Kelsey & Ma…AW FUCKING CHRIST!!! Jesus!!!
Goddammit…FUCK!!! Should’ve figured they’d do THIS again.
Sorry to get this review started off on the wrong foot. If you’re a fan of Sabrina Carpenters’ who somehow found this blog for the first time and are reading this right now, you’re probably unaware of my well established distaste for Domingo, so please bear with me here.
Well, Sabrinas’ lines about nursing school were decently funny.
I guess Kelsey has two new friends to…replace two of her old ones?
Ok, I can’t quite recognize whatever song this is parodying…the intentionally off key singing doesn’t help…is it something from “Life Of A Showgirl”?
I feel like I need to attend a self worth seminar after sitting through this and it’s not even over yet.
Ok, this obvious “Abracadabra” parody is all right.
Hey, there he fucking is. Finally…
Ok, is Marcello singing a parody of “Beautiful Things”? I’m so lost at this point.
All right, so we got the most obvious fucking thing ever out of the way. Go to bed, kids. D+
Monologue
Sabrina handled the monologue about as confidently as I expected her to.
I liked the pull out of her “Mans’ Best Friend” album cover with Bowen and Marty.
I wasn’t too crazy about the audience interactions. The shot of the stage hand taking her microphone as she walked back on to stage sadly may have been the most genuine laugh I got out of this so far.
Kenans’ walk on was decent. I guess Sabrina didn’t want to step TOO far outside of her comfort zone at the start of the show.
Ok, maybe I’m still a little bit put off by that cold open, but it’s SNL so who knows what else is in store? Let’s go into the rest of the show with an open mind and give it a fair chance. C-
Snack Homiez
Ok, I CAN’T be the only one getting major Kyle Mooney vibes from Chloes’ performance in this.
“Unc” is a new slang term, I guess. Great.
I don’t HATE the way they used Jane in this.
This is just a collection of Gen Z/Alpha buzzword slang, isn’t it?
Immediately, I’m getting strong flashbacks to “Gen Z Hospital” from this (which when you consider who hosted THAT episode is…NOT a compliment).
Ok, I liked that line about having avocados having “a wooden ball in the center”
You’re not the only one getting lost, Sabrina.
Ok, this might be my favorite usage of JAJs Trump by default (as telegraphed as it felt and despite the fact that they did this same basic joke in the last TikTok compilation from last season's Michael Keaton/Billie Eillish episode).
I did like the JAJ/Trump line where he just straight up asked the boys if he was getting into heaven.
Yeah, this sketch was certainly “not” fire. D+
Plans
Ok, I automatically like this just for something NOT aimed solely at Gen Z/Alpha.
I also liked the heavily modern horror stylized visual takes on uncomfortable mundane, draining social interactions. Even though this feels like the writers went down some beaten path to get here, this was well done.
Pairing Ben Marshall and Sabrina Carpenter is…quite the height disparity but it’s appropriate that he’s in this since the style and pacing seem reminiscent of a Please Don’t Destroy short while still closely resembling a modern horror movie trailer. B-
ShopTV
Well, given how Sabrina and the writers just demonstrated in the monologue just how unafraid they were to play on Sabrinas’ “horny” image, I guess I should’ve expected one of these.
JAJ showing off his Jesus head trick or treat bucket was pretty funny. Wasn’t expecting to get big Kyle Mooney vibes from two nearly back to back live sketches in one episode, but here we are.
I do like how they used Ashley in this (even if it kind of hangs a lampshade on the idea of her being used on the show to fill the “skilled actress” void left by Heidi in the cast now). Mikey in particular had a lot of great lines and his timing was impeccable here.
I’m glad that they even knew how to hit just the right beats with the two callers after the “deluxe fur lining” was revealed so that Mikey, um, “wearing” the pillow felt like just the right beat to end this on.
Sabrina performed this well and I do like the slight variation that this is a blatant vagina based product. I would genuinely love to be a fly on the wall when the writers discussed this prop with the censors.
Michael O’Donoghue must have been looking up and smiling at this sketch (get it? Anyone else here aware of HIS censor battles to get “At Home With The Psychos” sketch? iykyk).
As hot and cold as I’ve run on these “Shop TV” sketches, this one is definitely my personal favorite. C+
GirlBoss Seminar
So, this must be the sketch that was shown in that brief dress preview that was shown during the football game that made this show start 12 minutes late.
Was…Sabrinas’ character named…”Queen Leesha”?
I wanted to like this sketch more from the moment Jeremy and Tommy started swinging around that dummy of “Queen Leesha” and threw her out a window…but, I feel like it didn’t reach its full potential.
Some of the beats with Sabrinas’ strings of gibberish and Sarah as the audience surrogate should’ve been cut just to tighten up this sketch because they didn’t quite go anywhere.
I’ve heard Andrew Dick say on That Week In SNL that he enjoys gibberish and malapropism laden sketches like this, but somehow I doubt he will ever see it. Knowing him, I’m guessing he probably noped out of this episode by now.
It’s not that great a sign for this sketch that the second big technical blooper was the biggest laugh I got out of it (not the brief mic outage at the beginning but the brief moment with Kenan having to throw the Jeremy dummy out the window because whoever threw it missed).
I did get a kick out of Jeremy coming back into the scene with a big shard of glass embedded into his skull, though. That was my biggest laugh of this sketch. C+
Middle School
So, this must be the pretape Bowen filmed this week before high tailing it to LA to accept that award?
Gee, I better word my review of this sketch carefully. I don’t want any more of my reviews to get caught behind a fucking “sensitive content warning” without any explanation.
This was a good use of this episodes’ seemingly unavoidable Sabrina/Bowen pairing and the rest of the cast playing middle schoolers (Jeremy/Jane, Veronika/Ben, Marcello/Chloe/Kam) performed this well.
The scenes with Ashley and Kenan as the chaperones really made this for me.
Strangely, the song sounded like something that would've been on the pop charts back when I was starting HIGH school rather than middle school (which I’m thankful for as it makes me feel less old than the first third of this episode did). C+
Weekend Update w/Jost & Che
Josts’ Best Jokes: Santos/aggravated identity theft, Trump's enemies list, Naked Portland bike ride, Argentina, Cuomo/Mamdani debate, Shortened fall season,
Che’s Best Jokes: Trump/Zelenskyy/nobel peace prize, Jost family chat (only for the reaction “what did I do to you?”), Venezuelan boat, Prince Andrew, Pig liver transplant
I figured we’d see Marcellos’ “movie guy” in this one since this was expected to be a Marcello heavy episode (although those who tuned in solely to see Domingo should probably be in bed by this point).
Yeah, “Da Movie Guy” is usually a pretty stupid and empty character but at least there’s something in there that loops it back around to being stupidly funny like the “Saw”, “Stewie” and “Alien” lines.
I’m glad they gave Tommy Brennan his own showcase and I genuinely enjoyed his standup material. I especially liked his outlining of his unique midwestern upbringing and his “WWI locket/pre-integrated basketball star” jokes. He even added something to the masturbation material to make it feel lively and fresh. B-
Washer & Dryer
Ok, Dismukes and Ashley are a quietly toxic couple. I like this so far.
Figured we’d see Sabrina sing in this. I never guessed they’d use Veronika this way but I guess between this and her role as one of three “Drabble Sisters” in last weeks’ “Experienced Attorneys” I guess they might be making old timey roles part of her niche?
I liked that they did different song styles for each setting and the details of each song ending with various reasons NOT to get these. I am a bit surprised that Veronikas’ dryer costume coming apart prematurely didn't get a bigger reaction.
I’d definitely like them to showcase Veronikas’ singing more. She must be a powerful vocalist if she can hold her own next to Sabrina Carpenter.
I also liked the other odd details that Andrew threw in there about eating spaghetti on his bicycle and handing Kenan a small bag of money for both the washer and dryer. B-
Surprise
Jesus Christ, Ashley Padilla sure reacted to her massive farts like she was in pain. I sure hope she didn’t get a hernia from all the heavy lifting she had to do to singlehandedly make this sketch watchable.
Seriously, though…she did really elevate this sketch (especially during the “CSO” rant where she finds out she earns the least and is the least promoted out of all of her coworkers). It was almost enough to make you forget that this was a sketch built around farts/fart lighting with an unrelated commercial tag/button on the end.
Gee, I can't wait for the ITYSL/Tim Robinson stans to make the discourse surrounding this episode/sketch completely insufferable!
By the way, the official SNL YouTube channel appears to have uploaded the dress rehearsal version of this sketch that has many noticeable differences from the live air version.
…and since Jon Schneider has already compared Ashley to Bill Hader on his SNN Hot Take show, I’d like to invite you all to listen to mine and Deej Barens NEW podcast “We Pine For Padilla” making its debut on January 2nd, 2045. C+
(ha ha, just kidding Deej…but please feel free to check out our current podcast We Heart Hader)
Sabrina Carpenter Performs “Nobody’s Son”
Did…she just drop not one but TWO live f-bombs on air? I don’t really have anything to say about her performance of “Manchild” but I had to comment on the second song here.
Social Experiment
This must be the Martin Herlihy solo short that got cut from last weeks’ dress rehearsal.
From the interaction between Martin and Jane followed by him and his crew of Frankensteins breaking into Veronika's apartment (after they broke up), I could tell this was automatically going to be the funniest segment of the whole night.
I do like Martin Herlihy working solo was able to put out a more refined and better distilled version of the PDD brand/style of comedy that feels different from their previous output and just works better.
I liked the additional detail of the elderly female Frankenstein dying and the song at the end. I also liked Kams’ part though I feel like it went on a beat or two too long.
This reminded me a lot of Beck and Kyles “Mr. Riot Films” from season 40 where they played YouTubers conducting their own “social experiments”.
Boy, I sure am glad Nathan Fielder doesn’t seem to have the same type of online fanbase Tim Robinson has! A-
Ranking The 51st Season From Best To Worst
Amy Poehler/Role Model (10.11.2025)
Sabrina Carpenter (10.18.2025)
Bad Bunny/Doja Cat (10.04.2025)
Overall Thoughts
Well, I was a little more frustrated with this episode than I probably should have been but after giving myself some time to digest it, I’m a bit more OK with it.
Whatever problems I had with this episode barely had anything to do with Sabrinas’ performances as a host. She seemed like she would be a solid host, and she was. I guess I was just hoping that the writing served her better.
I suppose that it was too much to hope that Sabrina would’ve been trusted to helm the show on her own merits a lot more instead of building this episode's naked pop pandering around her.
Still, this episode did just barely avoid taking the premieres’ place as worst of the season so far by not having the same dire lack of energy that the Bad Bunny/Doja Cat episode did. That doesn’t make up for the fact that the episode reminded me of what bothered me so much about last years’ double duty episodes hosted by both Dua Lipa and Charli XCX (and I’m sure I'm not the only one who feels this way).
Even with one cast member not in the building and not in any live sketches, cast airtime felt pretty even this week. Ben, Jeremy, Sarah and Kam took some small hits but JAJ, Mikey, Jane, Tommy, Kenan, Veronika and (especially) Ashley really stepped up.
Closing Thoughts
Well, that might have been what everyone except for me was expecting it to be.
In two weeks, Miles Teller returns to host for his second time as host while Brandi Carlile returns for her fourth time as musical guest.
The last time Miles hosted, he was decent but the episode itself was quite a divisive one that I probably disliked a lot less than most people (although looking back at that episode's rundown, I can see why people disliked it as much as they did).
Still, HE wasn’t that episodes’ biggest problem and I’m hoping that will still be the case when he returns. I probably shouldn’t be confident that the writing of that episode will back that up but at least the writing of this season is feeling fresher and taking more chances than three years ago (last weeks’ episode may be proof of that) so here’s hoping SNL can find its way back on track next month.
Before that episode airs, I will be posting a full length review of the SNL season 32 finale with Zach Braff and Maroon 5 on this blog. That one will actually be posted on Friday October 24th as me and Deej will also be covering that episode on the next We Heart Hader podcast coming out the same day. Hope to see you then!
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