Saturday Night Live 31st season premiere 9/30 (spoilers)

[alphaboi867]

SNL comes back tonight with Dane Cook hosting. I wonder if there'll be any sketches involving page boys? :D

[overeasy4]

I'm waiting with baited breath.

[overeasy4]

Tell me I'm not the only one who googled a:f6.

[Kiros]

Monologue plus three sketches in... and only the monologue was non-political. Dane's monologue got a laugh or two, and Kenan had a great reaction to 'producing liquid... or gel...!'. That's about all so far, though. Terrible start, and all the more credit to the Studio 60 scene last week where all the crappy writers could suggest was stuff about Bush and Republicans.

A digital short coming up, apparently.

[Exapno Mapcase]

Apparently the writers were determined to prove Sorkin right.

[alphaboi867]

Weekend Update with Amy Poehler and Seth Meyers should be up soon. I still say Andy Samberg would make a great page.

[Snooooopy]

Has the lead singer of The Killers always been this much of a spaz?

[overeasy4]

Am I the only one who misses Horatio?

[Kiros]

Am I the only one who misses Horatio?

Yes :)

Brian Williams is now the current leader for "Funniest Person of the Night".

Just me, or the Killers didn't sound that great? Not a big fan of them, but the CD-radio stuff I've heard has been better than that.

Weekend update now~

[overeasy4]

Isn't this the 32nd season?

[alphaboi867]

Okay the Farrah Fawcett sketch was a little weird. :dubious:

[Kid_A]

From what I've heard about the Killers live, their performance was very similiar to what you'd normally get. I haven't heard people raving about them live.

I quit after Weekend Update, a couple of good lines but nothing to get me excited about this season.

[anyrose]

I was very impressed by the scheduling - I had been a bit perturbed by the sketch-commercial-sketch-commercial-music-commercial-news-commercial-sketch-commercial-music-commercial-close format of the last few seasons - I hope they keep this new format going for a few episodes. Loved seeing Hammond as Clinton - Really do not miss Sanz

[Kiros]

Well, that was my once yearly reminder of why I don't watch SNL anymore. Sort of a shame, too - Dane Cook has comedic timing and attitude that the rest of the cast would kill for... but the writing just wasn't funny, at all. Ah, well.

[overeasy4]

The water bottle falling out of the closet sketch was just weird, and surrealistically went on too long.

[overeasy4]

I think they had a purposely lousy first show, so the rest of the season would be uphill.

[astro]

The water bottle falling out of the closet sketch was just weird, and surrealistically went on too long.


I turned it off when they started the "selling this idea to the Saturday Night Live show" part of that bit.

[overeasy4]

lucky you.

[DanBlather]

I saw the Dane Cook HBO special and it was not funny. He is not funny here either. Who the hell is he and why is he semi-well known?

[jlrepka]

W-E-A-K

Worst cold opening ever... in fairness, I'm sure that they had to scramble at the last minute to replace their original opening, a Gilbert and Sullivan song parody.

And the Al Pacino bit was literally just a paid Wells Fargo ad...

The Homeland Security skit was good, and the Brian Williams bit was OK.

Weekend Update needs help. The Daily Show has taken the concept and run with it, and does a much better job. The bit is essentially a series of topical jokes, and they have a week to work on it (as opposed to the late night hosts who put the whole thing together 4-5 days a week).

WU has always worked best when it has had a dedicated anchor, i.e. Dennis Miller, Norm MacDonald, as opposed to someone who was spending the week writing and rehearsing skits.

In 1992, after the Nancy Kerrigan/Tonya Harding incident, they had Kerrigan on the show as host. I remember thinking, if this was 15 years ago they would have invited Tonya to host.

[jackelope]

The water bottle falling out of the closet sketch was just weird, and surrealistically went on too long.That was the only part of the show that I liked.

This was awful. I'm a big fan of SNL, thanks in part to having spent years at a job that had me sitting alone in an office with a TV and not much to do at that hour. And this was TERRIBLE. Not least because I loathe everything about Dane Cook.

I really did like the creative meta-approach of the water-bottles, though. It went from dreadful, to over-long, to funny because it was over-long, to conscious of being funny because it was over-long. Like a Family Guy sketch with an added level of self-awareness.

I'm surprised at how much the loss of Rachel Dratch (for whom I never thought I cared much) has weakened the cast.

[susan]

Pretty poor showing.

[zuma]

W-E-A-K

Worst cold opening ever...

This is the second time I've heard this term in a week, the first was on Studio 60. What, exactly, is a "cold open". Hollywoodspeak is like a foriegn language to me. I wish they'd just speak English.

[Baldwin]

Isn't this the 32nd season?Yes, it is. 31st anniversary; 32nd season.

Although the show apparently has a problem with basic math -- they celebrated their 25th anniversary at the beginning of the 25th season, in September 1999. At the same time that all the "news" sources were pretending the 20th century was about to end, SNL apparently couldn't subtract 1975 from 1999 correctly. Frustrating time for me.

Watched about half the show last night, and lost interest. Actually didn't recognize Dane Cook clean-shaven at first.

[brianjedi]

This is the second time I've heard this term in a week, the first was on Studio 60. What, exactly, is a "cold open". Hollywoodspeak is like a foriegn language to me. I wish they'd just speak English.

Last I checked, the words "cold" and "open" were part of the English language. ;)

A cold open (also referred to as a teaser) in a television program or movie is the technique of jumping directly into a story at the beginning or opening of the show, before the title sequence or opening credits are shown. Shows which air some form of titles before jumping in to the story and then running a formal opening sequence are also considered cold opens.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_open

[Wee Bairn]

Four months to write material and this is what they come up with?

Dane Cook seems to have the stand up routine down, just too bad his jokes are dumb- I assume they are targeted at teen girls?

The water bottle sketch had to be an in a joke- I hope whoever was in on it thought it was funny.

And it finally dawned on me who Dane Cook reminds me of- a gayer acting Monroe Ficus.

And I wish they had gotten Tobey Mcguire to reprise his Screech imitation from Inside the Actor's Studio.

Seth Myers, ala Kevin Nealon, didn't seem to have the pattern down for fake news joke telling- hopefully that will come in time.

[Exapno Mapcase]

Dane's monologue got a laugh or two,

So true. I've been thinking about that, and what it means.

The monologue on the opening night of a new season of SNL, a season overshadowed by two shows on its own network that will be making fun of the show's decline, an opening night that everyone in Hollywood will be watching closely, a monologue done by the supposedly hottest young comedian around, got a laugh or two. From the studio audience.

Think about that. Dan Rather could have come out and received more than a laugh or two from an opening night audience, primed (pun) and ready to explode into laughter. A loser off the Last Comic Standing could have killed in such a spot. Paris Hilton and Jessica Simpson could have made Abbott and Costello blush with inadequacy.

But Dane Cook manages a routine so exquisitely and extraordinarily unfunny that it gets "a laugh or two."

He should get out of show business now. Forever. He's a disgrace to the profession.

[Least Original User Name Ever]

It was definitely up and down. The Clinton and Rice thing for Weekend Update was just...ehh. Dane Cook is definitely not my favorite. I don't know if he should just quit, because, as it's been pointed out, he does have some good comedic timing. I see him going the way of the Sandler: not funny by himself, not even funny movies, but he's going to make gobs of money because someone thinks he's funny.

I remember arguing with some old friends in New York about Dane Cook. I watched one of his standup specials and might have giggled a couple times. They thought it was funny. I told them all that he wasn't funny and they'd see it when they weren't as drunk or high. Therefore, his targeted audience is stoners and drunks.

Thae guy's Pacino was...odd. He certainly looked nothing like Pacino, yet his voice was dead on. One of those things where you'd have to be out of the room to appreciate..or do what I did..and hold your hand over the right half of the tv screen where he was.

I liked the water bottle bit. It drug on too long, but that might have been part of it. Surreal, definitely. Sadly, that might have been the best sketch on the show. How much would it take to lure Mike Myers, Norm MacDonald, Will Ferrell, and Cheri Oteri back?

I also get the feeling that the loss of Tina Fey might be a crippling blow to SNL unless they get a winfall of very good, very young, funny writing.

[Snooooopy]

I liked the font they used for the opening titles.

[Wee Bairn]

I doubt it would take much to lure Cheri Oteri back, if they wanted her.

[Thudlow Boink]

I think they had a purposely lousy first show, so the rest of the season would be uphill.Dunno about purposely, but from past experience, the first episode of the season has very often been weak. They seem to need awhile to find their groove, or something.

[randwill]

I doubt it would take much to lure Cheri Oteri back, if they wanted her.

Or Chevy Chase.

[brianjedi]

Or Chevy Chase.

Chevy is persona non grata at Studio 8H now, thanks to some incredibly unprofessional behavior during his last appearance.

[MaxTheVool]

I thought it was pretty funny, overall. The cold open was weak, and the first half of Dane's monologue was quite poor, but the monologue, and the show as a whole, definitely got better. The water bottles sketch was quite funny, and Brian Williams was hilarious. The homeland security thing was pretty good.

Basically, it was 30 minutes of funny in a 90 minute show, which I'm OK with, given how much of the 90 minutes is ads and musical guests. Sometimes, SNL is only 5 minutes of funny in a 90 minute show, and that's when it's really as bad as people say it is.

[Typo Negative]

I stopped their breifly while channel surfing. Was that actually a Screech impression during WU??

And I too wonder about Dane Cook. For some reason, I want to like him.....but I never laugh.

[Valerieblaise]

Chevy is persona non grata at Studio 8H now, thanks to some incredibly unprofessional behavior during his last appearance.


Really? What did he do? Almost everyone in "Live from New York" mentioned awful behavior by him each time he returned, yet he was still asked back. I'm curious as to what crossed the line.

[brianjedi]

Really? What did he do? Almost everyone in "Live from New York" mentioned awful behavior by him each time he returned, yet he was still asked back. I'm curious as to what crossed the line.

Apparently he spent the entire week verbally berating the cast and crew. Since then, his only appearance was at the 25th anniversary show when everyone was invited back.

[overeasy4]

Who is Brian Williams?

[vivalostwages]

The TSA thing was funny, and that's about it.

I would have sworn that the Killers' drummer was Jason Lee.

[Kiros]

Basically, it was 30 minutes of funny in a 90 minute show, which I'm OK with, given how much of the 90 minutes is ads and musical guests. Sometimes, SNL is only 5 minutes of funny in a 90 minute show, and that's when it's really as bad as people say it is.

There's no way there was more than five minutes of funny last night, and five might be generous (maybe if you count the ENTIRE time water bottles are falling out of the closet). To be fair, I was completely sober at the time because I had done the driving earlier in the evening, so they had to work a little harder than usual to make me laugh... but really, I don't even know that they got that close

Who is Brian Williams?

He is the actual, real-life anchor of the NBC Nightly News.

[Krokodil]

Really? What did he do? Almost everyone in "Live from New York" mentioned awful behavior by him each time he returned, yet he was still asked back. I'm curious as to what crossed the line.

I thought he'd crossed the line with his Season 11 appearance, when he singled out Terry Sweeny for abuse, but he was the guest as recently as Season 17. True superstars can get away with bad behavior, and the people who think they are think they can.

[Sam Stone]

Brian Williams was the funniest person on screen. That's just sad.

And so far, Seth Meyers is a dud on Weekend Update. Totally unfunny delivery.

This is not a good start.

[Snooooopy]

I know that the cast was trimmed to save money, but I still figured they'd have a featured player or two to kick around.

[Dr. Fang]

I am surprised that nobody has commented on the Hugo Chavez skit. Foreign politicians with mismatched accents, and the writers relying on "Asians do funny things, you guys" for comedy. Did the writers suddenly become eleven-year olds?

Also, I am sick of Dane Cook. The man made a comedy album or two, and has been in some low quality 15-24 male audience movies, and everybody loves him. They love him enough to repeat his jokes over and over so people with sense can hate him even more.

[overeasy4]

It was somewhat realistic what with Armisen being part Venezeulan.

[Trunk]

I thought the opening skit was pretty funny. . .with Bush in the auditorium. "I bet I could be a good comp-troller. I'd like to comp-trol things."

The TSA skit was funny too. Somewhat satirical (like the moronic TSA workers being able to figure out how to get 6 ounces of fluid on an airplan), and Maya Rudolph is just funny to look at. I hope that she and Jaime Presley find something good to do next week.

The water bottles cracked me up. I thought the whole idea of them being addicted to water, and the image of them chugging those giant bottles, was funny.

[RumMunkey]

Had a few bright spots. Did anyone else notice the organic stage sound? It sounds like they moved the mics far back to pick up some echo.

That plus the retro-titling makes me think they are going for an "out of the garage" retro feel.

There was a reference to something that was at least a few years late... can't remember what that was though.

[MaxTheVool]

and the writers relying on "Asians do funny things, you guys" for comedy.

Where did you get that? I got "Kim Jong-Il does funny things".

[alphaboi867]

WTF, NBC's showing it again? Two weeks into the season and they're reairing the premiere. If they're going rerun an episode at least repeat one from last season.

[Gr8Kat]

WTF, NBC's showing it again? Two weeks into the season and they're reairing the premiere. If they're going rerun an episode at least repeat one from last season.

I'm wondering the same damn thing. :confused:

[jlrepka]

Is the repeat of this episode Lorne Michaels' Howard Beale moment? An admission that the first two weeks sucked so bad that they need to re-tool?

I've got to admit, between the blatant Wells Fargo ad disguised as a skit from this episode, and the GE oven ad in the premier of 30 Rock, it's tempting to swear off these shows all together...