SNL - "Melissa McCarthy/Lady Antebellum"

Season 37, Episode 2

Hey everybody, let’s watch fatty make a funny!

Cold Open: A Lawrence Welk cold open. Of course. I’ve never been a fan of them, for multiple reasons. It’s just another reason for Fred Armisen to adopt a funny voice and Kristen Wiig to act like yet another weirdo. It’s one of the recurring joke sketches that only has one joke, and it get old fast. Well, the show doubled down on that joke tonight; not only was Wiig there were her deformed hands and forehead, but McCarthy had to show up all muscle-bound and beaver-toothed. First sketch, first fat joke of the night. This does not bode well for the rest of the episode.

Monologue: I was going to start this off with a snarky “Oh good a dancing monologue, the old stand-by for when a guest doesn’t want to do comedy…” type of opening, but it seems as if the show has beat me to it. The dance routine has often be the fallback for monologue where the writers couldn’t come up with a real joke. It’s never funny, sometimes entertaining, and always a letdown. The show somehow managed to send this up by having Wiig and McCarthy dance around well, dancing around. It wasn’t particularly funny, but it was entertaining to watch it unfold, and I applaud SNL for at least acknowledging that it sometimes relies on a crutch.

Little Poundcake: Given the recent debates over the HPV vaccine, especially the “how young is too young?” debate, this was an ad that was surprisingly incisive without being overly obvious. Plus, it was a simple joke that didn’t overstay its welcome or take too long to build up, which is often the problem with the commercials as of late.

Arlene: “Hey guys, we got Melissa McCarthy as the host for our second episode!” “Oh man, she was great in Bridesmaids as the husky, sexually assertive woman!” “Hey, I bet we could turn that into a sketch.” “Oh, cool idea bro. High five!” “Oh, we should probably mix it up a little so people don’t accuse us of ripping off a movie.” “Hey, let’s throw in a second guy who’s a chubby chaser.” “Awwww yeah, that shit’s always funny.” “Yeah, let’s knock this bitch out, then we can go grab some beers.”

Digital Short – STOMP: As a fan of STOMP, I actually found this segment to be quite fun. But even if I wasn’t, I think it raises an important question: Do SNL sketches always have to be funny? Though it wasn’t exactly humorous, there was something entertaining about watching the variety of sounds come together to make something weird and wonderful, and I couldn’t help but hope that the show embrace its more oddball tendencies more often. Of course, the sketch then answered my question by ending on a punch line, albeit a hilarious one that involved the assassination of the Blue Man Group.

The Comments Section: So here’s the thing about Internet comment sections: they’re really only funny in context, and even then only if the commentators have enough comedic sense to build on previous comments. Now, I get that this sketch was meant to mock the unfunny comments that litter the internet (mostly YouTube), but unfunny comments just don’t make for a funny sketch.

Rock’s Way: Getting Jay Pharaoh to do another spot-on impression? Check. A sketch that mocks the shallowness of Hollywood casting? Check. Sure, mocking Rock’s shtick is a bit old hat at this point, but something about putting it in the context of Broadway made it funny all over again.

Weekend Update: In addition to Seth’s usual quips….We saw the Ghadaffi’s two best friends growing up, which I can’t believe is a returning thing. I guess I could pretend that I’m excited to be on the ground floor of a recurring segment, so I could comment on its evolution, but in truth it’s just too unfunny….Tyler Perry stopped by for a second time, here to comment on being the richest man in the world. I enjoyed Thompson’s original performance as Perry, and it was still pretty funny here, but I hope that the show doesn’t over-rely on him too much. Even as a Perry detractor, I admit there are only so many “he’s rich and self-absorbed” jokes that can be made before it gets old.

Focus Group: So I guess this would be a good place to talk about McCarthy as host, since it was yet another unfunny sketch. McCarthy seems game enough, and I respect the fact that the show has placed her front and center in some of the sketches. Yet the show seems to have banked on McCarthy’s sitcom training, as they’ve written all over-the-top roles for her, instead of writing things are actually funny.

The Essentials, Do Not Not Disturb: Fatty walks up the stairs, falls down, repeat. Apparently we’ve moved from Bridesmaids to Mike & Molly. I get that the sketch was trying to mock the idea of the films of the 40s that blatantly recycled premises over and over again, and Sudeikis was made some fairly funny interjections between each “film”, but the sketch still boiled down to a single fat joke repeated seven times over, and that’s just lazy.

Lovemaking Complaints: Finally, a sketch that McCarthy’s in that’s also funny. It may not be the most hilarious thing ever, but the show wisely made use of the 12:55 slot to work in some really bizarre and hilarious lovemaking complaints. Now, of course I can’t overlook the correlation between McCarthy’s smaller role and the sketch’s higher quality, but I don’t think that rests on McCarthy. Rather it’s indicative of the episode as a whole – the writers just couldn’t come up with good material for her.

Best Sketch – “Digital Short – STOMP”

Worst Sketch – “Focus Group”

Next Week: Ben Stiller hosts, and Foster The People performs. Only one of these is coming off a wave of critical support.

Quotes, Etc.:

“Was that Blue Man Group?” “Yup.” “Shit.”

“Hey, I can’t hit a woman.” “Well, she called Garfield the N-word.” “All right.”

“It was black-tacular!”

“She had to expose it, because she believe there’s something it’s not telling her about the Natalie Holloway case.”

“Unless drinking coffee was something the two of you used to do together.”

“It’s expected to sell well among parents who always buy the wrong thing.”

“Or you may be white.”

“Hah, I own Atlanta.”

“Seth, my movies are about the modern black experience. They’re ALL disaster movies.”

“While people who like Delta or Southwest enjoy sitting in the dark and stabbing knives into their leg.”

“Shut up, Sue…We all hate you, so much.”

“Hello, I’m Robert Osbourne. That’s pretty neat, right?”

“She died as she lived: on all fours with three closeted gay men staring at her butt.”

“…And because of you, her dog is pregnant.” “I don’t do condoms.”