Ana De Armas/Karol G (04.15.2023)

Okay, here's my review. This show met my expectations and defied them all at once. I ended up coming around on Ana De Armas and she was the wonderful host I expected her to be. The show fit her like a glove. They knew exactly how to write for her and she was clearly overjoyed to be there. They also made some changes to the shows established format which, while exciting to see at first, didn't quite distract me from some of the pacing issues that resulted. The show felt uneven since they gradually went back to some of their old writing tropes and began recurring previously established thin premises from the previous era that should've left behind. You'll see what I mean by all this in a moment when the review of the actual show starts proper. Still, the sheer levels of energy made up for this, and while I can already see it was a divisive show to some, I certainly had fun watching it. There was a nice cast balance tonight. While nobody seemed to get shut out if the show entirely, JAJ and Dismukes seemed to have each only made one appearance all night. Anyway, let’s just start since there is a lot to break down tonight.

First Warm Day Of The Year Red Carpet Show - Wow...what the hell was the cold open in dress, and how badly did it bomb for them to scramble and bump this up top? Still, I say that with love as it's a shrewd choice and a very welcome change of pace to open the show with this. It's truly gratifying to see a light, breezy, non-topical, not too long cold open that doesn't actively drain the shows' energy up top after years of our pleas for such a thing seemingly falling on deaf ears. The JAJ/Mikey Longs and Devon/Punkie pairings are my favorite so far. Kenan & Sarah kinda overshot whatever they were going for, and it didn't really work for me. I did like how they made Ego/Dismukes and Marcello/Day into their own separate mini-runners in this. I also liked that this was accessible and not too much of an inside joke for another "weird/obnoxious New Yorkers we saw in the park" sketch. B+

Monologue - Nice to see Ana address the language barrier in a charming and not too self effacing way. I know when I drew comparisons to previous hosts in last week's blog, I mentioned the names Sofia Vergara and Gal Gadot, but she immediately seems more in control and at ease than those women. Part of me doubts that the "beg your pardon/acting class/Robert Deniro" stories are true, but the way she carried herself in this monologue left me not thinking too much about that. This felt a little long, but I think they gave Ana exactly what she needed here. She was the perfect host to bring back the "sincere personal monologue" trend. B+

The Dome - Well, Joe (or Bill whichever one of you this applies to), there goes your "Margot Robbie hosts the season finale" theory, but your "this is Mikeys' last season" theory still absolutely holds water for the time being. Maybe Mikey knows who the last two (as of right now tentatively) scheduled hosts of this season are but obviously can't reveal them. Either the last two hosts are men or Ana De Armas is the last host this season who is a glamorous, beautiful Hollywood actress or Mikey is operating under the assumption that the upcoming writers strike is definitely happening. Either way, I can see why he had to do this now instead of the finale. He had to strike while the iron was hot (pun somewhat intended). Anyway, this was a nice way for them to Trojan horse a third Matt Shatt on us. I appreciated how this was different from both of the previous Matt Shatts, but I was still a little disappointed with the setting for this one. When I saw that this was a game show titled "The Dome" for some reason I was half expecting a parody of "The Wall" (which is inexplicably still on the air on NBC right now) so I was hoping to see some physical challenges just for the sake of a drastic change to the Matt Shatt formula. Sadly, this never came to pass and I ended up just setting myself up for failure. Still, the multiplying nipples got me. B-

American Girls - Even though SNL has been doing too many American Girl based sketches lately (which is something I've never been deep into the lore of but thankfully didn't need to be for this) I did like the very grim and detailed "writerly/gallows humor" nature of this sketch, but it seemed to have some serious pacing issues. It seemed like it was absolutely dying with the audience during each moment when Ego (who seemed like she should've been carrying this sketch), or Molly, or Sarah weren't delivering their lines. C-

Young Spicy Sessions - When you really break it down, this was basically the most overused, played out sketch trope in recent SNL history ("inappropriate responses to a seemingly innocuous prompt") but this more than got by on sheer charisma. This was one of Egos' better showcases in a while, but Devon was really the glue that held this together. He seemed completely in his element here, and I liked his line "you leave my Corolla our of this." I also got a kick out of the implications that he may have a learning disability and should be on a watchlist for drugging women. B-

Spanish Transfer Students - Even if this felt like an inverse of the inner city school sketch from the Megan Thee Stallion episode but with Mikey Day doing his usual Mikey Day shtick added in, it was perhaps the perfect vehicle for both Marcello AND Ana (and Karol G). I did like how lived in and sincere they made this feel without it coming off too "pandery." Still, it felt like it could've been tightened just a little. B-

PDD: Hangxiety - This was pretty much the Please Don't Destroy take on the "Holiday quick cuts" trope we've been seeing reoccur since season 42 but the performances along with the lack of saccharine family get together "cutting the tracle" vibes put this over for me. John Higgins and Chloe opening fire got the most laughs out of me along with the interactions between Heidi/Bowen and Ben Marshall/Mikey Longs. They probably should've rethought the ending with Mikey Day, though. C+

Update was, once again, mainly worth tuning in for the commentaries. I didn't even mind the Discord jokes (they didn't apply to me or anyone I interact with on Discord), but I kind of wish that leaked document scandal wasn't the context for the first ever mention of Discord on SNL. The only other jokes that stood out to me were Che's Tim Scott/Rat Czar/missing alert system and Josts' litter campaign jokes. Kenan as Funky Kong turned out to be more fun than I was expecting it to be. I mean, the visual if Kenan in a gorilla suit was a little...unsettling...but by the time he got to "booty cheeks/titty meat" and had possibly genuinely botched that "Monkey Kong" line I was as fully on board with it as both Jost and Che seemed to be. I liked Sarahs' meditation expert a lot. It may have just been an excuse for her to burn Jost again but less elaborately and more in character/less as "Sarah" but I was just relieved to hear Colin set up this commentary with the phrase "with mental health struggles on the rise..." and NOT see Bowen come out (Mikey Longs would've been a'ight, but maybe he needs to slow his roll for a minute). The true highlight of this Update was Molly Kearney as Molly Kearney. They delivered the same type of sincere personal political statement that Cecily (and at one point Aidy) pulled off successfully but did so in a less harrowing and confessional and more flashier and showier but also more positive, encouraging, cohesive and uplifting way (both literally and figuratively). B+

Lisa From Temecula - Well, I guess we willed this one into existence whether we meant to or not. I have to admit, I was a bit more into this one than I was the first one (maybe because Ego affected a much goofier Kenan-like voice and the breaking was a bit more under control despite what appeared to be Egos' best efforts) but this still appears to ve suffering from Debbie Downer syndrome while lacking variance at season 35 levels. C+

Enter Stage Woof: Acting School For Dogs - There's no way in hell you can convince me this WASN'T a leftover script from a Cecily/Aidy sketch from season 45 that got cut at the table read. This felt like the first sketch all night that Ana De Armas was truly an odd fit for, but I will say Chloe handle the inevitable mishaps like a pro and Punkie had the funniest lines on the whole sketch. C-

Nail Salon - After the last few character showcases Bowen has given us, it's nice that we got something that was more reminiscent of his "choking victim poster" sketch with Scarlett Johansson from season 45 (even if it's delivered with the hamminess that season 48 Bowen can't seem to leave behind for very long). I honestly didn't mind his midwife sketch from a few weeks ago, and this felt like a slightly scaled back version of that.I didn't hate that random Family Guy-ish Twilight reference, but it felt a little too forced. C+

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Quinta Brunson/Lil Yachty (04.01.2023)
6. Ana De Armas/Karol G (04/15/2023)
7. Molly Shannon/Jonas Brother's (04.08.2023)
8. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
9. Jenna Ortega/The 1975 (03.11.2023)
10. Travis Kelce/Kelsea Ballerini (03.04.2023)
11. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
12. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
13. Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)
14. Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)
15. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
16. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
17. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
18. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Well, that may not have been the ideal season finale for me...but there was fun to be had. The next announced episode doesn't sound like my ideal episode to even..
air or exist but I'm still holding out hope that the WGA can successfully negotiate another contract to get the pay they deserve and to give this season the proper finale it deserves (as of this writing the final two hosts and musical guest lineups of May have yet to be announced, so...who knows?) Barring the possibility of another Writer's Guild Of America strike, Pete Davidson will make his hosting debut in two week's time. That's right, Pete Davidson will be the first of the departing class of 2022 (less than a full year after he left to be exact) to return to the show (for a full length hosting gig, not just a surprisee unannounced cameo). For some reason, the words "TOO SOON" keep flashing in my head like an old, unprogrammed VCR constantly blinking "12:00" over and over again. I honestly can't say I can see how he would even fit into the show now despite the minimal changes made since his departure (mostly because he barely let us see how he could still fit into the show in his last season since he had multiple different reasons not to be there for his own personal well being) but I will say the trailer for his new Peacock series "Bupkis" looks...decent, so...if he had to host so soon at least it's to promote something that looks worth promoting. (Wait...a cast member hosts for their very first time just to promote a Peacock series? This might be just like the Will Forte episode from last season all over again! That doesn't exactly fill me with confidence either). Oh well. See you then!

Molly Shannon/Jonas Brothers (04.08.2023)

Okay, here's my review. Some people were a bit lower than me on this episode as a whole. They were underwhelmed by it but it worked just fine for me simply because I went in to it with the most tempered expectations possible (which you can easily do when a well loved cast member with a distinct performance style who had a decently long tenure on the show returns...see, that's the nice thing about alumni hosted episodes...especially when said alumni has previously hosted). As expected, Molly Shannon was a perfectly pleasant host whose charm and warm personality shined through. Even if the post Update half of the show started to crumble, she was able to put pretty much all of it over on her part. No cast member got shut out of the show entirely, but both Mikeys' felt underused (in fact you'd think we might see more of Mikey than we did given that he and Shannon previously worked together on the American remake of "Kath and Kim" which incidentally aired on NBC around the last time she hosted) but Dismukes and Punkie made big comebacks. Anyway, let’s begin.

Trumps' Last Supper - Well, I was expecting this to be a JAJ/Trump open. I was foolish NOT to think they'd make it Easter themed. After all, this is the second time they've done such a thing since JAJ joined the cast. All I can say is, aside from Molly's Judas and JAJs' "get very violent and start a war" line and the slight meta nod at the end, this did absolutely nothing for me. C-

Monologue - Well, I was expecting Molly to do SOMETHING at the top of the show to bring up the energy level. If she couldn't find a way to pull off a Mary Katherine Gallagher cold open like she did back in '07, a charming musical number with shades of 'Leg Up!' was the next best thing. I liked all the cast cameos (especially how they got BOTH Molly's to chat briefly with each other while all but ignoring the elephant in the room). Shorts' cameo was a nice touch. B-

Vincent's Valets - Even though this felt completely telegraphed, they had me right from Dismukes and JAJs' first interaction. Shannon and Kenan added some fun dark vibes to it. I did like how blatantly Kenan made Devon break. B+

Jeannie Darcy: Selective Startage - I do love how one of the only recurring characters of Molly's to appear in both her hosting stints is by far one of her most obscure to casual SNL fans. The basic level of anti-humor here still worked for me (even if this did seem a bit similar to that fake trailer for a fake Dave Bautista standup special that Netflix actually did tweet out last week), and I liked how they took the pics out of what an overblown "event" Netflix made thst Chris Rock special out to be (even if these could've worked better as two separate sketches). Ego's Arsenio and Punkies' Wanda were pretty funny (even if Punkies' impression could've used a bit more work). I honestly could've done without Chloes' Sarah Silverman, though. It felt like too much of a cheap imitation of Melissas' Sarah Silverman. I did like the meta Tesla joke at the end, though. B-

Office Baby Shower - While I'm not normally one for extended fart jokes, I do appreciate how committed this was to its own gleeful stupidity and I think that we can all agree that Molly Shannon is really the only sketch performer with the warmth and likable personality necessary to put this over. Honestly, the way the ending came across as botched would be my only point against this sketch. B-

PDD: Molly 2K23 - I thought the idea behind this was fun and clever, but maybe the PDD boys breezed through this a bit too fast, and something felt missing? Watching it over again, I liked the details of the commencement/death battle/skateboarding/daughter talk levels , and I did the rap at the end. I will also say I do like how they tried to throw in subtle references to MKG throughout the show to make up for the fact that Molly can't really play such a heavily physically comedic role anymore, though. B-

Year Of A Thousand Men - At first, this seemed like it wasn't going to work for me at all. The obligatory Nick Jonas sketch cameo almost cemented this for me but I just couldn't get over the tired premise of "one person being humiliated beyond belief in front of a crowd" that felt played out roughly a decade ago. What ended up turning this around for me was seeing the play-within-a-sketch catch up with the sketch chronologically in real time. C+

Update was pretty underwhelming. We're back to Che getting the lion's share of the better jokes (specifically his MTG/Murdoch/Pope sex blessing/YouTube prankster/Vogue cover jokes), but at least he and Jost seem to know how to play off each other well (and I'll give it to Jost for that DeSantis joke). Bowens' Jafar was something I completely tuned out of. I immediately could tell this wasn't for me, but I liked the dumb revelation that DeSantis apparently got married at Disney in real life. Punkies Angel Reese commentary was entertaining. I wonder if this was the shows' way of making it up to her for cutting her Brittney Griner commentaries over the past two seasons? Heidi's new character just barely got by on sheer goofball energy and Wiig-like mugging. The reveal of her being Che's assistant felt like an inside joke that they didn't care if the audience was in on or not. C+

Drug Commercial Shoot - This felt way too unfocused and slapdash for me. I appreciated Kenan trying to add some silliness to it, but it just seemed to veer this more and more off track. Ego and both Molly's were really the best thing about it. C-

Sally O'Malley - Well, just when I thought she was going to leave this character back in mothballs...here she is. Considering this was also the second "obligatory Jonas cameo sketch" of the night, it seems doubly odd that this was buried so late in the show. I guess Jonas brother's fans from their early days either don't have problems staying up late or just...won't stay up or stay in at all and will just catch this online if it pops up in their social feeds. This also felt a little too rushed and confused to me (especially given how overly long the previous Sally O'Malley sketches always felt to me) and it lacked an ending (not the sketches' biggest problem, I know) but kudos to Molly Shannon for finding SOME way to sneak in whatever physical humor she can give us here. Also, there is one elephant in the room we should be addressing tonight. Shouldn't Sally O'Malley at least chronologically be 73 or 74 by now? I mean, yeah, it's a sketch, and that may not HAVE to be canon. Sketch and cartoon characters are probably the last types of fictional characters that should age in any way but I had to brung this up not just because Shannon is now 58 in real life but also because 50 is no longer considered...well, not just "that old" necessarily but it's not an age where it would be considered outrageous to have an active lifestyle. In fact, Patton Oswalt would be the first to tell you that heavy exercise and an outdoor lifestyle would even MORE be encouraged once you turn 50 (well, at least low impact hiking if nothing else). Maybe this was the Jonas brother's "safe choice" for a sketch to cameo in that wouldn't alienate some of their more Christian fanbase that stuck with them (it was clearly just an excuse to get some cheap laughs by wearing goofy outfits) or maybe the Jonases just wanted to do this because it's a sketch they grew up watching with their parents but either way...they probably should've switched this around with the Jeannie Darcy pretape between dress and air so this could've been earlier in the show where it would’ve made sense. C+

CNZen - Hmm... modern day CNN coverage of Trumps' indictment/arraignment being channeled into a meditation app for bland centrist Colbert #Resistance liberals. This one seemed like it was going to be a bit of a thinker. What this was missing in conceptual coherence it quickly made up for execution. All the cast members playing current CNN anchors did great jobs in this. I especially liked the inclusion of Sarah as Wolf Blitzer and JAJ as Lindsay Graham. Molly Shannon does have the perfect voice to pull this sketch off. I do wonder who wrote this because it seems almost like a Che concept but more focused and almost as pointed as some of Che's Update jokes about, just...certain types of white people in general. I mean, it may not have been as pointed as the "Trump Addicts of America" pretape was from the season 46 Adele episode, but at least this targeted a different type of person who "makes hating Trump their entire personality" and did so at a time when the stakes were substantially lower. C+

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Quinta Brunson/Lil Yachty (04.01.2023)
6. Molly Shannon/Jonas Brother's (04.08.2023)
7. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
8. Jenna Ortega/The 1975 (03.11.2023)
9. Travis Kelce/Kelsea Ballerini (03.04.2023)
10. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
11. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
12. Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)
13. Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)
14. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
15. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
16. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
17. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Well, aside from a new "Delicious Dish" that episode pretty much gave me everything I was expecting. Next week, Ana De Armas makes her hosting debut. Given that this would be another female host for whom English is not quite their first language (I had read that she had to learn her lines for "Blonde" phoenetically) I would expect this to be another strange episode in the same vein as Gal Gadot Circa 2017 or Sofia Vergara Circa 2012 (hey, I wonder if Andy picked that one for him and Jon to review BEFORE she was announced? I'm sure it's just a coincidence). I would hope she could defy those expectations because from what little I have seen of her acting, she seems to be able to hold her own. Still, she doesn't seem like the ideal pick for "potential final host of the season if another strike DOES happen in May." Oh well, see you then and Happy Easter!

Quinta Brunson/Lil Yachty (04.01.2023)

Okay, here's my review. Unsurprisingly, this turned out to be a successful episode but not one that exactly blew me away. Quinta Brunson turned out to be a great host who certainly showed up to put in work but she blended in with the cast more than I expected (perhaps her time on "A Black Lady Sketch Show" was what helped her the most here). Surprisingly, this turned out to be a great night for JAJ of all people, but he's been ingratiating himself into the show for some time now, so that's to be expected. I agree with whoever has dubbed him the "backbone" of the show. You would expect Ego, Sarah, Heidi, and Punkie to have as good a night as JAJ did just given the way the show has been going but they still had their moments as did everyone else and thankfully no one got shut out of the show entirely. Anyway, let’s get right to it, shall we?

Trump Bopz - Well, it may have been a little too long and not every joke landed with me but at least this was the most outlandish and absurd "left field" framing device for a JAJ Trump cold open we've seen so far. I did like how their obligatory Trump indictment cold open was just a wild free association off the horrifying real life fact that a former president is plugging a new single by an actual group calling themselves "The J6 Prison Choir" who just sampled him. I'd go as far as to say this was more reminiscent of Tony Atamanuiks' "President Show" on Comedy Central than SNLs' typical approach to Trump sketches since his presidency (mostly because "President Show" was known for its flashy musical numbers). Plus, now I can name precisely one (1) song by Ice Spice. C+

Monologue - Unlike the cold open, this monologue was quite a bit different from what I was expecting. Quinta did make a sincere personal statement, but it was less about her connection to SNL and much more about her much more personal connection to education and the public school system (after a series of asides on how black women deal with sudden fame). I was half expecting various "audience members" or cast members to ask Quinta various questions about how to solve problems at their own local schools (mainly because this monologue made me flashback to those of Paul Reiser, Kerry Washington, Lena Dunham) until I realized we are well into the era of solo host monologues dominating SNL. It showed less energy and eagerness to please than it did laser-focus and wanting to educate (pardon the expression) the SNL audience on a cause that is near and dear to this host. I guess it's on me for expecting a bigger and showier monologue. I didn't realize her character on "Abbott" was the sincere, earnest voice of reason, and this monologue showed me how much of a real place in Quintas' life that came from. B-

Cocaine Bathroom - This felt like a very one-note, tired premise, but the casts' commitment (Marcello, Quinta, Dismukes, and Kenan in particular) put it over for me. Longfellows' Camouflaged Black Tar Herion Guy was genuinely my biggest laughs of the night. B-

I Was A Bridesmaid - This was more unexpectedly deep niche humor that I was not the target audience for (and not JUST because I still haven't been invited to a wedding in my life nor would this be what I would be a part of if I were). In fact, I'd say this felt more like something Baroness Von Sketch Show would've done (and I'm not just saying that because Molly reminded me quite a bit of Jennifer Whalen in the most decidedly feminized role they have been given on this show so far). They used JAJ and Squirm quite well in this, though. C-

Couple Goals - I do love how this took a dark turn toward exploring a very grim and specifically detailed premise. It had an unexpectedly great payoff. Quick side note: Is it just me, or did anyone else get the impression that when the camera cut to Devon and Ego in the audience as Kenans' parents that it was supposed to stay on them much longer but either there was a miscue or a major change was made at the last minute? C+

Traffic Charades - Honestly, the most notable thing about this sketch was the directing choices that were made. Visually, this felt like a season 32 sketch. Sadly, it also felt like it was written during season 39. Shockingly, Chloe may have been my favorite part of this sketch. I'm sorry to say I'm not as high on this sketch as everyone else seems to be. I recognize it had some decent writing. Maybe this is one of those things that would need to grow on me over time, but I don't know when I would find myself watching this again. C-

Update was carried by sheer audience energy tonight. Thank God Che pulled his biggest prank on Jost yet because his Trump jokes were real duds. Still, he made up for it with his biggest all-time break and that Christmas card joke. It's about damn time that SNL finally did SOMETHING to break its own format for an April Fools episode. Longfellows' David seemed like an attempt to top himself in terms of "character" character pieces like Dilbert and Punxsutawney Phil. This didn't quite live up to the high bar that granit head turn set, but still... good effort even if not everything worked. Marcellos' "short king" commentary was another great shortca..er, showcase, excuse me, for Marcello but it's very weird to me that he ended up getting to do this the week that the only person in the building shorter than him is the host. B+

Time Midwife - Well, this may have seemed far too thrown together at the last second for it's own good but I'm glad this turned out to be another writerly, detail heavy sketch instead of just another hammy Bowen showcase. His breaking near the end nearly ruined it for me. Kudos to that child extra for getting one of the last two laugh lines. C+

Penis Brothers - Great time for an insanely cartoony Squirmcase with an assist from Quinta. Sarah must've been watching a lot of Kids In The Hall lately. It's obvious her two favorite characters are Bruce McCullochs' Cabbage Head and Dave Foleys' AT&Love boss and thought it would be fun to combine them into the SAME character Make no mistake, I say that with love. B+

PDD: NY Street Eats - This was Please Don't Destroys' strongest outing to date. What especially made this work for me was how unafraid they were to gleefully plumb the absolute depths of their characters' sheer stupidity, ignorance, and cowardice. Marcello, Quinta, and Punkie made the absolute most out of their parts. A-

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Quinta Brunson/Lil Yachty (04.01.2023)
6. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
7. Jenna Ortega/The 1975 (03.11.2023)
8. Travis Kelce/Kelsea Ballerini (03.04.2023)
9. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
10. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
11. Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)
12. Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)
13. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
14. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
15. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
16. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Well, that may not have been as greater than the sum of its parts, but it was still a good show. Next week, Molly Shannon returns for her second time hosting in only 16 years. This is sure to be a great week for the current cast, but I am more curious to see how Molly might adapt to the current show. How might she be able to take a less physical approach to characters like Sally O'Malley and Mary Katherine Gallagher in 2023? There's no doubt in my mind that another Delicious Dish reprise would make the most sense (hey, if Will Forte could host last year to promote the MacGruber series on Peacock than Ana Gasteyer certainly deserves a chance to at least make another brief cameo to plug American Auto) but will they feel forced to top themselves in terms of homespun faux-raunch and search for the next "Schweddy Balls" or "Dusty Muffin" or will they be willing to scale themselves back towards the more dry subtle absurdities of the earlier installments? Maybe Molly could surprise us by going the route Ferrell and Sandler did just a few years ago, giving us a show full of (mostly) original non-recurring material. The possibilities are endless, and we'll certainly see what happens next week. 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 like I did for Ken George Jones, PLEASE let me know!)

Jenna Ortega/The 1975 (03.11.2023)

Okay, here's my review. This episode of SNL was a little uneven, but overall, it felt like the show was headed back in the right direction. Jenna Ortega proved to be a dynamic host who proved she belonged on that stage immediately. It was clear from the beginning the show knew exactly how to use and play to the strengths of (given all the creative control she took on the set of "Wednesday" she was probably glad to tell the writers exactly how to use her in sketches and what her strengths were as an actress). Honestly, it was nice to have a host who didn’t bring an "off" vibe to the show. It's nice to get back to hosts who aren't just relying on their own overconfidence and actually have the performing chops to be on the show. Plus, no one felt shut out of the show completely (although a little more Punkie, Squirm, and Longfellow and a little less reliance on Mikey wouldn't have hurt). Anyway, let’s break it down, shall we?

Access Hollywood Oscars Red Carpet Show - Well, we get another left field cold open that was, unfortunately, too scattershot for its own good. Still, I really liked how they used Marcello, Molly (their Brendan Gleeson was the sole highlight of this), Dismukes, Devon, Sarah (minus the Chuck Schumer tag at the end), Kenan (he had funny enough dialogue to make up for his disappointing Tyson) and Longfellow (yeah, I could tell that was him as Del Toros' Pinocchio). The only things that didn't work for me were Heidi as...well, Heidi, Mikey as Colin Farrell, Bowen as Santos (played out) and Chloe Fineman as Kate McKinnon as Kristen Wiig as Jamie Lee Curtis. C+

Monologue - Already, this monologue feels halfway between Aubrey Plaza and Selena Gomez (in terms of material and how much faith the host had in delivering it). Still, Jenna bought the exact right energy the show needed at this point. I'll admit that Facebook/TikTok joke made me laugh even though it sounds like a lone that would’ve gotten cut from an episode of "Velma." I liked the "happy, extroverted people" joke, too. The only part I could've done without was Armisens' cameo, which just made me feel...uneasy on multiple levels. I was a little nervous when Jenna named "The Californians" as her all-time favorite sketch, but thankfully, I realized how many more cameos they would need besides Armisen to pull off another one of those. Now that I think about it, I could've done with less reliance on her old toothpaste commercial. Also, as someone who has watched this show in their infancy, I can never imagine someone being "too young" to watch the show. C+

School Vs. School - Hmm...I'm torn between thinking this sketch didn't go far enough with its premise of "Not! X-Men cause chaos on a college competition game show" and thinking "the over the top acting from Jenna/Mikey/Molly justifies it's short length because they left it with nowhere else to go". I mean, it's been decades since I've seen any of the X-Men movies or even one of the cartoons. I wouldn't be able to tell you for sure if the acting in the movies really is that over the top so maybe this would've landed better with me if I was a bigger X-men fan, I dunno. One thing I'm NOT torn in is Kenans' rambling about Covid butt swabs could've been cut way down. I'll add that Jenna Ortega is definitely the right host for this sketch (as I could see her taking this exact role in an actual movie in an alternate universe). C+

PDD: Roadtrip - I really didn't know what to make of this. It just felt like four different sketch ideas crammed into one (and at least two of them felt like ones we've seen before, unfortunately). Still, I like that they tried to add some dark vibes to this. I just wish it had felt a little more focused, is all. I will say that JAJ as Billboard Jesus gave me my first genuine laugh in this. C-

Parent Trap Remake - From the moment Armisen walked in, I knew this was going to be a challenge, but thankfully, I've seen worse sketches than this one where Armisen plays inappropriately brash characters. Plus, Fred and Jenna do have a decent enough chemistry to make this work. C+

Ridiculousness - Now, this DEFINITELY feels like something the show should've just done in say...season 42 and been done with (which they kinda did if you go back and watch the Kristen Stewart episode) but adding Jenna Ortega as the one who just adds intense and horrifying personal anecdotes makes this worth putting on the air in 2023. This is honestly the thing that got me fully onboard with this episode. B-

Varsity Valley - I definitely liked the premise of "high schoolers being somehow oblivious to the insane chaos happening in the literal background of their unfunny romantic mellodrama." That's much more fun to watch than something where we just see Jenna and Marcello having a weird interaction. I didn't much care for the completely telegraphed ending reveal of Mikey being Jennas' Dad, but I did like him shoving Dismukes taser down his pants. I'd say if any of these episodes' pretapes could be used as a bargaining chip by the post production editors to get paid and otherwise compensated what they're worth and avoid the April 1st strike, THIS would be it. B+

Update was once again more worth tuning in for guests than jokes. The only ones that stood out to me were Che's Trump/DeSantis/great great grandchild jokes and Josts Rite-Aid/shower eating/RuPaul jokes (more swap vibes, at least...and we got a callback to something from earlier to make up for the callback we could've gotten during last weeks update that ended up getting cut). Molly, as a crusty, old closeted anti-LGBTQ Republican was something I wasn't sure I wanted to see at first, but then I realized she bought some things to this role that Aidy wouldn't have. Plus, this is not the first time in this episode let alone this season that Molly has played cisgendered men on the show and I liked both their Brendon Gleeson and their Terry Bradshaw just fine (...yeah, you guys understand why I'm extremely hesitant to use the word "drag" here, right? OK, good... moving on). JAJ, as himself just filling time with impressions on Update, was a nice touch. This feels like something the show only does once in a certain number of years. Even if the Adam Driver/Kyle Ren thing may have just been taken directly from his audition tape and I could see him getting some flack for the Jay-Z voice, I liked seeing this just for how he made it impossible for Jost & Che to not break. B-

Exorcism - Well, with this host, this sketch seems pretty much like a given. It's good to see another Ego/Kenan sketch, but this one didn’t really do much for me. It honestly felt a little too predictable and didn't go anywhere. C-

Soul Booth - A musical sketch with a JAJ/Dismukes pairing as the centerpiece that involves lots of shouting. I liked that part of it WAY more than I liked Bowens' wild over acting. B-

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
6. Jenna Ortega/The 1975 (03.11.2023)
7. Travis Kelce/Kelsea Ballerini (03.04.2023)
8. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
9. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
10. Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)
11. Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)
12. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
13. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
14. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
15. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Well, that's a nice course correction for this season. Next month, Abbot Elementarys' Quinta Brunson makes her hosting debut. She's another name who has been overdue to host since the beginning of this season. She's definitely got the chops to host SNL, so I'm excited to finally get to see her. However, I still have to make up my mind as to whether or not I would watch live if the post-production editors strike does indeed happen that night. Some have said that even watching makes them feel like they are crossing a picket line (and that would make me feel like a big hypocrite for very personal work related reasons I cannot get into here) but to each their own I suppose. Still, I would like to take this opportunity to state that I personally wish the SNL post production team the best of luck in their negotiations. I hope they get everything they are bargaining for. I wish the same for the writers as well as I understand they may have to go on strike for similar reasons in two months. 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 like I did for Ken George Jones, PLEASE let me know!)

Travis Kelce/Kelsea Ballerini (03.04.2023)

Okay, here's my review. After the confusing mess of last week where our expectations we based on an old returning hosts previous performances were decidedly not met, it was actually nice to see a bit of a change of course with a first time host we could easily temper our expectations for. Travis Kelce turned out to be a fun host who meshed well with the cast and writers. The show knew exactly what to do with him. The only real problem with this show was the cast imbalance as Dismukes and particularly Molly seemed to be shut out of the show completely (frankly, I'm starting to worry Molly especially since it will have almost been two whole months since they made an impact in any episode). Longfellow and Marcello only seemed to make one sketch appearance all night each but everyone else seemed to have a solid night. As expected, Heidi, Ego, Mikey and Bowen were standouts. Unexpectedly, Devon, Punkie, JAJ and Sarah had strong showings as well. Chloe and Kenan quietly faded into the background to provide scene support. Anyway, let’s break it down, shall we?

FOX & Friends - Well, this may be a more questionable cold open template than ever NOW (especially this particular week) but I do have to give them some credit for choosing an out-of-left-field topic for this week's cold open. Heidi had some funny lines with the subway/rats and wrong court case bits even if her delivery was a little over the top. I'll admit, the bit with the Laura Ingraham texts got me, too. Mike Lindell jokes may be beyond played out now, but it's more fun to watch JAJ put them over than anyone else. Speaking of played out, I also gotta give Kenan credit for a unique delivery of another solo LFNY. C+

Monologue - As someone who doesn't follow football too closely, Travis Kelce handled this monologue pretty much the exact way I was expecting him to given everything I've heard about him. Even in the face of what sounded like it could've been legitimate booing, he was charismatic, confident, and handled self deprication with ease. The "more...more...more" clips got me from the get go. I also liked the way they worked in the obligatory Jason Kelce cameo. I especially liked the shot of him laughing at Travis' joke about his old reality dating show not being on Peacock. B+

American Girl Cafe - I was expecting a prequel to Mikeys' American Girl sketch from the Saiorse Ronan/U2 episode from 2017 and what I got was the obligatory "huge, masculine guy in a dainty, feminized setting" sketch they seem to try to do some variation of with each athlete host. The fact that Travis' character was revealed to be more and more of a deranged, delusional creep throughout this really worked was nice but since this sketch had Mikey Days' fingerprints all over it, the fact that he was only onscreen for about the first third of it really worked in its favor and the ending with Devon as the security guard mistakenly shouting at Sarah really made it for me. C+

PDD: Self Defense - Ok, they had me right from the "little bitch boys" text from the interns with this one. You know, it's nice to see Please Don't Destroy take a break from the rapid fire quick cuts and give us something...linear with more of a straight throughline, something a little more static and grounded in just one outside setting. The fact that this was a lot darker and more violent than their previous shorts (with most of the violence being directed at them nonetheless...boy, they like to spoil their biggest online critics, don't they?) and that they threw that random old lady into the mix just to keep things from feeling too telegraphed) made this work for me. B+

Funeral At Miss Glendas' - Ego and Travis Kelce of all people keep the dark and weird vibes from PDD going with this. Great hydraulicized corpse work from Ego. She must have studied the old Merryville Brothers sketches for this one. The only bad thing I can really say about this was Devon, Punkie, and Sarah's timing seemed a little bit off (either that or one of them may have just skipped one of their lines entirely...and I'm not quite convinced that Punkie can be slotted into the Melissa Villaseñor role that easily...and it feels weird that Sarah would have such a peripheral role in a sketch that seemed to be so heavilywritten in her voice but none of these observations dragged the sketch down for me). B+

Straight Male Friend - It's nice to see something more quiet from Bowen that felt more from within his wheelhouse and felt more relatable to a wide swath of people. After seeing him play giant insects, inanimate objects and mythical demons its' nice to see Bowen take a break from carving out these odd niches for himself that don't quite work and start drawing his comedy from a more human place (and I mean that as LITERALLY as possible). One could make the argument that Travis' role could’ve been played by pretty much any straight male host but Travis Kelce was pretty much the ideal straight male host to execute this (I coukd also see this MAYBE working with Jack Harlow but a professional NFL player obviously fits the the role of "stereotypical central casting straight dude" more than a white rapper) so it was smart of Bowen to save this from him. B+

Tears Of An Ex-Girlfriend - Okay, the main conceit of this sketch seemed to have been given away right when Heidi got up since I could see the tube running up her dress, but this turned out...OK. This was a little less outlandish than what I was expecting (no sleeve vomiting, no floor peeing or...other bodily functions) but there wasn't a lot to dislike here. Good use of Jason here but the ending made me question (and thanks to Ellis Mitchell in the SNN Hot Take Show Livestream chat for answering this for me) whether Travis was also supposed to be fitted with some kind of hose that just so happened to be malfunctioning on a "Rookie Cop" level (he was not). C+

Update was another instance of the commentaries being more worth watching than the jokes. The only ones that stood out to me was Josts' TikTok ban/Alex Murdaugh/Jesus Lizard/James Bond jokes. Other than that, they tried to carry over the "joke swap vibes" from last week except instead of "who can tell the most outrageously offensive joke?" it became "who can make the other deliver the weakest punchline?" Michael Longfellow as a quietly deranged bizarro world Frank Grimes-like Dilbert made the whole show for me (anyone else get Rachel Dratch as Peppermint Patty vibes?). It was nice to see Mikey and Punkie just being their natural selves (hell, it's nice to just see Punkie on the show, period) and I liked how wildly Punkie defied my expectations. This is a pairing I would never expect on Update but given that Mikeys' been paired with Ego in sketches multiple times, has done two different 50 Shades Of Grey commentaries with Leslie in 2017 and, again, was on season one if Nick Cannons' "Wild N' Out" I guess I should've remembered he does have a certain type of chemistry with black women. Nice to see more "Sarah News". Not crazy about her returning to mostly Jost roasts, but at least she went harder on them and everything else in general she did tonight. My only complaint was that the cake was just a normal cake with nothing disgusting about it. B-

Parent's Song - It's nice to see this finally make air after being cut from the Pedro Pascal episode but I guess reading that detailed Reddit description kinda dampened my expectations for this sketch since I knew pretty much how it was going to go down. For some reason, I wasn't expecting the musical numbers to feel as scaled back as they felt. Also, is it just me, or did it seem like this sketch was written solely around a Michael McDonald impression that JAJ was trying to get on air? C+

Garrett From Hinge - OK, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't expecting to see a Heidi/Travis sketch begin like this for some reason but thankfully Bowen showed up playing a different, more grounded type of oddball I've been wanting to see him play. I got a kick out of the Stewie shirt, the inexplicabky green and glowing poison, and Travis repeating Bowens' "sucka at Buccacinnos (sp?)" line but not so much the breaking. Hey, maybe we should introduce Garrett from Hinge to...Lisa From Temecula? Something tells me they'd make a perfect pair! B+

Too Hot To Handle - Ok, this sketch went right over my head. It seemed like another one of those sketches written specifically for people who have watched the specific show its' parodying with everybody doing a specific impression of someone from said show. This would explain why Chloe seemed to be doing a specific voice that ended up coming out as a hopefully unintentional Garth Algar impression. Maybe Travis Kelce and Chloe both watch this show and they bonded over it? That might explain where this sketch came from and why it's the only time all night Travis attempted any kind of accent? Either way, I am left with far more questions than answers here, so I'll just leave it at that. D+

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
6. Travis Kelce/Kelsea Ballerini (03.04.2023)
7. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
8. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
9. Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)
10. Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)
11. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
12. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
13. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
14. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Well, that was a nice course correction. Next week, Jenna Ortega makes her hosting debut. She's someone I've definitely heard about way more than I have actually seen act (haven't seen Wednesday yet or whatever Disney Channel show she happened to be on) but I'm excited for this one because she's sure to bring more youthful energy to the show (at a time when it is desperately needed) and I have a hunch we might just get another episode like Aubrey Plazas'. 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 like I did for Ken George Jones, PLEASE let me know!)

Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)

Okay, here's my review. I went in expecting an episode more like Woodys' 2014 one and sadly what I got ended up resembling his 2019 episode but more focused yet still uneven and less cameo dependent. This episode was fine. It will probably be one of the weaker episodes of the second half of season 48 but it just felt like it was too front loaded with its' weaker material up top. I didn't mind that the show was pretty much dominated by Ego, Chloe, Kenan and Mikey but a little more Sarah, Molly, Marcello and Longfellow wouldn't have hurt either. Anyway, I'll just get right to it since I didn't have much to say about this episode anyway.

Trump Visits Palestine, Ohio - Well, that was...certainly questionable. This is definitely my least favorite use of JAJs' Trump so far. Still, I'd take this over literally any Baldwin Trump cold open any day. I appreciate that they threw in Chloe as someone for JAJ to play off of but she didn't do anything for me here either. C-

Monologue - Hmm...I'm not quite sure what to make of this either. I mean, I would appreciate an overly long set up to a straightforward punchline if said punchline had a much bigger payoff (of if said overly long set up didn't make keep needlessly coming back to the "Woody likes his weed...and naturally he tends to forget things because of it" well because I'm starting to think he naturally forgot this ISN'T the first time he's mentioned this on SNL). What I DID appreciate was the false set ups to the five timers jacket (along with the callback just before Jack Whites' first performance which was pretty solid and the payoff at the end with them both getting jackets from Kenan and ScarJo respectively) and the fact that SNL is finally starting to give 16 minute monologue slots (or at least monologues that FEEL 16 minutes long) to hosts with an actual likable presence. Also, was anyone else expecting him to bring up "Triangle Of Sadness" when he kept mentioning that script he was reading? C+

Visiting Hours - Thank God this turned out to be a two hander between Ego and Kenan. I don't think I would be that interested Woody and Chloe (bringing back THAT voice...or God forbid Chloe) as the main focus. The only thing I didn’t care for was how repetitive Ego and Kenans' lines felt. C+

PDD: The Stakeout - Ok, I know that some of us are souring on PDD but I definitely appreciated them giving us something with a little absurdist energy just when the episode needed it (even if it just feels like a slightly inverted neo-noir take on the "Andys' Dad" digital Short with Jonah Hill). It felt like it may have been a little too soon to make Ben the odd man out in this since we just got that in the short they did with Steve and Marty two months ago but thankfully they built on that and added more to it. B-

Slingshot - This felt like it had the most wasted potential because it went absolutely nowhere. The performances did it justice but that still isn't saying much. If this were any later in the show I'd be more inclined to think whatever ending it had needed to be edited for time because this show was obviously running long. D+

Naval Base - Somehow, Andrews' brief dialogue in this gave me my first genuine laugh of the entire show, so...yeah, even though this was essentially a "Boaty McBoatface" sketch done about seven and a half years too late this somehow worked for me. This was an extremely dignified and dramatic setup to an extremely juvenile punchline being shouted and overexplained in great detail. It didn’t overstay its' welcome either (which is more than I can say for the Slingshot sketch) and even though it was a standard length sketch, something about this execution made this feel like the closest thing this era to a blackout sketch this era could pull off. B-

Cologuard - This first part of this felt like the standard "creepy, off putting fetish" sketch we've seen time and time again in Mikeys' era on the show but the menacing twist with the (literal) knives coming out followed by Heidi and Dismukes appearance and the reveal of Woody playing himself worked for me. Unfortunately, those parts were too short. C+

Update didn't quite come in too hot but I did like Josts' Trump Water/Chloride/Tucker Carlson/Oscars jokes and Ches' Ron DeSantis joke. What I did appreciate more how they gradually snuck in more and more "joke swap" energy starting with Che's "What Did They Even Do Wrong?" segment. I appreciate them giving JAJ some insane dialogue as Bill Walton and Heidi what turned out to be a wonderfully dark character piece (even if it did remind me quite a bit of that oblivious grandma sketch with Jim Breuer and Colin Quinn from Tom Arnolds' season 21 episode). B-

The Hippo - While I appreciated the specificity in the writing of this and the sheer Norm MacDonald-like melancholy Woody bought to his performance (and the petty bitterness Chloe, Mikey, Ego and JAJ bought to their parts way JAJ kicked his trash can) I have slightly mixed feelings about this imagining the online discourse just the visuals of Woody in the fat suit will bring about. Incidentally, it reminded me quite of a bit of that "I Can't Even" sketch that was in Dakota Johnsons' episode from season 40 that got cut from tonight's "Vintage" airing or that sketch from 1987 where Dabney Coleman played a blind man so, yeah...it was just a little derivative. C+

Two Men Speak Inside The Most Beautiful Gym In The World - This felt like a very "Bowen" piece but a very writerly "Bowen" piece. It felt like Bowen returning to his roots and giving us something he would've more than likely come up with before he joined the cast and found a questionable new niche in playing insects, demons and inanimate objects. I liked the Sarah appearance (and I would’ve probably liked it more if it weren't her only non voice over role of the night) as well as the "gym rat" and "torn ACL" jokes but other than that it felt like another one of those sketches you'd frequently get during the Wiig/Samberg era that's just a random string of one liners being barely held together by a threadbare premise that I just couldn't get into. C-

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
6. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
7. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
8. Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)
9. Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)
10. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
11. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
12. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
13. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Now, let me revisit my rankings of Woodys' previous episodes and see where this one lands...

1. Woody Harrelson/Kendrick Lamar (11.15.2014)
2. Woody Harrelson/David Byrne (11.18.1989)
3. Woody Harrelson/Jack White (02.25.2023)
4. Woody Harrelson/Vanessa Williams (5.16.1992)
5. Woody Harrelson/Billie Eilish (9.28.2019)

Well, that was certainly one of the more underwhelming episodes of the season. Next week, Kansas City Chiefs Tight End (and recent Super Bowl champ) Travis Kelce makes his hosting debut. Huh, guess we were overdue for an athlete host? Oh well, I can't say whether or not he will be funny until I see him but the very little interview footage I've seen of this man (mainly when he professes to be a longtime SNL fan on Fallon recently) makes me think he will at least be game (no pun intended) for anything and have enough charm and charisma to pull it off so I'm keeping an open mind on this one. 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 like I did for Ken George Jones, PLEASE let me know!)

Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)

Okay, here's my review. This was definiteley the weakest SNL episode of 2023 but absolutely none of that was Pedro Pascals' fault. He was a fine host who certainly had fun and gelled with this cast but he didn’t exactly blow me away or anything. Still, there were fun moments to be had in a field of bland mediocrity so this was far from the worst episode of season 48. It's about what I would expect from the third episode of a run of three in a row. The cast felt a little imbalanced seeing as I really missed Dismukes after the strong outing he had last week and Molly was shoved into the background once again. Still, Longfellow, Marcello and Devon had great nights and JAJ and Sarah continue to make headway in a week where Bowen, Ego and Chloe dominated the show. I'd say the biggest thing this episode had going against it was their falling back on old habits when they should be experimenting a bit more in an effort to figure out what their identity will be going into the next era. Let me explain what I mean.

Katy Tur Reports - Something told me this would be the cold open...and something else told me it would be this goofy and aimless...as that's pretty much what this warrants, anyway. I'm getting the sense that somewhere my friend Rubys' nose must be bleeding right now and she will remember none of this by tomorrow and neither will I. Bowens' obligatory role makes me feel like this was supposed to be an Update commentary originally but had to be hastily rewritten once news broke that the baloon was shot down and then they were just like "fuck...ok, we gotta completely change the greenscreen effect we were going with now". Yeah, I'd find it hard to believe this was the original cold open in dress and I'd like to see them try to top this for "worst cold open of the season".D+

Monologue - Pedro seemed like a bundle of nerves at first when talking about The Mandalorian but once he started talking about his Chilean background he seemed more at ease. Near the end, those nerves seemed to have transformed into raw emotion. He was a little more low energy than recent hosts but he handled "charming self effacement" about as well as the rest of these past two seasons of hosts. B-

Big Hollywood Quiz - Well, Bowen hosting a game show (and a rather campy one that seemed to be written just for him) is something different at least. It's more low key and focused than typical "post monologue game show sketches" and it makes a salient point about our current media landscape (especially streaming shows...boy, Taylor Swift must've laughed her ass off at that "Ginny and Georgia" slam, right?). I remember how our friend Ruby made a similar point about how binge watching and streaming affect our memories. If I didn't know any better, I'd say either she wrote the entire show so far tonight or one of SNLs' current writers is stalking her. The only criticism I have of this is it somehow still felt like something we've seen before (like with "What Is Burn Notice?" or any of the Kate Mackinnon post covid "is my brain ok?" sketches) but it was at least a fresh spin on such a vaguely familiar framework. B-

HBOs' Mario Kart - Well, we got our obligatory host sketch and it seems like they were trying to recapture the lightning in a bottle they caught with the David Harbour Joker/Grouch parody from a few years ago but this felt way too telegraphed and predictable for me. I mean, it felt like another one of those pop culture parody sketches where you're meant to admire it more for how much it wrings out of such a thin, simple, nothing of a premise but even looking at it from that angle there seems to be nothing there. I mean, they made good use of Marcello here but Chloe as Princess Peach just made me flashback to Grimes as Miss Peach a couple of years ago and I have a feeling people are gonna react to this the same way they reacted to, well...that. Hell, after that "swole Grimace" sketch from the premiere I'm just thankful that Yoshi and Toad being bisexuality weren't the ENTIRE joke. D+

Coma Patient - This felt like it was written by an A.I. that was fed nothing but Mikey Day and Kroll Show sketches (yeah, I'm aware of how hacky that sounds so don't bother pointing that out. I just bring up A.I. because I was watching aboyt 25 minutes of that endless "Nothing Forever" Seinfeld Twitch feed to kill time before the show and I finally figured out that it was Jon Daly in those Kroll Show "Rich Dicks" sketches that Pascals' voice reminded me of). Pedro seemed to be breaking hard enough to guarantee not one but TWO band shots later in the show, so it's nice to see he was at least having fun here. Other than that, I was just glad to see that such a dadaist nothing of a sketch could have such a sweet, heartfelt ending. C+

Fancam Assembly - Ok, this HAD to have been written by the same writers behind "M3GAN 2.0" since it's mined heavily from GenZ social media lingo (yeah, thankfully I must've missed when "no crumbs left" became the hot new Twitter buzzword) and it features a cameo from Sarah Paulson (was she actually IN something with Pedro Pascal or was she just there because she fit the theme this sketch was going for so well?), so...yeah, whoever wrote this was either very in touch with "the gays" or just paid enough attention to the actual SNL fancams in the replies to tweets from the shows' official Twitter account and could only get this sketch on the air two years too late. I can tell Che DIDN’T write this (not for the obvious reason) but because it was written to humiliate the audience instead of the host and the cast. Plus, you could tell it was written by someone who didn’t hate their job with a burning white hot passion and thus was desperately trying to get fired. Molly's character was my only genuine laugh of the whole sketch (well, along with Devons' "mid" line and the wat he delivered it). I'm honestly not that shocked to discover how badly I missed that the "big boys" song from the Keke Palmer/SZA episode was the song used in all those fancams because I think I've made it pretty clear as to how and why that song left my brain permanently pretty much immediately after it aired. Still, I did appreciate how this sketch also went for a semi-heartfelt ending that tried to make a point about the relationship today's teens have with their social media (even if they just absolutely HAD to go and dip back into the "lol Covid broke all our brains" well ONCE AGAIN). The way this was acted made me realize that the only time I don't like Ego or Sarah as performers is when she leans to heavily into the trendy, social media buzzword/slang heavy stuff that's more in Bowens' wheelhouse than theirs (but at least when Ego does do this she appears completely at ease and it comes off as more believable and natural than when Sarah takes part in this). I was about to question how high schoolers would have access to that much footage of their teachers or how the students would avoid getting caught and written up for blatantly filming their teachers in class but overthinking this particular sketch anymore would just make me frustrate me more, so I'll just move on. C-

Wing Pit - Finally, this episode delivers on SOMETHING! This was definiteley my favorite segment of the night just for the sheer violent chaos and "Taco Town somehow gained sentience and tried cocaine for the first time" vibes of it. A+

Update was really only worth about two jokes ane one commentary this week. Ches' "Delaware beach house" joke and Josts' "16 year olds on social meda" jokes made me laugh just for their delivery and the "chicken wings" joke only made me laugh for Che's reaction to it. Good to see Mr. Longfellow get another commentary where he doesn’t just play himself. I have to give them credit for giving Michael Longfellow when we were being set up to expect Bowen Yang. It's also great that this was written for Michael and not Bowen. I could tell because they gave Punxsutawney Phil a real "burnt out dirtbag" vibe that only Michael Longfellow could pull off and I didn’t feel like this was supposed to be a Bowen commentary but Bowen suddenly fell ill so they just grabbed Longfellow, slapped Bowens' costume on him and threw him out there. JAJ and Devons' two hander was one of the highlights of the night for me as we finally got to see them break out of their shells (and see JAJ break out if his "political impressionist/southern gent" box) and experiment with some original and pleasantly silly character work. Whatever Kyle Mooney was going for with his "rapper from Holland" character JAJ improved upon a thousand fold with this. B-

Luis' Protective Mom - Nice to see Marcello get another one of his sketches on the air. Weird how this was the second sketch in this episode that made me flash back to David Harbours' episode but I was glad to see there was more to this sketch than just the host in drag and that this was able to focus up effectively mine it's humor from multiple culture clashes (which makes me all the more stunned to find out that PDD helped write this and not the next sketch). B+

Italian Restaurant - Well, I'm just shocked to hear that Sarah didn’t write or even help cowrite this herself because that's really the only way I could have even bought into the outrageously unbelievable and outlandish premise of "Sarah Sherman is repeatedly told by other men that she is ugly and/or unattractive". That's all I'm gonna say there. D+

Lisa From Temecula - While I'm glad to see Ego get another character on, I guess I was just expecting something a little different. This is the first time I've seen Ego do a Debbie Downer/Bill Hader/Kate & Aidy self-indulgent type pieces that seemed designed solely for her to get her castmates to break (or based on how quickly Bowen broke which makes me think this was based on some inside joke betweem them that the audience wasn’t in on), but I guess she's earned her right as a performer to do that at this point. Thankfully, this was short (or just had to be hastily edited for time) and felt more grounded and contained than I thought it was going to be. C+

Goodnights - I don't always comment on these but it was nice to see JAJ and Colin wearing shirts in solidarity with the increasingly-less-likely-to-strike-now-it-seems post production unit. Also, I noticed Chloe was wearing a brunette wig and a leopard print dress which made me wonder if that was her costume from one of the cut for time sketches?

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
6. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
7. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
8. Pedro Pascal/Coldplay (02.04.2023)
9. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
10. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
11. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
12. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Well, that certainly was another episode of SNL. In three weeks, Woody Harrelson joins the five timers club. Even though his last episode from 2019 has somehow aged the worst out of his existing four episodes (yes, even his 1992 one) I'll be looking forward to this one as Woody is always a welcome presence at the show. 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 like I did for Ken George Jones, PLEASE let me know!)

Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023) and Fan Mailbag #1 (01.29.2023)

Okay, here's my review. Michael B. Jordan is definitely my pick for the best host of this season, no doubt about it. He had a strong presence and showed endless charisma right out of the gate. He also seemed to attract a lot of his own female fans into the audience based on some of their reactions (especially from Update onward). The newer, more underused cast members even got plenty of chances to shine (JAJ, Marcello and Squirm in particular). Molly was the only cast member who was shut out of the show entirely but other than that there was a near perfect balance of newbies vs old veterans (Kenan, Mikey, Heidi, Ego) getting big lead roles tonight. I would say this is the second best episode of the season simply because it felt like there were a lot of retreads (intentional or not) of premises we've seen before. I'll explain what I mean, so let's get to it.

Merrick Garlands' Document Search - Hmm, another "off the beaten path" political open for this season, allright. Those opening graphics and Steve Higgins voice over were way more than this sketch warranted, though. Mikey seemed to just be doing a sharper, harder edged version of his "super centenarian" character from season 44 mixed in with a bit of Dana Carveys' "Grumpy Old Man" character (if Garth Algar aged into him) but it was fun enough for a sketch where he wasn't the sole focus. Kenans' character was all right. At least he gave us a different take on Mike Pence than "lol he gay" but "an unpopular Republican politician who desperately any form craves human contact" is a take I've already seen assigned to Ted Cruz. Ego's part was essentially Ego but very brief and the same could pretty much be said about Bowen what with him essentially playing his role as "culturista/name dropper/star fucker". Also, while it wasn’t completely wrong for SNL to briefly mention the situation going on in Memphis right now, I would’ve rather they done so in a more sincere and focused way in the middle of Weekend Update rather than as just an odd button on the end of this cold open. C+

Monologue - Well, Michael B. Confident. Michael B. Hiding His Aforementioned Nervousness VERY Well. Michael B. Carrying Off This Monologue Expertly. Michael B. Giving Me The Impression He Will Be A Strong Host. However, Michael NOT B. Needing The Female Cast Hitting On Him Mid-Monologue But Hey, I Didn’t Hate Seeing It (but I have to give them SOME credit because I can really only think of one other time they did this with a male host instead of a female host and it was just recent enough that both Chloe and Ego were in it too). B+

Good Morning Today - Wow, Sarah B. Gettin' One Of Her Patented Cronenberg-Lite Concept Sketches On Air Post Fucking Monologue And Michael B. In It Willing To Make Himself Look As Equally Ridiculous As Her (and Andrew B. Sticking The Landing)! Way To Go! This may have dragged a little but I'll very glad to see this make it to air. B-

Southwest Airlines - Well, I am vaguely familiar with what has been going on lately with Southwest Airlines but I feel like you didn't need to be to get the basic jokes in this since they didn’t feel too specific. This reminded me too much of the airline ad from season seven and the "we learn something from every crash" sketch from Roseannes' season 20 episode for me to say anything else about it except that I can relate a little too well to working at a job where you just get yelled at all day and they only give you a 2002 IBM Thinkpad Laptop with the little red nipple on the keyboard. C+

Towell Guys - Wow, Marcello B. Getting His Sketch On, Too (allright, allriiiiiiight, I'll stop this now and start putting some damn effort into writing this thing already). Yeah, so good for Marcello for getting a sketch on with some funny lines and being able to hold his own next to Kenan, JAJ and Michael B but this felt too much like Kenan just threw all of his David Ortiz commentaries in a blender with Key and Peeles' valet sketches and Beck and Kyles' waterslide lifeguard sketch with Reese Witherspoon from season 40 (and maybe a dash of "fresh pepper" from season 20 but Kenan definitely knew when to say when). I mean, it was still fun to watch but it could’ve used a bit more structure to it. The Tony Soprano jokes got the biggest laughs from this our of me. JAJ and Sarah was definitely my favorite of all the side characters asking for towels (or an umbrella in the case of the latter). B-

Jake From State Farm - I felt like I immediately knew where this was going as soon as I saw Mikey, Heidi and Mr. Jordan all on screen together at once and I was expecting a retread of the Roach-Ex pretape from Don Cheadles' episode. Thankfully, this took a slow left turn once Heidi mentioned the kids went to church. I immediately thought "ok, this is going to be just wholesome enough to subvert my expectations." Then, it gradually went into M3GAN-like, dark, psychological thriller territory into a grittier version of Its' A Wonderful Life when Andrew and the Limu Emu showed up (I liked how that was literally the only time a "surprise twist" ending where it is revealed that there is a different sponsor you weren't expecting actually worked and I liked how they stuck with using that cheap looking Emu puppet in such a glossy detailed pretape). A-

Street Fighter Sessions - I was expecting a retread of the J.J. Watt/Owen Wilson voice over sketches and ended up getting something that felt more like a retread of a Eli Manning EA Sports sketch. I figured this would go a different way once Mikey showed up WAY later than I expected. I will say Andrew was really the glue that held this together and Michael B. Delivering His Lines In A Way That Didn't Let The Jokes In His And Bowens Back-And-Forth Breathe (GOD. DAMMIT!!! I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I just...yeah, I saw what I was setting myself up for there and just...couldn't stop myself. Trust me, it WON'T happen again. I promise you that). C+

Update kept up the energy from last week but it was still kinda all over the place. Weirdly, Jost had the better jokes tonight (I especially liked his Disney/Dopey/new coat jokes as it gave me my biggest chuckle) but Che seemed to take some wild swings that mostly missed (that Taylor Swift joke in particular felt like a HUGE misfire...not that the joke was bad or anything but it just seemed like the type of joke that would’ve played better had it been told five years ago in some alternate universe where the show DIDN'T manage to get Tay-Tay on to plug "reputation"...man, they must've completely given up on ever getting her on again...and also, I think Che mentioning the "cat turd" Twitter account was a mistake too but he's not on Twitter so he won't see it...Che did kinda win me back with that Kanye joke though). I expected the first commentary to be Sarah for a second when wealth inequality was mentioned but then when I heard the word "doorman" I correctly expected Kenan and I gotta say his character felt a little aimless but he won me over with that "barking dog" joke. I like that he added some absurdity to the typical "Che is a degenerate deadbeat dad" fare. I was probably a little more surprised than I shouldn't been seeing Heidi bring Angel out of mothballs. I thought the "every boxers girlfriend" trilogy concluded with Damons' appearance as...well, THE boxer in question but then Michael B. Reprising His "Creed" Role...MOTHERFUCKER!!! SHIT!!! Ok, THAT was the last one. No really, I'm DONE with it! Shows you what a promise from me is worth, huh? C+

Male Confidence Seminar - This was definiteley Andrew Dismukes best role of the night (and possibly his best role of his entire tenure in the cast tonight). JAJ had his second best role of the night but it's good to see him branch out a little and give us a new voice. Devon did some good character work but I'd like to see him rely on giving himself lisps at random a little less. Longfellow and Marcello has good one-liners. This would not be the last time Dismukes and MBJ would play off each other tonight but to me it was the best for how pointed and focused within its own premise it felt. B+

Palm Springs Bachelorette Weekend - This just felt like it was written to be female eye candy even more blatantly than the monologue (but with Sarah included in a capacity where her presence would make sense) until Heidi showed up and I immediately flashed back to that Woody Harrelson season 45 sketch where he was a high school football coach and she played his inappropriately young girlfriend. It immediately became clear that this was gonna be another "Heidi plays an obnoxiously dim woman accidentally dragged by her man into an inappropriate situation she does not belong in" sketch an from there everything felt too telegraphed for me. Also, this feels like something Heidi cowrote too just to see what it would take to get Ego, Chloe and Sarah to break on air. Still, no one really broke and everyone was so professional here that they all just blew past MBJ casually dropping a caught-just-in-time-to-be-muted F-bomb on air like it was nothing (I knew I could've be the only one that caught that one since catching the same night rerun in my area they obviously replaced this with the dress version and that is the second time this exact thing happened this season...and now that I think about it, the blatant "other camera barging into frame" shot was probably the other reason for this). C+

King Bros. Toyota Vs. The Coward Hugo Gallegos & Raising Canes - This might have been my favorite live sketch of the night and not just because it was JAJ biggest non-impression lead role in a sketch to date and how the continued chances Dismukes got to play to his strengths continued. I loved how increasingly detailed this got as they doubled down on the threats of vengeance and petty specificity of it all. I also loved the frequent references to Marcellos' character only seen in still photo form. They even found a way to make MBJs' presence make sense in this. Hell, I know there's an actual Raising Canes restaurant that opened up near me recently that I'm now curious to try out sometime. A-

Michael B. Falling Down (grrrrr) - Wow, I never knew Michael B. Jordan was such a gifted physical conedian. Maybe he's been playing the long game this whole time and has only been taking all these acting roles just to get to host SNL someday and show off his ability to take a fall. Somewhere Chevy Chase is quietly seething about twice as much as he normally does on any given day. Anyway, I liked how well MBJ and Dismukes played worthy adversaries (with some assists from Bowen and Squirm) and...HOLY SHIT I HAVE to meet whoever at SNL has an actual vintage issue of MAD magazine just hanging on the corkboard in their office. Anyway, yeah I liked this. The only thing negative I can say about this is that it reminded me of the much inferior "Drake's Beef" short from season 41 where he just raps about how much he likes Josh Gad more than that cast and crew after petty slights (maybe I just noticed a slight physical resemblance between Drake and MBJ? I dunno). I'd be especially curious to know who wrote this because if it's NOT PDD, it is DEFINITELY someone aping their style. B-

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

1. Aubrey Plaza/Sam Smith (01.21.2023)
2. Michael B. Jordan/Lil Baby (01.28.2023)
3. Dave Chappelle/Black Star (11.12.2022)
4. Steve Martin & Martin Short/Brandi Carlile (12.10.2022)
5. Keke Palmer/SZA (12.03.2022)
6. Austin Butler/Lizzo (12.17.2022)
7. Jack Harlow (10.29.2022)
8. Brendon Gleeson/Willow (10.08.2022)
9. Miles Teller/Kendrick Lamar (10.01.2022)
10. Amy Schumer/Steve Lacy (11.05.2022)
11. Megan Thee Stallion (10.15.2022)

Now, it's time to introduce a new 10 year anniversary feature to my blog that I like to simply call "Fan Mailbag". This is where I invite you, my loyal long-time readers to submit actual fan questions to me and I answer them here on the blog.

Like I mentioned here last week, the fans of mine who read this blog and regulary give me valuable feedback mean the world to me and you are what drives me to keep this going so...please forgive me if the regular review portion of this weekends' blog post seemed a little rushed or thrown together at the last second. I wanted to make sure I had enough time and energy to get this new feature in here because I know for sure that i would especially a lot to one of you in particular. Plus, it kinda helped that this show didn’t give me a whole lot to unpack and over analyze so I wanted to move through it quickly to get to this point right here.

Anyway, this week's inaugural question was submitted by a dear friend of mine who goes by the name of Ken George Jones (among other names) who writes...

"What made you become a fan of SNL, and what keeps you watching SNL?"

Well, I'd say I became a fan literally from birth. My parents were fans of the show from its inception and the were really the ones who introduced me to it. They actually invited my sister and I to stay up late with them and watch the show live Saturday nights on NBC. Sometimes they would do the sanme thing with early MAD TV, All That and Kids In The Hall. They wanted it to be a formative part of our senses of humor and by gum, it worked. What keeps my watching it is mainly that it's always been such an integral part of my life from having been ingrained into my personality from an almost irresponsibly young age (hell, I'd say about 96% of my earliest childhood memories are centered around the show in some way) but going beyond that I'd say I've just always been drawn to anything having to do with comedy, parody and satire in my life (and especially people, places and things that have been considered long running "institutions" in that field like MAD/CRACKED, MST3K, Weird Al, The Simpsons and other "adult" animated shows, etc) and since I watched it from a young age and the show did a lot of topical/political humor I'd say it had a way of helping me process the world around me to the point where it didn’t because it would be pretty ignorant and un-hip to say that about how the show does what it does now. I've always been intrigued by the "live" aspect of it as well (that NBC has been playing up more and more in recent years, because let's face it...they, and really all of broadcast television in general now really have nothing else going on) that makes you feel like you're watching along with the whole rest of the country in real time even when you're alone. There's not much else besides sports and internet livestreams that do this now but SNL is so fine tuned and carefully crafted to be what it is that it's still really the only thing of it's kind nearly five decades later. The last thing I want to mention here is just the fact that it's something I grew up loving as a part of my life for a long time so naturally I was drawn to online communities of similar minded fans who wanted to discuss the show and similarly analyze it and find out all there is to know about all it's previous eras that may have been before our time, which, of course, led me...here of all places. When somethings' been around that long and stuck around and has absolutely refused to give into the battle against its' own looming irrelevancy, you naturally want to learn more and more abour its history and how it evolved to stick around in wildly changing times. 

Thank you, Ken! Here's hoping at lesst part of that answered your question they way you hoped it would!

Remember, if YOU out there would also like your own fan mailbag questions answered by me (or if you would like to write your own guest post on the blog like Blood Meridian) please either leave them in the comments or privately reach out to me elsewhere.

Well, SNL certainly continues on it's upward trend into the new year! Next week, Pedro Pascal makes his hosting debut. I thought I was the only one who knew that guys' name from somewhere but couldn't think of anything I'd seen him in or known him from (or even what he looks like, to be honest). Thank God some of you are in the same boat as me. Oh, well. He seems to have a devoted fanbase from the stuff he's been in so he must leave a great impression on people as an actor. I'm sure he'll make it a fun show. See you then!

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!)