Hurricane Sandy Press
Conference
There was certainly no way to avoid doing a hurricane Sandy
sketch considering the national attention it’s gotten over the past week. The
tough part is trying to make a natural disaster funny. Mayor Bloomberg’s sign
language interpreter was a good target considering her ability to sign so
enthusiastically earned her plenty of recent internet fame including her very
own Tumblr page. Following that up we got Chris Christie expressing his
thoughts on the hurricane along with his New Jersey-style interpreter who added
the Jersey stereotype gestures to her signing. Also, I thoroughly enjoyed Fred
Armisen’s delivery of the line “Los blancos amore Homeland.” Pretty solid cold
open, glad they didn’t take up too much time with it knowing they had Louis
C.K. in waiting and didn’t have to use the open to kill some time like they’ve
had to do with weaker hosts earlier in the season. Grade: B
Monologue
Louis C.K. comes out in his classic black pants and black
golf shirt. Wouldn’t want Louis any other way. This was clearly a case of the
SNL writers telling Louis to just do your thing man as the entirety of his monologue
is him doing stand-up about a recent event that happened in his life.
Louis tells the comedic story about how he was forced to be
the one who helped up an old lady who had fallen down at the airport and how difficult
it was for her to stand back up: “What are you a baby deer? Just stand.” Then,
to his dismay, she then requires further help from him to find her gate. His
response is: “I have to help her. I’ve already been kind. I can’t switch now.”
Ah, I think I could listen to him describing foreign old ladies for the rest of
my life. Really fun start and apart from the way he says the word “ell-ectricity”
I totally approve of the monologue. Grade: A
Fox and Friends
This has been one of the best recurring skits of late,
thanks in large part to Bobby Moynihan being so funny playing Brian Kilmeade.
Him playing the innocent moron is definitely tapping into Brick Tamblyn
territory and it’s fantastic. Donald Trump is the show’s special guest this
week played by Jason Sudeikis and he comes bearing some pivotal election
information: “I have it on good authority that President Obama has been texting
Abu Nizar, Jafaar, and the Riddler.” Louis shows up with some real warnings
related to the hurricane and to throw away food perishables, but as Taran Killan
explains: “It’s better to drink spoiled milk then no milk at all.” They also
ran their show’s fact checker corrections and the only one I initially caught
was “trees do not have bones.” Grade: A-
Lincoln
The bar that was already set high with “Sad Mouse” for the
new SNL digital shorts that will not actually be called “digital shorts.” But
damnit if Lincoln didn’t just blow it out of the water. In one spectacular meta
joke we get to see Louis C.K. playing Abraham Lincoln, playing Louis. They were
able to recreate the “Louis” opening credits to a tee, this time with C.K.
dressed as Lincoln as he goes about climbing up the subway steps and eating ¾ of
his pizza before running to do his stand-up set. And Only Abraham Louicoln
would have the depressing self-awareness to feel bad for the detective who will
have to solve his inevitable murder. You’ve got competition Daniel Day-Lewis.
Grade: A+
Australian Screen
Legend
The most honest and passionate love scene in Australian
cinema.
Fred Armisen hosts this Australian version of Masterpiece
Theatre in which he looks at some of “best” scenes that have occurred over the
great and illustrious history of Australian film. Kate McKinnon plays Tess
Davies and Bill Hader plays Graham Dixon. Louis shows up later and plays John
Chisholm who, after Tess’ character has been killed off, becomes intimate with
Graham Dixon in “On the Bluffs,” the story of forbidden love. It’s that rare
shot taken at Australia that we don’t see enough but the jokes weren’t there on
this one. Grade: C-
Musical Break Number
One
Fun. decided to go with “Some Nights” as their first song and
it just not there. I don’t know if the sound was off or what but it didn’t sound
right and was far from enjoyable. I feel like if you call your band “Fun.” it
automatically set you up for the “more like anything but fun” hack joke so I
won’t make it. Yet. Grade: D
Weekend Update
The biggest headline hit was in reference to Mayor Bloomberg’s
remarks on the subway system being down because of Hurricane Sandy: “The subway
will be up and running at full capacity. Which would be amazing considering
it’s never happened before. Then they take the opportunity to pepper in some politics
here before the election with Sudeikis coming in as Romney for a few fluff
jokes. The next guest is Aidy Bryant as Courtney Barnes who is a social media
“expert.” It’s been a long time coming for these people to be made fun of and
it allowed for us to be shown this very important political tweet: “Vegetables
suck and ice cream rules” sent from the account of Joe Biden. The girl you wish
you hadn’t started a conversation with at a party appears as the third guest
and gets played by Cecily Strong. She explains, or attempts to, her views on
politics and how put off she is by, well, everything. I can definitely see this
being a recurring character going forward. Fairly strong weekend update, but
considering there were three guests, none of which played by Louis, I was a
little disappointed. Grade: A-
Mountain Pass of Zog
Well that explains why Louis wasn’t in Weekend Update,
probably took a little while to get into costume. To Louis’ amusement, they
aren’t quite able to get the timing right on the act of blowing the horn and using
the sound they have prerecorded for it. The whole sketch turns out to be a long
joke about how Louis had been mispronouncing the name Zorn as Zog and at the
end he goes on his merry way after delivering the crystal that will save his
life. Certainly not the best sketch of the night. It kind of felt like they had
the idea for a scene and wanted to do a farce of fantasy worlds and they came
up with the premise later. Grade: D+
Hotel Check Out
“This is why it’s very important to double check the bill.”
I liked this sketch enough that I’m glad they did it. This could have been a
scene right out of Louis too, only he would the guy checking out, some sad and
somber music would start playing as Louis’ life crumbles around him when he
realizes he doesn’t have enough money to pay for all these mistaken charges but
if he doesn’t leave now he’ll miss a potential career changing opportunity.
This sketch, however, is much more upbeat and we get to have some laughs at the
lunacy we now endure from hotels and the likes. Grade: C+
Musical Break Number
Two
This time going with “Carry On.” When will musical guests learn that slow
songs usually don’t transfer well to the stage of Saturday Night Live? I
thought Carry On was better than their rendition of “Some Nights,” but I just
thought it felt out of place, especially after Louis came back from a
commercial break clearly having joking around with the audience members. Based
on the way some of them were sitting, I’m assuming he was discussing with them
whether or not they should actually look backward awkwardly at the camera while
he introduced Fun. again.
If it had been me making the song picks I would have gone
with “Pretty Girls” for song number one, it’s actually a fun song like the
band’s name suggests and the lyrics talk about being Saturday Night for petesake!
And then you have to go with the song that got you here with “We are Young” and see if you can get Janelle Monae to show up to help out. Grade: C
Last Call at Donnelly’s
It’s “you don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here time”
at Donnelly’s pub in which Louis and Kate McKinnon are the final two bar
patrons of the bar run by Kenan Thompson. They engage in nonsense drunk talk
and are able to make connections between the two of them for every aspect of
their lives including what they think are very similar meals: “What did you
have for lunch today? Same time… Baby food, Candy Corn.” Kenan Thompson plays a
great straight man throughout the sketch and does an excellent job of showing
the disgust we were all feeling when the two engage in a kiss involving way too
much tongue. Grade: B+
Final Thoughts
Overall I was satisfied with the episode and there were a few
really great moments. I wish they had done a little more politically related
such as Romney collecting food in Ohio and Louis plays some kind of average
citizen that questions where it’s going and it’s hinted at that Mitt is keeping
all of it himself… I don’t know there’s something there. Also, I think they
should have done something with the new Disney/Star wars merger and the
announcement of the movie which could have replaced the weak “Mountain Pass”
sketch. But of course I’m nitpicking. Next week we get Anne Hathaway with
musical guest Rihanna. My hopes aren't high but we’ll see.
What did everyone else
think? Comments are always welcome.
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