SNL - "Joseph Gordon-Levitt/Mumford & Sons"

Season 38, Episode 2

For me, Joseph Gordon-Levitt (or JGL, for brevity’s sake) is an actor who just sort of…exists. It’s not that I actively dislike him, but I’ve never seen the appeal that drives so many people to swoon and whatever else it is they do at the mention of his name. (Note: This could all change if I ever get around to seeing Looper.) Will my ambivalence towards him transfer over to the show? Let’s find out.

Cold Open – Live with Kelly & Michael: Much like with the Steve Harvey sketch last week, “Live with Kelly & Michael” is a show that, in it’s current format, it’s well-known enough to really serve as the basis for a parody sketch. However, SNL played it safe by instead poking fun at the disparity of the two hosts. The best lines came from Pharoah’s Michael Strahan (another winning impression), who was endearingly dense and easily excited about his new job. The Kelly Ripa jokes were a bit more hit and miss, as Hader’s Robert Pattinson felt a little shoe-horned in, but otherwise this was a fairly strong way to start the show.

Monologue: So that it? It’s just JGL stripping? Fan service does not a great monologue make. In fact, it’s just really, really lazy.

The Undecided Voter: Making fun of undecided voters as a bloc of uniformed idiots is a fairly toothless route to go (in fact, Bill Maher made the same observation on last night’s Real Time), but this sketch gets points for how far it took the idea, having the undecideds being unknowledgeable about not just the current political climate, but also out nation’s history, procreation, and so much more.

The Son of the Most Interesting Man in the World: Though it was obvious from the beginning that this was a take on the popular Dos Equis commercials, I don’t think I could have predicted the ending reveal of it being the son of The Most Interesting Man in the World. And it was a good surprise, because the list of things that the SOTMIMW did or does was somewhat hit or miss, but the revelation that he’s doing it all in order to impress/show up his absentee father is a perfectly dark twist, and one which cast all that came before it in a different light.

Private Investigator: The idea of the artiste PI is fairly light and unsubstantial, and though the cute depictions of cheating as caricatures made for a good surprise sight gag, this is something to hang a full sketch on. Luckily this one got in and out pretty quickly – though it had to employ a really left-field, confusing, and unfunny closing punchline in order to do it.

The Son of…, Take 2: The second installment just takes the darkness of first part even farther, giving us an argument between father and son that was equal parts tense and funny. Let’s just hope that these fake ads stop here, because I don’t think it will get any better than this.

Hypnotist: Considering how many times hypnotists have been used for hoary storylines in multicam sitcoms, this sketch had me worried when it started out, and it wasn’t aided by how long it took for the first real laughs to start. But considering that those laughs were brought about by the great visual humor of Killam’s character not actually being hypnotized by JGL’s character. Where as someone acting crazy under hypnotism would have felt tired and unfunny, Killam acting crazy as if he was hypnotized even though he wasn’t was actually unfunny, especially when you consider that there was no reason for him to do so in the first place.

GOP Tampons: Given how many other late night shows have tackled the idea of Republicans not understanding women’s bodies with sketches fairly close to this one, this should have come across as stale and unoriginal. Thankfully, this was saved by the visual elements, as all the poorly engineered elements of the tampons were bizarre enough to sell the idea.

Weekend Update: In addition to Meyer’s usual shtick, we got…What Are You Doing?, which, despite just being another “Really?!” retread, worked in WU’s favor by tying together the first set of one liners, giving the gags a cohesion that’s usually missing from this segment...Assad’s Two Best Friends, which is just another retread of all the other unfunny “Two Best Friends” appearances you’ve seen in the past. This is one recurring WU bit that just needs to die…Kate McKinnon showed up and as Ann Romney, and though this one seemed primed to die in it’s early stages, McKinnon was fantastic, and helped to sell a lot of her lines. (Hader showing up as Rick Perry for a whole five seconds was similarly fantastic, and it’s little things like this that show why this episode has been so good this far)…And finally, because this was a particularly long WU, Jay Pharoah came one with an impression of sports commentator Steven A. Smith. I’m not familiar with Smith, so it’s possible that this was an impression that just went over my head (and those of the studio audience it seems), but I could recognize the strong rhythms and use of catchphrases in this one regardless. Maybe if it came up earlier in the segment I would have laughed more.

You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away: Similar to a sketch from the Ed Helms-hosted episode, this sketch used a simple song-joke rythym that gave the sketch a strong foundation. Too bad that the jokes the actors were slinging (apart from Kennan Thompson’s) weren’t all that funny. (Also, the sound mix was bit off and it was hard to hear some of the actor’s lines, which certainly didn’t help things.) But hey, at least the song was catchy, and we can always marvel at the fact that SNL got the rights to use a Beatles song in one of its sketches.

The Finer Things: A solid send-up of rap culture’s move away from gangster glorification and into straight up materialism, this was a simple idea that was perhaps stretched to an ill-fitting running time. However, the idea itself was pretty funny, and this sketch had an acceptable hit-to-miss joke ratio.

Evelyn: Ah, the weird sketch of the night, and this one did not disappoint. SNL has long used music in its sketches to varying results, but something about parents serenading a potential suitor with their daughter’s flaws in song form just worked. (However, to those audience members who laughed at the sight of JGL dressed like a woman: Seriously, how old are you?)

Powers Reality: How do you make juvenile, unfunny vandalism into the basis for a fairly funny sketch? By toying around with the exasperation of the victims, and making sure to use varied and specific details when describing the vandalism in question. It’s just too bad that this sketch had to be cut for time.

This was one of the strongest SNL episodes in recent memory, and for once the host had nothing to do with it. That’s not to ding JGL’s hosting duties – indeed, he was top-notch and game for anything. But the writers were equally on top of their game this week as well, and turned out a string of solid to great sketches. It’s interesting to note that a lot of these sketches started out weak or from shaky premises before growing stronger, but apart from that, you won’t here a whole lot a whole of complaints from me.

Best Sketch – Hypnotist

Worst Sketch – You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away

In Two Weeks: Daniel Craig acts all British, and Muse does…whatever it is that Muse does.

Quotes, Etc.:

“It’s like I’m living the life of a rich bear.”

“We’re like a poster for The Blind Side.”

“Wait, you’re mean we’re getting paid too? This just keeps getting better and better. Yesterday Mario Batali made me pasta, and all I had to say was ‘yum!’”

“In that movie I play a young Bruce Willis, so basically I’m playing Ashton Kutcher.”

“Can women vote? Because if not, as a women, I have a problem with that?”

“Can a women get pregnant just from French kissing?”

“And he just accidentally sent a picture of his penis to the guy who delivers his Chinese food.”

“Tres Equis. That means ‘triple ex’, homies.”

“How did he get such a low rate? He claimed 47% of Americans as dependents.”

“Then Ryan won them back by yelling, ‘Hey, who likes soup?!’”

“You’re like the killer who gets away with murder and then sends cops puzzles to figure them out.”

“So wait, was Clint Eastwood the Smoke Monster?”

“Thought what’s shocking is that there are humans inside those suits, and not, as I had assumed, a hundred rats working together.”

“I drank so much apple cider I woke up the next morning in my bed in my pajamas.”

“She’s going to be even more upset when she finds out Michael Phelps is white.”

“Don’t give my husband a black eye, and then imply that he got pistol-whipped by a ding-dong.”

“And both of them playing Penis Tennis at Wimbledong.”