Jeff "Jmunney" Malone's Self-Styled "Expert" Thoughts on Movies, TV, Music, and the Rest of Pop Culture
February 27, 2022
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television John Mulaney, LCD Soundsystem, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47 Leave a comment
SNL: John Mulaney, LCD Soundsystem, Cecily Strong (CREDIT: NBC/Cecily Strong)
Good morning to the end of February. This is a review of John Mulaney’s fifth time hosting Saturday Night Live. (N.B.: He also used to be an SNL staff writer.) As such, I will be listing the sketches in order of how close their running times are to five minutes. Noted indie-dance-electronic rock band LCD Soundsystem provided the tunes.
January 30, 2022
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Katy Perry, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47, Willem Dafoe Leave a comment
SNL: Katy Perry, Willem Dafoe, Chris Redd (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
Oh hello there, you’re reading my review of the TWELFTH episode of the FORTY-SEVENTH season of Saturday Night Live. Who’s the host? That’s an important piece of information, and the reality is that it is American actor Willem Dafoe. Also noteworthy: the musical guest is Katy Perry, who’s known for performing songs.
For this episode, since we’re in the middle of winter, I’m ordering sketches from least cold to coldest. It’s a subjective rubric, sure, but hopefully you can see what I’m going for.
January 23, 2022
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Måneskin, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47, Will Forte Leave a comment
SNL: Will Forte, Kenan Thompson, Måneskin (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
Believe it or not, Orville Willis Forte IV is now an SNL host. Formerly he was an SNL cast member. Now he’s both! Rock band Måneskin is neither of those things, but they are an SNL musical guest, and that’s pretty cool, too.
Now I’m going to talk about the episode! For Season 47, I’ve been listing the sketches in various orders. This time, since the episode is being hosted by an alum, and there’s thus an expectation for the return of some of his recurring bits, I’ll be listing the sketches in order from least to most original. So the recurring sketches will be covered first, with those that deviate the least from the formula covered up top. Then I’ll get to the one-off bits, with the big conclusion reserved for the most original sketch of the episode.
January 16, 2022
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Ariana DeBose, Bleachers, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47 1 Comment
SNL: Jack Antonoff, Ariana DeBose, Bowen Yang (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
Good morning, I’m coming to you live from January 2022! It’s the first new Saturday Night Live episode of the year, that’s what I’m going to be talking about here. Speaking of firsts, it’s the first time that singing actress Ariana DeBose is the host and also the first time that Jack Antonoff’s band Bleachers is the musical guest, but not the first time that Jack’s been here, as he also performed with fun.) Hopefully that’s not too confusing!
In case this is your first time reading one of my reviews, you should know that this season, I’ve been ordering the sketches in a variety of ways, like alphabetical and reverse airing order. This time, I’m doing it in order of the number of speaking/singing roles per sketch. A few notes on this: narrators are counted, except for Darrell Hammond during the monologue (since that’s more a part of the opening credits). The person introducing the musical guest IS counted for the musical performances, while backup singers are NOT counted if they only sing backup. And for Weekend Update, the parts with guests are counted separately from the parts that are just Michael and Colin telling jokes.
Okay, here we go!
December 19, 2021
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Charli XCX, Paul Rudd, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47 1 Comment
SNL: Charli XCX, Paul Rudd, Ego Nwodim (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
This Paul Rudd-hosted episode of Saturday Night Live was supposed to feature Charli XCX as the musical guest, but instead there was no musical guest. (Although Charli did show up in a pre-recorded sketch!) Changes were made at the last minute, but the show had to go on, so it did go on! There were some new bits, but several of the sketches were classic Christmas-themed selections, along with new intros from Rudd and/or Tina Fey, Kenan Thompson, and Tom Hanks.
Rudd was in town presumably to promote his new flick Ghostbusters: Afterlife (which also features some SNL alums in its cast) and his new Apple TV+ show The Shrink Next Door (which also co-stars an SNL alum). But I also must mention that he has a recurring voice gig on the terrific new Netflix show Saturday Morning All Star Hits!, which stars and was co-created by current SNL cast member Kyle Mooney.
In the spirit of persevering, I will stick with the reviewing plan I had for this episode, which was to list the sketches in order from least Christmassy to most Christmassy. I’ve determined this according to the number of times we hear spoken in the sketch the word “Christmas” (or its derivatives, like “Christmassy,” “Christmastime,” etc.). I have included in the counts those Christmases spoken in the intros.
December 12, 2021
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Billie Eilish, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47 1 Comment
SNL: Billie Eilish, Kate McKinnon (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
The eighth episode of Saturday Night Live Season 47 features the same person as both host and musical guest, and that person is Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O’Connell (or just Billie Eilish, for short). This is the first time this season that the same person has been both host and MG. If you were worried that this sort of double duty was never going to happen again, then that was quite an overreaction.
Last episode, I listed the sketches in order of running time, from longest to shortest, so this time I will go from shortest to longest.
November 21, 2021
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, Saweetie, Simu Liu, SNL, SNL Season 47 2 Comments
SNL: Kyle Mooney, Saweetie, Simu Liu, Cecily Strong (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
This year I am thankful for new episodes of Saturday Night Live. And the NEWEST new SNL is the one hosted by Simu Liu with musical guest Saweetie. He’s the self-proclaimed “first Chinese host to be the fourth Chinese host,” while she’s the Santa Clara native who sure seems to rap a lot.
For this review, I will be listing the sketches in order of running time, starting with the longest.
November 14, 2021
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Jonathan Majors, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47, Taylor Swift Leave a comment
SNL: Bowen Yang, Taylor Swift, Jonathan Majors, Aidy Bryant (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
In case this is the first of my SNL reviews you’re reading this season (or if you just need a refresher), I’ve been mixing up the order in which I list each sketch. This time, I’ve listed them in order of how long my notes were for each sketch, starting with the most notes. (You’ll have to trust me on this one.)
Anyway, Jonathan Majors was booked as the host, while Taylor Swift managed to be the musical guest. This is his first time entertaining us from Studio 8H, while she’s been here multiple times already. Maybe she gave him some advice.
November 12, 2021
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Ed Sheeran, Kieran Culkin, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47 1 Comment
SNL: Heidi Gardner, Kieran Culkin, Chris Redd (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
I ran the New York City Marathon on Sunday, November 7, 2021, which made it a little difficult to post my review of the 11/6/21 SNL on Sunday as I normally do. Sorry, Kieran Culkin and Ed Sheeran! (They were the guests of this episode.) So I decided instead to write this review over the course of the week, at a rate of a few sketches per day. Anyway, maybe it was the post-marathon glow, but I really enjoyed this episode!
October 24, 2021
Saturday Night Live, SNL Weekly Recaps, Television Brandi Carlile, Jason Sudeikis, Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Live Season 47, SNL, SNL Season 47 1 Comment
SNL: Alex Moffat, Brandi Carlile, Jason Sudeikis, Chloe Fineman (CREDIT: NBC/Screenshot)
Jason Sudeikis used to be a cast member on Saturday Night Live, but now he’s the host. Not permanently, just for this episode (although possibly also future episodes as well). Brandi Carlile is the musical guest. Rock ‘n’ roll!
This time, I’m assembling my review in order of the birthdays of the first person to speak in each sketch. Just the dates and not the years, though. So, for example, someone born January 1, 1980 will go ahead of someone born on January 2, 1970. (For the musical performances, I’ll organize them according to the introducing person’s birthday.)
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