SNL 10/2

With just his WTF look in the midst of "What Up Wit Dat?", Morgan Freeman is killing it. As is that mad sex machine Ernest Borgnine.

 

I'm not watching, but 'What's Up With Dat?' remains one of my all-time favorite SNL recurring skits. Like all-time as in ever. The absurdist flair, perfectly played by Keenan Thompson. The put-upon guest. So good.

 

I've actually laughed pretty hard a few times tonight.

What Up Wit Dat was pretty damn funny. As previously mentioned, Morgan Freeman was great. Then the Shanna skit, where she "mixed" the smoothie and then when she did the way-long belch. Finally, the Rescue Dog skit had a good payoff with the severed arm.

I'm also laughing at this way-overproduced Kanye West performance, although I don't think he'd like to hear that.

 

Bryan Cranston was pretty damn good. I was surprised they let some of the lyrics in the second Kanye song go through, but hey... it's 12:45 and I know it's a heavily edited song (for network television, anyway).

All in all, a pretty good show for current SNL standards. Jane Lynch should be good next week, but we better hold off on seeing if Bruno Mars will really be the musical guest (Bruno's in a heap of drug trouble, FYI).

 

I think they're better off going with B-list people like Cranston and Lynch, who will put a bigger effort into hosting. Then again, SNL may be at the point where the only A-listers they can attract are former castmembers and the handful of people who really like hosting (Baldwin, Martin, Timberlake, Affleck, Goodman)

 

Cranston was criminally underused. What's Up With That is dumb but Sudekis' dancing always makes me laugh. The new cast members actually seem to have some decent characters and I don't know why they bury Nasim Pedrad's stuff.

 

Fred Armisen will be on the list of worst cast members (who were there for multiple seasons) ever.

No wonder the girl from Mad Men left him.

 

Have to admit to (EDIT: surprise) reading all the praise. I watched the first hour and thought it was the usual dreck - especially "What's Up With That?" Just dreadful.

 

Morgan Freeman was the only thing funny about What's Up With That?

 

I've hit upon an all-too-familiar system for watching SNL for some time now. I never miss an episode, because I DVR them. But when I screen it, I watch the opening politico skit for the news of the week; fast forward to Weekend Update (still good, and Seth and Amy was a nice touch two weeks ago, if not unexpected); fast forward to What's Up With That? for the cameo celebs; and fast forward to the closing thank-yous from the guest host (I like the unrehearsed aspect of it -- Gov. Paterson was casting around aimlessly on the stage, and it clearly was not an act).

I almost never watch the musical guests. And most of the other skits, unless I read someone pointing to it later, are eminently missable.

One of last episodes I remember watching start to finish was last season when Jenny Slate dropped the F-bomb. U2 was the musical guest, so I didn't have to skip-edit.

 

I usually have it one while I'm working to kill off a weekly design project with a Sunday night deadline, so I'm not usually watching intently.

So maybe my criticism isn't the most well-formed. But, there is so much of the current SNL arsenal that doesn't even get a chuckle from me.

So much of it is formulaic crutch, so much of it unfunny on the fourth, fifth or 20th time around. You can count on, every week, there being a commercial parody (largely hit-or-miss), some kind of goofy gameshow send-up (again, hit-or-miss and it's miss most of the time), some sort of talk show goof and a sketch with Wiig acting strangely.

Very little of it is new, innovative or (though I hate the phrase) "outside the box." It's tired. It's trite.

 

I always DVR it. It usually takes me less than 30 minutes to watch. Admittedly, I'll skip anything after update unless it looks really interesting or if the show has been great to that point. I think the only time in recent memory when that was the case was when Timberlake hosted two years ago. Actually, when Ferrell did the following week and they did the Goodnight Saigon singalong. I watched that to the end as well.