“Oopsie doopsie, I’ve muffed it up again”
Cold Open: The Presidential Debate
3 Stars
The debate moderators announce Donald Trump and President Hilary Clinton. Yeah, those jokes still hold up. The 3rd Trump cold open in a row is probably the weakest of the bunch but I can remember watching the real debate in 2016 and waiting to see what SNL was gonna do with it. This probably never worked better than it did on October 15th, 2016. We get Trump sneaking up behind Hilary, which was the most talked about thing of the real debate. The 2nd most talked about thing of the debate was Ken Bone, remember him? Even without context it's still fun to see Bobby make a stupid face.
Emily Blunt Monologue
3 Stars
Emily and the cast sing 'Get Happy' to help people through rough times. They also hand out free puppies, cookies, face cakes, and massages from Pete. Ha, remember when 2016 was the worst? Bros, it ain't gone get better.
Escorts
3 Stars
Mikey and Alex get the ground rules from their prostitutes. Leslie will only role play as Stewie from Family Guy and Emily will need to take sudden milk breaks during intercourse. Emily breaks hard a few times during this, which didn't irk me as much as it usually does. She is falling down and screaming in a cockney accent.
Melanianade
2 Stars
I didn't like this at the time but I thought it was because this was parodying something I was unfamiliar with (I don't listen to a lot of music and I don't watch music videos) but if memory serves correct this was praised. I didn't like it for different reasons this time. Much like the Kellyanne Conway short from the last episode, you can't honestly think any of the women in Trump's life were insulted by his pussy grabbing comments. This Beyoncé parody posits that Melania, Ivanka, and Tiffany Trump as well as Conway and Omarosa were pushed to their breaking point by the Access Hollywood tapes. Like they just found out who the real Trump was. It feels ludicrous now and it felt like that at the time. It's a well put together music video but it's not all that funny, even putting politics aside.
Short Film Festival
3 Stars
After the premiere of a non-sensical short film, the entire cast and crew gets on stage for a Q+A which only leaves Vanessa in the audience to ask the Qs. The joke of them only having one microphone they need to share gets a little repetitive but Vanessa's mounting frustration was the star of this one. The final punchline that Emily Blunt was playing herself the whole time was a nice touch.
Chonk
3 Stars
A clothing store that doesn't discriminate against sizes has an unfortunate sounding name which is displayed on screen in big letters. Nice bit with the store for men called Normal Clothes which only sells a bunch of the same shirt.
Bruno Mars
“24K Magic”
This song is an instant all-time banger. Did Bruno Mars have to start it from the dressing room and come through the crowd? No. The song doesn't need any help being awesome but he done made it one of the all-time great SNL musical performances.
Weekend Update
We get the 7th appearance of Olya Povlatsky, Kate's Russian woman who mourns for the sweet release of death. I remember getting tired of this character and rolling my eyes when she would come out but I haven't seen it for a while so I actually enjoyed this. See, absence really does make the heart grow fonder.
It's also the 7th appearance of Laura Parsons, Vanessa's adorable child actress who reads the news that is way too adult for her ("He said he liked her butthole!"). I always liked this character in sketches before she transitioned to the Update desk. I wonder how that is seen behind the scenes. Is moving your character to Update a promotion or is it seen as an act of desperation? For some it works like Stefon and Jon Bovi but I could watch Laura Parsons perform adult themed movies every 4 episodes or so.
Drive-Thru Window
1 Star
Pete's working the Burger King drive-thru and runs through the whole menu as if this was a commercial for Burger King. A stretch hummer pulls up and everyone is a crazy character. Mikey is driving and he's crazy, Kenan is in the next window and he's crazy, followed by crazy Emily Blunt, crazy Bobby, Kate and Cecily as crazy twins, Beck with a crazy puppet, and crazy Aidy getting a massage from Bruno Mars. They all start with the same "What up?" and aside from the image of Bobby in a blond wig holding a giant lollipop I hated all of this. Just a repetitive everybody does a goofy voice sketch with an advertisement for Burger King, man, I want to try one of those Angry Whoppers.
The Sink
4 Stars
Emily voices a fancy sink that feels it may be a little too much. Another nice change of tone sketch in the back half of the show after Diego Calls His Mom from the last episode.
Honda Robotics
2 Stars
Mikey and Emily play malfunctioning robots at a presentation. I got a solid laugh from Emily repeatedly bumping into Kate offering her an "ooey gooey quesadilla" but this offered little more than slapstick. The punchline that they were malfunctioning because Leslie's robot mechanic forgot to put her phone on airplane mode was weak and felt like just an easy way to end the sketch. It almost feels like it was designed to get everyone to break, and I don't like that.
Melania Moments
3 Stars
Much like the cold open, the 3rd Melania moment of the season is probably the weakest. All the Trump humor is starting to wear thin. Good thing we only got a couple more episode before this all goes away, right?
Bruno Mars returns with “Chunky” which is another awesome jam.
The Great British Bake Off
2 Stars
That PBS intro scared me. A little too late in the night to bring back The Lawrence Welk Show. Luckily, it's quiet and proper British bakers but with Cecily and Emily as the types of women you'd see on Love Island. I didn't watch The Great British Bake Off at the time but I do now so I appreciate all the references that went over my head in 2016. Maybe it's because I watched this episode late at night but I started zoning out during this.
Hamsters
2 Stars
A bunch of hamsters act like Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?. They drink booze from upside down water bottles and eat pellets while they talk dramatically about their marital issues. I could not get past how corny this was. I like the idea behind it but something happens in execution where it comes off instantly lame. I do appreciate how committed all of the performances are with the exception of Kyle playing the child watching through the cage.
“She ate our babies, you know, all 8 of them”
Average
2.5 Stars
MVP
I almost went with Bruno Mars
It's a close race between Kate and Vanessa but I'll go with
Kate McKinnon
The Presidential Debate, Melanianade, Short Film Festival, Weekend Update, Drive-Thru Window, Honda Robotics, The Great British Bake Off, Hamsters
Best Sketch
Short Film Festival
Worst Sketch
Drive-Thru Window
How I Would Have Lorne Michaels-ed It
This was a well paced show. I would just cut Melania Moments (which ends up being the last one) and save it for next week since we already got the Melanianade music video earlier in the night. Bruno Mars and a strong Update added to the overall tightness of the episode, I didn't feel the mid-show lull that I usually do. The sketches were average to weak, nothing really standing out as great, but if I added bonus points for Update and the musical guest that would definitely boost the average.
Host Analysis
She was given more to do than either of the other two hosts this season and she handled herself well. She broke a couple of times which came off as a little sloppy but I really liked her in the robot sketch. That seemed designed for breaking but she held it together. She was also funny in pretty much everything and had a good energy. Her voice-over as the sink was perfect and I don't think that sketch works with as well with any other host this season.
Final Thoughts
There wasn't really anything special or memorable about this one but I walked away enjoying it. Only one sketch tanked and I could see Drive-Thru Window making my worst list by season's end but nothing comes close to making the best list, outside of Bruno Mars. I wouldn't usually recommend an episode just for the musical guest but he definitely boosted the enjoyment level of the show. This was a perfectly fine, average episode of SNL and probably lands smack dab in the middle of all 800 plus episodes up to this point. I probably won't remember a lot of it by the end of the year but I also wouldn't be surprised if I think back more fondly of it when I look back once I'm done with the season.
Up Next
Tom Hanks hosts for the 9th time, and first time in 10 years, with musical guest Lady Gaga
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