is fantastic. There was a sketch with a similar premise in the season 13 Angie Dickinson episode (as I mentioned in this review of that episode), but I doubt many people remember that sketch compared to this one, and that’s understandable, as the Angie Dickinson sketch was, while not bad, completely unmemorable, and pales in comparison to the expert way this Carpool sketch is executing the similar premise.
— The on-point delivery from both Alec and Kristen is complementing this material so perfectly. Kristen is particularly fantastic here. One of her all-time best SNL performances.
— Hilarious reveal of Kristen being metal from the waist down.
— And there’s the moment that solidifies this already-fantastic sketch as a bonafide classic: Alec immediately blurting out “Bobby McFerrin raped my grandmother” in response to Kristen attempting to lighten the mood by affably saying “Don’t worry, be happy.” I remember when this sketch originally aired, that Bobby McFerrin one-liner of Alec’s gave me one of the hardest laughs I have EVER gotten from SNL. I’ll never forget that.
— Alec’s priceless Bobby McFerrin line is capped off well by the song “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” immediately playing on the car radio when Kristen turns it on in an attempt to get Alec’s mind off of what he had just said about Bobby McFerrin. Great way to end this sketch. I heard there’s some versions of this sketch that shorten the ending, fading to black immediately after Alec’s Bobby McFerrin one-liner, presumably because of music licensing issues involving the use of the song “Don’t Worry, Be Happy”. I can’t remember if I’ve ever seen this edited version of the sketch, but the shortened ending sounds like it would still be a perfect way to end this sketch.
— Overall, an absolute masterpiece.
STARS: *****


TV FUNHOUSE
“Kobayashi” [real] by RBS- champion hot dog eater saves the day in anime

— A hilarious and brilliant idea of a Takeru Kobayashi-starring anime superhero series. And as Robert Smigel has proven with the Ah-Lin The Skater Man cartoon from season 23, he’s adept at spoofing the anime genre.
— The cutaway to an anime Refrigerator Perry saying a shocked “Damn!” was hilarious.
— Very strong execution of this TV Funhouse.
— Wow, this is even involving the real Kobayashi in live-action interstitial scenes.
— A big laugh from the brief cutaway to a child puking in the toilet during the upbeat live-action musical scene with Kobayashi and the children.
STARS: ****½


THE PLATINUM LOUNGE
Steve Martin [real] rues host’s 13th SNL gig; MAS & Paul McCartney cameos

— Oh, words cannot express how I love that SNL is doing a variation of the Five-Timers Club concept, by having a Platinum Lounge for people who have hosted over 12 times.
— A big laugh from Alec immediately going from telling Maya he’ll allow her to visit the exclusive Platinum Lounge club to telling her a half-hearted, dismissive “I’m sorry, Maya, I did what I could” when the doorman doesn’t allow her into the club.
— Steve Martin! And it’s wonderful that SNL is continuing the premise of the Steve Martin/Alec Baldwin rivalry that was established in Steve’s episode from the preceding season.
— Ha, Martin Short randomly playing the waiter of the Platinum Lounge! And I love how Steve comments on that by just telling Alec “It’s sad.”
— Very fun bit with Steve’s attempts at poisoning Alec’s drink.
— I love Steve trying to make Alec continue looking out the window while panickedly trying to wipe up Alec’s drink that has overflowed after Steve poisoned it.
— Alec, while violently kicking Steve on the floor: “I…was in…Schwetty….Balls!”
— As an SNL nerd, and the fact that doing this SNL project has basically and unintentionally made an SNL historian out of me, I love how, when Alec is rapidly running down the dates of all of Steve Martin’s hosting stints, he mumbles the actual dates of Steve’s first few episodes (October 23, 1976, February 26, 1977, September 24, 1977, three times in 1978) before resorting to just mumbling fast-paced gibberish for the rest of the dates.
— Paul McCartney! And judging from Alec’s reaction, Alec was not expecting this. His shocked facial reaction to Paul’s cameo looks 100% genuine. I’m assuming SNL sprung this as a surprise to Alec. I recall hearing that a surprise Paul McCartney cameo being sprung on Alec would later happen again in a live 30 Rock episode. Is that true? I’ve never seen that 30 Rock episode myself.
— The ending between Steve, Paul, and Martin seems ad-libbed, adding further evidence that Paul’s cameo was most likely thrown in at the last minute.
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Ain’t No Other Man”


WEEKEND UPDATE
process of moving Donald Rumsfeld (DAH) from his office allegorizes Iraq

AMP’s irked Aunt Linda (KRW) gives eye-rolling reviews of new movies

waiter’s (ANS) misplaced decimal point produced Tom Cruise’s $10,000 meal

 

— Interesting change of pace by having Seth do a live (though we’re told it’s taped) interview of Darrell’s Donald Rumsfeld on a different set.
— I’m not caring for the the bit with Kenan’s mover character during the Rumsfeld interview, and how Kenan’s failure to move the couch is alluding to the Iraq situation.
— The overall Donald Rumsfeld/couch mover segment fell badly flat for me. SNL would later replace this segment with the dress rehearsal version in reruns, in which a lot of the lines are completely different, and the overall segment works MUCH better than the live version of it did. The fact that they re-wrote the piece between dress rehearsal and the live show probably at least partly explains why the live version came off so weak and poorly executed.
— After the Donald Rumfseld interview ends and Amy thanks Seth for his “taped” report, I love Seth then re-entering the Update set, walking up to Amy, and saying, while looking into the camera, “You’re welcome, Amy”, comically breaking the illusion that the Rumsfeld interview Seth had just done was pre-taped.
— Kristen’s big night continues, as she gets her very first Weekend Update showcase (unless I’m forgetting something).
— A decent characterization from Kristen as Aunt Linda, and this commentary isn’t bad. However, this seems like something best left as a one-off. I get the feeling I’m not going to care for this character’s subsequent appearances when I have to review them (and it doesn’t help that she makes A LOT of appearances this season, IIRC).
— Seth has been having some killer jokes tonight. Amy has also had a few.
— I love Andy’s flat “Ohhh, noooo” when realizing he overcharged Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes on their meal. This is the type of humor that Andy can make work.
— Overall, Amy and Seth had their best Update up to this point. Too bad the guest commentaries weren’t up to the same level and brought the rating down a little bit, even if I liked two of the three commentaries.
STARS: ***½


THE TONY BENNETT SHOW
tribute act (Tony Bennett) helps Tony Bennett (host) with duet

— Alec’s wig and make-up as Tony Bennett looks a little more spot-on than usual here, but that may be because of a certain special thing in store for us later in this sketch…
— Andy is perfect as a douchey Kevin Federline.
— And there he is: the real Tony Bennett. Tonight’s episode has been having some fantastic cameos.
— I get the feeling Tony stopping Alec mid-sentence to humorously tell him “You got a great nose job” was an ad-lib.
— I love the reveal of Tony’s stage name as a Tony Bennett impersonator: Phony Bennett.
— Out of SNL’s many “impersonator meets the celebrity they’re impersonating” sketches, which can get annoyingly cheesy and cliche at times, this is definitely one of the better and more charming ones.
— The usual funny spiel from Alec’s Bennett whenever he does his mid-sketch promotional ad.
— Nice duet from Alec and Tony at the end.
STARS: ****½


BRAZILIAN BAR
in a Brazil lounge, gauche roue (host) fails to charm (KRW), (ANS), (AMP)

— A fun one-off character for Alec, one that he seems like he can play to perfection.
— Alec to Amy: “You know what part of a woman I like best? And I’m not kidding about this: the vagina.”
— The occasional musical interstitial bits with Maya and Fred are a funny touch to this sketch.
— What’s the point of Jason even being in this sketch? He’s reduced to the role of a background extra, standing in the back of the set as a barely-noticeable bartender, and has no lines, nothing to do, and the camera doesn’t even show a remotely close shot of him. Odd. This has been a very light night for him in general.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Hurt”


A MOMENT WITH THE OUT-OF-BREATH JOGGER FROM 1992
The Out-Of-Breath Jogger’s moment from 1992 yields bits of nostalgia

— Well, this sure was an unlikely sketch to bring back.
— This isn’t working quite as well as the 1982 jogger one from earlier this season, but I’m still laughing. It also helps that I have somewhat of an obsession with early-mid 90s pop culture (probably due to those years being the peak years of my childhood).
— Something interesting I realized about this sketch: the amount of time between 1992, the year this sketch is taking place in, and 2006, the year this episode originally aired in, is only 14 years, the exact same amount of time between 2006 and our current year, 2020. This kinda blows my mind, as 1992 and all of its pop culture felt much older to me in 2006 than 2006 and all of its pop culture feels to me today. Can anyone else relate to this? Then again, I was only a little kid in 1992, which probably explains it. I’m guessing 2006 and its pop culture now feel really old to people who were little kids that year.
— Also, the fact that 1992 and 2006 have the exact same amount of years between them as 2006 and 2020 means that Andy could conceivably now do an “Out-of-Breath Jogger from 2006” sketch, a fact that further blows my mind. I’d actually be very curious to see him do that sketch.
STARS: ***


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest & Tony Bennett [real] perform “Steppin’ Out With My Baby”


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— While a little more flawed than I feel a lot of people remember this episode as being, this episode as a whole definitely had a classic vibe to it. The misfires from early on in the episode bring the overall quality down a bit, but this was still a strong episode. A lot of what worked in this episode was absolutely killer, we got two sketches tonight that received a perfect five-star rating from me (Carpool and The Platinum Lounge), and we got lots of special, fun, and very impressive cameos. The Christina Aguilera/Tony Bennett duet at the end of the show also added to the special, epic feel of this episode. And, of course, it helps that we had a veteran host like Alec Baldwin doing his usual terrific, expert job. An overall great episode, and one of Alec’s best. SNL has been on a real hot streak these past two episodes.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Hugh Laurie)
a very slight step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Ludacris

Posted on

October 28, 2006 – Hugh Laurie / Beck (S32 E4)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

KAZAKHSTAN MINISTRY OF INFORMATION
Borat (Sacha Baron Cohen) promotes Kazakhstan during paid announcement

— A message from Lorne? I see we’re already starting off with something different.
— A laugh from Lorne taking the time to pour himself a drink while telling us about the drastic budget cuts NBC has had to make lately.
— Right before Lorne is handed his sandwich by someone, the audience suddenly breaks out into WILD applause out of nowhere. This is presumably because off-camera, a certain special guest who we’re about to see onscreen was spotted by the audience (the set he’s standing at was probably lit up at this point), but I remember a lot of online SNL fans back at this time in 2006 speculating if the applause was for the person who handed Lorne his sandwich, a person who is mostly off-camera, except for their hand holding the plate with the sandwich. Some of those SNL fans not only wondered if that person handing Lorne the sandwich was a famous person, but they even assumed it might’ve been the recently-departed-from-the-show Tina Fey, because, upon being given his sandwich, Lorne says what sounds like “Thank you, Tina!” (it’s hard to tell what name Lorne is saying under all the wild applause from the audience). Pretty silly to think Tina Fey would make such a brief, off-camera “cameo” in which the only thing we can see of her onscreen is her hand. That would be probably the oddest form of a cameo in SNL history, though you have to admit, it IS amusing to imagine Tina Fey making a hand cameo. Coincidentally, we actually do end up getting a Tina Fey cameo (and a certain other SNL alum/30 Rock cast member) in the monologue of the very next episode.
— An unintentional laugh from Lorne’s genuine difficulty in pronouncing “Kazakhstan”. Charming to see Lorne make a gaffe like that.
— And now we see who the audience was wildly applauding for earlier: Borat!
— The “human pubis” that Borat displays is hilarious, as is him saying “This bale took over three women to make.”
— I’m getting so much of the usual “oh, so wrong” laughs at Borat’s juvenile-and-offensive-but-funny comedy.
— I like the Wayne’s World reference with Borat occasionally saying “Shwing?”
— Borat even manages to make his “Live from New York…” funny, by throwing in “home of the Jew”.
STARS: ****


MONOLOGUE
host tells how he’s unlike House & says what to expect from an Englishman

— A big gaffe right at the beginning, in which SNL’s fake applause track accidentally continues to play long after the real audience has stopped applauding and long after Hugh Laurie has begun speaking. I really don’t understand SNL’s need to use a fake applause track during the opening montage, and this gaffe tonight should’ve led to SNL finally stopping their usage of it, but nope. They continue to use it to this day, I believe.
— I love Hugh naming the audience collectively “Sweetcheeks”.
— Hugh, in one of the many things he says he is: “I’m the yelp of a puppy freed from the microwave.”
— I am absolutely LOVING this monologue. Not only are there lots of funny lines, but Hugh is handling this so damn well, with tons of charm, expertise, and genuine funniness.
— Great ad-lib from Hugh after his Shakespeare joke doesn’t go over well with the audience.
STARS: ****½


MOST HAUNTED
(host)’s flatus is mistaken for sign of paranormal activity

— The use of infrared night-vision is interesting and unique for a live SNL sketch.
— A fart sketch? And as the lead-off sketch of the night?!? I do recall this actually being surprisingly not bad for a fart sketch, though.
— So far, while this is not quite as good as I had remembered, it’s still working decently for something with such a sophomoric premise. What makes this sketch work is how overly seriously Fred, Amy, and Bill are taking the “mysterious sound”, how ridiculously heavily they’re analyzing it, and how embarrassed Hugh is over all of this.
— The ending with a ghost’s voice actually saying “Juliaaaan” (as a callback to Fred, Amy, and Bill mistaking the sound of Hugh’s fart for a voice saying a stretched-out “Julian”) didn’t work for me.
STARS: ***


TV FUNHOUSE
by RBS- George W. Bush downplays scare tactics of GOP’s negative TV spots

— Our first TV Funhouse of the season.
— Blah, the Bush intro at the beginning appears to be using the same odd animation style that was used in the TV Funhouse from the season 30 Luke Wilson episode, an animation style that I hated (and it didn’t help matters any that that particular TV Funhouse itself was a dud).
— Luckily, most of this cartoon isn’t focusing on the badly-animated Bush scenes.
— Good political satire in the gay marriage/“Count Obama” ad.
— The Hillary Clinton ad made me laugh out loud. The ridiculous voice used for her made it even funnier.
— This cartoon is over already? This felt unusually short, and it seemed like we were meant to see a third political attack ad instead of just two.
STARS: ***½


NATIONAL ANTHEM
at the World Series, (MAR) renders National Anthem nearly unrecognizable

— A very well-known Maya Rudolph sketch.
— I used to pretty much HATE this sketch and find it insanely overrated, but that was also back in the days when I had a seething dislike for Maya Rudolph in general, and thus, I just dismissed this sketch as both “Another bad Maya Rudolph singing sketch” and “Another bad Maya-Rudolph-does-a-goofy-voice sketch”. Now that I’m older, more mature, and try to be more critically fair in my assessments of SNL than I was in my original days as an SNL reviewer back in the 2000s and early 2010s, I’ve become more appreciative of Maya’s comedic talents, and thus, I can recognize this sketch’s value. While I’m still certainly not finding it to be a classic like a lot of people seemingly do, I’m enjoying this sketch a lot, and I’m finding Maya’s many different bad singing styles for each individual verse of the National Anthem not only amusing and fun, but actually impressive, and a good spoof of the overwrought way certain singers butcher the National Anthem when trying to show off their vocal range.
STARS: ****


PROMO

— Bizarrely and inexplicably, Don Pardo announces that the next live episode is airing “on MONDAY, November 11”, despite that date being, of course, a Saturday. All I have to say is, boy, is Don getting old.


ADVANCE MAN
equerry (host) requisitions oddities for Queen Elizabeth’s hotel stay

— When failing in his attempt to apply his glasses onto his face with one hand, Hugh ad-libs a witty “Fortunately, these are just an affectation”, and does away with the glasses. And showing what a true pro she is, Kristen perfectly keeps a straight face during this funny ad-lib.
— I am absolutely LOVING the absurd British, Monty Python-ish comedy style of this sketch, which Hugh Laurie is obviously a natural for. His delivery of these lines about Queen Elizabeth’s very eccentric requests is a riot.
— I love Hugh responding to Kristen’s “Will you be here when she (the Queen) arrives?” question with an “Absolutely not” before making his exit.
STARS: ****½


HARDBALL WITH CHRIS MATTHEWS
Ken Mehlman (ANS) & Howard Dean (JAS) forsee GOP midterm defeat

— Our first Hardball sketch in almost an entire year.
— Darrell’s Chris Matthews impression seems a little more toned down and serious tonight.
— I think that’s SNL producer Ken Aymong as Glenn Beasley in the various photos.
— So far, this feels very different from typical Hardball sketches. They’ve shaken up the format, which is much needed, after how stale the last few Hardball sketches before this were.
— Darrell is a stumbly mess throughout this sketch. He can barely get a line out without flubbing it.
— Jason’s Howard Dean challenging Andy’s Ken Mehlman to a fistfight is making me laugh.
— While I’m enjoying the dialogue and humor here, the pacing and energy of this whole sketch feels off, which is hurting this.
STARS: **½


PROTEST SONG
host performs a protest song that mumbles answers to the world’s problems

— Ooh, I like the setting of this. Feels like a throwback to earlier SNL seasons, where a performer doing a comedy bit on SNL’s home base stage was much more common, outside of monologues.
— I recall finding out this is an old bit that Hugh brought to SNL from his comedy act. It’s coming off solid here, and a very nice change of pace for an SNL piece in this era.
— Some nice camera angles throughout this that show both Hugh and the audience.
— I particularly love the part with Hugh desperately resorting to a harmonica solo during one of his many avoidances of saying what the answer is.
STARS: ****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Nausea”


WEEKEND UPDATE
senatorial candidate Tim Calhoun offers qualifications & proposals

New Jerseyite same-sex couple (FRA) & (BIH) endorses gay marriage ruling

— I’m starting to question just how much Amy has “improved” as an Update anchor so far in this Poehler/Meyers era, because I’ve been noticing that she’s still using the same annoyingly cutesy, cheesy delivery she used during the Fey/Poehler era, and her jokes are just as cringey as they were back then. Seth, on the other hand, has been absolutely solid and sharp as an anchor so far, and he has by far the better jokes of the two anchors. Despite their always-great chemistry when interacting with each other, Seth and Amy’s individual Update delivery styles are kind of an odd mish-mash with each other so far. Maybe Amy eventually gets better, because I recall feeling she was decent when the Poehler/Meyers era of Update originally aired.
— Tim Calhoun!
— I love the similarities Tim Calhoun says he has to America: he’s heavily in debt, he’s 10% gay, and he has a really bad gas problem.
— A particularly hilarious Tim Calhoun confession right now (and remember that this is when the Mark Foley/teenage pages scandal was going on): “I have touched many pages in my life……..because I am a voracious reader……..of child pornography……..studies……..illustrated studies.”
— My god, Calhoun is even funnier than ever tonight, which I didn’t think was possible. I am being DESTROYED with laughter here.
— I’ll give Amy credit for her good delivery of the Panama Canal Widening joke. Despite my criticism of how the quality of her delivery and jokes has mostly been unchanged from the Fey/Poehler era, Amy has some occasional winners.
— The debut of Bill and Fred’s Same-Sex New Jersey Couple. (*groan*) How do you follow up a killer Tim Calhoun commentary with THIS?
— So far in tonight’s Same-Sex New Jersey Couple commentary, I am liking Bill’s delivery (and he’s always great at delivering wiseguy-esque “Ohhhhh!”s), but otherwise, this is just as weak as I had remembered these characters being back when this SNL era originally aired.
— Ha, I love Seth ad-libbing a callback to the Same-Sex New Jersey Couple commentary from earlier in this Update, by improvising a quiet “Ohhhh!” after the punchline of his gay marriage/St. Louis Cardinals joke.
STARS: ***


TRUST YOUR PHYSICIAN
broken leg sufferer’s (KET) distrust of doctor (WLF) impedes treatment

— Kenan makes his first and ONLY appearance of the night here. So far this season, I feel like he’s been kinda struggling to fit into this season’s shortened cast, especially now that he’s the only black male cast member left.
— That fucking horrible sketch with John C. Reilly in drag in the preceding episode makes me initially worried seeing Hugh Laurie in drag here.
— Interesting role for Kenan, which feels out of the ordinary from the way he’s typically used in these earlier seasons of his SNL tenure.
— Hugh is actually really funny in this drag role, further proving how great of a performer he is.
— While I’m getting some laughs and am enjoying all of the interplay between Kenan and Hugh, this sketch is kinda hard for me to figure.
— There’s been quite a number of sketches this season so far that have ended with a character breaking the fourth wall and delivering a message to the camera.
STARS: **½


THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN
snide Frankenstein (BIH) hides his identity from confused villagers

— A very solid role for Bill, and SNL allowing him to deservedly carry a sketch in the lead role feels somewhat rare at this point of his SNL tenure.
— I love both Bill and Jason playing relatable, realistic personifications of Frankenstein and Dracula, respectively, with Bill’s characterization being snarky and Jason’s characterization being laid-back and smug (nice detail with the latter nonchalantly filing his nails while the angry mob is questioning him).
— I like the way Bill’s Frankenstein keeps sternly telling one of the people in the angry mob to get that fiery torch away from him.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Clap Hands”


JOB INTERVIEW
(host) & (FRA) squeal “Ooh!” while interviewing (AMP) for a law firm job

— The slow build-up to Hugh and Fred’s first “ooooOOOOOoooooh!” is good.
— I really like how this silly “ooooOOOOOoooooh!” routine feels like something Dana Carvey and Jon Lovitz would’ve done together in the late 80s SNL era. In fact, this sketch feels like a spiritual successor to a sketch that Dana and Jon did do together once: a fun, silly sketch from the season 15 Robert Wagner episode (an episode filled with fun, silly sketches that are really strong) where Dana, Jon, and Robert Wagner were professionals on a political roundtable show, and Dana and Jon each kept making high-pitched, childlike bragging noises whenever one would one-up the other during their debate.
— I like Hugh and Fred quietly starting an “oooooo–” and holding it for a long time while anxiously waiting for Amy to deliver one particular answer.
— Decent turn with Hugh and Fred having a displeased reaction to Amy doing the “ooooOOOOOoooooh!” thing herself, leading to her not getting the job after all.
— The show is seemingly starting to run a little long, as this sketch suddenly fades to an SNL bumper photo of Hugh a tad early while Hugh and Fred are still delivering the final exchange of the sketch.
STARS: ***½


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very solid episode, and a complete turnaround from that wretched preceding episode with John C. Reilly. I liked almost every single sketch tonight, and even the few I didn’t care for were nothing terrible. Tonight had a lot of strong highlights, and the show as a whole had a fun vibe. Hugh Laurie was also a fantastic host, no doubt due to all of his comedy experience in his career, and he added to the aforementioned fun vibe of this episode. Another big positive in this episode was SNL favorite Beck, who’s musical performances tonight (particularly the second one) were outstanding.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (John C. Reilly)
a huge step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Well, as I already gave away earlier in this review…

Posted on

October 21, 2006 – John C. Reilly / My Chemical Romance (S32 E3)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

SPECIAL REPORT W/ BRIT HUME
George W. Bush (WLF) acknowledges Iraq failures but remains optimistic

— I’m being tickled by Will’s President Bush matter-of-factly agreeing with Darrell’s Brit Hume on all of the horrible screw-ups Bush has made in his handling of the war in Iraq. The overly serious look on Will’s face during that matter-of-factly agreeing is adding to the humor.
— I have very mixed feelings on the punchline, and I was expecting it to be funnier after such a long set-up of this nature.
— This ends up being Will’s final appearance as Bush. Unlike the last two cast members who played Bush before him (Chris Parnell and Darrell), Will didn’t get the Bush impression yanked away from him against his will. He would later reveal it was his own decision to stop playing Bush. He asked SNL to be taken out of the role because he never felt comfortable doing political humor. A shame, because I liked him as Bush, and it was nice to have stability in the role for a few seasons after the initial revolving door of Bush impersonators after Will Ferrell’s departure.
STARS: ***


OPENING MONTAGE
— The SNL logo has gone through a third and final modification this season. While it still has a similar look to the Ebersol-era look it had in the last episode, the letters are widened, giving it a bit of a more unique identity. (below is a tracking of this season’s logo changes, in chronological order)


MONOLOGUE
James Lipton (WIF) incorrectly credits host during his hagiography

— Will Ferrell as James Lipton!
— Not only is it always nice to see Ferrell return to the show, but it’s always fun to see him and John C. Reilly together.
— Ferrell’s Lipton constantly mistaking John for being in movies that he wasn’t even in is worth some good laughs.
— Pretty funny bit with Ferrell’s Lipton making John pretend to be Roxie from the movie Chicago.
— A huge laugh from “I have an erection” being one of the many things Will’s Lipton says in delight during John’s singing.
— Not sure I needed this to turn into a duet, as I have a low tolerance for musical monologues.
— The “Sean C Reilly” light-up sign is pretty funny.
STARS: ***½


COLONIAL WILLIAMSBURG
Colonial Williamsburg role accuracy is a pretense for (host)’s racism

— I love Jason’s line about how John “really came within a stone’s throw of using correctly once”, regarding his constant use of the word “harken”.
— Some laughs from the bigoted comments we’re told that John made towards the black employees, and Jason is a good straight man here.
— While this sketch isn’t too bad so far, it feels too quiet and slow for a lead-off sketch. It would’ve fit much more a little later in the show. This has no business being the lead-off sketch of an episode. Already a sign that we may be in for a rough night.
— I love Kenan’s walk-on. He steals this sketch for me.
— John’s ending line (“Those knee socks are inaccurate!”) was a weak note to end this sketch on.
STARS: **½


SWIMMING LESSON
(WLF) learns strokes while strapped to unorthodox swim instructor (host)

— Funny entrance from John.
— I remember some online SNL fans back at this time in 2006 saying John’s character felt awfully Will Ferrell-esque, specifically Ferrell’s Ted Brogan character, and those fans also said that, since Ferrell was actually in the building during this episode, they might as well have given this role to him.
— John’s inappropriate “69” comment was hilarious.
— A pretty good laugh from the penis-adjusting bit.
— Okay, this sketch is starting to devolve into pointless, sophomoric, and unfunny homoeroticism. It’s losing me.
— I’m usually iffy on text crawl endings, but this one made me laugh, despite being awfully long-winded.
STARS: **


KIM JONG IL’S ADDRESS
Kim Jong Il (AMP) flaunts nukes & asks North Koreans to sacrifice

— I found Amy’s Kim Jong Il impression pretty funny as a supporting role in that Hugo Chavez Political Roundup sketch, but it doesn’t seem like something that can carry its own sketch. And was it really necessary to give him his own extensive, fleshed-out opening title sequence here?
— I’m still hearing Dexter from Cartoon Network’s Dexter’s Laboratory in Amy’s Kim Jong Il voice. As a 90s kid, I’d like to think that’s intentional on Amy’s part, but would she even be familiar with that cartoon?
— Not caring for anything in this sketch at all so far.
— Yeah, this is pretty much a dud.
— The “Th-th-th-th-that’s all, folks!” ending wasn’t necessary, and I’m usually a sucker for a Looney Tunes reference.
STARS: *


TWO A-HOLES WORK OUT WITH A TRAINER
personal trainer (host) doesn’t know what to make of insouciant A-holes

— This is our first appearance this season of any pre-existing recurring characters. Impressive that SNL went this long into the season before they whipped out any recurring characters.
— The usual funny comments from the Two A-holes.
— I particularly like the part where, when Jason just stands in silence after bringing up the fact that he can do a great impression of Shaggy from Scooby-Doo, John asks him “So, are you gonna do it, or…” and Jason immediately answers with a blunt “No.”
— This sketch has taken a VERY odd and out-of-the-ordinary turn with John’s whole flustered monologue in reaction to the Two A-holes refusing to speak to him anymore. I appreciate this attempt at something different in a Two A-holes sketch, but it’s not working for me and it’s absolutely bombing with the audience. This episode in general has been having a bit of a hollow feel, and the uncomfortable lack of audience reaction during John’s flustered monologue portion of this Two A-holes sketch is further adding to that hollow feel.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Welcome To The Black Parade”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Flavor Flav (KET) assigns cheeky nicknames to female politicians

AMP leaves a note for SEM upon heading to Colorado for hassle-free weed

— Wow, Kenan’s Flavor Flav impression is fucking HORRIBLE. See, this is one of the problems with having Kenan as the only black male cast member left after Finesse Mitchell’s firing. This being long before the days where he became the polished, reliable veteran he’s appreciated as today, Kenan’s limitations as a performer get exposed badly in these post-Finesse Mitchell pre-Jay Pharoah seasons, when, due to being the only black guy in the cast, he’s sometimes thrown into certain types of black roles that he can’t pull off.
— In addition to his horrible impression, Kenan-as-Flavor-Flav’s breakdown of politicians is just plain unfunny.
— In retrospect, it’s unintentionally amusing how Barack Obama is one of the various politicians who’s photo Kenan’s Flavor Flav responds to with a dismissive “Don’t know ‘im”. If he only knew what the future held for Obama… (Though even Seth, in this Update commentary, is shocked that Kenan’s Flavor Flav doesn’t know who Obama is.)
— Quite a number of weak and/or baffling Update jokes tonight.
— Oh, I absolutely love this side bit with Seth reading a wartime-esque farewell letter from Amy after she’s left the Update desk to get some soon-to-be-legal weed at Colorado. Even the little detail of Amy’s voice crumbling whenever Seth crumbles the letter into a ball while she’s narrating it is fantastic.
— Kinda funny seeing Seth do a Matthew McConaughey vocal impression, as I remember Seth’s brother Josh regularly doing a pretty popular McConaughey impression on MADtv.
— Overall, a few good jokes and a great “farewell letter/Colorado weed” bit, but this was the first subpar Update of the Poehler/Meyers era. Still more tolerable than a typical Fey/Poehler-era Update.
STARS: **½


SHE’S A MESS
(host) alternately gorges on Mexican food & pines for ex-boyfriend (FRA)

— A male extra at the beginning of this sketch botches his cue on when to enter the set. At the same time, you can also hear the stage manager hurriedly whispering to him “Go!”
— Ugh at the reveal of John in drag. I can already tell this is going to be a rough sketch. I remember saying in the original 2006 review (which sadly isn’t available anymore) I did of this episode back when it originally aired, “After John’s opening line in this sketch after the reveal of him in drag, I half-expected this sketch to cut to the “And then there’s Carol!” opening title sequence from Horatio Sanz’s Carol sketches.
— This surprisingly feels like Maya’s first appearance all night, until I remembered she made a small appearance in the Colonial Williamsburg sketch. Amy’s been having a surprisingly light night too, making only three appearances all night, which is a very paltry number compared to how insanely high her appearance-per-show average was the preceding season.
— This sketch is PAINFUL so far. The comedic conceit of John C. Reilly in drag simultaneously crying, talking, and stuffing his face with food, with no funny dialogue to be found anywhere, is comedy death. I also feel bad for Maya, Amy, and Kristen, who’s respective talents are being completely wasted in this sketch in very poor roles.
— What’s with the excessive number of “you guys” being delivered during Maya, Amy, and Kristen’s secretive conversation with each other about John’s character? Is that supposed to be amusing?
— WTF at Fred’s walk-on as some bizarre, unfunny character? And was it intentional to make him look like the lovechild of Austin Powers and Dr. Evil?
— Aaaaaaaaaaand to top this already-horrible sketch off, we end with a man-on-man kiss as a cheap, unnecessary, and brutally unfunny attempt at a laugh. Yep, it’s now official: this is, hands down, one of the worst sketches I have EVER sat through during my SNL project. For various reasons, I get the strong feeling James Anderson was the writer behind this disaster (right down to the Anderson trademark of the camera doing a pan shot of each normal character having a frozen unpleasant look on their face as they’re witnessing something odd the lead comedic character is doing). If so, I see he’s done it once again with yet another sketch that actually ANGERS me with how painfully bad it is. I’m sure James Anderson is a great person behind the scenes at SNL and everything, but it utterly baffles me that this man has kept his job as an SNL writer for 20+ seasons, still continuing TO THIS FUCKING DAY. Looking at a list of sketches he wrote is like looking at a list of sketches that I hated the most from the 2000s and 2010s – there’s an unsettling number of the same sketches on both lists.
STARS: *


HOUSE OF CARTERS
brothers Nick (JAS) & Aaron (ANS) argue & make up

— Jason’s portrayal of Nick Carter is hilarious.
— Meh, the comedic conceit of this sketch is ALREADY getting old.
— Andy shirtless in two sketches tonight?
— Kenan as “black manager” got a laugh out of me with his one line.
— I spoke too soon, as Kenan’s second line fell badly flat and ended this sketch on an awkward note.
STARS: **


HARPOON MAN
whaler Harpoon Man (host) hunts his derogative orca balladeer (ANS)

— Interesting idea for a Shaft spoof, and the mere idea of Andy Samberg as an Isaac Hayes-esque deep-voiced singing narrator tickles me.
— This short has a very “Young Chuck Norris” vibe. Even Bill (where has he been tonight, by the way?) and Jorma Taccone reprise their bit roles from Young Chuck Norris, right down to the same costumes.
— I like the turn with Harpoon Man hunting down the singing narrator during all of his childish insults of him.
— I love the oddball ending.
STARS: ***½


MCMILLAN FAMILY MOMENT
Mr. McMillan (host) relays family Oreo tradition to unreceptive son (ANS)

— I recall an online SNL fan pointing out back when this episode originally aired that a tooth crown can be seen accidentally falling out of John’s mouth during his angry rant at Andy in this sketch, and that John can then be seen awkwardly using the inside of his mouth to feel the missing crown. I’m watching this sketch right now, and I’m pretty sure the “tooth crown” falling out of John’s mouth (the last above screencap for this sketch) was actually only a piece of white cookie filling he had just licked from the Oreo. He does appear to be awkwardly using the inside of his mouth to feel his teeth afterwards, but he’s probably just doing that because he presumably has some cookie filling stuck on his teeth.
— Yet another sketch tonight that ends very awkwardly.
— Overall………no idea what to say about this sketch, other than I didn’t laugh a single time. Man, tonight’s episode is getting BRUTAL with all of its bad sketches.
STARS: *


THE BEAR SHARK PROJECT
scientists (host) & (MAR) sing to mourn the end of Operation Bear Shark

— This looks like it could be a good oddball sketch. The premise alone is very interesting and creative.
— Great visual effect of Jason’s endlessly-bleeding chewed-off arm, especially the little gag of him unintentionally leaving blood on the door window as he’s making his exit.
— Funny line from John about losing his hand AND his virginity to the Bear Shark.
— I’m pretty sure Bill hasn’t uttered a single line in this entire episode (not counting his various Chris Parnell-esque voice-over roles). Damn.
— OH, GOD. Why’d this have to turn into a freakin’ musical sketch? What happened to the jokes? Why waste such a brilliantly absurd premise? God, this episode is DESTROYING me.
— Not even the lyric from a Will Forte-voiced Bear Shark during the Maya/John musical number can save this for me.
— Ugh, this unfunny musical number from Maya and John feels like it’s going on FOREVER.
— Jason, to us viewers, regarding how this sketch turned out: “You feel gypped, right?” Hell fucking yes. You read my mind, Jason, even if you didn’t mean that in the way I want you to.
— Jason’s condescending ending message to us viewers is pretty funny, ALMOST saving this extremely disappointing sketch.
STARS: *½


MCMILLAN FAMILY MOMENT
Mr. McMillan can’t interest Little Brother (KET) in family Oreo tradition

— (*sigh*) Another one of these?
— Once again, not a single laugh from me during the entire sketch. These McMillan Family bits are so weak, and tonight’s episode continues to gradually murder me with its horrible quality.
STARS: *


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Cancer”


MCMILLAN FAMILY MOMENT
Mr. McMillan’s dad (JAS) denies authenticity of family Oreo tradition

— OH FUCKING NO.
— Watching this episode is starting to make me feel like I am in hell.
— I very rarely, if ever, criticize Jason Sudeikis, but something about his performance here doesn’t feel right for the character he’s playing. On paper, you’d think the casting of Jason as a grumpy elderly father would be perfect, but he’s coming off too…I dunno, stiff? Something feels awkward and off about his performance in this role. This is a role that Chris Parnell would’ve played to perfection IN HIS SLEEP had he still been on the show.
— Wow, this overall third edition of the McMillan Family runner was somehow even worse than the first two, which I didn’t think was possible. What a horrible runner. How did stuff like this make it on the air?!?
STARS: *


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— Oof. What a rough, rough episode. Easily the worst episode I’ve reviewed since the dreaded season 30. Looks like we have a new entry for the list of my lowest-ranked reviews. Very few sketches in this episode worked for me (and not even any of THOSE received a rating over a measly three-and-a-half stars), while A LOT of stuff flopped hard. The post-Weekend Update half in particular was downright unwatchable, aside from the Digital Short. That half of the show made me increasingly miserable, as seen throughout my review. This episode in general felt SO off that even some of the not-so-bad stuff had kind of a hollow, quiet feel, like I mentioned earlier. When your funniest live sketch of the night is a Two A-holes sketch that isn’t up to snuff compared to previous Two A-holes sketches, there’s a big problem. Even SNL themselves seemed to know this episode is a dud, because, IIRC, it ended up never getting an NBC rerun. [ADDENDUM: As said by some in the comments section of this review, this episode did get an NBC rerun, but it was over a year later and was during a long writers strike, showing that SNL was indeed not proud of this episode for a long time.] I remember how both this episode and the worst aspects of the preceding Jaime Pressly episode had a lot of online SNL fans back at this time in 2006 worrying about the direction of this new season, fearing we were in for a potential disaster season. Hindsight has taught us better, as we now know this season ends up turning out fine. I’ll just chalk the shakiness of these past two episodes up to this season trying to find its footing after some major shakeups in the cast. There’s been a different, experimental feel in the early episodes of this season, and, knowing in hindsight that this season ends up being good, I can accept a big misfire like tonight’s episode and the rough patch in the middle of the preceding episode as byproducts of that early experimentation.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Jaime Pressly)
a step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Hugh Laurie

Posted on

October 7, 2006 – Jaime Pressly / Corinne Bailey Rae (S32 E2)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

A MESSAGE FROM THE SPEAKER
Dennis Hastert (DAH) tells of Mark Foley’s deep interest in page program

— Not caring all that much for the lines about Mark Foley’s love for teenage male pages. My only chuckles from this are very mild. This tepid material isn’t helped by the way it’s being presented, with this being YET ANOTHER cold opening with Darrell doing a dull, non-comedic impression of some boring politician sitting behind a desk and delivering a straight-to-camera address to the nation. Yawn.
— Overall, very meh.
STARS: **


OPENING MONTAGE
— The new SNL logo introduced in the preceding episode has been altered tonight. Not only are the words “Saturday Night Live” now displayed vertically instead of horizontally, but the look of the logo’s font is slightly modified to look EXACTLY like the 1981-1985 Dick Ebersol-era SNL logo. (comparisons below between the Ebersol-era logo and tonight’s logo)

       

I remember finding this logo alteration quite jarring when this episode originally aired. Whenever an SNL bumper photo of Jaime Pressly or Corinne Bailey Rae would appear onscreen each time this episode came back from a commercial break, the SNL logo in the bumper made me feel like I was watching an early 80s rerun, making me half-expect to see a young Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo in the about-to-air sketch. (I remember actually kinda liking that, especially since it was somewhat rare back then to see SNL episodes from the early 80s.) This switchover to the Ebersol-era logo would only last for tonight’s episode. In the next episode, the logo goes through a third and final alteration.
— The way the musical guest and host’s photos are displayed in this opening montage has also changed. They’re displayed as a full-screen shot tonight (which would remain a regular thing for the rest of this opening montage’s run), whereas in the season premiere, they were displayed as a smaller shot in front of a live-action NYC backdrop.


MONOLOGUE
host’s song is interrupted by cast members dressed as southern stereotypes

— Kenan, dressed as Uncle Remus, bitterly saying “Zippety-do-dah, my ass!” while making his exit gave me a good laugh.
— A guilty laugh from Fred’s KKK hood bit.
— I love Bill randomly and slowly entering in the background dressed as Colonel Sanders during Jaime Pressly’s singing of “Fever”. Between dressing as Colonel Sanders in both the Unsolved Mysteries sketch from the preceding season’s Julia Louis-Dreyfus episode and now this monologue, I remember thinking at the time tonight’s episode originally aired that SNL was going to make a long-standing running gag of Bill dressing as Colonel Sanders, but we end up never seeing it again after tonight’s episode.
— Jason’s portrayal of a redneck is very funny.
— I love how this is yet another instance this season of the entire cast being worked into a sketch, once again showing how refreshingly small this cast is compared to the preceding season’s bloated cast.
— An unintentional laugh from the mistiming of Andy’s banjo strumming, which Andy makes a comical facial reaction to.
STARS: ***½


NANCY GRACE
interviewees (ANS), (host), (KET) dodge accusations from Nancy Grace (AMP)

— This is using the same opening theme music that was used as the theme music for the Situation Room cold opening in the preceding season’s Lindsay Lohan episode. I assumed back when I reviewed that Lohan episode that that music was the actual Situation Room theme music, but now I take it that’s just stock music SNL uses for some of their political talking head show sketches? I do love hearing that epic music, though.
— Amy’s portrayal of Nancy Grace is good.
— The occasional unrelated comments from Amy’s Nancy Grace about her chair being moved come off baffling and random at first, though thanks to having already seen this sketch before, I’m now aware of where it’s going.
— Some good laughs from Amy’s Nancy Grace constantly reaching to find seediness about every little thing.
— Great bit with Kenan as a janitor suddenly being mic’ed and sat down for an interview, much to his complete confusion. Kenan can always sell stuff like this well.
STARS: ***½


NEW YORK CITY STORIES
Martin Scorsese (FRA) & Rosie Perez (AMP) on NYC

— Interesting format to this piece.
— A good and amusing Martin Scorsese impression from Fred. And I absolutely LOVE the voice Amy’s using as Rosie Perez. I’m finding her Rosie Perez voice both funny and oddly endearing.
— A very funny brief Do The Right Thing-esque cutaway to Amy’s Rosie Perez dancing in the street.
STARS: ***½


JON BOVI
record exec (host) hears antonym-based lyrics of Jon Bovi (JAS) & (WLF)

— The debut of Jason and Will’s Jon Bovi characters. Unless I’m forgetting something, this ends up being the only non-Weekend Update appearance they would ever make on SNL.
— As I said in a recent review, I’m usually a sucker for whenever Will or Jason individually do comical singing in a sketch, so as you can imagine, this Jon Bovi bit is pretty much comedy gold to me. While the comedy of this is incredibly dumb, Will and Jason make it the absolutely right kind of dumb, and they’re a blast as a duo in this.
— I love the repeated sayings of “Where the eff do we sign?!?” “We brought our own peeeeeeeens!”
— A very fun, silly conceit of Jon Bovi singing opposite lyrics of hit songs.
— Such a funny little detail with the random countdown numbers Will and Jason keep doing before each song.
— The completely nonsensical bit about Will having lost his pens in his butt is hilarious.
STARS: ****


WVIR NEWS
TV reporter Michelle Dison (KRW) awkwardly hits on interviewee (host)

— Early on in this, Kristen manages to get a good laugh just from the simple bit with her looking Jaime up and down, before we realize the comedic conceit of this sketch.
— A good laugh from Kristen’s out-of-nowhere comment about how Jaime must look coming fresh out of the shower.
— Some more good amusement from Kristen’s increasingly lustful-but-nervous compliments about Jaime’s looks.
— Decent ending with how Kristen’s embarrassment from the Jaime situation increases when bird poop from above randomly drops onto Kristen’s shoulder while she’s still on camera. Her drawn-out, mostly-silent awkward reaction to that is the type of thing Kristen is always so good at getting laughs out of.
STARS: ***½


NEW YORK CITY STORIES
Lou Reed (FRA) & Patti Smith (AMP) on CBGB

— I like how not only is this a runner, but each segment features Fred and Amy playing a different pair of celebrities.
— I’m really enjoying the format of these New York City Stories pieces, and I love the way this particular one is shot, including the black-and-white screen filter.
— Overall, my favorite of these New York City Stories pieces so far.
STARS: ****


ST. AMBROSE SCHOOL
principal (BIH) meets with unruly (host)’s stepmom Virginiaca (KET)

— Kenan In A Dress alert.
— Ugh, the debut of Kenan’s Virginiaca character, the nadir of Kenan’s annoying and constant drag in these earlier seasons of his SNL tenure. I think I’ve said this before, but old stuff like this sketch makes you really appreciate how much more mature Kenan is as a performer nowadays.
— I can’t find anything else to say about this sketch while I’m suffering through it.
STARS: *


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Put Your Records On”


WEEKEND UPDATE
Peter O’Toole (BIH) thinks Mark Foley is unworthy of the term “alcoholic”

Fugly Betsy (FRA) stars in Ugly Betty knock-off produced by Charo (MAR)

— I love the idea of Bill doing a commentary as a drunk Peter O’Toole.
— Bill is killing it here, and I feel this is one of the best things he’s done by this point of his SNL tenure. At the time this originally aired, I remember considering this to be the type of brilliant, mature comedy that I knew Bill was capable of, and that I wanted SNL to let Bill display much more often.
— Even the post-commentary bit with Bill’s O’Toole is funny, with him having to be told which direction to exit in.
— Seth’s joke about how Bill Frist “is the guy who thought we could still fix Terri Schiavo” got a VERY interesting and initially-hesitant audience reaction. I also remember it getting LOTS of praise on some of the SNL message boards at the time, for how edgy and daring the joke was perceived to be, and it was because of this that a lot of people on those message boards started coming around on Seth as an Update anchor. I admit to following the hype back then, regarding the love for Seth’s Terri Schiavo joke. Nowadays, I have absolutely no idea how to react to that joke, and I’m someone who can enjoy a good edgy, tasteless Update joke (after all, Norm Macdonald is one of my all-time favorite Update anchors).
— I love Seth’s Iran/masturbation joke.
— Meh, this commentary with Fred as an Ugly Betty knock-off doesn’t seem like it’ll be something I’ll like. If anything, at least this, in retrospect, serves as a time capsule of when Ugly Betty was the big new hit show.
— I did get a laugh from Fred-as-Fugly-Betsy’s “Aaaaaaaaaand…” when trying to think of another thing she did in her acting career besides play a bludgeoning victim once. Otherwise, yeah, just as I predicted, I’m not caring for this Update commentary.
— The return of Maya’s Charo impression. I still can’t understand a word she’s saying, much like in the Charades sketch from the preceding season’s Julia Louis-Dreyfus episode.
— Another winner from Seth tonight: his delivery of the eye laser surgery joke.
STARS: ***


THE NASCARETTES
Nascarettes (host), (FRA), (KRW), (AMP), (MAR) dance on the racetrack

— A laugh from Amy’s line about being the girl who held the cards between rounds at cockfights.
— I love the brief cutaway to Kristen helplessly still doing her dance move while panickedly looking for her lost earring on the track.
— Okay, I am not enjoying where this sketch is going.
— Ugh. Yeah, this is an unfunny endless repetition of a joke that didn’t work all that well to begin with.
— Very weak ending.
STARS: *½


NEW YORK CITY STORIES
Fran Lebowitz (FRA) & Yoko Ono (AMP) opine

— Not quite as funny as the last two editions of this, but Fred’s delivery and performance are keeping this amusing for me. He’s so good at making fun of pretentious people like this.
STARS: ***


BIG WIGS
ceiling fan cuts down corporate consulting of Big Wigs (host) & (AMP)

 

— What the heck is this? So-called “big wigs” literally having big wigs? Are they kidding me with this grade-school-level comedy?
— Is half of this episode being written by James Anderson, because I’ve been getting an awfully big James Anderson vibe from the Virginiaca, Nascarettes, and Big Wigs sketches. (I think I heard he indeed wrote Nascarettes, but I’m not sure about the other two. He would also later write a few sketches that are in a very similar vein to Nascarettes, including a really wretched sketch from Lindsay Lohan’s season 37 episode.) And all three of these sketches represent so many things I despise about Anderson as a writer.
— Man, what the hell am I watching? This sketch is awful.
— Not even the Ball Busters ending with Maya and Kristen could save this for me. At least this sketch was short, though.
— When this episode originally aired, an online SNL fan said this sketch had a HUGE season 6 vibe (and he or she certainly didn’t mean that as a compliment). Back in 2006, I wasn’t able to accurately agree or disagree with that SNL fan’s comment, because at the time, I had barely seen anything from season 6, though from all the things I had heard about that season back then, I could see that SNL fan’s point about Big Wigs. Now that I’m very familiar with season 6 after having reviewed the entire season earlier in my SNL project, I can definitely agree with that comment about Big Wigs feeling like a season 6 sketch. It especially would’ve fit right at home in that season’s bad-pun-filled Malcolm McDowell episode (Serf City, Jack the Stripper, etc.). Regardless of which season 6 episode this sketch would’ve appeared in, I can easily picture Jason, Andy, and Bill’s roles as the businessmen being played by Charles Rocket, Gilbert Gottfried, and Joe Piscopo, Jaime and Amy’s roles as the Big Wigs being played by a female host and Gail Matthius (the latter doing her Roweena’s Cut ‘n’ Curl/Bobby’s World “Don’cha know” voice), and Maya and Kristen’s roles as the Ball Busters being played by Ann Risley and Denny Dillon. Alternately, you can switch Gail and Denny in each other’s roles, as I can also easily picture Denny as one of the Big Wigs, and I can kinda see Gail as one of the Ball Busters. Or, if this sketch appeared in a season 6 episode without a female host, then both Gail AND Denny could’ve played the Big Wigs, and Ann and Yvonne Hudson could’ve played the Ball Busters. Okay, I am thinking WAY too hard about this, but hey, I’m far more entertained by imagining Big Wigs as a bad season 6 sketch than I am by watching the ACTUAL bad season 32 version of the sketch.
STARS: *


KUATO
vile Kuato (ANS) in (BIH)’s abdomen creeps out fellow partygoers

— Uh…okay. Certainly an out-of-the-ordinary Total Recall-inspired premise. This does seem like something Andy can make work, though.
— I’m now halfway through this sketch, and I’m not sure how to feel about it so far. I’ve been liking some of Andy’s lines, and the off-beat concept is growing on me, but at the same time, I’m not laughing at this sketch as much as I feel like I should.
— I love Bill’s exaggerated delivery of “DAMN YOU, KUATO WHO LIVES IN MY STOMACH!”
— No. NO! Not the return of Darrell’s awful Ahnuld impression. Ugh.
— A terrible ending that felt unnecessary.
STARS: **


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Like A Star”


PORCH TALK
daft & indiscreet (host) & (KRW) sip hot cider on a pleasant fall evening

— Another example tonight of the type of role that Kristen is always great at selling perfectly. She has been really solid, reliable, and fun in these early seasons of her SNL tenure so far.
— I’m enjoying the bizarre and disturbing facts about themselves that Kristen and Jaime are very calmly and affably sharing with each other in between their sips of cider.
— A very funny random and casual ending reveal from Jaime of “I peed in the cider.”
— Overall, short and sweet.
STARS: ***½


A MOMENT WITH THE OUT-OF-BREATH JOGGER FROM 1982
The Out-Of-Breath Jogger’s (ANS) moment from 1982 is a time capsule

— A very Andy Samberg-y premise (one that he auditioned for SNL with), and the type of stupidity and inanity that only he can sell.
— I particularly love the little part with Andy just randomly yelling out “Pet rock!” as a non-sequitur sentence.
STARS: ***


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A bit of a hard show to figure. The show both started and closed with a string of good pieces (minus the weak cold opening), but there was a string of truly AWFUL things in the middle of the show (not counting Weekend Update): Virginiaca, Nascarettes, and Big Wigs. Even the Kuato sketch, which I didn’t exactly hate, left me a little cold, despite some aspects of it that I liked. The good does outnumber the bad in this overall episode, but boy, was that middle BRUTAL. And even with the highlights this episode had, this episode didn’t have many strong pieces that I found to be worthy of a 4 or 5-star rating, unlike the preceding episode. I do like how this season is continuing to have a new, experimental feel, including a continued refrain from relying on any recurring characters (which I forgot to point out in my review of the preceding episode, which I’m surprised at, given how I remember heaping praise for it in the review I wrote back in 2006 when that episode originally aired, a review that’s sadly not available anymore).


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING ONE (Dane Cook)
a step down


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
John C. Reilly

Posted on

September 30, 2006 – Dane Cook / The Killers (S32 E1)

Segments are rated on a scale of 1-5 stars

COMPTROLLER RALLY
unpopular George W. Bush (WLF) is sidelined at minor GOP campaign event

— Hmm, an unexpected way to open a new season.
— Fred and Maya even manage to get laughs just from the simple way they nod their heads lightly and smile politely when they’re introduced by Jason’s character.
— Oh, so we get a random inclusion of Will’s President Bush, which I guess is why this is the cold opening.
— A good way to work almost the entire cast into the season premiere’s cold opening (I think only Darrell and Kenan are missing from this, not counting the now-Weekend-Update-only Seth), immediately showing how much smaller this new season’s cast is compared to the preceding season.
— This odd use of Will’s Bush could, in retrospect, be seen as a sign of the beginning of the end for Will’s run as Bush. He makes only one more appearance as Bush two episodes later (in another odd usage of him) before the Bush role is given to a certain other cast member.
— I love Will-as-Bush’s delivery of “Taliban is back, that’s a burn.”
— A funny reaction from Will’s Bush to Andy’s “Politics” line.
STARS: ***


OPENING MONTAGE
— New montage.

   

— We get a new SNL logo for the first time in 11 years. As you might have noticed among the above screencaps, the words in this new logo are displayed differently from how it would soon go on to be, as the words are displayed horizontally tonight instead of vertically. This 2006-2014 SNL logo will be going through some noteworthy changes the next few episodes before SNL settles on the now-familiar style of it.
— Bill Hader, Andy Samberg, Jason Sudeikis, and Kristen Wiig have all been promoted from featured players to repertory players.
— No new cast members this season.
— The final shot of this opening montage, with the camera showing a tilted shot of the NBC Studios sign (the last above screencap for this opening montage), seems like it might’ve been inspired by a shot shown in the cold opening from the preceding season’s Steve Martin episode (side-by-side comparison below).


MONOLOGUE
host does stand-up about negative people, liars, suicides, car wrecks

— The monitors on the left and right side of the home base stage still display the preceding season’s SNL logo and a still from that season’s opening montage. This would eventually be changed to reflect this season’s new logo and montage.
— Welp, here comes another round of Dane Cook stand-up I have to endure in this SNL project.
— Like I said in my review of Dane’s last monologue, I really dislike his trademark stand-up delivery.
— The suicide bits about “Karaoke Kevin” and “Limbo Linda” are decent.
— The bit about how everything is on YouTube now (and to think, this was before our more current days, where truly almost everything CAN be found on YouTube) is memorable and funny, mainly the “A:F6” part.
— A laugh from Dane’s “Ma’am, you can drive through ghosts” comment.
— Overall, I’m surprised by how much I laughed at this Dane Cook stand-up monologue, and this thankfully lacked some of the more annoying aspects of Dane’s previous monologue.
STARS: ***


SIDE NOTE: No post-monologue fake commercial in tonight’s season premiere? Can’t remember the last time prior to this where a season premiere went without one.


AIRPORT SECURITY SEMINAR
(host) & (JAS) instruct airport security workers regarding liquids & gels

— A fun ensemble piece for the lead-off sketch of the season.
— Dane and Jason make a good duo here, and I’m really liking Jason’s delivery.
— A good laugh from the whole bit with Fred trying to claim that a turkey sandwich can count as a liquid.
— I love Will and Kenan simultaneously saying the same answer to the question of why someone would put a turkey sandwich in a blender: “Well, if your jaw was wired shut–”
— All of the asinine questions the employees are asking are very funny.
— Maya seems like she’s playing a variation of her Jackie character from season 26, who, in one of her appearances, actually did work at an airport (she worked at a post office in her other appearance).
— The “You mean producing a liquid?” “Or a gel” exchange is a particularly hilarious and memorable part of this sketch, made even funnier by Kenan making a classic “Kenan reacts” face in the background.
— A great stern and blunt delivery of “No” from Dane in response to Maya asking if a meatball can count as a liquid.
— Here’s the first sign that I noticed tonight’s episode has a new director (Don Roy King): this sketch ends with a cutaway to an exterior shot of an airport, which I remember feeling was an odd choice when this episode originally aired, especially given the fact that this sketch didn’t open with an exterior shot of anything.
— Overall, a very strong sketch, and a promising way to lead off the new season.
STARS: ****½


HUGO CHAVEZ POLITICAL ROUNDUP
heads of state bash USA & its leader

— Right out of the gate, Fred’s exaggerated gestures and facial expressions as Hugo Chavez are freakin’ slaying me. I can definitely see some people being annoyed by this, but it has me practically on the floor.
— The debut of Amy’s Kim Jong Il, my first reminder that Horatio Sanz is no longer in the cast, as he used to play this role.
— I recall an online SNL fan back at this time (possibly fellow SNL reviewer and fellow SNL blogger The Doc, but I can’t remember for sure) pointing out Amy’s voice and accent as Kim Jong Il in this sketch sounded like the character Dexter from Cartoon Network’s 90s animated series Dexter’s Laboratory.
— The performances in this sketch are very fun, and that, coupled with the silly atmosphere of this sketch, is making the dialogue much funnier than it actually is.
— Holy hell at Dane’s Saddam Hussein voice. Is he attempting to imitate the gruff voice Alec Baldwin used as Saddam the preceding season? I recall an online SNL fan back at this time (not sure if it was the same fan I mentioned above) saying Dane’s Saddam voice sounded like Cookie Monster with a foreign accent.
STARS: ***½


CUBICLE FIGHT
(host) fiercely guards territory from new employee (BIH)

— Funny “Cubicle Fight” reveal.
— Jason is great as the boss with his occasional interruptions during Bill and Dane’s wild fight.
— Solid bit with Bill using Dane’s tongue to lick an envelope.
— Good bit with the pencil sharpener.
— I love the little strut Dane does when he’s turning around as he’s about to stab Bill with a knife.
— Uh…okay. A very odd, speechless, abrupt ending to this short after Dane’s violent and very bloody off-camera stabbing of Bill. Half of me actually kinda loves that, as a Michael O’Donoghue-esque weird, dark, and disturbing way of ending this short, while the other half of me is just left baffled.
STARS: ***½


AL PACINO CHECKS HIS BANK BALANCE
operator (KRW) helps excitable Al Pacino (BIH) check his bank balance

— Fun concept for a sketch showcasing Bill’s killer Al Pacino impression, which we last saw a year prior in Bill’s breakout performance in his very first episode.
— A lot of funny lines from Bill’s Pacino throughout his phone conversation, helped by his very funny delivery.
STARS: ***½


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “When You Were Young”


NEW CO-ANCHOR
crestfallen Brian Williams [real] learns that SEM is AMP’s new co-anchor

— Wow, a change of pace, with a pre-Weekend Update intro segment, or a Weekend Update cold opening.
— I see we have a new Update set.
— Very strong premise of the real Brian Williams mistakenly thinking he’s Amy’s new Update co-anchor.
— I love Brian’s reactions to finding out SNL decided to go with Seth as the co-anchor instead of him. We’re seeing early signs of the surprisingly solid SNL host Brian would be the following season.
— Great exit line from Brian, and I love the detail of how he gives Seth a rude, dismissive shoulder bump as he walks past him.
— Odd how the show has gone back to a commercial break right after this short piece, instead of immediately cutting to the Update opening title sequence. However, the copy I’m watching of this episode cuts out all the commercial breaks, which makes it look like SNL does go immediately from this Brian Williams piece to the Update opening title sequence.
STARS: not sure this segment even warrants a rating, but if it does, I’ll give it a very high ****½


WEEKEND UPDATE
Bill Clinton (DAH) refires passion of old flame Condoleezza Rice (MAR)

George Allen (JAS) says he’s an inventor of silly words, not a racist

Dustin Diamond (ANS) hopes to raise money with his unappealing sex tape

— A new Update era officially begins.
— I’m not crazy at all about Amy’s opening joke. Feels like nothing has changed with her from the dire Fey/Poehler era that preceding this.
— A better second joke from Amy tonight.
— Right out of the gate, I’m finding myself liking Seth’s delivery as an Update anchor. His opening joke deserved a much better audience reaction.
— We’re already getting our first Update commentary, after only about three Update jokes?
— Interesting how Darrell and Maya are paired together in this Update commentary in the season premiere, because I remember how, after the somewhat large exodus of season 31 cast members over the summer of 2006, I was disappointed to learn that Darrell and Maya survived the purge, as I was of the opinion that, of all the returning cast members for season 32, Darrell and Maya were the ONLY two that should’ve went out the door with Horatio Sanz, Finesse Mitchell, etc. In hindsight, I’m now aware that season 32 ends up being Maya’s best season in a long while. Darrell, on the other hand? Meh.
— Interesting how Darrell’s Bill Clinton is going right to the point as soon as he shows up in this commentary, bypassing his usual habit of drawing out the beginning of his Update commentaries by making flirtatious comments towards the female anchorperson and milking laughs over little things.
— Maya’s “smirk” as Condoleezza Rice is pretty funny.
— Darrell’s Clinton continues to come off more streamlined tonight, as he surprisingly waited until the end of this Update commentary before he broke out his trademark thumbs-up and lip-bite moves. I appreciate how he saved that for the end, because, while I generally like Darrell’s Clinton, he does usually have a habit of relying on certain things too much as a crutch to get easy audience laughter and applause.
— Seth has been impressing me more and more with his delivery as an Update anchor in his debut tonight. A breath of fresh air from Tina Fey’s later years at the desk. Right out of the gate in his first Update, Seth is coming off so comfortable and sharp.
— Jason is always fun in Update commentaries.
— I’m not too crazy about a lot of the dialogue itself that Jason has here, but his delivery is making it work for me.
— The casting of Andy as Dustin Diamond/Screech seems fitting.
— I like the Saved By The Bell-themed names Andy’s Dustin Diamond/Screech gives for his sex acts.
— Amy’s Miss Cleo/lesbian joke really rubbed me the wrong way. Am I the only one?
— A fun closing joke from Seth.
— Overall, things are looking up for Update in this new era. Seth had a surprisingly very solid debut, and the writing of the jokes was a little better from the last few seasons. Amy still had some iffy moments that reminded me a little too much of her typical Update performance the preceding two seasons, but I’m seeing small signs of improvement in her. I found tonight’s Update alone to be better than literally any Fey/Poehler Update.
STARS: ***


POLAND SPRING DELIVERY MEN
empty bottles belie claims of thirsty water deliverymen (host) & (WLF)

— Right out the gate, we open on a hilarious and odd visual of Will and Dane chugging gallon jugs of water.
— I love Dane poorly and bizarrely making up an excuse that he’s busy “boning” some lady right now, and Will then telling Dane that was a good cover.
— I got a huge laugh from Will’s meek delivery of “I like to watch”, in regards to Dane “boning” his lady.
— Kristen is a great stern straight man here.
— This is such a strong oddball Will Forte sketch as usual. It’s so good, that even Dane Freakin’ Cook is coming off really well here, and his typical delivery style is actually working well in this material instead of hurting it. And who knew he would make a great duo with Will?
— A very memorable and classic sequence right now with an ENDLESS number of water jugs falling out of the closet. Very much in the “Sideshow Bob rake sequence” category of comedy.
— I’m really liking the very meta turn this sketch has taken, with Will detailing his plan to get this whole situation adapted into an SNL sketch. We also get a mention of NBC having two new SNL-based shows at this time: 30 Rock and Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip. This was an interesting time to be an SNL fan.
— A solid self-deprecating ending line from Will about how the funny part of this sketch “ended a looooong time ago”.
STARS: *****


MUSICAL PERFORMANCE
musical guest performs “Bones”


FARRAH FAWCETT FOR OCEAN SAVE
flighty Farrah Fawcett’s (AMP) pro-ocean message lacks focus

— Random idea for a sketch, but I like that we’ve been getting quite a lot of randomness in tonight’s season premiere.
— I’m not 100% sure if the bit with one of Amy’s fake breasts falling down her dress was intentional, as I recall some online SNL fans back at this time questioning if it was a genuine accident. It seemed planned to me, but if it was an accident, then Amy did a good job playing it off like it was part of the sketch.
— Yet another very meta turn tonight (which is another theme in this episode), with Amy-as-Farrah-Fawcett’s rambling getting interrupted by the camera pulling away from this sketch and panning over to the set for the next sketch, all the while Amy’s Farrah Fawcett worriedly follows the camera and asks where it’s going. The audience seems sooooo confused over this, judging from their awkward silence, but I am LOVING this. Such a unique transition into the following sketch. I also love how Amy’s Farrah ends this transition by randomly saying “I’m gonna do this scene now” as the screen fades to black.
STARS: ***½


CLOSING TIME
jerks (host) & (JAS) forcibly eject patrons from a bar at closing time

— Another Jason Sudeikis-starring sketch that takes place in his (I think) real-life hometown of Kansas City, much like the Once In A Lifetime Jewelers sketch he did the preceding season.
— Jason and Dane make yet another solid duo tonight.
— Solid execution of this sketch.
— Another good way tonight to work this entire cast into a sketch.
— Amy’s Farrah Fawcett, in her only line of this sketch: “She’s getting married, and I’m Farrah Fawcett.”
— I love the bit with Fred, which is a great way to end this sketch.
STARS: ****


GEICO
Geico customer’s (ANS) tale is augmented by wreck Whitney Houston (MAR)

— A funny way to spoof the Geico commercials from this time that each had a comical testimonial with an average citizen paired with a celebrity.
— I’m usually not all that crazy about Maya’s Whitney Houston appearances, but it’s working more for me in this format, with her always following up a straitlaced brief anecdote from Andy by saying a crazy brief anecdote.
STARS: ***


GOODNIGHTS

IMMEDIATE POST-SHOW THOUGHTS
— A very solid season premiere. I enjoyed literally EVERY SINGLE SEGMENT in this episode, the whole show had a fun vibe, two of the sketches were particularly strong (Poland Spring Delivery Men and Airport Security Seminar), and I liked all the different, out-of-the-ordinary, meta things the show tried. A promising start to a different-feeling SNL season so far. Speaking of a different-feeling SNL season so far, when this episode originally aired, I considered this the start of a new era. There were various things that gave this episode such a “new era” vibe for me back then, which include a new opening montage, a new Update co-anchor and Update set, a new director, the unusual lack of a pre-taped commercial for a season premiere, Weekend Update having a “cold opening”, the aforementioned focus on breaking-the-fourth-wall, meta humor, how unusual it felt seeing the show have a much smaller cast than the extremely large cast of the preceding season, and even a change of the formatting of the post-Weekend Update commercial breaks (though that’s probably more an NBC thing than an involuntary SNL thing). Speaking of the much smaller cast, I remember when I first watched this episode the night it originally aired, I was so used to the preceding season’s large cast that I kept getting an empty feel regarding the smaller cast in this episode. Not necessarily empty in a bad way, but in a way that I kept wondering why the heck it feels like one-third of the cast hadn’t appeared in any sketches yet, until I had to keep reminding myself that one-third of the cast is now gone. It took me an episode or two to get used to this season’s smaller cast, though I definitely appreciated the cast having a more streamlined feel this season (something modern-day SNL in 2020 could learn from). I really like how there were several segments in this episode where SNL used the entire cast (or most of them), showing how much smaller, cohesive, and comfortable-seeming this cast is than season 31’s bloated, mish-mashed cast.
— I was surprised by Dane Cook’s performance as a host in this episode. Unlike his first hosting stint, where I ran hot and cold on him all night (much more cold than hot towards the end of that episode), Dane didn’t bother me at all in any of the sketches he was in tonight (the closest was his odd Saddam Hussein voice in the Hugo Chavez sketch, but that was harmless and only a small part of that sketch), and he also worked well when paired with certain cast members, such as Will Forte and (especially) Jason Sudeikis. Even Dane’s monologue was decent tonight, after an iffy first two minutes.


MY PERSONAL CHOICE OF “BEST OF” MOMENTS FOR THIS EPISODE, REPRESENTED WITH SCREENCAPS


HOW THIS EPISODE STACKS UP AGAINST THE PRECEDING SEASON (2005-06)
a slight step up


My full set of screencaps for this episode is here


TOMORROW
Jaime Pressly