In the early days of Saturday Night Live, it wasn’t surprising for a host to return within the same season or calendar year. Candice Bergen, Buck Henry, and Elliott Gould all hosted twice during the first season with Henry hosting 10 times total during the show’s first five seasons. But as SNL grew in popularity and influence, the pool of possible hosts grew outside the small group of friends and heroes that hosted the first few seasons to include politicians, athletes and musicians, leading to longer gaps between hosting gigs.
Chris Hemsworth hosted for the second time in nine months this past weekend, and showed that his fun first appearance in March was no fluke. Hemsworth is probably known more for his physique and starring in action movies, but his two turns as host (along with The Cabin in the Woods and the occasional joke as Thor in the Marvel films) have shown that he is a capable comedic actor. Hemsworth’s comedic timing, along with some slightly off-kilter sketches, kept SNL fun and funny for the fourth episode in a row leading up to the final show before the show’s holiday break next week .
Cold Open: A Message from former President George W. Bush
Outside of Larry David as Senator Bernie Sanders and Jay Pharoah as Dr. Ben Carson, this season — which is already needing to address the 2016 presidential election — has been lacking a bit in good political impressions. Kate McKinnon is still trying to find her voice as Hillary Clinton, something doesn’t seem right (not racist enough?) about Taran Killam’s Donald Trump, and we haven’t even seen Pharoah’s President Barack Obama once this season.
Thankfully, someone like former cast member Will Ferrell can just waltz onto stage, transport himself and everyone back in time 15 years, and deliver a great impression and cold open. Ferrell’s George W. Bush might be the greatest political impression in the history of SNL, and has helped Ferrell be listed amongst the all-time great cast members. In fact, he won the Grantland (RIP) “Best Cast Member” tournament before the start of last season, beating Phil Hartman in the final round by almost 7,000 votes. These six minutes with Ferrell remind us how great he was on SNL, and had me hoping for a Bill Brasky sketch to end the night.
Best Sketch: Star Wars Toys
I try to stay away from picking the commercial parodies because they are typically one of the more consistently funny sketches in each episode, but this one hit a little too close to home.
While I never had a massive case to hold my Star Wars collectibles, I bought my fair share of newer Star Wars figures that never left their package and were placed into a box for resale later. Sadly, I probably lost money when I sold them (plus my broken childhood Star Wars toys) 10+ years ago, and now my oldest son is a massive Star Wars fan. He could have had my Star Destroyer and Millennium Falcon instead of asking me to buy new ones.
Second Best Sketch: Christmas Sing-a-long
During a regular episode, this sketch may have been placed in the “10-to-1” spot, but in an episode filled with absurd sketches it aired before the first musical performance. Cecily Strong gives a great performance singing the faux-Broadway standard, “Debra’s Time,” confusing her friends in the process. Sadly, this song and the musical “It’s Christmas After All” are not actually appearing on Broadway.
Weekend Update Moment: Leslie Jones on Breaking Bad
If you follow Leslie Jones on Twitter, you may have noticed that for the past few weeks she has been watching and tweeting about the late, great Breaking Bad. Jones is upset that her new favorite show failed to receive any Golden Globe nominations, especially since the show has inspired her to start her own meth operation. If you’re older than 35, you may have laughed at the great AMC hatchback joke, unlike the studio audience.
McKinnon returned as German chancellor Angela Merkel to discuss her recent TIME Person of the Year cover, while Michael Che and Colin Jost continued their assault on Donald Trump. Che and Jost have been the most consistent voice against Trump on SNL, and finally received some help this week from Ferrell’s cold open.
Second Best SNL Male Stripper Sketch Ever: Male Strippers
The patrons of an all-nude male strip club, Hunk Junktion, are confused when five guys from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts put on a show about their “America” without ever taking their clothes off. While nowhere near the level of Patrick Swayze and Chris Farley’s classic “Chippendales” sketch, it was slightly better than the “Bongo’s Clown Room” sketch with Channing Tatum.
Other Notes:
Jay Pharoah teamed up on a video this week with First Lady Michelle Obama and CollegeHumor to bring awareness to her Better Make Room campaign, which is working to engage teenagers about educational opportunities beyond high school.
Chance the Rapper debuted a new song, “Somewhere in Paradise,” during his first performance which also featured an appearance from Jeremih.
Jon Rudnitsky finally starred in his first sketch as Mark the Pirate.
“Brother 2 Brother” returned with another sketch devoted to pointing out the differences between Hemsworth’s and Killam’s bodies. My favorite joke was in the credits:
Killam replaced Bobby Moynihan as Senator Ted Cruz in the “On the Record with Greta Van Susteren” sketch. Moynihan appeared as New Jersey governor Chris Christie in the same sketch, so it’s possible this is just temporary.
Saturday Night Live returns on Dec. 19 with hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler and musical guest Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band.
