Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)

Okay, here's my review. This was honestly the best show of the season so far for me. Aubrey Plaza was a strongly committed host who bought a diverse acting range to everything she was in and she clearly bonded well with the cast and writers because they knew exactly how to use her. Plus, this episode gave the newer featured players quite a few chances to each break out on their own. The only sense of imbalance in the cast I found was the fact that Michael Longfellow was seemingly only used in pretapes tonight. It truly felt like we were finally truly breaking into a new era of SNL. Anyway, let's get right to it because we have a lot to unpack here.

NFL on FOX - Wow, I have to give them credit for the epic misdirection here. Way to Trojan horse your obligatory George Santos sketch on your audience SNL. I guess Bowen playing him instead of, say...Marcello (hey, at lesst we know he's not letting it get to him right now) is appropriate because George Santos' real ethnicity (and sexuality apparently given his drag queen past) is so heavily shrouded in secrets and lies the he also might as well be lying about being gay and Asian too at this point? Oh well, it still works for me. Kudos to Bowen on the impossible seeming quick change and jumping in for a solo LFNY. I'll still take a solo one even if it involves one cast member jumping over to another set. Devons' Michael Strahan was pretty solid. As this went along, it seemed more and more like he WASN'T just adding a lisp to his "Ed from Good Burger" voice. It was fun seeing JAJ as Jimmie Johnson and Molly as Terry Bradshaw. The voices they used may have sounded a little more JAJ/Molly than Bradshaw/Johnson to me, but it's easier for me to buy those impressions than it is for me to buy Mikey Day as Howie Long. B-

Monologue - I guess the only things this monologue delivered on that I did NOT fully expect were it's sheer length and the eerily disquieting Biden pretaped cameo (that I'm still not sure should’ve happened for numerous reasons and even given his connection to Aubrey I'm never going to be 100% sure WASN'T deepfaked). I guess I let myself get lulled into a false sense of security with all these sincere host monologues from mostly first time hosts whose only tenuous connections to the show are them being longtime fans or...just having lived and/or worked in New York at some point in their lives. I was definiteley expecting Aubrey to bring up her past connection to the show in her monologue (maybe her failed audition moreso than her internship but hey, what do I know?) but I wasn’t quite expecting her to take that and RUN with it this much. Still, I am a sucker for a sprawling, back-stage wandering monologue and an out of nowhere Leo Yoshimura cameo. An unexpected NFL cold open and a backstage monologue back to back? What is this? The Dan Levy/Phoebe Bridgers episode? I was half expecting the Poehler cameo, not counting on it. This era of the show has taught me not to get my heart set on cameos from the host's costars or even cameos in sketches from certain musical guests if I don't want to just set myself up for disappointment. Plus, Amy seemed like she's in what I like to call the "wine mom Jordan Peele" phase of her career in that she's not only moved on from SNL but moved on from acting and performing in general in favor of directing and producing but given that I know how much Amy Poehlers' influence meant to Aubrey Plaza (hell, I know Plaza was so dead set on not just working for SNL/NBC but just working for Poehler in some capacity professionally because she idolized her so much that Plaza just borderline stalked Poehler just to beg her for a job which is basically how she got that page gig) I can see how and why Amy may have made an exception. Hell, this cold open and monologue combo put it over Chappelles' episode for me and made it the best episode of the season for me. Sure, tonight's sketches weren't as consistent all across the board (as we'll get into in just a moment) but this episode had a more all across the board likable host who didn’t cast a dark shadow over the whole show from the week before it started and this monologue cemented that. A-

Miss Universe - Well, I'm only VAGUELY familiar with the "Miss FRAAAAAAAAAAAAAANCE!!!" thing because I just read about it (yeah, I still get the "Know Your Meme" newsletter in my inbox from time to time, don't ask me how or why) so it's a viral moment I only know about tenuously because I haven't seen the TikToks or the remixes. Naturally, I'm more than a little surprised they found a way to SSSSSTTTTRRRRREEEEEEETCCCCCHHHHH this thing into a full length sketch but even as scattered as this was I'm all for any sketch that's written for Molly Kearney to scream. Also, Aubrey really sold the hell out of this with some assists from Squirm, Punkie and Heidi (could've used a bit more of them). The Tony Hawk cameo was fun but the Property Brothers felt a little gratuitous. C+

Black Lotus - You know, I've definitely heard more about "White Lotus" than I've actually seen (which is none, haven watched a single episode but I could tell this was written by someone who has at lesst seen this season). Still, as much as this seemed like a simple premise stuck out of time, I was glad to see someone take this approach to satirizing it. It seems to me like this show is getting more and more ridiculous with each season (and again, I'm basing this take on one Jennifer Coolidge GIF alone so take that statement with a grain of salt), so it's about time some poke some holes in it and (if you'll forgive the expression) take some of the wind out of its' sails. Kenan seemed to most into this premise as anything he has been in so far this season (the fact that it was a pretape probably helped) and JAJ, Ego, Aubrey, Punkie and Dismukes stole the scenes they were in. B-

Taboo - This definitely felt like a sketch tailor made for Aubrey. Only she could make this feel like it's more than just "Cards Against Humanity: The Sketch". It was nice to get an inversion of the dreaded "Mikey reacts" trope (where everyone else reacts to Mikeys' strangeness and it's brief and not too dragged out). The pacing felt off but then I realized that the sketch just left me wanting more after it just ended with minimal Kenan/Ego/Heidi/Longfellow reactions to Mikey and Aubreys' intensity, which...might actually be a good thing? I mean, this live sketch and the one that followed it felt quite short compared to everything that came before it but then when we got to Sam Smith and Kim Petras' performance of "Unholy" I realized what a short, concise song THAT was and suddenly it clicked as to why this show felt like it had minor pacing issues. B+

Sisters - Wow, two sketches in a row that only Aubrey Plaza can hit out of the park this well (with or without her McKinnon-like commitment to that Irish accent!) Plus, we finally get a Molly showcase that really showcases their strengths as a performer (with some assists from Dismukes and Squirmy, of course). I didn’t care too much for the "Shallow" musical ending. It put an awkward button on the sketch that I didn’t quite like but everything else hit home for me! B-

M3GAN 2.0 - I'm honestly not sure how I feel about the idea of SNL doing a "M3GAN" parody in general (unsurprisingly, Chloe and Aubrey can both physically play "robotic doll girl" well but neither could pull off the "uncanny valley" look well enough for this to work much for me on a basic ground level) but adding gay camp to it (seriously, does Aubrey Plaza now have a huge gay male following from that I'm unaware of?) is automatically going to make a great deal of this sail gently over my head (I mean, I can see how maybe "White Lotus" or some early "Parks and Rec" moments could make Aubrey one of those "gay icon" chicks, but...anyway, I don't wanna get too sidetracked here). It didn’t help that it didn’t escalate or go anywhere (literally, since this was set almost entirely inside a gay nightclub) and the only real ending it had was "Allison Williams shows up for a surprise cameo" but...it seemed like the underlying message of this was "gay men are gleefully oblivious to their own imminent danger?" I dunno, at least that's what I picked up. I mean, there's a very big chance I could be missing something important here but...something about that bring my main takeaway just...doesn’t sit right even with me. C-

Update was quite possibly the best it's been all season. It's really nice to see Jost and Che NOT gassed out even in the slightest for once (seriously, until tonight I legit can't remember the last time I saw either one of them looking like they actually wanted to be there. It's legitimately been years). That MTG drag queen joke and Josts' tennis joke were both a bit...questionable to me but all the rest worked well for me simply because they looked lile they were actually having fun delivering them. I'm not sure why the show felt we needed two different segments where Bowen Yang played George Santos in the same episode (I'd say maybe they stuck with it because they probably wrote this before they wrote or decided on the cold open but this feelt like they just dusted off the script for one of Bill Haders' John Mark Karr commentaries from the beginning of season 32 but with Stefon-levels of dress to air cue cards changes) but I will admit that Bowen had quite a few lines that worked better for me than the material he had in the cold open (especially the Madonna calls and the Rasputin/Anastasia bits). I didn't think I would enjoy a blatantly drumrolled Parks and Rec fan service bit (especially since it's been years since I've seen the show and it would still take some convincing for me to believe it holds up that well) but this was fun. I could get into this because the good vibes this show had already been putting out carried it over. It worked for me even though I felt like Amy and Aubrey were forcing themselves to channel season one April and Leslie since I couldn't escape this nagging feeling that Poehler and Plaza may have grown out of these roles (and I say that not in terms' of these womens real life age at all but more in terms of their character development throughout the run of a series that's been off the air for eight years outside of one Covid Zoom reunion, just to be clear). B+ 

Avatar, Too - This was definiteley the weakest and most conceptually confused sketch of the night for me. I mean, I know what I'm about to say makes it seem like I am WAY overthinking this but how would two random possible lesbians from Arizona even get access to Avatar equipment and how would the other Na'vi go nearly a decade and a half living with Jake Sully and not catch on to tye fact that he too is a human in an Avatar. Putting all that aside, this did nothing for me. I'm starting to think maybe Ego discovered she could do an impression of one of the roles from Avatar and she took it to Mikey and Heidi who helped her write this sketch backwards from there. D+

Dovato Commercial Shoot - Wow, right off the bat this comes off pretty dicey premise-wise...and a little unfocused, too. I mean, Aubrey played a solid distracted (but comitted) director but why were both Mikey and Devon the split focus of this? Devon was solid here and had some genuinely funny lines but something about this sketch made it feel a little too much like a product of a previous, less enlightened era for me. If Devon weren't playing a dumb character here, this would've felt more like a contradiction of his big Weekemd Update commentary about making women feel safe as a straight man. Weirdly, this was the second sketch of the night set at a gay nightclub that I could've fully get on board with. C-

Jack Raughley, Private Eye - Well, we didn’t QUITE get the JAJ character piece I was hoping for but this was possiby the best use of his knack for old timey acting voices (since he got to play it more subtle as a male non-impression lead in something for once). Plus, he got the lion's share of the best jokes in this and held his own against Aubrey who, again, was well cast here. She must've drawn on her past Parks and Rec persona as Janet Snakehole for this one. The Sharon Stone cameo actually worked for me. I mean, it took Jon Schneider, Bill Kenney and Kaley Morrison on the SNN hot take show pointing it out to me that THAT WAS Sharon Stone (odd to have her and Amy Poehler in the building on the same night, huh? I guess I'll have to revisit her '92 episode to see if it's truly that bad or if it just aged incredibly poorly) but she served this sketch well (and given that she was the quite literal centerpiece of Sam Smiths' performance of "Gloria" it makes me think Sam might have had more to do with getting her on this week than Aubrey did). B+

Now, my latest ranking of the season so far...

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
3. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
4. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
5. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
6. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
7. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
8. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
9. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
10. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Well, this seems like the beginning of a promising new year for SNL! Next week, Michael B. Jordan makes his hosting debut. He's someone I would consider another "wild card" since he's mostly known for serious, dramatic roles as well as Black Panther. I believe SNL might be his first foray into comedy, so I wish him well. See you then!

(...and remember, I am still taking applications for guest blogger, so if you want to write your own guest post like Blood Meridian did or if you want to submit your own fan mailbag question for me to answer, please let me know!)