Saturday Night Live
 

I have been digging SNL so hard this year. Everyone was so quick to write it off, but the show has always gone through highs and lows and now it looks like we're beginning to see another high period. They've definitely benefited from the election and how much Tina Fey looks like Sarah Palin. That stuff made them somewhat relevant again. And they are going to be in a bit of trouble now that Amy Poehler's gone. But I'm confident they'll recover. This past weekend's show with Mad Men's Jon Hamm was the best in a long time. Vincent Price's Halloween Spectacular and The Finger Guy and John Hamm's John Ham were all priceless bits of funny.

The cast needs some work, there's some dead weight hanging around. But in terms of just making me laugh, SNL has been doing a pretty good job of it lately. Saturday Night Live throughout the nineties was always very hit-or-miss, but I still loved it. And now I think I'm ready to love it again.

So is anybody else watching the current incarnation of SNL? What do you think of the cast? Does the show make you laugh?

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Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I DVR it most weeks and at least skim through it. Whatever you think of SNL and its fluctuating quality, you have to watch during election season. You just have to. They'll probably never top their work on the 2000 election, which was positively, epicly funny (and strikingly even-handed), but it's still one of the things they do best.

LOVED to see Tim Calhoun back a couple weeks ago, by the way. Definitely one of my favorite recurring Update characters.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I think the idea that they lean so heavily to the left in their political comedy is a fair criticism. But you also have to admit that McCain/Palin are a lot easier to make fun of than Obama/Biden. Not to mention the fact that their relatively young audience is probably something like 75% liberal, maybe even more. But, yeah, I agree that the Gore/Bush debate sketches with "Strategery" and "Lock-boxes" and whatnot were much better than the recent riffs we've gotten on this election.

SNL's cold open last weekend did make fun of Biden but it wasn't necessarily all that funny. I can't really explain it, but lately whenever something like SNL or The Daily Show tries to reach across the aisle and mock the political left, it just comes off as tired and unnatural and it doesn't seem to work at all. I think their hands are tied by the sharp, dividing political climate we've got going now and the fact that, like I said, the majority of their audience is young and liberal.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

Tina Fey and Amy Poehler are hilarious!

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I really don't bother to watch SNL these days. But judging from clips I have seen on YouTube among other places it seems that the election has sort of revitalized the show. At least for a while. SNL hasn't really been all that funny since the late 90s.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I watched bits of it here and there (mostly because on one of them had the Killers performing) it wasn't as ad as I expected. I liked the Mark Walberg skit, where he comes back and is angry about talking to animals.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

Last weekend's show did do a pretty fantastic job of providing more politically balanced comedy. McCain was actually very funny both times he appeared and the fact that he was willing to poke fun at himself so much as well as ripping Obama is great. The "Sad Grandpa" strategy almost made me drop dead from convulsive laughter. And host Ben Affleck delivered one of the most virtuoso, hilarious SNL performances ever in a fine-tuned skewering of Keith Olbermann. He looked like Olbermann, and even though he sounded nothing like Olbermann, it was still a perfect flippin Olbermann. Just dead-on. Say what you will about Affleck's acting chops, he's still a dynamite Saturday Night Live host and that Countdown sketch was brilliant.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

Aye, I agree on both counts -- both that their left-aimed stuff usually feels forced, but that it absolutely didn't this weekend. Couldn't agree more about the Olbermann skit. That guy's had it coming to him for ages, and they didn't disappoint, even though, you're right, it didn't sound anything like him. It just kept going and goin and Affleck never let up.

My girlfriend was laughing like crazy at the McCain stuff, though she laughed hardest at "The Double Maverick" ("that's when I go totally bezerk and freak everyone out!"). Great stuff. The audience didn't seem to properly appreciate the "McCain Fine Gold" line, though.

I thought the Murtha/Biden stuff kinda fell flat, but it was a nice try.

Re: Affleck as an actor (not to get too off topic). I think he's quite good actually, but my lady friend pointed out that people had tried to shoehorn him into movie star action roles, probably because he looks like a movie star. So it was probably inevitable that he end up in things like Pearl Harbor and Daredevil, but it just doesn't suit him.

Obviously he was great in Good Will Hunting, and I heartily recommend him (and everyone else) in Changing Lanes if you haven't seen it already. And with Gone Baby Gone he's clearly shown people that he's got plenty of talent on the other side of the lens. I think he's still got some genuinely great roles in him, though, and it seems like he's got a good handle on what his strengths are, too.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I have to watch SNL clips on the official website cause im a brit so i dont get the whole effect. I love amy poehler and the bill hader but think kristin wiig is so damn funny but shes not getting the press she deserves. her Suzie Orman sketch was high-larious, well i enjoyed it
http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Li...-orman/250061/

I think keenan Thompson is good too but he's getting minimal parts. I cannot stand Andy Samberg. Eugh!

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

SNL was way better in the days of John Belushi, Dan Akroyd, Molly Shannon, Steve Martin, etc.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I hear a lot of people saying that but I bet at the time people didnt think it was that great

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

Great call on Kristin Wiig; she's brilliant. SNL has something like four characters that are really based on nothing more than one of her voices and a collection of mannerisms, and most of them work.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I like what I've seen of this season, it's good to see they're not writing the show for teenagers anymore, and doing more clever things. The cast is one of the better ones in recent years. I mean yeah, there's dead spots, but every season has those, even the legendary first five.

The first few seasons, and then the late 80's/early 90's seasons are the ones to beat for me though.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

I enjoyed SNL the most when Chris Farley, Phil Hartman, etc. were the cast.

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

Tonight is Amy Poehler's last appearance on Saturday Night Live.

Bummer.

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Re: Saturday Night Live
 

:(

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

Not sure if this is the place, but had to post this somewhere:

https://twitter.com/nbcsnl/status/1183237058963398658

Re: Saturday Night Live
 

That.
Sent.
CHILLS.
down my spine.


I'd buy the collector edition of that. Twice.

So glad to see this posted...one of television's biggest secrets right now is that SNL is funny again. It has become so fashionable to diss this show, but I think this latest retooling of the show has produced one of the best casts this show has had since the Mike Meyers/Dana Carvey/Chris Rock/Adam Sandler days. Kate McKinnon is nothing short of brilliant, as are Beck Bennett, Pete Davidson, Alex Moffat, Cecily Strong, and Mikey Day. And Colin Jost and Michael Che have completely reinvented Weekend Update. I wish people who deserted this show 20 years ago would give it another chance.