Scarlett Johansson/Niall Horan (12.14.19)

Okay, here's my review. I went into this show with pretty low expectations, so I was more than pleasantly surprised at how this show turned out. Scarlett Johansson may be a polarizing celebrity now but at least she gets along quite well with the SNL cast and crew. There must be something about her behind the scenes that makes everybody at SNL love working with her so much to get her to keep getting asked back. She's obviously more fun to work with than she is to watch in most things (especially SNL these days) but having her around studio 8H obviously boosts morale somehow because they turned out one if the most solidly well written episodes in recent memory. Some say she blended in very well with the cast but I think the was just underused. Thankfully, her presence wasn't just diminished by an onslaught of guest cameos that would've easily washed most other hosts off the screen. Plus, by taking a backseat throughout most of the show she really let the cast shine. Everybody got an amount of airtime that was beneficial to them. Chloe, Bowen and Ego especially had really strong nights. They finally figured out how to use their cast to the show's full potential. There were far less recurring characters and premises than there were last week but what recurring sketches and premises there were did feel earned or justified. They also seemed to touch on comedy tropes that seemed to have been referenced elsewhere but they delivered fresh takes on each of them. Anyway, let's break it down, shall we?

Three American Households - Well, first off, thank God for Kenan Thompson. If his performance here didn't convince you he really is the heart and should of current day SNL, nothing will. Part of me is glad they got this out of the way before Eddie comes back next week but then another part of me wondered if there was a possibility that adding Eddie to the Kenan/Redd/Ego scenes would have improved this or not. I suspect this was another Che/Tucker joint. Whoever wrote it, it was smart of them to spend the bulk of this sketch focusing on him while minimizing Cecily, Beck and everyone else's parts. The only laugh I got from Beck was his mentioning he was somehow made a federal judge just because Trump retweeted him. Good to see Chloe (two weeks in a row) and Bowen get visible supporting parts in a cold open. Seeing Aidy as the snowman narrator from Rudolph was a bit of am oddity. I guess it was inevitable that Kate would portray Greta and somehow her being named Times' "Person Of The Year" somehow made it appropriate for them to do this. Anyway, it was pretty much the same standard boilerplate Kate European accent stuff that one would come to expect. C-

Monologue - Well, this monologue is certainly better appreciated on repeat viewings. It definitely helped ger the show off to a better start than that cold open. It's nice to see SNL get meta about something other than the overabundance of random "well outside of the current cast" cameos they keep foisting upon us every damn week (except for this one, thankfully). I liked the first part of this monologue a lot more for how ambitious and packed with jokes and an actual through line it seemed but after Che and Jost made their first walk ons it seemed like an unfocused scattershot mess that they struggled to write an ending for. I have to say the things I liked most about Pete's apperance were the background details in his office (namely, the cue card and Machine Gun Kelly posters pinned to the wall). Still, that random peacock promo felt out of place and I wasn't exactly crazy about how they chose to acknowledge the romantic elephant in the studio either. I mean, it was still sweet there at the very end but that doesn't make up for how awkward and tacked on it felt (especially when Che first walked on). Also, it bugged me that they placed Cecily and Heidi against a green screen when they obviously survived the snap until I noticed that the backstage llama didn't. B-

Santa Land - Here was something I ended up liking exactly as much as I wanted to (and felt this sketch deserved). Good to see Chloe get another noticable (but again, still supporting) role in something. I like to think of this as Kenan and Scarletts' characters from the Deep House Dish sketch they did the first time she hosted back in '06 went through a rough patch after MTV4 cancelled their show and her career didn't take off. Beck and Heidi's reactions and back-and-forth was what made this for me and Bowen's entrance gave me my first laugh of the night. He obviously wrote this as it has too many Todrick Hall references and isn't nearly campy enough for James Anderson to have been involved. Speaking of, the way Beck referenced Todrick Hall makes me think Bowen may only appreciate him ironically. B-

Macy's Uncomfortable Winter Wear For Children - Speaking of who wrote what, at first I was sure Anna Drezen must have written this one if she was the one who wrote the "Duolingo For Talking To Children" ad from Kristen Stewart's episode. Then, my second suspicion that Mikey wrote this was confirmed by his frequent writing collaborator Streeter Siedell on Twitter (since we now know Mikey has a five year old son of his own who probably made a "blink and you'll miss it" appearance in this). I have to commend Mikey for pulling off the once thought impossible feat of writing a pretape that is at once longer than it needed to be and funny throughout without belaboring the point at all. This could've used a trim, but didn't absolutely NEED one. Then again, a lot of his sketches feel exactly like that. Chris, Mikey, Heidi and Kenan all had the best lines in this. B+

Charlie (Inexplicably) Returns - I'm actually a little surprised they would make this Kenan character recurring, but I don't mind that they did since I did like the first version of this sketch and it obviously workd much better with Scarlett Johansson placed in (ugh, yes, really) James Franco's role. This sketch arguably needed a do-over and they thankfully didn't do it too soon. Still, it pretty much reached season 35 levels of cut and paste/by the numbers recurring script rewriting. Bowen's presence kind of made up for this sketch lacking some of the same rapid fire energy and tightness that the Franco version of this sketch had. I even liked that they still ended it with Beck rattling off a brief laundry list of outrageous unrelated reasons Kenans' character was really getting fired for but even that felt a little sluggish compared to last time. B-

A Conway Marriage Story - This was one of SNLs' most (if not THE most) unexpected "obligatory host sketches" in recent memory. This is mainly because a) what's now commonly known as "film Twitter" is really the only place making the Netflix release of "A Marriage Story" into a big deal and b) while they're parodying something the host had one of the lead roles in, they place Kate in her role here while swapping her out in the supporting therapist role here. Also, I don't think Kellyanne Conway or her husband and their ongoing public social media spats have been in the news THIS week and it feels like SNL finally referenced this LONG after every other late night political comedy show did (y'know, BEFORE George Conway and his tweets reached their news cycle "sell by date). Still, at least this being taped allowed this to have the right, fast pace it needed to be watchable and they went the extra mile by parodying more than just the wall punching fight scene that the aforementioned "film Twitter" just made into their latest recurring meme. C+

Update was the most uneven it's been all season so far. As far as jokes, I only really liked Josts' Joe Manchin and Ches' Kamala/"rob a bank" line and his Jost/Cosby comparison (just for how Che put their real chemistry on display) at first but after the first commentary every other joke seemed to work (mostly Josts' spelling bee/IHOP and Che's Hallmark channel ones). I'm surprised they thought Bowen's Chinese trade daddy Chen Biao was more than a one off bit but I still liked and laughed at this one despite this suffering from diminishing returns and lacking the same energy as the first one. I really liked his Chinese social media "cleanse" and "CBD oil/Ainsley/pick a lane" lines. After that, it seemed like they were just checking off a list of Twitter memes that haven't been referenced on SNL yet. I'm glad we finally got to see Kyle's cut Baby Yoda from last week (although I wished they'd stuck with the green screen effect they reportedly used to pull this off then rather than this jarring green prosthetic frenzy). I wanted to like this more but Kyle just wasn't as funny as he usually is here. It reminded me of one of Kyle's old pre-SNL era YouTube characters that obviously could never make it on the show (namely, the ten year old boy who gives viewers tips on how to get laid and caused a big controversy at something called "VidCon" by presenting a list of what different candies pussy tastes like) if he had a bastard abomination love child with Sambergs' Total Recall Kuato from season 32. Thankfully, they didn't keep this going on too long. C+

Ghosts of '70s Hot Tub Drowned Strippers Past - This was another thing I wanted to like more if not for some of the little things that bugged me. First off, the green screen ghost effect was very badly botched. Cecily's face disappeared way before Ego's hand even reached it. I'm glad they fixed this in the YouTube version, though. Plus, the song itself dragged a little too much for me. I guess I did like how they worked Niall Horan into this sketch. Honestly, he seemed to be a more natural sketch performer than his former bandmate Harry Styles was and Harry's the one we just had to sit through a whole episode of. Chris and Ego pretty much made this sketch for me. Chris had the best lines and Ego entered the hot tub wearing a swimsuit. Seriously, I try to avoid writing comments like these into my reviews now, but they at least consider putting Ego and Cecily in swimsuits much more in sketches than they are currently. Oh, that reminds me, did anyone else get strong "Bless The Hearts" vibes off their Southern accents? C+

Hallmark Dating Game - Hallmark movies are definitely something that have been broken down and dissected for their tropes more than outright comedically parodied over and over before. I was about to give SNL credit for being the first ones to turn them into a game show until I realized that even this is the second time they have done that exact thing (see "What's Wrong With Tanya?" from the Anna Faris/Drake episode from October 2011). Still, I guess I should give them credit for their apparent realization that Hallmarks' Christmas movies are an entirely different genre from their regular "every other time of the year" movies and should this be treated differently. Among the highlights were Scarlett saying she lives in "stock footage of New York that still has the twin towers in it", Chris having a mental breakdown once Scarlett questions any part of his character and Mikey as Scarletts' dad reminding her that her mom exploded. The ending seemed like a jumbled, confusing, disjointed mess but I guess all Hallmark movies (Christmas or otherwise) are jumbled, confusing, disjointed messes and naturally, SNL had to reflect this in their parody. C-

I Saw Daddy Cucked By Santa Claus - I feel like this song has also been parodied and or comedically referenced before elsewhere but I enjoyed the sheer level of committment that went into this one. I liked how well the incongruity of the skeeviness of a rough Craigslist hookup between Santa and a married couple worked when pitted directly against the sheer adorableness and charm of Cecily singing (and quite well I might add) an faithfully early '60s styled novelty Christmas jingle about it and then going on a deep dive into the uncomfortable parts of her own psyche and coming to terms with herself. I also thought both Mikey and Scarletts' lines in their own voices in the middle of the song as themselves were funny. I also liked how they just happened to mention that "Santa" just happened to drive the exact make and model if a car my dad once had. B+

Heimlich Models' Night Out - This was one of the more creative premises of the night. It felt vaguely like something that had been done before somewhere in comedy on general but I can't quite put my finger on where. I didn't love it or hate it. I liked the low key vibe they were going for with this much more than I liked whatever they were going for with that hot tub sketch. The zombie like ending was the real highlight of this piece to me. C+

MAGA Mind Pug (much MUCH less inexplicably, let's face it) Also Returns - This is the third vaguely topical thing that the show did previously that I expected to remain a one off (and the second one that made sure to hit the exact same beats by the numbers as the first one while lacking the same energy) but given this seasons' penchant for placing Cecily in live sketches that heavily involve live dogs, I definitely should've seen this one coming (but at least this one had a sweeter ending than the first). Still, I appreciate them establishing continuity from the first one. I do have to say though, as far as potential political material for this week goes, I would've certainly rather taken this and "A Conway Marriage Story" over another Ivanka sketch. I'm glad they had the restraint to at least avoid that. C+

Now, for my updated rankings of the entire season so far...

1. David Harbour/Camilla Cabello
2. Chance The Rapper
3. Phoebe Waller-Bridge/Taylor Swift
4. Woody Harrelson/Billie Eilish
5. Scarlett Johansson/Niall Horan
6. Jennifer Lopez/DaBaby
7. Will Ferrell/King Princess
8. Harry Styles
9. Kristen Stewart/Coldplay

Now, time to update my rankings of each of Scarletts' previous episodes...

1. Scarlett Johansson/Death Cab For Cutie (1.14.2006)
2. Scarlet Johansson/Niall Horan (12.14.2019)
2. Scarlett Johansson/Bjork (4.21.2007)
3. Scarlett Johansson/Lorde (3.11.2017)
4. Scarlett Johansson/Wiz Khalifa (5.2.2015)
5. Scarlett Johansson/Arcade Fire (11.14.2010)

Well, that was the first episode all season that delivered beyond expectations. Next week, for the last episode of both the year AND the decade, Eddie Murphy makes his long anticipated return to Studio 8H to host the show for his third time (but his first under Lorne Michaels as the show's executive producer). I don't know what's left to say about this one except that I'm glad season 45 (and Eddie's career now if the reviews for "Dolemite Is My Name" are to be believed) are now in enough of an upward trajectory that there's a better chance for this to be the best episode of the season. Let's hope Eddie brings some of his old writers and takes some creative control when necessary while ingratiating himself with the current cast and crew. I'm just glad Scarlett could tee up the show for Eddie to potentially knock way out of the park. See you then!