Matt Damon/Noah Kahan (05.09.2026)

Three A-Holes Walk Into A Bar In Washington, D.C.

• OK, a random bar scene...with just Kenan and Chloe. This has some promise.

• Wait...don't fucking tell me....

• Josts' Hegseth meets Damons' Kavanaugh. Wow. Unbelievable.

• I guess absolutely no one in the casts' mom's were available? 

• I didn't think Brett Kavanaugh was a relevant or notorious enough figure in 2026 as he was in 2018 for this or that Damon's impression of him was that popular or well remembered...but supreme court judgeships are lifetime appointments unless they retire...so what the hell.

• Hey, there's Aziz' Patel again. At least that's an impression that I was expecting them to setup and reveal (although Matts' "male loneliness" line was kind of an awkward introduction)...and at least Aziz is the only one capable of putting in overtime to sell the sleazy, slimy bro-tastic frattiness of this sketch.

• At first and second glance, this is mostly just playing as lifeless word salad that just washes over me. 

• I did like Matt's line about Trump having written the word "PSYCHE!" on the original constitution and the Chumbawumba Tubthumping ending was a nice energy boost to end this on...but that's about it. Still better than another JAJ Trump sketch. C+

Monologue

• Huh, I genuinely wondered what Matt was plugging. I did like the "Odyssey opens nine weekends from now" line and the callback to it later.

• Who the hell was that random dude asking where Marcellos' mom was? Were we supposed to recognize him?

• Oh, apparently we WERE supposed to recognize him because that was rookie SNL writer Jack Bensinger...who I believe is also Sarah Shermans' boyfriend.

• Oh, well at least Marcellos' mom did show up for a callback after the most unambitious and telegraphed monologue Matt Damon has done on this show so far. C-

Godzilla: King Of The Monsters 2

• Oh, come on. I don't think "Spittakes On Mikey: The Sketch" needs this elaborate of a set up.

• Is this just a reworking of the "delights" sketch Mikey did during Finn Wolfhards' show? 

• Was this something Mikey & Streeter wrote for Jack Black last month that didn't make it knowing he was in a sketch that was pretty much exactly like this but with wine back in 2003?

• Well, I at least do like how varied, sudden and precise the spittakes were...and how quick the ending was. C+

Mom: The Movie

• Well, as much as this reminds me of the "Mommys' Little Scotty" trailer from Comedy Bang Bang...at least this is going for something.

• I liked how well this used Ashley, Veronika & Jeremy. He had what might have been my favorite line in this about liking how his mom told him the race of everyone involved in her story.

• Even as much as Matts' part felt an unnecessary extension of the last third of his monologue, it worked better here (probably because they wrote it, like, four or five days before they wrote the monologue anyway). I did like his line about noticing Ashley's giant necklace from the stage of the theater when he was giving an audience Q&A for one of his movies.

• My biggest criticism of this sketch is that it went on a little too long. Maybe at least some of the Jane/Squirm/Chloe segment could've been cut or tightened? I don't know if I buy Jane as your average middle aged mom anyway. As great as Veronika was in this maybe one of her parts could've been cut? Either the part with the puffy pink purse or the part where she tearfully tells Ashley her friend she doesn't like dies? B-

Tough Guy Barbecue

• Huh, at least Damon, Marcello and Kenan playing Goombah Jersey Italians is...something different and unexpected.

• OK, this is pretty much the same gag as the "McManus & Sons Bar" sketch from 1993 with Chris Farley & Miranda Richardson, isn't it?

• Who the hells' phone keeps vibrating offscreen?

• Yeah, this was really lumbering along and going nowhere but I like Marcellos' story about being caged like a dog and fed gummy bears and the "quarter check" boy showing up to yell at Kenan. D+

Tidy Care Kitty Litter

• OK, FINALLY something with a semi out there premise.

• This did remind me of the ketchup factory sketch with Taran Killam and Martin Freeman from December 2014, but I liked how this escalated.

• Ashley & Matt played off each other perfectly. JAJ and Dismukes jumped in at the perfect times to make this work, giving it just the right "That's Not Yogurt/Almost Pizza" vibes it needed to work.

• I ended up liking this sketch so much I didn't even mind that this was the third sketch tonight with a sudden non-ending. B+

Weekend Update w/Jost & Che

• Josts' Best Jokes: Hantavirus, Bus Driver (that's gotta be the most Norm MacDonald ass joke Colin had ever landed)

• Che's Best Jokes: Gas Prices, RFK Caught Bird At Airport

• Boy, these two had a lot of rough jokes tonight. Che especially.

• I'm guessing that those Marco/Rubio callbacks weren't totally planned or scripted?

• Hell yes! Nice to see Jeremy's Tucker Carlson after it got cut from dress recently.

• This narrowly achieved the recurring SNL character/impression feat of being better than the original (in spite of its length but this may be the exception rather than the rule).

• Hmm...is this Mikey/Marcello kamikaze dolphin commentary just a reworked version of their emoji commentary from a while ago?

• Nope, it's just them screaming bad sexual puns at us and each other.

• I did get a kick out of Mikey making Marcello break and the meta ending referencing Colins' Ferry worked for me.

• Hey, a new Jane Wickline song! I'm not crazy about the "chronically late" setup but let's see where this goes.

• OK, this is just classic blunt atonal Jane absurdity. This is nice. The backup dancers were a nice touch. C+

Substitute Teacher

• So...this whole sketch was just Matt Damon playing off everyones' non- reactions to his dancing...and being willfully ignorant of no one else rightfully wanting to dance with him?

• It is rare that we see a sketch structured essentially like a one man show on SNL. It feels familiar, but other than the gay porn star sketch with Sam Rockwell, I can't quite place where I've seen the basic elements of this sketch before.

• Chloe damn near ruined this by being the only one breaking. I did like Damons' "Amber Alert" and "shake your booty with the substitutey" line.

• This really worked best when absolutely no one was reacting to Matt...so they should've just ended it when he left the room. We didn't need to hear the students hacky "well...that just happened" level lines or the reveal that Dismukes' character is Damons' son. C+

Scene From A Crumbling Marriage Of Two Auctioneers

• OK, from the title card...I'm interested in seeing how this plays out.

• I'm assuming this is loosely (and I mean VERY loosely) adapted from some if Sarah's standup? She is pulling off the Southern Dame look (and voice) quite well.

• Aside from a minor line flub from Damon, this is being executed flawlessly (even if it seems like Sarah & JAJ were picking up some slack from Damon).

• Adding Marcello, Dismukes, Tommy and Jeremy as prepubescent children and JAJ as a horny neighbor were nice touches.

• This is playing out more wholesome and sweet than I expected. Maybe Sarah's leaving next week (I mean, it us her fifth season and she seems like she's got plenty of irons in the fire) and this is something she's been wanting to get on the air? Maybe she wanted to go out on a high note by showing us the softer side of Squirm? B+

Ranking The 51st Season From Best To Worst

1. Nikki Glaser/Sombr (11.08.2025)
2. Glenn Powell/Olivia Dean (11.15.2025)
3. Alexander Skarsgard/Cardi B (01.31.2026)
4. Melissa McCarthy/Dijon (12.06.2025)
5. Olivia Rodrigo (05.02.2026)
6. Matt Damon/Noah Kahan (05.09.2026)
7. Ariana Grande/Cher (12.20.2025)
8. Jack Black/Jack White (04.04.2026)
9. Ryan Gosling/Gorillaz (03.07.2026)
10. Amy Poehler/Role Model (10.11.2025)
11. Miles Teller/Brandi Carlile (11.01.2025)
12. Finn Wolfhard/A$AP Rocky (01.17.2026)
13. Colman Domingo/Anitta (04.11.2026)
14. Harry Styles (03.14.2026)
15. Connor Storrie/Mumford & Sons (02.28.2026)
16. Josh O'Connor/Lily Allen (12.13.2025)
17. Sabrina Carpenter (10.18.2025) 
18. Teyana Taylor/Geese (01.24.2026)
19. Bad Bunny/Doja Cat (10.04.2025)

Overall Thoughts

• Well, like most mothers' day/second episode of a three week May run/last episode before the season finale shows, there was a sense of palpable burn out with this one. Still, the show managed to quietly redeem itself with some unique moments near the end.

• Matt Damon may not have had his most memorable or most energetic performances as host tonight, but...he is getting older and his very first outing as host was nearly 25 years ago at this point. I wouldn't go as far as saying he was the weak link of this episode, but he was almost sleepwalking through much of it.

• This was far from the weakest of the season, but may have been the weakest of Damon's three episodes so far.

• As far as cast usage goes, nobody got entirely shut out. Tommy and Kam came pretty close, but got to do some decent support work in a couple of things.

• Ashley Padilla wasn't in any live sketches but she made a strong enough impression in the pretapes she was in to have a presence in this episode. Kenan and Mikey continue to both be used in ways that suggest next week might be their last episodes. Everyone else we saw plenty of.

Closing Thoughts

• Next week is SNLs' season 51 finale with host Will Ferrell (who also would make enough sense as a host for Sarah's final show if you think about it) and musical guest Paul McCartney.

• Even after having to tell myself to tamp down any potential excitement I could have for another Ferrell hosted episode (I mean, the guy's a five timer who's hosted two standout episodes and three duds) I'm still quietly looking forward to this the most out of all three May shows (probably because it's the season finale and I get to take a break from blogging for a few months after this). Let's hope this evens out Wills' hosting record a bit and lets the season go out on at least a high, positive note if not a bittersweet blowout sendoff for whoever could be leaving soon.

• The big thing with Ferrells' episodes when he hosts is to not expect him to bring back any old characters from his era. He's pretty far removed from that time and has probably retired said characters and moved on.

• Still, I'd say in this political climate that another Dubya cold open wouldn't be too big a stretch of the imagination. Plus, Cheri Oteri is gonna be in Scary Movie 6 coming out next month, so...she could legitimately make a cameo. I don't think they could do another Spartan Cheerleaders sketch today (just for the reason that it's been 25-30 years since the last one they did together) but maaaaybee another "Morning Latte" could work?

• If Ana's available they could also do another Culps BUT they last did that a year ago at the SNL50 Homecoming Concert, so that might be considered overkill and there aren't any other recent pop songs they'd need to get caught up with in the past year.

• Oh well. Hey, while you're here, please feel free to listen to the newest episode of We Heart Hader that just came out this past Friday. Deej & I cover part one of the two part "Blue Jean Committee" episode of Documentary Now. Our review of part two of that will be coming out next month. In the meantime, we're set to record our episode covering the Elliot Page/Wilco episode of SNL from season 33. That should be out in two weeks along with my accompanying blog post about it. 

• Also, my review of the latest episode of SNL UK hosted by Hannah Waddingham is coming real soon before either of those. Now, as of this writing, I have not yet even SEEN any part of that episode let along taken any notes on it....so yeah, they won't be published simultaneously this week. Anyway, see you again real soon!

Emma Stone/Noah Kahan (12.2.2023)

DISCLAIMER: Due to a long first week of training at a new job and some minor personal concerns, some of my ability to discern amd watch Saturday Night Live extremely critically and as more than just as an escape from substantial life changes may have been corrupted. 

Unfortunately, I did not have access to any deepfake or A.I. technology and neither John Higgins, Bill Brasky, Soaps and Scifi, or Blood Meridian were available to yassify this review on such short notice. 

Luckily, I had the idea to open with this lame attempt at a meta in-joke parodying one of tonights pretapes just to fully cover my own self consciousness at my latest batch of polished hot takes not exactly lining up fully with the groupthink of the small cult following of people I regularly interact with on Discord who I know are the only ones actually reading any of this and yo therapeutically acknowledge the nagging fear of losing considerable clout within said group.

Now, at the risk of possibly losing some of your respect for me as a writer, please enjoy.

Okay, whew. Sorry for making that disclalaimer, like, four times longer than what it was parodying (I swear, I'm gonna start learning to actually edit these better), but here's my review. As you can tell, this turned out to be a shockingly divisive episode amongst fans online. On paper, this isn't that far off from some of the weaker episodes of the season (so pretty much the ones not hosted by Bargatze or Chalamet but on a different level just slightly above Bad Bunny as that one was beset by its own unique issues). On the surface, what actually put this episode over (at least for me personally) was mostly Emma's performance and the fact that the show made use of some much beloved and underused new cast members who might not have seen as much screentime lately. Now, I don't know if the kids today still say things like "the Longfellow stans and the Troast tribe have been FED" on the TikkityToks and the YouFaceBlueThreadTwitters, but yeah, I would say that exact thing happened. Back to Emma, though, she proved she is still the solid reliable host she always was. As I've said before, Emma has a special way of working within the show to make sure none of her episodes feel exactly the same (well, aside from one recent recurring sketch) so even if the show itself was pretty cookie cutter in its basic outline, Emmas such a unique performer that she can bring her own special flair to sketch premises and templates that you feel like you've seen the show attempt multiple times before. Emma, Longfellow, Punkie and Troast in particular really helper push the highs of this show that much higher to take the sting out of how low the lows actually were. She just makes the show that much more fun to watch but smoke and mirrors aside, this reminded me more of her season 42 episode than anything else with it starting off fairly strong and falling off quite a bit by the bottom third (and her also hosting the first of three consecutive episodes taking place in December). As far as screentime, only Molly Kearney suffered a steep drop (don't worry, Molly... you'll get 'em next week), but everyone else really scored. Anyway, let's not waste any more time and just get right to it.

Situation Room - Well, opening the show with Squirm Blitzer was certainly a choic... Oh, THIS is what they scrambled to write for Bowen on Friday. Huh, I was kinda wondering how they would handle the Santos news? I gotta say, though, as cold as I've always run on Bowens' Santos, his actual performance here made this feel about a hundred times less "scrambled" than it had any right to feel. He actually imbued this with some dramatic theatrical energy that a Santos piece may have actually warranted by now instead of just cheekily droning his way through another Update desk piece (probably because he knew as well as we did or just flat out hoped this would be his last time ever playing him). I'm glad to see he had fun with it. I could even look past the boilerplate gay camp that came with this. The Princess Diaries and Beyonce references stood out to me the most. Even ending it with a slightly clumsy clunky "Candle In The Wind" parody was a nice touch (even if I thought replacing "candle" with "scandal" was far beneath even SNL but hey, it was probably 4:00am on a Friday night). His singing was decent, if not a little bit pitchy. I did genuinely laugh at the "evil Forrest Gump" line. I mean, I wouldn't go as far as to say that should've been cut or anything, but it did need some serious work. Eat shit, Randy Rainbow! Bowens got your number! B-

Monologue - Here it is, the obligatory jacket ceremony. We were all expecting this since we all know what a huge SNL nerd Emma is and what a deep and emotional connection she has to the show (not one deep enough that she felt she could do a solo monologue, apparently). I guess they're all gonna be as stripped down and bare bones as what Paul Rudd ended up having to get? Nice to see Tina and Candy again. If only I could forget that the last time they introduced the concept of a "ladies only" five timers club, Drew Barrymore and (somehow, inexplicably Jonah Hill) were involved. I genuinely did laugh at the Mulaney/Woody/Marty jabs and Tinas' "youngest members" and Candys' "places to cry" joke. Also, was anybody else actually hoping to get to see Dave McCary and maybe a brief overview of his history and involvement with the show rather than just visual confirmation that Lorne has...well, seen better days? B+

Question Quest - Thank God this show held off on opening the show with a game show sketch until they could put together a very absurd, writerly, detail/premise heavy one anchored by Michael Longfellow with a BIG assist from Punkie Johnson and Emma and JAJ (who really has a realistic game show announcer cadence down) there to pick up the slack. Oh hai, Molly & Chloe Troast. I laughed consistently throughout this (especially at Punkies' "same color penis" line and her string of fake reindeer names). I mean, it was very reminiscent of one of my all-time favorite State sketches (just replace the tortoise with orphaned children) but this was different enough conceptually that I cannot count that against it. A-

Fully Naked In New York - Wow, two absurd detail heavy sketches in a row. This one really just hits you out of nowhere, doesn’t it? There is just so damn much going on in this sketch that it's impossible to fullly process in one single viewing. I'll say that my first official thought upon the reveal was that SNL has fully escaped the November sweeps trap of getting big names and pandering to a wide audience for ratings and ad money and have allowed themselves to return to letting previously well established friends of the show take over and do unique things. This really started to pick up for me once we heard the Troast/Hernandez duet. The brief cameos from Fineman, Dismukes Punkie and Sarah helped this, too. The last SNL cast member I saw jump on the back of a garbage truck before this was Dennis Miller in season 11 second intro. Thank God he wore a big plaid coat there. B-

Treece Returns - Hmm, I never thought we needed to see this again. Bowen filling in for Kyle Mooney and Emma going all Fargo on us didn’t do anything to change my mind. I mean, I remember the one with Seth Meyers from 2018 being just fine mostly due to Seth but this couldn't make it past dress when Eddie Murphy last hosted. I will admit to chuckling at the "sewage" and "human dumbass" lines. D+

PDD: Please Don't Deepfake - Were Please Don't Destroy a little self conscious about the light criticism they may have received for some lightly A.I. assisted crowd scenes from "Foggy Mountain"? Anyway, while I liked how they used Punkie here (besides just reusing the old framework of "Punkie doesn’t know white celebrities or pop culture very well") this is something I couldn't fully get on board with until I saw how they used Marcello and how they showed a self-Yassified John Higgins in this. Honestly, the constant disclaimers kinda hurt this for me. It led to an unhealthy "tell don't show" feel for this and kinda hurt the pacing of an already slightly inconsistent pretape that started to feel like four separate sketch ideas smashed together. It reminded me a lot of the cold open to Scarjos' season 40 episode in a not so good way. C+

What's In The Kiln? - Hmm, I'm not too crazy about the pairing of Chloe & Heidi right from jumpstreet. Still, this is far less over the top than their demonic posession commentary from a year ago. It's much more than just a watered down version of Delicious Dish or the baking competition sketches that Cheadle, Murphy, Chalamet and Simu Liu gave us. It's much more prop and visual based in a similar vein to the grey pigtails sketch with Natasha Lyonne or the big dumb hat sketch with Amy Schumer so...this definitely has the feel of a female writer who recently left the show coming back. Either way, it's something I have a surprising amount of appreciation for considering I'm not exactly the target audience for it. C+

Update was possibly the strongest it's been all year (and in terms of THIS season, that's really saying something). Jost & Che had a string of great pre-commentary jokes but they really started to taper off post-commentary. Ironic that Che told an A.I. joke since he seemed so stumbly bumbly tonight it was almost like he was replaced with an A.I. deepfake of himself. Mikey Longs absolutely killed it as the old fashioned cigarette. Good to see he can still absolutely crush Bowen at playing inanimate objects. B-

Mama Cass Sessions - While this wasn't QUITE the Troast showcase I was hoping for since she was deceptively snuck into more of a supporting role, her voice alone put this over for me. Anyone else get slightly more Aidy vibes than Cecily vibes from her here? While I wasn’t too crazy about the idea of Emma in drag being the main focus, I loved how committed she was to it. Once she started acting out violent montages with Bowen, Mikey and Dismukes I could fully get on board with it. I especially liked the ending, too. B-

Return Of The Posters - With Pete being in the first two and him already having come and gone this season, I seriously wasn't expecting them to bring this back at all (and I was kinda hoping they wouldn't but Chrissy Knox seems to be Emma's only recurring character on the show, but Emma must like playing her and Mikey must like writing them). Still, this had a level of variation to it the others didn’t have (and I'm not just talking about Marcello being used in a pinch). Even Chrissy herself seemed to have four or five brain cells instead of the usual two. Did they let other do a major punch up on this one? C+

Diet Coke By Olay - Thank god this got in and got out quickly. There seemed to be absolutely nothing to this besides "lol (mostly white) women be mainlining Diet Coke amirite?" Was this written by whoever wrote the vagina sketch from Pete's episode? Would Diet Coke have been replaced by Starbucks if they did this a decade ago? It's a shame we may never hear or see what cut for time live sketch this replaced at the last second. D-

Now, looking back at my review of Emma's 2019 episode, it seems I DID actually try to rank her previous ones, so let me try and update those rankings right now.

1. Emma Stone/Coldplay (11.12.2011)
2. Emma Stone/BTS (4.13.2019)
3. Emma Stone/Kings Of Leon (10.23.2010)
4. Emma Stone/Noah Kahan (12.2.2016)
5. Emma Stone/Shawn Mendes (12.3.2016)

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

1. Nate Bargatze/Foo Fighters (10.28.2023)
2. Timothee Chalamet/Boygenius (11.11.2023)
3. Emma Stone/Noah Kahan (12.2.2023)
4. Jason Momoa/Tate McRae (11.18.2023)
5. Bad Bunny (10.21.2023)
6. Pete Davidson/Ice Spice (10.14.2023)

Well, THAT was certainly a journey. Next week, Adam Driver returns for his fourth time hosting. Now, he's anothrr solid, reliable host I always enjoyed seeing on the show. For as much of a sharp dynamic performer as he is, even he could still use some help from strong writing to put things over. Let's just hope this episode turns out more like his 2020 one than his 2018 one. See you soon!