SNL: Ariana Grande, Chris Pratt (CREDIT: YouTube Screenshot)

This review was originally posted on Starpulse in September 2014.

To kick off its milestone 40th season, “SNL” entrusted the premiere to first-time guests Chris Pratt and Ariana Grande.  Pratt proved to be the perfect utility player host, comfortably slotting into all his roles without overshadowing the cast.  His trademark goofy energy could have been put to greater use, but this was an episode of “SNL” that wanted to try out new material and cover some of the most pressing news stories.  New cast members Michael Che and Pete Davidson looked perfectly comfortable as they made auspicious debuts.  Overall, this was an episode that was not entirely focused but was overall more interesting and more experimental than “SNL” usually allows itself to be.  Let’s take a closer look at each of the sketches:

State of the Union with Candy Crowley – This is one of those typical “SNL” cold openings: a news talk show parody that allows multiple stories to be covered with minimal connective tissue.  At least in this case, the various stories were all under the same umbrella of “NFL in Crisis.”  While Roger Goodell and former Baltimore Ravens Ray Lewis and Shannon Sharpe all had their funny moments, this sketch did not make much of a point beyond “Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson are not the only NFL players who have had legal troubles.” Lewis’s hook of constantly changing the subject to kids going to school made up for the fact that this was yet another non-impression from Kenan Thompson, while Sharpe continued to be one of Jay Pharoah’s best impressions, with a particularly Eddie Murphy-esque laugh. B-

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