In the weeks leading up to what should have been the final three episodes of Season 48 of Saturday Night Live, the writing was on the wall – or, rather, the writing wasn’t on the wall.
By May, the Writers Guild of America strike was all but certain, which meant the show would be put on indefinite hiatus. No one expected the issue to be resolved in time for the season to have a proper conclusion – would-be hosts Pete Davidson, Kieran Culkin and Jennifer Coolidge were left hanging – and now, almost two months later, the fight is still ongoing.
The strike is only the latest dramatic turn to roil Saturday Night Live over the last several years, coming as it did on the heels of the Covid shutdowns and a mass exodus of longtime on-screen talent. Despite this, the show has remained more or less the same in terms of quality, which is to say, uneven at best.
Eyes
Since joining the cast two seasons ago, Sarah Sherman has proven divisive. Her wacky, grotesque style of body-horror comedy was never going to be to everyone’s liking, nor did it seem like a good fit for the strictures of network television. However, if nothing else, she’s managed to carve a niche for herself within the cast, and the show has given her lots of airtime to flaunt her weirdness.
One of the best examples is this closing sketch from the second episode, which sees her play a kooky marketer showing off the brand-new googly-eyes she had surgically implanted, only to quickly realize that the procedure – non-reversable since she forgot to refrigerate her old eyes – makes her both see and look worse. The prosthetics are goofy enough to sustain laughter past the initial sight gag (pun intended), while Sherman’s herky-jerky movements and high-pitched freakouts add to the enjoyable zaniness.
Potato Hole
When Dave Chapelle returned to host this season, he was coming off a prolonged public battle with LGBTQ+ advocates over what they considered increasingly transphobic comments. Chappelle’s whiny resentment over this criticism had all but taken over his comedy performances, so there was a question as to whether he could still make an audience not already in thrall to his POV actually laugh.
Turns out, he can. As with his previous hosting gigs, the comedian basically turned SNL into an episode of his long-defunct Chappelle Show, with the opening sketch –in which he plays a laconic bluesman sitting in on a morning talkshow in promotion of his new album, cryptically titled My Potato Hole – worthy of the best of that series. The whole thing is a slow build to one incredible reveal, as brutally decimating and politically cutting as it is hilarious.
Heaven Scene
The other great sketch from Chappelle’s episode makes ingenious use of his signature introductions by having him explain that one of the other cast members is filling in for him in the next sketch. At first, we assume he’s referring to new featured player Devon Walker, starring as a recently deceased man who finds himself in Black Heaven. But we soon have the rug pulled out from under us when Mikey Day shows up as a streetwise pimp. Day plays the part perfectly by playing himself not wanting to play the part, while Chappelle, along with musical guests Black Star and cameoing Chappelle Show cast member Donnell Rawlings, laugh it up from the sidelines, adding more hilarious meta-layers to the whole thing.
Aubrey Plaza monologue
Aubrey Plaza made her name starring alongside Amy Poehler on the NBC sitcom Parks and Recreation, so even though she was never a member of Saturday Night Live, her hosting debut still felt like a homecoming of sorts, as well as a victory lap following her high-profile turns in HBO’s The White Lotus and the acclaimed indie drama Emily the Criminal.
Plaza made the most of it too, bringing onboard some big names for her monologue, including the aforementioned Poehler, as well as fellow Parks and Rec alumnus president Joe Biden.
A lot of times, the host’s monologues can come off as smugly self-congratulatory, but Plaza avoids this by simply being her deadpan, cynical, slightly sinister self. She’s a natural comic talent and one who fits so perfectly into the milieu of Saturday Night Live it’s a wonder the show failed to scoop her up back when she was starting out.
King Brothers Toyota
One of the occasional pleasures of Saturday Night Live comes from the late-in-the-episode weirdo sketch – the one whose very premise is so idiosyncratic that you wonder how the writers even came up with the idea in the first place, let alone how it made it to air. Think: Potato Chips or Career Day.
This season’s King Brothers’ Toyota Overstock Sale-A-Thon never reaches those heights, but it manages to take the viewer on a wild ride all the same. What starts out as a solid and relatable spoof of local auto dealer TV commercials and traffic jams caused by “prohibitively popular” fast-food chains eventually unspools into a chronicle of one family’s war of attrition against the “Brigham Chamber of Commerce and their villainous patron, Councilman Hugo Gallegos”.
Wing Pit
One of SNL’s go-to formulas these days, especially when it comes to pre-filmed sketches, is to take the type of ubiquitous TV commercial viewers see all the time – in this case, a food chain’s ad for a game day deal – and steer it into horror movie territory. But few of these examples take it as far as Wing Pit, which sees a Super Bowl party at first overwhelmed, and eventually decimated, by an apocalyptic deluge of spicy chicken wings, all in the name of “Chirax, the Chicken God of Death”.
American Girls Cafe
Of all the celebrities to take on hosting duties this season, none were received with more trepidation than the Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. While a handful of athletes have acquitted themselves well on Saturday Night Live over the years, most have fallen flat. If Kelce simply managed not to embarrass himself, it would have counted as another victory for the jock.
Well, not only did he meet those expectations, he absolutely demolished them. After displaying some easy charm and a natural stage presence during his monologue, he got the audience dying in the very first sketch, wherein he plays an aloof, pervy dandy enjoying a lunch with his favorite dolls at an American Girl Cafe. He’s a little wooden at the start, but by the time he gets rolling, it’s clear the guy has a future in acting.
Straight Male Friend
Kelce is even better in this pre-filmed sketch, playing a character more in line with his public persona. As Bowen Yang’s meathead “Straight Male Friend”, he provides a “low-effort, low-stakes relationship that requires no emotional commitment, no financial investment, and other than the occasional video game-related outburst, no drama”. Kelce proves very smart at playing dumb, while also betraying a tangible sweetness reminiscent of Channing Tatum. But he also brings an edge to his performance, especially when delivering what is probably the best line of the season: “Yo, sorry about being a pussy about my dad dying earlier, man. That won’t happen again.”
Couple Goals
The only gameshow sketch that proved memorable this season came during Quinta Brunson’s episode late in the truncated season. We think we have Couple Goals pegged early on: in their attempt to answer seemingly easy questions about one another, Brunson and Kenan Thompson’s married couple will end up stumbling upon some shocking hidden truth. This is indeed what happens, but the secret that’s revealed is far darker and, for reasons that will reveal themselves in the best visual punchline the show has given us in ages, highly specific than anyone can guess.
Weekend Update: Che Pulls April Fool’s Prank on Jost
One area where Saturday Night Live showed a marked improvement this year was Weekend Update. There was no noticeable change to pinpoint: Colin Jost and Michael Che once again found themselves behind the desk telling the same types of jokes they’ve been telling for the past nine years, but something about their chemistry finally clicked.
While not a sketch per se, the best Update moment this season came during the April Fool’s Day episode, with Che secretly instructing the audience not to laugh at any of Jost’s jokes during the first rundown of headlines. Watching it live was a tense affair, especially when someone in the crowd starts verbally heckling Jost. Then, before things can go any further, Che reveals the truth, causing Jost and the audience to completely lose it. In giving over to sheer, unadulterated relief (“I was like, ‘Am I not mic’d?’ And then I was like, ‘Oh, I just suck!’), Jost comes off more empathetic than he’s ever been before.
