Jason Momoa/Tate McRae (11.18.2023)

Okay, here's my review. This show may have been more underwhelming compared to last week's episode, and it would be hard for me to say Jason Momoa actually redeemed himself from his 2018 episode, but at least he turned in a more mature and grounded performance here. It was still an uneven episode, but it felt more "safe" somehow. The lows were more middling than outright shocking and the highs were pleasant, but not as high aside from one Update piece and one choice pretape near the end of the show. Overall, it was another Thanksgiving episode that felt like it easily fell into SNLs' usual November/early February/mid May trap of losing focus on what the overall guiding vision of the season will be and what the new hires can bring to the show in favor of getting big name stars and personalities for "sweeps week/month" and having to appeal to a wider mass audience for ratings and ad dollars. Thankfully, airtime seemed to be evenly distributed this week. Longfellow, Walker, Dismukes and Hernandez each got a well needed bump but Kearney and Troast seemed to take hits (although in Troasts case, that might just be because she didn't get her own center showcase sketch like last week...and come to think of it I'm not sure she appeared in any live sketches, either). Anyway, let’s get right down to it.

Biden Press Conference - Ok, I guess they're really sticking with Mikey Biden then. Good for them. I genuinely liked the "Roman Numeral 11" and "panda" and "fake elevator" jokes. They seem to actually have some more pointed takes on Bidens' actual polices. Oh, no. Bowen just walked in wearing a panda suit...playing a panda who's quite full of himself. At least he made an actual pointed statement on Trump (even if it was the kind of thing the show SHOULD have been saying eight years ago). It's such a shame. This cold open had some real potential. At least we got to see Longfellow, Punkie, Marcello, Ego, Heidi, and Molly as reporters. That's something. Good for them. Mikey Longs is already starting to make up for his absence. C-

Monologue - It's truly nice to see a more focused and settled monologue from Jason than the one he gave us in 2018. We got a more personal glimpse into Jason, and the show let him explain more about a cause he cares about and has started his own environmental organization to pursue. I have to admit though, I considered the far off possibility that he MIGHT have been using this monologue to explain that he hasn't been in many memorable acting roles inbetween Aquaman movies because he took some time off to focus on this project. Ironically, this was reminiscent of the type of monologue that your Halseys, your Schreibers, your Damons, and your Elbas gave us the last time Jason hosted. It now seems like Momoa was the only season 44 host to NOT give us one of those monologues then. At least this monologue gives me a bit more confidence about the rest of this show than the cold open did. B-

Masters Of The Pen - Hey, a premise heavy period piece. Maybe one of the writers got some inspiration from that lost Charlie Chaplin sketch Dana Carvey (R.I.P. Dex) posted on Twitter a while ago (or maybe those Jim Carrey "Background Guy" sketches from In Living Color)? I mean that sincerely and affectionately and not as an accusation of plagarism. Maybe Day & Seidell wrote this? I wonder because it also reminded me of his sniper sketch with Chris Pine from 2017. I liked this as a decent glue role for Longfellow and as a fun old timey take on modern technology obsession and its symbiotic relationship with good old-fashioned timeless human narcicissm. Interesting choice though to end this on a zoom out from home base where the old timey footage was being staged from. B-

Ancient Rome Rap - Hmm, I have two theories about this sketch. Either the some of the writers saw the flak the show got for that Britneys' Audiobook Audition sketch last week (particularly Molly's role as Kevin James' meme) and decided to write this sketch as a giant middle finger to them or someone was just saving this for the exact right host because I'm having a hard time imagining any other male host besides Jason Momoa anchoring this piece. Ego, Punkie and Troast (who for a quick second there I thought might have been Tate McRae, Camilla Cabellos' non-union Canadian equivalent) did great jobs in this, but the main thing this will probably be remembered for is a child actor (who seems like they want us to recognize from somewhere based on how prominently he was featured...is he one of Momoa and Lisa Bonets' actual kids?) saying "goddamn Tyrannosaurus". C-

Nightclub - Hmm, it seemed at first like they were trying to bring back that towel boy sketch from Michael B. Jordans' episode (except they made the questionable decision to give Jason Momoa an accent he probably shouldn't have attempted). Then it seemed like they were trying to bring back that restaurant sketch from Pedro Pascals' episode last season (except they let Mikey Longs share some of the burns with Sarah Squirm). Either way, this came very close to working for me but didn't quite get there, but it's still good to see Marcello (and Kenan) try their damndest to put it over. C-

Hudson News Thanksgiving Week Airport Parade - Well, this is an interesting rearrangement of those "regular crazy person red carpet" sketches we got twice last year. Ego as a cohost instead of an interviewee is a nice change. Even if they gave us the obligatory "flirtation" between her and Captain Jason they just gave us a few small concentrated doses of it. Somehow, they managed to give Chloe Fineman actual funny dialogue that she could deliver in a way that landed with me. Usually, Kenan spouting gibberish and Mikey and Heidi as a bickering couple work better for me than they did here. Marcello in a stereotypical gay role is something I'm not sure I needed (hell, the direction and timing of his part kinda blew the eventual reveal that Ego and Jason snuck off to hook up), but Longfellow and Dismukes cameo was a highlight. I liked Molly and JAJs' parts (when in doubt, have a child swear, huh? Let's just be careful and not make that too much of a crutch). Punkie had some funny lines. I will say I feel like Sarah's viral woman felt a little much and could've been cut (if my first theory about the Rome rap is true) but hey, Devon had a good line to tag that with. C+

PDD: Ramen Fever - For some reason, I was expecting this week's PDD short to be something where the joke turns out to be the boys letting their Peacock streaming movie fame go straight to their heads. Instead, what they gave us this week was a short where they built on the formula of the matzoh ball soup sketch from Amy Schumers' episode from last year. Ben and Big Mart-Mart are too distracted by thoughts of gourmet restaurant ramen to console John through his very sudden breakup. I did like the "spicy/with buns" bit in the middle and John subtly getting his wallet stolen near the end. That added a bit of variety to this. Even with their signature quick cuts and manic pacing, this felt just a little longer than it needed to be since they established the joke in a bit of a rush. Still, it had the perfect ending. B+

Update was really only worth it for 2/3rds of the commentaries (sorry Bowen, I don't think we needed to see your Santos again...especially if those were the best OnlyFans jokes you guys could come up with). Weirdly, Jost had better jokes this week with his "feeling menopausal" crack and his meta NBCUniversal/X (even as awkwardly delivered as that was) and Six Flags/fraud awareness jokes. Che's jokes didn't really land with me but I did like his delivery of that "gender death gap" joke JUST for how he and Jost leaned into the reaction to it without cracking themselves up over it. Every bit of Devons' Draymond Green gave me my first genuine laughs of the night. I especially liked how it was written in such a way that you really didn’t need to follow basketball that closely to get the jokes. It's nice to see Devon find another impression role that fits his voice and niche within this cast. He definitely put that over better than Kenan would've. It was great to see JAJ & Dismukes as another musical duo initially (especially as Colins' intro made it seem like this would be more of a unique format break than it was). I even laughed immediately just at JAJs jacket and that sphere/cylinder joke but as soon as it dawned on me that they were just giving us a 2018 updates of Geminis' Twin and Jon Bovi in 2023 (seriously, Dismukes was even vocally channeling Forte REAL hard) I realized this may not have been their best work as much fun as it was to see them pop up at this point. One particular piece it reminded me of was when Beck Bennet played himself on Update in early 2017 to "sing" brief fake pop songs he wrote for himself. Sadly, I think I liked that better than this. C+

Guess Who's Coming Straight Off The Island To Dinner? (Or Yassified Castaway...wait, Yasss-taway is right th...nah, I'll just stick with the first one) - Well, Chloe sure gave us a lot of exposition for what turned out to just be her "Ok, Ego. You had your fun in the airport sketch. Now, it's MY turn to hang off of and drool all over Jason!" sketch. Still, you gotta hand it to Dismukes for trying his damndest to put this one over (and hey, bud...you should be proud of yourself for getting just as much audience lady screams as Jason did when YOUR shirt came off!) C-

Untold: Battle Of The Sexes - Sarah Squirm as the woman who suffered the most gruesome public sports related death imaginable so Billie Jean King could run. It's great to see Sarah finally found a way to sneak in as much Squirmgore as NBC would allow in one sitting. She gave us a more interesting twist on a sketch template we've seen previously when Mikey Day got pummeled by both John Cena and J.J. Watt and when Vanessa Bayer got pummeled by Ronda Rousey. Hell, we even saw it earlier this year when each of the PDD boys got wrecked by Travis Kelce. I also loved how precisely measured it seemed. She knew exactly when to escalate this and what the perfect ending would be. By far, this was the best sketch of the night (minor pacing issues and an unnecessarily edgelordy line from Chloe aside). A-

Cab Ride - This was fun, too. A list of increasingly absurd bad medical news delivered via speakerphone ending with a Kenan comfortably and casually speed walking out of a slow moving cab. Not every little detail worked for me, but I did chuckle at "Hepatitis Gold" and "Purr Night," and Jasons attempt to high five Kenan over the worst things ever. I had heard via the SNN Hot Take show that this sketch was actually cut from Keiran Culkins' episode two years ago. After hearing that, I am thankful that we got a cut sketch from THAT episode instead of any litany of cut sketches from Travis Kelces' episode back in March. I considered the possibility that that's what we might be getting after I noticed a slight facial resemblance between Jason and Travis during the monologue and also just from the semi-gassed out, last show before they get to go on a holiday break feeling I got from this and really most Thanksgiving episodes of SNL. C+

Now, for my updated ranking of season 49...

1. Nate Bargatze/Foo Fighters (10.28.2023)
2. Timothee Chalamet/Boygenius (11.11.2023)
3. Jason Momoa/Tate McRae (11.18.2023)
4. Bad Bunny (10.21.2023)
5. Pete Davidson/Ice Spice (10.14.2023)

Well, they sure put that episode as a whole over. After Thanksgiving, SNL returns on December 2nd with Emma Stone (our first female host this season) returning to most likely receive her five timers club jacket! I have to say, I'll be looking forward to this one. Emma has proven herself to be a dependable, versatile host who the writers always knew exactly how to write for. She has proven she can gel well with three very different casts so it will be great to see her do the same with a fourth. Seriously, of the four episodes she has hosted thus far, I can't think of one that stands out as being any worse than the others. Even during the weaker seasons she hosted in, she always found some way to elevate the show. Yes, Emma Stone is a welcome presence at SNL who has demonstrated her deep love of the show (and I mean that literally as she married and had a baby with a writer/producer/director who I'm fairly certain has left the show recently) so it should be great to have her come back and try to steer the show back on course. See you then!

Timothee Chalamet/Boygenius (11.11.2023)

Okay, here's my review. This was an episode that took some wild swings that may not have paid off and relied a bit too much on old sketch premises (some not even from this particular hosts last episode). Still, the highs were higher this season than they've ever been and the lowest were just shocking blows coming out of nowhere. It's still a wildly uneven episode, though. Certain things were holding this show back from being the best of the season. I'd say it was second best behind the comfortably consistent Nate Bargatze episode and just ahead of the slightly avant guard Bad Bunny episode. Timothee was still a likable presence as host, but he didn’t seem to be giving it his all like he was three years ago. Unsurprisingly, Heidi had a great night. More surprisingly was how Ego and Punkie managed to have great nights this week. JAJ and Squirm dropped in with some assists. Longfellow was barely present but he managed to make the most out of what little screentime he did get (much like everyone else even if they weren't given the best roles). Anyway, let's just get right to it because there's a lot we gotta break down this week.

Republican Debate 2024 - Jesus Christ, old habits really DO die hard on SNL, huh? Well, good on Kenan and Devon for trying the hardest right out if the gate (even if Devon ended up accidentally doing the hackiest Bill Clinton impression 1993 had to offer...geez, I sure hope he isn't recovering from a bout if laryngitis or something), but Ego, Heidi...why? I mean, I hope it wasn't you guys' INTENT to send a cold chill through my very soul like that. You know, things aren't going great when one of your first thoughts on trying to process this cold open is "Hmm, okay... maybe out of all of these new political impressions I MIGHT not mind getting to see Molly Kearney as Chris Christie some more?" Oh, thank God for JAJs' scene/focus stealing abilities. I mean, I don't like how SNL is basically using his Trump to give it's audience Stockholm syndrome at this point but I was holding out hope that this would be some kind of low-level fakeout that would turn out to be worth not completely tuning out of and letting my brain turn into unpleasant white noise at some point. At least Ego as Vivek and John Higgins as Michael Longfellow as Arturo Castro as Ron DeSantis were only there to set up a meta moment. I just wish it wasn't the type of meta moment we used to get in either season 20, 43 or 48 just to shake off the cobwebs and dead weight and work through their baggage of 47 (although I will admit to chuckling at that Paul Rudd line as well as the slams at Vivek as a candidate and the jokes about Trump going after his judge). D+

Monologue - Well, already Chalamet isn't quite bringing that season 46 energy to the monologue. It's all right, bro. That cold open really drained me, too. Anyway, I wasn't expecting him to reference the SAG-AFTRA strike ending THAT directly, but go off, I guess. I appreciate the attempt at a "pure imagination" parody as clumsily and sweatily written as it seemed. This was one of several moments where Timothee was visibly on the verge of breaking (although this actually was the only one where the entire audience was right there with him). The only way I can process it is that everyone was just as taken aback by that one guy just voluntarily giving up his seat so easily for Timothee to sit down in or he thought the CGI bleachers crowd was as funny as I did or just the Wonka portion of this monologue was heavily rewritten between dress and air Stefon-style so Timothee was reading a lot of those jokes for the first time. This wasn't quite the meta moment I wanted either, but compared to that cold open, it's the kind of meta moment I can live with. Thankfully, Marcello, Punkie Minaj and Kenan Thompson were there to liven this up for me. Sadly, none of this was enough to distract me from wondering "why the hell did they just smash two different monologues together instead of just doing the baby face rap as a pretape? I mean, I realize that the Wonka song was probably written after the SAG strike ended and the rap was written before, but just pick ONE monologue concept and stick with it! Did they just not have it in their budget for one extra pretape?" B-

50 Years Of Hip Hop - Frankly, I was hoping they would leave this a one off and not try to recapture lightning in a bottle for the sake of YouTube views and TikTok hits but shockingly this worked better for me without Pete. It does help that they also switched around pretty much all of the impressions starting with Punkie J. Blige. Chalamets' character in these is somehow funnier when he is playing off of someone who is not trying to match his wild energy. JAJs' Rick Rubin in particular was really the yin to Chalamets dialed back yang here. Plus, Timothee had several actual lines here that were funnier alone than the entire last sketch such as the one about hip hop being discovered in 2014, his dad making him get braces instead of Invisalign, his explanation of the absence of Pete's character, listing Jason Derulo and Dixie D'amelio as "GOATs" and him only knowing Kenans' Cornell West from a Matrix sequel and, last but not least, him dissing Biggie Smalls just to drumroll his new Soundcloud single. The ending with Kenan spanking him was a bit too similar to the last one for me but it would've worked more if Timothee would have sold it a bit better. B+

Auditions For Britneys' Audiobook - Um, I...thought we were PAST the era of "impression parades," but I do have to give the 2023 cast credit for finding a new angle that keeps these fresh. All right, let’s just get through these as quickly as we can. First of all, I'd like to thank Chloe Fineman for limiting her presence in this to her few impressions thst worked for me (Britney, Natasha, her Julia Fox even if it seemed a little aimless and pointless in this and her Chalamet even though I still think that the real Timothee may have aged out of whatever early era of his career she based that impression on...but at least they got the hair and the over all current look right?) and I'd also like to thank Chloe Troast for debuting a Maggie Smith that was silly enough to work for me. Speaking of the real Timothee, his Scorcese was a little run of the mill for me. I've seen plenty of other Scorceses that were just like his but shockingly he msy be one of the few to impersonate him who also worked with him. It's always nice to see Heidi's Allison Janney and Kenans' Neil Degrasse Tyson again (although in the context of this sketch Kenan sound more like he was chanelling his Virginica character and his Deep House Dish host at the same time with a dash of Rick Ross thrown in to taste). I wasn’t expecting Sarah to have a Mulaney in her back pocket but that may have been my second favorite moment of this sketch. She really nails Mulaneys' stand up style. Vocally, it worked better than Melissa Villaseñors' impression whereas Melissa's worked mainly based on a slight facial resemblance between her and Mulaney. My absolute favorite moment of this sketch may have been JAJ as Werner Hertzog just for the "entranced by this Floridian vernacular" line they gave him. As much as I like seeing Molly Kearney used on the show, their Kevin James meme impression is something that should've been cut entirely. I feel like the show actually is starting to lean on Molly playing heavyset men as a crutch too often lately and it may be diminishing their presence in the cast. The same goes for Egos' Jada Pinkett Smith as that impression (and moreso the material it is based on, really) have both more than run their course. Bowen as The B-52s' Fred Schneider and Punkie as Ice Spice were two impressions that worked better than they had any right to in this. Hell, I might have laughed a bit harder than I should have at Bowens part. The age and height differences alone between Punkie & Ice Spice made me doubt she could pull that off until I actually saw it but then again, Punkie just has a certain knack for playing female rappers in general. Speaking of parts of this sketch I laughed at more than I should've, I got a kick out of Mikey as Steve-O stapling his nutsack to his leg. The voice was a little less nasal and a little more Tiny Tooms Buster Bunny than it should've been and with that wig he looked a little more like Knoxville than Steve-O but it was just dumb and goofy enough and I could see where he was pulling from. I appreciate that they gave us Michael Longfellow as Bill Hader even if it only seemed to exist as the shows' mere acknowledgement that yes, there is a slight resemblance between these two gentlemen. C+

Lost Bag At Shred Gym - Hmm...DID PDD write this? I mean, it does seriously lack their signature pacing, but it DOES seem like someone HEAVILY diluted their Spectrum sketch with Kieran Culkin. Either way, this worked for me just for containing the exact right amount of dumbness and not iverstayimg it's welcome. As soon as I said to myself, "Ok, Sarah's gonna come out," it ended. C+

Tiny Horse II: Giant Horse - Hey, I gotta give 'em credit for the way they decided to Trojan ho...nope, not going there. Uh, uh. It's not worth it. Anyway, I wouldn't prefer they kept this a one off too but at least this worked well enough as a well plotted sequel. I also got a kick out of the visual gag of Bowens' severed Alien-like robotic head singing along to the "tiny horse" song. Also, did anyone else get strong David Mitchell vibes from JAJs' Palpatine Malfoy character? B-

Update was thankfully short considering how all over the place the jokes were and what the sole commentary was. I liked Che's Eric Adams/Trump bibles/couples therapy/Instagram app jokes. Josts' elephant/Jared Leto jokes were solid but his Bankman-Freid/Streisand jokes were so heavily telegraphed I could see the punchlines coming from two towns over. Che's "Israel School" joke was only notable for how shockingly hesitant he was to even tell it. All the rest were just pure white noise to me. I wasn’t crazy about Heidi's performatively busy coworker the first time. I certainly didn’t need to see it again, but with more phone throwing and Peepers-esque burrito consumption. I will say that having her occupation be "Britney Spears' Instagram coreographer" was an easier joke to get than having her be Che's assistant (which again, felt too "inside baseball" even for me). On a personal note, I will add that this commentary gave me some pause and left me more time and space to look inside myself and examine how much Heidi's work/life habits might have mirrored my own these past few months (especially as I try to get these blogs finished and posted on time) as I prepare to swtich jobs for the second time this year, but I won't to too much into those details of my personal life on this here blog. C-

Troy "Sleep Demon" Sivan - Hmm...well, they knew exactly who their audience would be for this episode. This wasn't exactly what I was hoping a sketch that opens with the visual of Sarah Squirm with electrodes hooked up to her temples would be. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say Bowen had a hand in writing this. Thankfully, he made it seem more like a vanity piece for Timothee than for him (well, at first. Hell, given how out of step he seemed with Timothees' already inconsistent and seemingly under-rehearsed choreography I'm not sure calling this a "vanity piece" for either one of them would be entirely accurate...heyoooooooo!). I'm not quite sure the Boygenius girls needed to make cameos in this, though (though I find it oddly funny how the one who clearly has the most tattoos was the most seemingly hesitant to show her underwear). Don't you just love it when modern-day SNL writes an entire sketch devoted to just simply explaining some current pop culture ephemera to you? Now, I do remember about five (almost six now, really) years ago now when Mr. Sivan himself was an actual musical guest on this show. Since I'm already vaguely familiar enough with him just to know the name but not whatever HBO show he was on (I wanna say "The Idol" which I never bothered watching but, I mean...that SOUNDS right, doesn't it?), it honestly makes it all the more confounding as to why they would do this sketch now and not six years ago. Either way, I can't imagine ol' Troy having an enthusiastically positive reaction to this if he even is made aware of it (unless he and Timothee are friends which I can't imagine as easily as him being friends with Boygenius). Oh yeah, and before I forget, I will admit to having seen one interview with him in the past so I do really appreciate Timothee just straight up calling himself out on his own inability to do an Australian accent because if he didn’t, that would’ve gotten under my skin for the entire sketch. C+

Also, quick side tangent, those "Prime" water drinks are made by fucking Logan Paul? Yeah, I tried those and they weren't that great. (Hey, that had ones flavored like Rocket Pops! I'm not completely made of stone!) I think I'll stop buying those and just stick with those "Hoist" drinks. They're not made by anyone that bad, right?

PDD: Frank & His "Music" - Goddammit, PDD. Thank you for coming in clutch once again and giving me my longest, most sustained laughter in this episode. I've said this to you guys before, and I'll say it again; Never EVER stop being you! B+

Lil Orphan Cassidy - Hey, a Chloe Troast led sketch! It's also a very writerly character piece with a lot of absurd escalating little details! She even makes Maya Rudolph in Dreamgirls-esque singing work pretty well. The assists from Mikey & Timothee didn’t hurt this sketch either. I think I have an idea who wrote this too. Don't ever stop being YOU either, Chloe T! B+

Calm App Sleep Story Recording Session - I'm not too crazy about these types of "already strange recording session gone gradually more and more wrong" sketches we first got with J.J. Watt and Owen Wilson either but Mikey Days' absence makes me think this isn't exactly one of those. Whatever the hell this was, at least it gave us a fairly short burst of Timothee and Andy Dismukes matching each others' passive agression with aggressive aggression. I didn’t like how this ended with a cameo that felt like just as much a slap to the face as that cold open was. Man, I hate to sound like a broken record but old habits really DO. DIE. HARD. on this show, don't they? C-

Now, for my updated ranking of season 49...

1. Nate Bargatze/Foo Fighters (10.28.2023)
2. Timothee Chalamet/Boygenius (11.11.2023)
3. Bad Bunny (10.21.2023)
4. Pete Davidson/Ice Spice (10.14.2023)

Well, that was certainly a wild ass ride. Next week, Jason Momoa returns for his second time hosting. Again, I am cautiously optimistic about this one as well for different reasons. While Momoas first episode from December 2018 wasn’t that strong, his social media posts in the weeks leading up to his episode showed him to be almost as big and as an enthusiastic of an SNL nerd as you or I (emphasis on "you" if you are still reading this far). Unfortunately, that energy didn't translate as well onscreen as it should have. Still, he hosted in the middle of a slightly troubled, mostly D.O.A. season so I'm sure that had someone to do with it. He seemed like a fun guy to work with even if the writers may not have figured out how best to use him. Fortunately, the show has shed all its dead weight from season 44 and we have a new, more dynamic cast that I can already tell may be able to play to his strengths better so we should be in good shape. See you then!