Alec Baldwin / Jonas Brothers
February 14, 2009
RATINGS SYSTEM
***** = Excellent, a possible future classic
**** = Great
*** = Average
** = Meh
* = How'd this get past dress?
Cold Opening - Republican Congressional Leadership Meeting
• Aykroyd! That was a nice surprise. It’s always nice to see him back on SNL, but it’s too bad they gave him such weak material here.
• While it was interesting seeing them do an anti-Obama opening, this just didn’t work. It went on way too long and there were no big laughs.
• Apparently, Aykroyd was also supposed to appear in a Jeff Montgomery sketch that must’ve got cut after dress. The dress rehearsal promo that NBC aired before the show had a clip of Will as Jeff Montgomery and Aykroyd standing next to him dressed similarly and both of them saying “Whaaaaaat” to the camera. Funny, the last time they did a Jeff Montgomery sketch, I predicted he would next appear on Valentine’s Day.
Stars: *½
Monologue - Alec Baldwin
• The “Thank you, Christian Bale” bit at the beginning was hilarious.
• It was nice seeing Jack McBrayer on SNL. His line at the end about not wanting to seem desperate by hosting SNL frequently & Alec’s facial reaction to that was really good.
• I also liked the part with Bobby taking a picture with Jack.
Stars: ***½
Sketch - The Oldest Jonas
• The obligatory Jonas Brothers sketch appearance of the night.
• This wasn’t too good and it seemed like too obvious a premise, but Alec did the best he could and got a few good laughs.
• The ending with Alec revealing he was himself but “not the Alec Baldwin from 30 Rock” didn’t make any sense AT ALL.
Stars: **
Sketch - The Cougar Den
• I was disappointed at first to see this sketch back again since I didn’t like the second one and I thought it was gone for good after Amy left, but they replaced her with Michaela. Tonight’s sketch ended up being a little better than I thought.
• Michaela didn’t really get enough to say, though.
• Alec as the cou-gay was great and I loved his line about “uno vagina”.
• Kristen’s story about the 12 ½ year old was very funny.
• Kenan’s character in this sketch is usually pretty funny, but they overdid it this time with the cutaways to him after he insults the cougars.
• In the aforementioned dress rehearsal promo, they showed a clip from this sketch, but Cameron Diaz’s character was trying to pounce on the Jonas Brothers instead of Bill, Will, and Andy.
Stars: ***
Digital Short - Property of the Queen
• I should’ve expected a digital short featuring the Jonas Brothers tonight.
• The VCR bit at the beginning was funny.
• The first few music videos weren’t anything special although I give the Jonas Brothers credit for having a sense of humor to do this, but the Ask the Wizard video was awesome and saved this. Bill looked hilarious and the ending with him on the couch was great.
Stars: ***
Sketch/Commercial - Sir Mix-A-Lot’s Photo Shop
• Not only was this incredibly dated, but it just wasn’t funny. And it starred Kenan. Nuff said.
• The only laugh I got was from Will and Bobby in the background dancing at the end. Did anyone else notice their faces looked really similar? I almost couldn’t tell the difference between them at first.
Stars: *½
Weekend Update - Seth Meyers, featuring Oscar Rogers, Angelina Jolie, Angie Tempura, Joaquin Phoenix
• Best jokes: Helen Thomas, Marion Barry, Joaquin Phoenix, Valentine’s Day
• I was disappointed to see Kenan’s “Fix It!” character back once again, but at least they attempted to make this different from his last two appearances. Still wasn’t funny, though, and why is there so much Kenan in this episode anyway?
• The Angelina Jolie bit was basically just the same as last time and it wasn’t quite as good. Why must SNL make EVERYTHING recurring?
• It was interesting to see Michaela do a character. Her commentary was great and a dead-on parody of those types of stupid bloggers.
• I had been hoping they’d do a parody of the infamous Joaquin Phoenix/Letterman interview. Jason did a good job as him.
Stars: ***½
Sketch - Vincent Price’s Valentine’s Day Special
• I always love this sketch. Bill did his usual excellent job as Vincent Price.
• Kristen does another great classical impression, this time as Carol Channing. THIS is the stuff that Kristen excels at. The part with her sitting on top of the hand was hilarious as well.
• Fred as Liberace and the “strange hand sticking through a hole” and “how long do I have to tug on this until something happens” parts were priceless.
Stars: ****
Sketch - Meeting Schedule
• I’m very surprised they brought the Fartface guys back, especially considering that sketch was so poorly received. I was one of the very few people who actually liked the Farface sketch (mainly because of Forte and Hader's performances, not so much the material itself), so I didn’t mind seeing them back again. And they actually made this sketch different this time and had the characters doing something new, which is something SNL doesn’t do enough with recurring sketches.
• Will’s tiny toupee had me laughing right from the start.
• Is it just me, or did Will’s character have a moustache last time? How come he didn’t have one tonight?
• The autopsy & gloryhole bits were the funniest moments. Weird how there was a gloryhole joke in two back-to-back sketches tonight, though.
• Every time Will said “Carol, hold my caaaalllls” cracked me up as well.
Stars: ***½
Sketch - Wario Shake
• A low-brow sketch and Mad TV did something similar before with flashlights, but I still laughed and the performances from Alec and everyone else made the material better.
• The “she’ll be a natural at this” line was great.
Stars: ***
Commercial - Chewable Pampers
• Rerun.
Commercial - Virgania Horsen’s Hot Air Balloon Rides
• ANOTHER rerun??? What’s going on? And why two commercials in a row starring Kristen? Did we need another reminder of how overexposed she is? And why re-air a commercial from LAST season? If they had to re-air a Virgania Horsen ad, at least have it be the Pony Express one from this season. Or they could’ve aired the second part of the Hot Air Balloon one that was allegedly cut after dress last time.
Sketch - First Coughs
• A pretty funny closing sketch.
• The expression on Bill’s face when he looked at the napkin he coughed into was excellent.
Stars: ***
_________________________________________________________
Episode Highlights:
• Vincent Price’s Valentine’s Day Special
• Parts of Weekend Update
• Monologue
• Meeting Schedule
• Bill as the Wizard
Episode Lowlights:
• Sir Mix-A-Lot’s Photo Shop
• Republican Congressional Leadership Meeting
• The “Fix It!” guy
• The ending of The Oldest Jonas
• The fact that there were TWO repeated commercials, and aired back-to-back to boot
Best Performer of the Night:
• Alec Baldwin / Bill Hader
FINAL THOUGHTS
A decent show, but not up to the standards of Baldwin’s last episode. A lot of the sketches were passable, but I wish there was more instant-classic material like most Baldwin shows have. There was also a little too much rehashing of characters for my likes. Still, this was an overall satisfying-enough episode and Baldwin was his usual excellent self.
CASTMEMBER COUNT DOWN
ARMISEN: 3 sketches (Monologue, Vincent Price, First Coughs)
FORTE: 6 sketches (Republican Meeting, Cougar Den, Digital Short, Sir Mix-A-Lot, Schedule, First Coughs)
HADER: 6 sketches (Cougar Den, Digital Short, Vincent Price, Schedule, Wario Shake, First Coughs)
HAMMOND: 1 sketch (Republican Meeting)
MEYERS: 1 sketch (Update)
SAMBERG: 4 sketches (Republican Meeting, Cougar Den, Digital Short, First Coughs)
SUDEIKIS: 5 sketches (Republican Meeting, Monologue, Update, Wario Shake, First Coughs)
THOMPSON: 5 sketches (Cougar Den, Digital Short, Sir Mix-A-Lot, Update, First Coughs)
WIIG: 5 sketches (Republican Meeting, Monologue, Cougar Den, Vincent Price, First Coughs)
ELLIOTT: 2 sketches (Sir Mix-A-Lot, Update)
MOYNIHAN: 3 sketches (Monologue, Digital Short, Sir Mix-A-Lot)
WATKINS: 3 sketches (Cougar Den, Update, Wario Shake)
WILSON: 3 sketches (Cougar Den, Sir Mix-A-Lot, Vincent Price)