Dakota Johnson/Justin Timberlake (1.27.2024)

Okay, here's my review. Dakota Johnson showed she had the right attitude for hosting SNL and her heart was into doing the show moreso than it was nine years ago (even if tonight that gradually faded away by the shows' end). She and the show figured out how to place their mutual trust in each other. However, if it takes Dakota Johnson of all people to make you feel that SNL is in safe stable hands again after the previous week and they both let you down multiple times by the end of the episode, something is seriously wrong. This episode was only marginally better than Jacob Elordis outing was in the same way that somehow Keegan Michael-Keys' episode was marginally better than Elon Musks episode three seasons ago. Okay, I know I am not the first person to make this comparison but the fact that I felt the need to make it at all is a damning statement on this season. I went into this episode wanting to like it more than I did. Still, the highs were higher than last week but not by a whole (mostly due to certain pretapes and by the time they and Update were through I may have stopped wanting to like this episode altogether). The cast balance was a bit uneven as far as airtime went mainly because Ego & Punkie felt invisible after nearly dominating last week's show (so did Chloe Troast but she didn't exactly "dominate" last week). Michael Longfellow, Heidi Gardner and Sarah Sherman made some minor gains but Marcello, Devon, Mikey and Kenans airtime remains stable. At times, it felt like Dakota was misused as a host the way some of the "hands off" host's of Dick Ebersols' era were used but that may have been the show accomodating/hyping the musical guest and his obligatory sketch cameo with his even more obligatory special guest. We'll get to them in just a moment but first let's kick off this review of the show proper starting with the cold open.

NFL on CBS - Well, I was slightly intrigued as to where this was going until it was mentioned that this was a Kansas City Chiefs game. Then, I was slightly MORE intrigued when Dismukes started rambling about the end of "real football," and Kenan, Day, Longfellow, and Devon took that and ran with it. Thankfully, they didn’t linger too long on Molly as Andy Reid. The meta "live tv" joke was...a little on the nose. I could take it or leave it but the "Blue Bloods/So Help Me Todd Damn Awful" jokes got me. The "predictions" and wildly autotuned closing number really made this for me. It felt like a more dry, existentialist take on the Super Bowl Power Outage we got in Justin Beibers' otherwise dark cloud tinged episode from season 38. I appreciated the subtle look into mens' camaeraderie and seasonal loss of identity here. It's nice to know that every few years, you can look to the show around Super Bowl time for the show to deliver an out-of-the-box, non-political vaguely football themed cold open. B+

Monologue - It's nice to see Dakota with about 100% more life in her eyes than her last hosting stint and riffing in her own unstoppable sassiness from age 7. I appreciate her mentioning her SNL40 cameo. I didn’t appreciate the Trump/Swift mention, but I at least appreciated the misdirect it built up to. Speaking of what this monologue built up to, I  appreciated the gently buttering up the OTHER Justin who last hosted in season 38 the absolute LEAST of all but hopefully my week old prediction of Dakota shutting down another Barry Gibb Talk Show turns out to be true before the night is done! - C+

Mason Family Dinner - Well, it's a mashup of premises that Kevin Nealon did with Rosie O'Donnell on this show, and Tommy Davidson did on In Living Color 30 years ago. Still, getting to watch Sarah, Dakota, and Kenan malaprop their way through it is a fresh twist and a noticable improvement even if I got very few genuine laughs out of it. C+

Home Movies - The premise of discovering the paternity test of a Maury-like daytime trash talk show was a pivotal moment in your moms' pregnancy is a bit shaky. Even though it feels like the type of thing a show like this should've done two decades ago and been done with, I liked seeing exactly how much fun Mikey, Dakota, Sarah, Marcello, Dismukes, JAJ and Mikeys' stunt double got to have with this. They really did throw themselves into the execution of this. I guess it's just assumed that the parents aged so much in...I'm gonna say somewhere between 15 and 20 years because they lived a HARD 15 to 20 years? The one negative thing I will say about this is that it was another pretape that was just long enough to feel like it could've had some cuts made but so many things worked it would be hard to pick out something that absolutely NEEDED to be cut. It doesn’t surprise me to learn that Stephen Castillo wrote this as well because it was really one of only two fun things in tonight's show. B-

Barry Gibb Ta...AAAAHHH, Fuck Me! Couldn't This Show Just Let Me Have This ONE Thing For The Week? - Jeez, they really ARE that desperate to pander aren't they? (*whew*) Sorry to go off like that. To tell you the truth, I kinda liked the first two of these but after the third one they got harder to not actively tune out of. I'm not THAT staunchly against these but unfortunately, as I grew older my attention span grew with me so I had to convince myself to keep watching to see if there would be some kind of twist that didn't come. When they're making Bowen do an impression he did in his first season that no one remembers four years later, you know they're desperately clutching at straws, hoping for our approval viewed through rose tinted glasses. The last one of these I just remember for a ridiculous and unnecessary Madonna cameo and that's it. I mean, I appreciate that Fallon really decided to give this his all (even as tryhard as he always is) but man, it just didn't work for me. The Saltburn and Bluey references in particular seemed really shameless and desperate. At least this was over with quickly with surprisingly little fanfare. D+

PDD Vs. Dakota: Roast Battle - I wasn’t crazy about the fact that they did something that addresses Dakotas' snarkiness so directly and unsubtly. Fortunately, Please Don't Destroy have shown they have the specific chops and expert timing necessary to heighten this to the point where it works. I particularly liked the Aubrey Plaza/Hamilton/Daddio burns the most. This peaked when John Higgins suddenly weeped then threatened to make Dakota drop an N-bomb off a cue card in her monologue. B+

Big Dumb Cup - So, apparently Allison Gates came back to the writer's table this week to just drop off some light riffs on the Pink Stanley Cup craze and then leave as quickly as she could before someone could bring up what SORELY needed to be cut from this for pacing reasons? I'm sure some of you reading this will be pleased to hear that. Anyway, I honestly thought this was an inferior companion piece to last seasons' "Big Dumb Hat" that didn’t really go anywhere. When you're making me more favorably remember a sketch from an episode hosted by Amy Frigging Schumer of all people and the biggest laugh I actually got from it was a botched cutaway (looking at you, Chloe F.) something may seriously be wrong here. D-

Update was almost completely unnoteworthy. Very few of the jokes worked for me. I did like how Che played off the crowd and used a clip of Ron DeSantis' own words to bite him hard in the ass. I liked his Ghans joke and Josts' Bees On A Plane and Spirit/JetBlue merger and Planet Fitness jokes (glad I haven't signed up with them yet) got a chuckle out of me too. Bowen "Ethan" Yangs' commentary felt like something Kyle Mooney could've done better two years ago, but I will admit I was on board with it overall and his "100% Asian" and "In Memoriam" bits got me. Otherwise, this felt like Bowen just purposely wrote this as a subtle middle finger to anyone who has ever called any of his character pieces "self-indulgent". At least this was more grounded by his standards instead of being another inanimate object or insect or mythical demon or something. Speaking of "self-indulgent", I thought Heidi was mostly over giving us these broad, campy mugfests but as a vehicle for her to elaborately roast Che in a way that almost echoes Bobby Moynihan as "Riblet", I'll let it slide for tonight (even as labored and hacky as the OnlyFans & Jost/Catfish bits felt). I also appreciated the direction choices this made giving us an overhead shot of the desk for once. C-

Women's Book Club Meeting - This was a heavy concept "writerly" sketch that didn't quite land with me. It felt like a direct cross between Chadwick Bosemans' fireman sketch and those two sketches Aidy did where she played a mom opening presents that just turned out to be a series of signs with wine based slogans. I did appreciate that it finally started to go SOMEWHERE when Dakota started to apply her "human condition" theory to Heidi reducing her to tears. Just when you felt like this sketch got in and got out at exactly the right spot, two actual Shark Tank judges show up out of nowhere throwing the whole timing of the sketch off. I realize that this is the exact type of surprise "never in a million years would we have seen this coming" cameo we were pleasantly surprised by in the beginning of last season but this time it just doesn't work. C-

Airport Luggage - It's nice to finally see Devon Walker finally get a character showcase of his own. He really seemed to give it his all, too but he seemed to gradually morph into Debra Wilsons' embarassing pharmacist from MADtvs' fourth season. Kenan was allright but he felt too much like a Key and Peele character just got drag and dropped into this sketch. Sarah was all right but she just left me wondering if she just adlibbed her last line based on its response and what might have been cut from this sketch based on how short on time the show seemed by this point. C-

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

1. Nate Bargatze/Foo Fighters (10.28.2023)
2. Adam Driver/Olivia Rodrigo (12.9.2023)
3. Kate McKinnon/Billie Eilish (12.16.2023)
4. Timothee Chalamet/Boygenius (11.11.2023)
5. Emma Stone/Noah Kahan (12.2.2023)
6. Bad Bunny (10.21.2023)
7. Pete Davidson/Ice Spice (10.14.2023)
8. Dakota Johnson/Justin Timberlake (1.27.2024)
9. Jacob Elordi/Renée Rapp (01.20.2024)
10. Jason Momoa/Tate McRae (11.18.2023)

Well, that was certainly something. Next week, Ayo Edeberi makes her hosting debut. Now, I have to admit I can't say I've really seen much that Ayo has been in but looking at her list of credits and hearing all of you guys (yes, you among others reading this right now specifically, you know who you are) talk her up a great deal has me more excited than ever for this show. I immediately got the impression that Ayo is someone who has proved herself to be just as adept at comedy as she is at award winning dramatic performances so it will be so nice to see the show helmed by someone primarily known for their comedic chops again. Besides, the last time we got an Abbot Elementary alum as host, she did absolute wonders for the show (even if they were just for that one fleeting week). Jennifer Lopez is the musical guest, another Xennial pop star who has hosted multiple times in the past. She's also consistently been a solid and relaible presence in sketches. She even hosted in season 35 and as hard as I remember being on that season when it aired I have to say hers was one of the least dire or disappointing episodes of that year. I guess something rubbed off on her during her time as a Fly Girl on In Living Color. So, if J.Lo wanted to appear in a sketch or two next week, I honestly wouldn't mind. See you then!