I have pretty low expectations for “Saturday Night Live,” but this was the LAMEST episode I can ever remember seeing. Bland from wire to wire. It was a bad sign when one of the first sketches involved monkey poop.
I didn’t even watch. I was listening to it while my roomie watched, laughing hysterically during Weekend Update, but he’s fairly easily amused. 
SNL and, really, TV in general, is going downhill fast.
It’s a good thing I like to read books. I finished one the other day (3rd time I’d read it) and asked That Guy (my roomie) if he wanted to read it. Him: “Why would I want to read?!” Gee, I really have no idea.
:rolleyes:
I noticed the same thing about the last two weeks I tried giving it a shot. Not even the opening sketch is worth watching. Usually they’d reserve the crap for the last half hour and punctuate the show heavily with ads.
I’m really happy it wasn’t only me. Weekend Update seems to be the only thing worth watching, and sometimes I wonder about that 
I wish we could bring back The (real) Not Ready For Prime Time Players.
Our NBC affiliate is playing classic SNL right after the current show. They’ve been doing all the Emmy winning shows from the 70s for a while.
And yes, it really was that much better back then. Even with the not current any more current events that drove so much of their stuff. Those guys had real talent. Were real comedians. Those eps are still great.
I hadn’t watched SNL in years (wow, lots of new actors!) so when I was able to tune in last night I was hoping to be at lease slightly entertained. The entire show was bad.
What’s with the constant toilet humor? Throwing poop and some fat rapper farting is the best they can come up with? It’s too bad, really.
I haven’t watched the show with any regularity for quite a while, but I tuned in to see what Bateman would say about A.D. during his monologue.
At least he was still trying to save it. Ame Poehler’s bit was funny, but it seemed something was wrong with the cue cards. She kept saying “I wanna keep my boat” over and over like she was lost and just needed something to say.
I didn’t think it was THAT bad, but not good. Better than the week before, IMO. But not good.
Anyone else notice that Amy Poehler was in almost every skit? It looks like she’s emerging as the star of the current cast. Which makes sense, since she’s probably the most talented of the bunch. But in the past, the big stars of the show were people like Eddy Murphy, John Belushi, Bill Murray, Wil Ferrel, Mike Myers, and Dana Carvey. If Amy Poehler is the best they’ve got now, that tells you how weak the rest of the cast is.
But there is hope. Fred Armusen is a really funny guy. So are a couple of other people on the show. They just need to find the material to allow them to shine, and they cuold break out.
What’s Amy Poehler’s talent? She plays herself in every skit. She doesn’t even have a personality separate from Tina’s in Weekend Update. Compare her to Maya Rudolph, who has incredible talent, can impersonate anyone, and can sing as well.
As for the rest, when you begin a show with Monkeys Throwing Poop, you can’t recover even if you were to raise Belushi and Radner from the dead and let them have sex on stage.
Once again, the musical act outshined the rest of the show.
E! showed the Ben Affleck episode (the one with the t-shirts as the opening sketch-- “Mary Kate and Ashfleck”) at 10:00 PM EST, and while it wasn’t the best of episodes, it was so much better than the crap that aired at 11:35 PM EST.
The sad part is I think some of the cast is great - Amy, Maya, and Tina are all hysterical, in my opinion. It’s the weak writing and the few awful, awful people in the cast that ruin it for me. Like Horatio. I hate him.
It was almost fascinating to watch. Especially me harmony.com and love music album. Lorne would roll over in his grave! 
There were, however, some funny bits. The recurring ‘black history’ commercials were pretty funny: “Want to go skydiving?” “HELL NO!”
I stopped watching after 12:30 (Our ABC affiliate has West Wing reruns then). None of the sketches seemed to involve anything they really needed Jason Bateman for, and would’ve been just as funny and interchangeable with virtually any other actor of his generation or younger. Maybe they were just cleaning out their desks with sketches other guest hosts didn’t want to do?
Seems to be the M.O. for the whole season so far.
I thought Bateman did really well. He stumbled on some of his lines, but for the most part, he seemed to maintain good eye contact, had good flow, and did a decent job of acting. It also seemed as if some of his AD persona was brought into his SNL characters.
I, too, find Horatio Sanz totally unfunny. He reminds me of those popular guys in high school who’d get cheers and laughs just because he had friends in the audience. :rolleyes:
Now I actually like Horatio Sanz–he makes me laugh. He’s no John Belushi, but I think people on the Internet are overly hard on him. For filling the “goofy fat guy” role, he’s way funnier than Chris Farley ever was.
I think the women of SNL are the most talented female cast in the show’s history. Tina, Amy, and Maya are THE BEST, and Rachael Dratch has her moments, even though I largely find her and her characters annoying. I think Chris Parnell is very talented and terribly underused, Fred Armisen and Will Forte are great, and Seth Meyers is really coming into his own (even if he seems to be filling the “effeminate Jimmy Fallon” role for now). As long as Kenan Thompson keeps doing his Bill Cosby impression, I’ll keep liking him too. But even when SNL is mediocre (more often than not), I know I can at least stay tuned in for Weekend Update for some good comedy.
Maybe I’m unique. Or maybe I have bad taste. But I thought the Monkeys Throwing Poop was quite funny.
BTW, since we’re on the subject of monkeys, did anyone see the chimp snap at Jason Bateman at the very end when they had the whole cast out on stage?
I’ve been out of the loop a bit on American TV, but what’s Jason Bateman been doing to merit hosting SNL? Has he finally graduated from his 80’s role as the poor man’s Michael J. Fox?
Or has SNL just really slipped that far, and next week’s guest is going to be the guy who did the voice of K.I.T.T.?