SNL Reviews: Elon Musk/Miley Cyrus (5/8/21)

 We’re in for a rough show, fellas….

Cold Open

A special Mother’s Day message from the cast of SNL.

• The scene with Kate and her mom (who oddly resembles Kristen Wiig) was really sweet. I also enjoyed the meta reference where she assumes that Kate plays Mary Katherine Gallagher, and they do a variation of her “Superstar!” catchphrase afterwards.

• Holy shit, Kyle’s a fucking giant compared to his mom!

• Beck’s mom looks like a drag version of him. Their scene is then followed by Mikey’s mom asking to hold Beck’s hand.

• Heidi and her mom have the exact same smile! She must have been cloned or something.

• Kenan’s scene was probably my favorite. There’s yet another meta joke here when he says that she taught him all about doing reaction shots, which is of course followed by a shot of Kenan doing that bug-eyed surprised face he does so well.

• Another really funny part is when Bowen Yang’s mom sprays his mouth when he tries to kiss her. Yeah, that would probably be my reaction too.

• The only cast member we don’t get to see here is Michael Che, but this is more than made up for when Colin’s mom wants to read out a joke he wrote to the audience, which Colin is very much against.

• Overall, probably the best cold open of the season. No stupid politics, just a nice heartwarming piece that we need to have more of on SNL these days.

Monologue

Elon Musk talks about why he loves SNL and what he was like as a kid.

• Already off to a bad start when Musk claims that he’s the first person with Asperger’s Syndrome to host the show. Sorry pal, but Dan Aykroyd beat you to it.

• What’s with all those awkward pauses he keeps doing?

• All these jokes are so cringeworthy, especially the one about his son’s name being “Cat running across the keyboard”.

• “Her name is Maye, like the month, but with an E added on.” You can tell he has no faith in this show when he has to read lines like this.

• His mom showing up added nothing to this, although I did like her response to the above line: “Thank you for spelling my name, Elon.” 

• Also, is it just me, or does she look a lot like Dame Judi Dench?

• What a boring monologue! Thus beginning the horror that is this episode.

Sketch: Gen Z Hospital

A friend group eagerly awaits for updates on an injured patient.

• SNL tries to take on Gen Z/Millennial culture, and fails miserably. Good lord, did I hate this sketch.

• Most of the characters in this sketch are wearing ridiculously colored wigs, and they speak in that annoying West Coast Millennial dialect that I really hate. You know, words like “dude”, and “bruh”. The use of this kind of language actually got the show in trouble with some black audiences for “co-opting” their vernacular.

• The sketch dies a painful death once Musk enters the scene and starts talking like the others. I don’t know why, but it feels really sad to see a famous billionaire be reduced to this garbage. They should have gotten Steve Jobs to host while he was still with us. He had a lot of charisma that would have translated perfectly to this show.

• Overall, this may be one of the worst sketches of the entire season. I can’t believe I forgot to put it on my list!

Film: Every Conversation With People You Haven’t Seen Since Quarantine Started

Partygoers try to make it through extremely awkward conversations.

• The main joke of this sketch got old really fast. 

• Another example of random violence as a punchline comes when Kate’s inner thoughts reveal that she stabbed her husband with a screwdriver. Um, okay?

Sketch: The Ooli Show

An Icelandic talk show, where the host (Chloe Fineman) keeps getting interrupted by her celebrity guests.

• This character, who appeared in a one-off sketch in the second At Home episode, becomes recurring…for some reason. Even worse, they do it in the worst way: they put her in a talk show sketch! While recurring characters being given their own talk show sketches certainly has worked in the past (think of Fericito or Will Ferrell as Harry Caray), I don’t see it working with this particular character.

• Oh, and this is yet another “Funny Accent Sketch”! Lucky me…

• I did get a chuckle from the noise Beck’s character made after being introduced. And there’s poor Lauren Holt being wasted with a silent role.

• I’m getting a Hans and Franz vibe from the voice of Musk’s character.

• First appearance of Kate’s Frances McDormand impression in quite a while. Too bad it’s wasted here.

• Ooli’s apparent catchphrase (“Wow, pretty cool!”) gets more and more annoying every time she says it.

• Mikey Day’s performance as Ooli’s co-host is pretty good, but I wish he was in a better sketch than this.

• Pete Davidson’s appearance as Steve Buscemi is completely wasted. He only gets two lines! I wanted to hear more of him, because he sounds like he’s got the voice down.

• Melissa Villaseñor plays Bjork here, and her impression is nowhere near as good as the one Winona Ryder did in the Season 27 finale. Hell, it’s not even as good as Kristen Wiig’s, which is something I never thought I would say.

• While not as terrible as I remembered this being, it was still extremely annoying. I hope we never see this character again.

Film: Murder Durdur

An advertisement for a new TV show that follows a Pennsylvanian detective (McKinnon) trying to solve a case.

• Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me! Two funny accent sketches in a row?

• Apparently, this is a parody of some detective show starring Kate Winslet that I’ve never heard of.

• This mostly just consists of McKinnon’s character confusing everybody else with her bizarre accent. I wasn’t even aware there was a specific Pennsylvanian accent.

Musical Performance: “Without You”

Weekend Update (featuring Pauline, Lloyd Ostertag, and Baby Yoda)

• Rather unusual to see a joke about the episode’s host. There was a lot of controversy before this aired regarding him being chosen, but this is about all we get making fun of that.

• Some more anti-white jokes from Che. I’ve stopped mentioning them as much in my reviews because he does it in pretty much every episode.

• Ego is back at the desk with a new character, a mother named Pauline, who’s here to talk about her recent trip to Disney World. Instead, she goes on a passionate rant about what a terrible time she had. This is yet another great commentary from Ego! It seems like every time she appears on Update, she knocks it out of the park!

• My favorite part was at the end, when she reveals that she fathered a child with Michael Che. What’s the son’s name? Che Jr. Che. Brilliant.

• Another unusual moment comes when Musk shows up as Weekend Update’s financial expert, with a commentary about cryptocurrency. I don’t give a fuck about cryptocurrencies so I found this a total snooze.

• I cringed so hard when Musk mentioned “Dogecoin”. That’s a word that I never thought I’d hear on this show, and I wish it stayed that way.

• But the worst moment of this entire update is when…ugh, Baby fucking Yoda returns yet again! I have no further comment about this shitty character, so let’s move on to the next sketch.

Sketch: Wario Trial

Wario (Musk) goes on trial for the alleged murder of Mario.

• DEAR. FUCKING. LORD. I have to review THIS shit again? Oh well, it wouldn’t hurt to tear it another asshole.

• A while back, I put this at the top of my Worst Sketches of Season 46 list. I still stand by that decision today, because this is, without a doubt, the absolute WORST thing SNL has ever produced.

• Things start off bad right away with Luigi’s borderline offensive accent. 

• I have no comment on the “joke” with the judge using a ? Block for her gavel. And it makes the actual sound effect, too, which makes me wonder if this whole sketch is another promotion for Universal’s upcoming Mario film.

• Unintentionally funny part when Wario’s lawyer (Mikey Day) says he’s going to bring up his client’s page on the Super Mario Wiki, but the page shown is actually from the Wario Wiki.

• Yet another drag role for McKinnon, this time as Waluigi. And, yes, she speaks in a very offensive accent.

• My life would have been a lot better had I never seen Elon Musk attempting to dance.

• I should have known they would do a “lol Mario eats mushrooms” joke at some point in this. That joke has been used and abused for over twenty years now, and it still isn’t funny.

• I could rant on forever about how awful that Princess Peach scene is, with her inaccurate Italian accent, and the fact that they claim she is Mario’s wife (she’s not), but I don’t want to waste too much space.

• The less said about that blurred picture of Luigi’s dick, the better.

• Something I didn’t bring up the last time I talked about this was the HORRIBLE way it ends. Davidson comes out as Andrew Cuomo, who advises us to not unfairly stereotype Italian-Americans. Wow, I don’t even know what to say. Do they not see the irony here?!? 

Film: The Astronaut

Chad is chosen to save Elon Musk’s SpaceX colony on Mars.

• Our first Chad film in a while. And this is a very special one…

• I like how a lot of these start without any indication that he’s in them. For example, he doesn’t show up in this one until about 40 seconds in.

• Chad’s usual bored and uninterested delivery is just as funny as usual. I even got a laugh from his somewhat juvenile amusement at the word “sacrifice”, because of the “sac” part.

• The scene where he leaves his girlfriend (played by Miley Cyrus) is great. When she tells him that she’s carrying a baby, he says “No thank you” and shuts the door. That was a really well timed joke.

• Another surprisingly funny juvenile joke where he misreads the pressure numbers as “BOOBS”. This is followed by a nice fake out gag where a burst of pressurized gas pushes him back, only for him to return without any apparent injuries and save the day.

• And now, for the grand finale. Musk beams the camera feed all over the world so everybody can see the man who saved Mars. Chad thinks this means that they want him to take off his helmet, which he does, and then his head blows up, killing him instantly. 

• According to Davidson, this is indeed supposed to be the final appearance of Chad, as he had gotten tired of playing him. While it is a shame that we won’t be getting anymore of him, I’m glad they decided to kill him off before he got too stale. Definitely a highlight of this troubled episode.

Musical Performance: “Plastic Hearts”

Sketch: Cowboy Standoff

A group of cowboys can’t agree on a plan to take down a powerful gang. 

• This is surprisingly the first we’ve seen of Kenan since the cold open. Unfortunately, he starts speaking in a Western version of that annoying voice he does.

• A weak ending to a weak episode. Hearing Musk try to talk like a cowboy was extremely painful, and the material itself wasn’t that funny. They should have just ended the episode after the Chad sketch.

Final thoughts: While not as bad as I remembered it being, this was still a very poor outing. Of course, it didn’t help that one of the worst sketches ever was in this episode. Even without all of the controversy, Musk was an awful host. I hope they never try booking someone like him again.

Best sketches: Cold Opening, Ego’s commentary, The Astronaut

Worst sketches: Gen Z Hospital, Murder Durdur, Baby Yoda commentary, Wario Trial

Next review: Keegan-Michael Key/Olivia Rodrigo

RIP Chad

2016-2021

SNL Reviews: John Mulaney/The Strokes (10/31/20)

 Cold Open

Joe Biden delivers a special Halloween message.

• Ugh, Carrey continues to be an unfunny nuisance. I really hate this impression.

• Lame and super dated joke about how he borrowed his Halloween decorations from Melania Trump’s Christmas decorations.

• We get an unwelcome return from McKinnon’s Hillary impression for the first time since Season 43. Thankfully, this is the last time we ever see it.

• She tells some lame Al Gore jokes that weren’t even funny in 2000. Leave the Gore jokes to Darrell Hammond.

• As much as I love Mikey Day, he really needs to stop doing impressions. Most of them have the same annoying nasal voice.

• Dead on Lil Wayne impression from Chris Redd. Kenan, on the other hand, looks and sounds nothing like Ice Cube.

• I cringed so hard when Biden put on sunglasses. I hate SNL’s tendency to portray world leaders as relatable slacker dudes.

• No further comment on the return of Maya, or the return of the frog-faced Mitch McConnell impression.

Monologue

Mulaney talks about Cuomo, the election, and his grandma.

• It‘ll certainly be…interesting…to rewatch this monologue knowing what we know now about Mulaney.

• Indeed, his voice sounds a little rougher and less enthusiastic than his previous appearances.

• He has some good jokes about Andrew Cuomo here, and his impression is spot on. Thank God that loser isn’t our governor anymore.

• Unfortunately he then blows it by resorting to a stereotypical Mafia joke. You know, cuz Cuomo’s Italian.

• Something else I noticed about Mulaney in this episode is that he seems to be stumbling over some of his lines.

• This monologue went on a little too long, and some of those negatives I mentioned set the tone for the rough episode to come.

Sketch: Cinema Classics

A never before seen alternate scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds.

• Uggghhhhh. Why do they keep bringing this shit back?

• Kenan’s usual shtick as the host is just as tired as ever. Maybe that’s why this ends up being the last Cinema Classics sketch as of December 2021. (EDIT: Not anymore! They brought it back in the recent Will Forte episode!)

• I was not surprised at all that Kate McKinnon was given the role of Tippi Hedren. She uses the same generic British-sounding voice she does for all of the old-time Hollywood roles she plays. I’m pretty sure Tippi Hedren is American.

• We get another example of the “random violence as a punchline” trope that I mentioned in my last review, when the birds smash into the telephone booth window in a gory mess.

• The sketch starts to get even worse when they resort to having the birds do impossible shit like using glass cutters. What the fuck is that all about?

• Another juvenile poop joke when one bird shits out an egg.

• The worst thing about this sketch is that it’s yet another example of corporate synergy. Which studio released The Birds? Universal, of course. Who’s Universal’s corporate sister? NBC! Hooray for cross-promotion!

Film: Strollin’

In which the cast delivers a thinly-veiled message for the viewers to go vote.

• I’m tired of these dumb rap videos. Apart from the nice sets and costumes, there’s nothing else I have to say here.

Sketch: Headless Horseman

The Headless Horseman (Beck Bennett) has to answer some uncomfortable questions from the citizens of Sleepy Hollow.

• Some more really good set design. I believe this is the same set from the Spooky Songs sketch in Chance the Rapper’s last episode. 

• The first minute or so of this sketch is actually really promising. There’s an appropriately eerie mood, with lots of fog, and, of course, that cheesy old “Castle Thunder” sound effect. And then the Horseman himself shows up, and he looks great! I’d love to know how they pulled the effect off.

• Sadly, the sketch goes downhill immediately after that, when Ichabod Crane (Mulaney) asks him if he ever uses his head to…suck his own dick. *groooooaaaaan* Why did they have to ruin such a promising sketch with more lame dick jokes? Then, Pete Davidson and Mikey Day enter, and the routine repeats itself.

• It’s also in this sketch that I notice how badly Mulaney’s enthusiasm has declined. He doesn’t seem all that interested in his lines. Hmmm, maybe he also realized that this sketch sucks?

• Super lame “twist” ending where it’s revealed that the reason they’ve been asking the Horseman all these depraved questions is because they are Puritans. An awful way to end a sketch that started out so well, but quickly went downhill because the writers are a bunch of mentally challenged stoners who think that dicks are the funniest things in the world.

Film: New York PSA

A public service announcement pays tribute to New Yorkers.

• All I will say about this one is that Kate McKinnon is briefly topless in it. Gross!

Musical Performance: “The Adults Are Talking”

Weekend Update (featuring Baby Yoda)

• Absolutely sick joke comparing Trump to Jeffrey Dahmer and John Wayne Gacy.

• Speaking of sick, we get a reappearance from that terrifying Baby Yoda impression. This is exactly the same as the last time he showed up, except it’s somehow even less funny. That’s quite an accomplishment.

• A surprisingly short Update. But these really short ones are usually the most painful for me.

Sketch: Souvenir Underwear

A man (Pete Davidson) learns why you shouldn’t buy underwear from a Times Square souvenir shop.

• FUUUUUCK!!!! Not another Mulaney Musical sketch! Ugh, I hate how this has to be a tradition every time he hosts.

• Sorry for going on a tangent here, but I just don’t get the appeal of these musical sketches. The only reason they keep doing them is because the media eats up shit like this. Maybe I’d like them better if I was into Broadway musicals. Then again, I’d probably still get tired of them if they keep getting brought back.

• Mulaney’s voice is sounding pretty rough again. Too bad they gave him a lot of dialogue here to make it even more noticeable.

• Of fucking COURSE they gave Maya a role in this sketch. It’s official; this is the worst installment out of all of these. Please end my life now.

Musical Performance: “Bad Decisions”

Random note: The lead singer’s mike looks like a dildo.

Sketch: Another Uncle Meme

Young Tyler (Davidson) has turned his Uncle Ron (Mulaney) into a meme again.

• This sketch from Mulaney’s previous episode becomes recurring.

• I got a laugh from the name of the popular account that retweeted Ron’s picture: “Purple Drank Posse”. The actual meme they posted was pretty funny too.

• While I certainly got some laughs here, this is definitely a step down from the previous installment. It doesn’t help that there’s a cringeworthy anti-Catholic joke in this one. But, I’d still consider this sketch okay, especially compared to all of the other garbage in Season 46.

• I liked the twist at the end, where it’s revealed that the reason Uncle Ron posted his image online in the first place is because he was looking for girls in prison to have sex with.

Final thoughts: A disappointing outing from Mulaney. While I now know that this is because of problems with his personal life, his dour mood affects the rest of the episode. I’m glad he eventually got the treatment he needed.

Best sketches: The first minute or so of Headless Horseman, Another Uncle Meme

Worst sketches: Cold Open, Cinema Classics, the rest of Headless Horseman, Souvenir Underwear

Next review: Elon Musk/Miley Cyrus. Lord have mercy….

SNL Reviews: Kristen Wiig/Dua Lipa (12/19/20)

 Cold Open

Mike Pence gets the COVID vaccine.

• The final appearance of Beck Bennett’s bland and unremarkable Pence impression. I am not sad to see him go.

• Not sure what the joke is with his wife not saying a word. I also don’t get the joke of him referring to her as “Mother” as she walks off. Is that supposed to be some kind of Norman Bates thing?

• Super hacky joke when he starts to pull down his pants, thinking that this is the type of vaccine that goes in your butt.

• To make this even more painful, Maya returns as Kamala Harris again. And she gets a ton of applause when she tells Pence that she won more votes.

• Even more cringeworthy clapter when she slaps Pence. That’s like something you’d see in a bad political cartoon.

• First appearance of Alex Moffat’s short-lived Joe Biden impression. He makes his entrance by walking out with a cane. Because he’s old! Get it?

• They comment on his change in appearance again, and Biden responds with a lame joke about how he’s like Colonel Sanders: “Every time you see me, I’m a different guy.”

• After Biden and Harris leave, we get, ugggghhhh, Kate McKinnon as Giuliani again. Thankfully, this is his final appearance as of November 2021.

• More of the usual Giuliani nonsense that never makes me laugh. 

• Kenan returns as Ben Carson for the last time. Wow, a lot of impressions making their final appearances here. That’s all I have to say about that because nothing he says is funny.

Monologue

Kristen Wiig bids farewell to 2020, with some help from Maya and Kate.

• After a nice long break, this is the first musical monologue of Season 46. I can’t say I’ve missed them.

• This monologue is like pure torture. Three of my least favorite cast members hurting my ears with terrible lyrics.

Sketch: Secret Word

Mindy Grayson still keeps blurting out the secret word too early.

• Sorry for stealing your catchphrase, Stooge, but, *groan*.

• As usual, the annoying running gag of Grayson saying the secret word too early is overused and unfunny.

• How do you make a bad recurring sketch even worse? Add Kate McKinnon to it. Here, she plays a European actress, and uses her stock foreigner accent that she uses for all of her European characters.

• As bad as these sketches are, they always had Bill Hader to liven them up in the past. Since he’s not here now, though, we get Kenan as the host instead. He does okay, but not as good as Hader used to be.

Film: Christmas Morning 

A family shows off what they got for Christmas this year.

• Blah. Another boring rap video.

Sketch: USO

The military receives a special Christmas performance from their peers.

• Yet another musical sketch in this episode. Yawn.

• Even worse, Asian Terry Sweeney is in this one. His singing voice is something I never wanted to hear.

• There’s a similar USO sketch that was in Madeline Kahn’s Season 21 episode. The only difference is that it was actually funny, and had Darrell’s great Jay Leno impression as the host. This one doesn’t have anything like that.

Film: A Teacher

A new show where a student (Andrew Dismukes) tries to get special attention from his teacher (Ego Nwodim).

• Nice to see Ego and Andrew get big roles. In fact, they’re the only cast members in this at all.

• When this first aired, I thought this was a parody of a real show on Hulu, but apparently, it’s just some bullshit they made up.

• Yet another sketch that revolves around having sex, except it’s even worse in this case, given that it revolves around a teacher discussing sex with an underage boy.

• Despite all that, Ego still manages to give a good performance here. Why isn’t she the female cast member who gets all the screentime instead of Kate?

Sketch: Home Alone 2 Alternate Ending

Kevin (Melissa Villaseñor) strikes up a friendship with the Pigeon Lady (Wiig) in this alternate ending to Home Alone 2.

• Boy, am I getting tired of all these “alternate ending” sketches the show has been shitting out lately. Given how bad the show is at parodying movies lately, you just know this one is going to be bad.

• I don’t get why Kevin had to be played by a woman in this sketch. Why not someone like Dismukes?

• Wiig surprisingly keeps her performance restrained here. It’s stuff like this where she really shines.

• Those wobbly pigeons on her shoulders are distracting as fuck.

• Speaking of bad impressions, Kyle Mooney unveils the worst Joe Pesci voice known to man. It isn’t a patch on the one that Jim Breuer did in the 90s.

• Mikey Day’s Marv impression isn’t much better, but I did get a kick out of him dressed like that.

• And then Wiig randomly beats the Wet Bandits to death in a brutally gory fashion. If you can’t think of a way to end a sketch, just resort to random violence, and maybe people won’t notice how bad your writing is.

Musical Performance: “Don’t Start Now”

Weekend Update (featuring Willie, Smokey Robinson, and Landis Trotter)

• The final Weekend Update during the Trump presidency. To “celebrate”, they show a montage of some of Trump’s greatest accomplishments. And, dear God, that montage is PAINFUL. They only show the most unflattering clips they could find of him.

• And they make a joke about tranquillizing him. How come the Secret Service isn’t investigating these morons?

• Yet ANOTHER joke about Mitch McConnell hating children. Please stop with these!!!

• Chris Redd does a commentary as Smokey Robinson, who had apparently gone viral that week in a video where he mispronounced “Hanukkah”. I usually like Redd’s impressions, but his Smokey sounds more like Michael Jackson.

• I did get a laugh at the joke about the Utah Jazz being the only black people in Utah.

• Kenan’s Willie character returns. This was the first time I had ever seen the character, but he didn’t leave a good impression on me. 

• Heidi Gardner introduces a new character named Landis Trotter, which I refuse to say anything more about because it sucked like all of her other characters.

• Now, we get the traditional joke swap between Che and Jost. This should be good…

• You know things are really fucked up when the only jokes in this episode that got a big laugh out of me are ones that are meant to be offensive. Colin always has the best jokes in these joke swapping bits.

Sketch: The Grinch

Cindy-Lou Who (Chloe Fineman) and her family have an awkward morning with The Grinch (Pete Davidson).

• There’s some really nice set design and makeup in this sketch. Mikey looks downright hilarious with the big Who nose.

• Fineman’s Cindy-Lou voice is the same annoying high-pitched voice she uses for half of her celebrity impressions.

• Another surprisingly underplayed role from Wiig. Is this even the same woman that was in that Secret Word shit from earlier?

• Amazing makeup job on Davidson as The Grinch. His voice is dead on, too, which doesn’t surprise me, since we’ve previously heard him do it in that Chad sketch from the Saoirse Ronan episode. 

• Despite all of the positive things I mentioned, I knew as soon as that “The Next Morning” subtitle appeared that this sketch was going to be yet another “lol sex is funny” sketch. Such a shame that they wasted these beautiful sets and costumes for a lame premise. I’d rather watch the scene from the movie where The Grinch makes the Mayor kiss his dog’s ass than watch this sketch again.

• Super predictable and hacky “That’s not the only thing that grew” joke regarding his heart growing three sizes. Did a twelve year old write that?

Sketch: Surprise Sue

Sue tries to contain her excitement at a holiday party.

• *groaaaaan* Not this shitty character again! And now we’re back to Wiig going over the top.

• Oh, that’s right, there’s another black woman on this show. Given how rarely they use her, I’m surprised that she’s the only black character in the sketch. And I’m even more surprised that she got a second season.

• What else is there to say about this sketch that hasn’t been said by other SNL reviewers? Actually, there is one other thing I’ll say. In Kristen’s last hosting stint, the characters she brought back were the same ones she brought back here (Secret Word and Surprise Sue). Are these her favorite characters or something?

Musical Performance: “Levitating”

Final thoughts: As I expected going in, this was a really bad episode. While Wiig certainly didn’t help, the main problem I had was with the writing. Half of the sketches were about sex, as is usual with this season. The only good thing I can say is that this is thankfully the end of the Trump era on SNL. It was a rough four years, but it can’t get any worse, right? Right???

Best sketches: Colin’s racist jokes, Pete Davidson as The Grinch

Worst sketches: Cold Open, Monologue, Secret Word, Surprise Sue

Next review: John Mulaney/The Strokes

SNL Reviews: Dave Chappelle/Foo Fighters (11/7/20)

 Lord have mercy for what I’m about to review….

Cold Open: Biden Victory

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris gloat about their victory to the audience.

• Already off to a bad start with the worst Wolf Blitzer impression ever. Why is this cast so bad at impressions?

• Blitzer’s announcement that Biden has won the election is followed by extremely loud applause. That certainly proves who this show’s intended audience is.

• Thankfully, this is the final appearance of Jim Carrey’s awful Joe Biden impression. I’m not going to miss it at all.

• More cliched old people jokes about Biden follow afterwards. I wish they’d just admit that they have no interest in mocking Biden and they just want to suck his dick.

• Maya as Kamala Harris gets more and more annoying with each appearance she makes. 

• As if this cold open wasn’t painful enough, Trump shows up next. Ugggghhhh!!!!! 

• It’s the same usual unfunny business with this impression. Baldwin could clearly give less of a fuck about wanting to be there. And he still hasn’t stopped doing those dumb faces after he finishes speaking.

• Then, we get something horrifying…something unholy…Trump sits in front of a piano and starts singing “Macho Man” by The Village People. UGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!

• As much as it pains me to say it, this actually makes the “Hallelujah” cold open look good, because at least that had some…genuine heart put into it. Jesus, that really hurt me to say.

• And, with that, Baldwin’s Trump makes his final physical appearance. He has a voice-only appearance in another sketch later in this episode, though.

• Because of the “Macho Man” scene, this cold open isn’t even available on YouTube or on the show’s website. I had to resort to…somewhat illegal means to see it again.

Note: This episode aired nearly an hour later than scheduled, due to a football game running too long.

Monologue

Dave Chappelle talks about Trump, COVID, and the election.

• Hoo boy. I’m not kidding when I tell you guys this, but this monologue goes on for sixteen and a half minutes. This is only the beginning of what I have to deal with in this episode.

• I’m ashamed to admit this, but I’ve never seen an episode of Chappelle’s Show. If I had, then I might be more of a fan of this long-ass monologue.

• More sickening clapter when his statement that Trump is gone gets followed up by mass applause.

• Sick joke when he compares Trump getting the virus to Freddie Mercury getting AIDS. What an awful thing to say! No offense to Freddie, but at least Trump didn’t die!

Sketch: Fired Mascots

Aunt Jemima (Rudolph), Uncle Ben (Kenan Thompson), and the Allstate Guy (Chappelle) try to keep their jobs after being fired due to political correctness.

• Rather unusual intro to this sketch, where Chappelle stands on home base and tells us what the sketch is going to be about. This is apparently a thing that they do on Chappelle’s Show.

• As soon as I saw that Maya was playing Aunt Jemima, I could tell exactly where this sketch was headed. 

• Rather uncomfortably long silence from Maya after she says her first line. Couldn’t she have spoken over the audience laughter?

• The “joke” that she uses her own breast milk to make her pancakes was embarrassingly childish. It doesn’t help that she literally winks at the camera after she says this.

• Then Kenan appears as Uncle Ben. Once again, he uses the same “sassy black guy” voice that I’ve grown so tired of by this point. 

• The “humor” in this sketch is so broad and stereotypical that I was surprised to find out it was written by at least three black people. I’m sure it’s supposed to be making fun of these stereotypes, but they’re playing it too straight. If you want to see a good sketch mocking the use of African-American mascots, look for that commercial Tracy Morgan did for “Uncle Jemima’s Mash Liquor”.

• Chappelle appears as the Allstate Guy. Couldn’t they have made him Jake from State Farm? That would be pretty funny. I did like the artificially-deepened voice he had, though.

• Pete Davidson’s random appearance as Count Chocula fell flat for me, as did Chappelle calling him a “chocolatey ni***”, his second n-word of the episode (the first was in the monologue). You can actually hear some people in the audience gasp after he says that.

• Overall, a really poor attempt at satire. And the sad thing is that there are people out there who think otherwise.

Sketch: Mario Moments

Gamers talk about their favorite memories of playing Mario games.

• I already talked about this sketch in my Worst Sketches of Season 46 list, but it’s so horrible that I need to talk about it again. 

• I could tell that this sketch was going to be bad before it even started, seeing as it’s a blatant promotion for Universal’s upcoming Mario movie.

• Mikey and Kyle’s game reviewer characters show up, and it’s there where this sketch goes from boring to downright terrible. Season 46’s trend of lame testicle jokes continues when they won’t stop talking about Kyle’s balls “popping”. Exactly what that has to do with Mario, I have no idea.

• And then they just keep dragging the joke on when all of the other people being interviewed are more concerned about his balls. When it seems like it’s going to focus on something else, they just keep going back to the ball talk.

• Really bad ending tagline: “The fun never pops. I mean, stops”. Fucking horrible.

Film: Take Me Back

A man (Beck Bennett) tries to convince his ex (Ego Nwodim) to get back together with him.

• I paid very little attention to this when it first aired, mostly because I was still trying to wrap my head around the awful Mario sketch.

• Rewatching it for this review, I see that I didn’t miss much. Another bland short film with very little jokes. And, continuing the Season 46 trend, there’s another dick joke.

Musical Performance: “Shame Shame”

Weekend Update (feat. Rudy Giuliani)

• Yet another long round of applause when someone mentions Biden’s victory. Then they follow up by showing cringeworthy video clips of protesters mocking Trump for losing. I’ve never wanted to punch the TV more in my life.

• Jost then compares the celebrations to the end of World War II. Um, that’s a very odd comparison to make.

• The biggest laugh I got from this Update was the clip they showed of some asshole interrupting a live report on News 12 Long Island. So you know things are bad when my biggest laugh comes from a video that they didn’t even create.

• Then….to complete the pure horror that is this Weekend Update, Kate McKinnon shows up as Giuliani for the one millionth time. When watching this episode for the first time, I turned my TV off as soon as that happened. It had been a bad week for me, and I just wasn’t in the mood for any Giuliani nonsense to make me feel worse.

Sketch: News Center 5 Albany

News reporters can’t keep an interview about a hailstorm on track.

• I missed these next two sketches the first time I watched the episode, due to reasons I mentioned above.

• The fact that this sketch takes place in my area of New York caught my interest at first, but then I got disappointed when I saw that they made up a town instead of using a real one.

• As soon as I saw Kenan’s character, I knew exactly what the joke with him was going to be. And then it became the main joke of the sketch. 

• I’m getting so sick of these constant “news reporters can’t keep a story on track” sketches. Every time they do a sketch about a news report these days, they always follow this same formula.

• I feel really sorry for poor Ego Nwodim having to be in this sketch. She tries her hardest, though.

Sketch: DC Morning

Donald Trump is involved in a car chase.

• Well, here we are, folks. The final (vocal) appearance of Alec Baldwin as Trump…and it’s just one line about him wanting a hamburger. Get it?!?? He’s fat!!!!

• When I saw that this sketch involved a car chase, I knew that there was going to be an OJ reference somewhere. I was right, because the footage they use to represent this car chase is taken from the OJ chase. So, is the point they’re trying to make here that Donald Trump is a murderer? Or something? I don’t know, these writers are clearly not healthy.

Musical Performance: “Times Like These”

Final Thoughts: Good God, this is one of the worst episodes I’ve ever had to review. Every single joke fell flat for me. Every single sketch idea was awful. And, of course, there was that unbearably long monologue at the beginning. Overall, a terrible mess of an episode.

Best sketches: NONE

Worst sketches: They all sucked, but I really hated Fired Mascots, Mario Moments, and DC Morning the most.

Next review: Kristen Wiig/Dua Lipa

Worst sketches of Season 46

 Season 46 of SNL will go down in my books as one of the worst seasons ever. Out of all the episodes, none of them were good. The closest we got was the Bill Burr episode, but even that had problems, such as the worst cold opening ever. Like my Worst Sketches in the Trump Era list, I’m going to be rating these sketches using The Rating of Suckitude. The higher the number, the more the sketch sucked.

1. A Rona Family Christmas (from Timothee Chalamet/Bruce Springsteen, 12/12/20)

Summary: This one is about living coronavirus spores telling bad jokes while preparing for the holidays.

• One of the most unfunny things I’ve ever seen on television. This is full of such hacky jokes as a TV show called “Dancing With The SARS”. I groaned so loud when I watched this live. Asian Terry Sweeney also plays a character named “Oral”, because of course he does.

Suckitude: 2/10

2. Universal Studios Tram Tour (from Dan Levy/Phoebe Bridgers, 2/6/21)

Summary: Corporate synergy up the ass!

• Season 46 continues the recent trend of bad shilling for fellow corporations. This is one of the most pathetic examples, and it’s full of bad greenscreening, blatant research failure (they get the year that the first live-action Flintstones movie came out wrong), and overall, it’s just a commercial for Universal Studios.

Suckitude: 4/10

3. Mario Memories (from Dave Chappelle/Foo Fighters, 11/7/20)

Summary: Gamers talk about their favorite memories playing Mario games.

• The Dave Chappelle episode has so much wrong with it that I am going to be doing a separate review for it in the future. But I wanted to give you a preview of the horrors it contains by bringing up one particular sketch that thoroughly broke me when I saw it. Not only is this Mario Memories shit just another example of bad corporate synergy (Universal has a Mario film coming out soon), but it’s another example of Season 46’s juvenile obsession with testicle jokes. The sketch with the guy jizzing on the pizza in Season 45 was bad enough, but this takes the cake. And the worst part is that this isn’t even the only Mario-related sketch on this list….

Suckitude: 8/10

4. Pelotaunt (from Regina King/Nathaniel Rateliff, 2/13/21)

Summary: A commercial for an exercise bike that insults you.

• Remember all of those Peloton sketches I got sick of in Season 45? Well, here’s another one. It actually has a good concept, but, as is usual with SNL these days, they think that having a good idea prevents them from doing anything creative with it. This sketch could have worked if they had made the bike’s insults funny and biting. Instead, it’s all lame playground bully shit.

Suckitude: 4/10

5. Now That’s What I Call Theme Songs Sung By The Stars Of The Show (from John Krasinski/Machine Gun Kelly, 1/30/21)

Summary: Characters from shows I’ve never seen sing their theme songs.

• One of SNL’s trademarks has been its celebrity impressions, and I usually love it when they do sketches showing them off, like the famous Star Wars Screen Tests sketch from 1997. Unfortunately, most of the impressions on this show nowadays are extremely bad, such as in this sketch. Maybe I’d like it better if had ever seen any of these shows, but the problem they have these days is that they don’t try to make their parodies accessible to people who haven’t seen them. The worst part is when they bring back that horrfying and unfunny Baby Yoda impression. Do they realize that nobody gives a shit about The Mandalorian anymore?!?

Suckitude: 7/10

6. The Grinch (from Kristen Wiig/Dua Lipa, 12/19/20)

Summary: A family has an awkward morning with The Grinch.

• Yet ANOTHER example of Universal synergy, as this is obviously supposed to be based on the 2000 film. Pete Davidson’s honestly pretty good Jim Carrey impression is wasted on this sketch, which I immediately predicted was going to be about sex when it started.

Suckitude: 9/10

And the worst sketch of Season 46 is….

7. Wario Trial (from Elon Musk/Miley Cyrus, 5/8/21)

Summary: Wario (Elon Musk) is on trial for allegedly killing Mario with a shell.

• To say that this sketch is an abomination is an understatement. It is an insult to the Mario games, and an insult to my sanity. And I’m not alone in thinking so. EVERYBODY in the world panned this sketch, and most of the YouTube comments are extremely negative. Let’s go over the ways this sketch sucks…

• For starters, Musk looks downright uncomfortable in this sketch. I would be too if I had to deliver some of these jokes.

• The jury is made up of Toads, and by that, I mean they took the first image of Toad they could find on Google and copypasted it.

• The worst thing of all is when Princess Peach shows up, and she starts speaking in a horribly stereotypical Italian accent. If there was any doubt these people have never played the games, this is the proof. Peach has never spoken with an Italian accent in any of her appearances. 

• And the ultimate insult comes at the end when they show a blurred picture of Luigi’s penis, once again, continuing Season 46’s juvenile obsession with penis jokes. I was so disgusted at this part that I seriously contemplated throwing the remote at the TV. Why didn’t Nintendo sue them for this?

Suckitude: 8,000/10 

SNL Reviews: Owen Wilson/Kacey Musgreaves (10/02/21)

 I’m skipping ahead to start reviewing Season 47. 

Cold Open

President Biden and his fellow Democrats address the president’s infrastructure bill.

• We have a brand new Joe Biden impersonator starting with this episode: new cast member James Austin Johnson. While he certainly looks the part, his voice needs a lot more work. It might also help if they actually made fun of him instead of lame “haha he’s old” jokes.

• Aidy Bryant debuts an impression of Senator Joe Manchin. She’s been doing a lot of drag roles lately, for some reason. 

• Speaking of drag roles, I thought I’d mention that Kate McKinnon is absent from this episode, and will be until at least December. All I have to say about that is, YAAAAAAY!

Cast Notes:

• Beck Bennett and Lauren Holt are no longer in the cast. While I was expecting Holt to get the boot, since she never did anything of note, I was not expecting Bennett to leave. Even so, I’m happy that he did, because he was a terrible impressionist, and he just wasn’t funny.

• There are three new cast members: James Austin Johnson (who I already mentioned), Sarah Sherman, and Aristotle Athari. Chloe Fineman and Bowen Yang have also been promoted to repertory status.

Monologue

Owen Wilson talks about hosting the show for his first time.

• I’m surprised that this is only the first time that Owen is hosting the show. His brother Luke did in one of the better episodes of the disastrous Season 30.

• Speaking of Luke, he makes a cameo in the audience, along with their other brother Andrew.

• I was hoping Owen would do something special for his first ever monologue, but it was just a long, boring speech. As much as I hate to say this, I would have preferred something like a questions or musical monologue for this one.

Sketch: The Talking

A doctor delivers COVID tests to the four hosts of a talk show.

• This sketch is a parody of an incident that happened on The View that week where two of the hosts tested positive for COVID during the show. 

• This was where I first noticed Kate’s absence. Usually, they make sure to include her in sketches that involve most of the female cast, so her absence here was rather jarring to me.

• Unfortunately, the lack of McKinnon couldn’t save this sketch from being extremely formulaic. As soon as the main joke revealed itself, that was all we got.

Film: Star Trek: Ego Quest

Jeff Bezos and his brother get involved in some “hilarious” shenanigans in space.

• Nice of them to do a sketch with the Wilson brothers. Owen plays Jeff Bezos, while Luke plays his brother. Does Jeff even have a brother?

• There’s also some other billionaire impressions on the ship, including Elon Musk (*shudder* I’m getting bad memories of his hosting stint) and Richard Branson. Unsurprisingly, these impressions both suck. The Branson one has nothing on the one that Bill Hader used to do.

• Another really boring sketch about something I have no interest in.

Sketch: Cars 4

Owen Wilson records lines for the new Cars movie.

• Ugh, another pathetic example of sucking up to Disney.

• Even worse, it’s yet another sketch with lame juvenile sex jokes. Most of the lines Owen has to read are related to Lightning McQueen having sex with girl cars.

• James Austin Johnson shows up as Larry The Cable Guy, and good lord is the impression terrible! In his defense, though, it’s a really hard voice to do.

• The only thing I liked were the illustrations that accompanied each of their lines.

Sketch: School Board Meeting

Attendees at a school board meeting stray wildly off-topic.

• This sketch makes its first appearance since Season 41.

• I shudder to think what the first two installments of this were like, because this was terrible! While it was nice to see the whole cast (minus McKinnon, Che, and Jost) involved in this, it went on for way too long.

• I got a brief chuckle from Mikey’s character introducing himself. Something about his delivery made me smile.

• Continuing the theme of bad impressions, Pete Davidson shows up as Dog The Bounty Hunter. Not only does he not look like him, but he sounds awful.

• This was Asian Terry Sweeney’s first and only appearance in the whole episode. Awesome!

Musical Performance: “Justified”

• For some strange reason, Musgreaves performs this song in the nude, with her lady parts strategically hidden by a cleverly placed guitar.

Weekend Update (featuring A Black Woman Who’s Been Missing For Ten Years and Pete Davidson)

• Oh, geez, it’s these morons again. Despite being the longest lasting anchors this segment has ever had, they haven’t gotten any funnier.

• I am extremely tired of Michael Che laughing at his jokes. He does it twice here, including after a really tasteless joke about R. Kelly.

• Ego Nwodim has a commentary as a missing black woman. And, just like the one in the JJ Watt episode, I actually enjoyed it a lot! She brings up some good points about what it’s like to be a missing black woman, like how her missing person poster is actually a WANTED poster (great picture they used for it, btw), and the reward for finding her is a Chili’s Too coupon that only works at the airport. She also has a pretty good slam at Madea when bringing up movies about missing women. I can’t understand why they barely give her any commentaries, because she knocks them out of the park every time!

• As this was the first episode to air after the death of Norm MacDonald, Pete Davidson wears a shirt with his face on it during his commentary. The only laugh I got from it was showing a picture of a guy in a gimp mask that he claims is of Colin Jost.

• Speaking of Norm, they end Update with a nice tribute to him by showing some old clips from his time behind the desk, including one of his famous OJ jokes. Unfortunately, the clips they chose were some of his blandest, least likely to offend anybody jokes. But it was still nice of them to pay tribute to him.

Sketch: Funeral Song

A funeral ceremony goes awry when the deceased’s final wishes take a bizarre turn.

• The sketch begins with an extremely odd technical gaffe where we can hear the director’s voice, and Lorne is seen walking off the set. This error was surprisingly not edited out for the online upload.

• Now this was a nice surprise! For the first time in who knows how long, I was actually laughing a lot at an SNL sketch. 

• The sketch starts off on a low-key note, then picks up when Kenan arrives as a man named “Levar B. Burton”, who makes sure to emphasize that he has a B in the middle, for legal reasons. He starts singing “I Believe I Can Fly”, which offends the other guests at the funeral because of all the terrible things its composer did. They eventually relent when they realize it was the deceased’s wish for the song to be played, and let Burton continue. So far, so good…

• Then, the sketch gets really good when the slideshow of pictures of the deceased woman start to reveal that she may not have been as nice as her family believed. She is then shown with such disgraced celebrities as Louis CK, Trump, and Kevin Spacey, before ending with the best one of all: a photo of her saluting Bill Cosby. 

• I was feeling sick on the night this episode aired, and this sketch was the perfect thing I needed to cheer me up! 

• The thing that surprised me the most about this sketch was that it was written by Michael Che. I find that hard to believe, because it had none of his usual anti-white jokes in it.

Musical Performance: “Camera Roll”

Sketch: NFL on FOX

Two FOX Sports announcers keep interrupting game coverage to plug a new show on FOX.

• Great, another sketch about something I have no interest in.

• Johnson debuts another impression, this time of Joe Buck. Wilson plays Troy Aikman. I have no idea how accurate the voices are, but Johnson certainly looks like Buck.

• The main joke of this sketch got old pretty fast, even if it is an accurate parody of those annoying “pop-up” ads that usually appear during football games on FOX and other networks. Not only that, but it’s a premise that was already done better in a sketch from the Will Ferrell episode from Season 34, in which Charles Barkley is more interested in the onscreen promos for a sitcom than basketball.

• Not even the random inclusion of Stacey Abrams in one of the promos made me laugh, because, instead of making it a funny background joke, they decided to point it out.

Sketch: Mail-In Testing Service

Two doctors have difficulty filming a promo for their…ugh…stool sample testing service.

• Newbie Sarah Sherman gets her first lead role.

• This sketch was unfortunately nothing but a bunch of lame jokes about playing with poop. Yuck! 

• There was a glitch at my station when this first aired, so we joined this sketch right when the poop jokes began. Needless to say, that was a hell of an introduction.

Note: A dedication to a guy named Robert Schlosser is shown before the goodnights.

Final thoughts: Overall, I’m surprised at how much better this episode was than I thought it was going to be. It wasn’t perfect, but it was miles better than the entirety of Season 46. The lack of Kate McKinnon certainly helped it, as did the new cast members. Owen Wilson didn’t really stand out that much as a host, to be honest. I was expecting a lot more from him.

Best sketches: Ego’s commentary, Funeral Song

Worst sketches: Cars 4, Mail-In Testing Service

Next review: Dave Chappelle/Foo Fighters

The Amanda Show reviews: Episode 5

Cold Open: Elevator

Amanda tries to reach the studio via the elevator, but it keeps making stops.

• A really good cold open, and always one of the first ones that comes to my mind.

• Nice twist at the end where Amanda realizes she forgot her purse and has to ride the elevator all the way down again.

TV Clips: A panning shot of trees, and a guy doing jumping jacks

Monologue

People keep interrupting Amanda to ask which floor they’re on. Andrew Keegan makes a cameo.

• I like how this is somewhat of a continuation of the cold open. 

• Is it me, or does Dan Schneider have something against Asian people? Most of the time, when they show up in his shows, they’re villains, or they have bad things happen to them. Any Asian that doesn’t fit these two categories is often a sumo, which is what we get here.

• After the sumo leaves, we get a cameo from teen heartthrob Andrew Keegan, who picks up Amanda and carries her away. Kind of a random ending, but, I’ll take it.

Commercial: Remote Control Underpants

The title says it all; they’re underpants that you can race.

• One of the more bizarre commercials on this show. 

• Despite the odd concept, this is one of my favorites. I love the hilariously bad acting (“This truck BITES!!!”) and the twist at the end where Amanda wins with a pair of pink underpants.

Hillbilly Moment: Witch Broom

Sketch: Mr. Gullible

The world’s most gullible substitute teacher (Kassir) gets tricked by his students into doing several unusual things that their regular teacher apparently does.

• One of my favorite recurring characters makes his debut. I absolutely love Johnny Kassir’s performance, which is based off of Jerry Lewis as Julius Kelp from The Nutty Professor.

• The gag where they make him slam his head against the chalkboard as he takes attendance is frickin’ genius. After one kid pretends to not hear him so he’ll hurt himself even more, he just gives up and assumes everyone else is in.

• The highlight of this is undeniably his dance on top of the table. Just seeing Kassir dance like a buffoon is comedy gold.

• Although this was a great introduction to the character, my favorite sketch of his is still yet to come...

Stop-Motion: Messy Bedroom

Amanda tries to clean her messy bedroom.

• First appearance of Amanda’s German-accented mother.

• A Blockblister sketch can be heard on Amanda’s TV at the beginning of this.

• I like how the posters in her room are all in the same stop-motion art style.

• Overall, another really bizarre short, but in a good way.

Hillbilly Moment: Beaver

Penelope Taynt

Penelope interrupts a sketch about pirates to plug her website.

• This is the first of several occasions where Penelope interrupts a sketch to try to meet Amanda. 

• The actual bit of the sketch we see before it gets interrupted is pretty funny (“Mom!! My room is full of pirates!!!!”). It makes me want to see a full version of this sketch without any interruptions.

• I like how Drake and Johnny try to stay in character at first when Penelope breaks onto the set (“We will ignore this person and continue stealing things!”). Then they threaten to make her walk the plank. (“Plank? I see no plank! Where’s Amanda?”)

• Penelope introduces the “Video Clip of The Week” part of her site. This week’s clip is a video of Amanda singing to a birdhouse.

• I believe this is the first instance of Penelope referring to Drake as “Blake”.

• Nice ending where Amanda arrives with a sword to fight the pirates, only to realize that they have already left.

Totally Kyle: Dead Bird

Kyle tells of the time he saw a dead bird on the sidewalk while walking to school.

• One of my favorite Kyle bits. This same situation happened to my brother once, so it has the added bonus of being relatable to us.

• They haven’t started using Amanda’s intro and outro for the sketch yet.

Scooper Dooper 

A visit to Doreen (Amanda) and her father’s (Kassir) ice cream shop, which sells bizarre and disgusting flavors.

• Ah, another one of my favorite recurring sketches makes its debut. 

• Surprisingly, they show restraint by not having a flavor themed after feet.

• The girl who eats “Chili Willy” is the same girl who plays Tammy in the Girls’ Room sketches. And then she tries a flavor called “Lobster Tackle” and gets tackled by a Dancing Lobster.

• The finale is nothing short of epic. Drake comes and orders “Spider Crunch”, which has actual spiders in it. He calls for a health inspector, who turns out to be of no help when he has no problem with Doreen pouring more spiders into the ice cream. After Drake runs away, they offer the inspector “Cookies and Dynamite”. As soon as he leaves the restaurant he BLOWS THE FUCK UP!!!! And, to top it all off, Doreen and her father don’t even care that a man just exploded.

Closing

Amanda presents awards to the audience.

• The fat kid who Amanda gives the “Best Laugher” award to doesn’t appear to be really laughing. It sounds like stock laughter sounds have been dubbed over him.

• Random but funny ending where she gives the “Audience Member From The Furthest Planet” award to an alien.

Final thoughts: And now the show finally hits its stride. With the debut of two of the show’s most iconic sketches, it seems things can only get better from here.