Saturday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday

By Nathan Rabin  |  October 17, 2008 | 3:19am
TV Reviews TV

In the comments for last week's write up of Saturday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday, a reader complained that I should not be writing about Saturday Night Live, since I obviously didn't care about the show. I have never in my life been more offended. If anything I care way the fuck too much about Saturday Night Live. I watch SNL religiously, have written essays about it, read every book written about the show and happily volunteered to write about the release of the NBC fixture's first few seasons for a TV Club Classic blog read by literally several people. I even have Horatio Sanz's face tattooed on my ass, though that, in retrospect, may have been a mistake, like the three dozen tequila shots I imbibed before I decided to give myself a homemade tattoo of the corpulent, giggle-prone comedy institution.

So it pleases me greatly to announce that the second installment of the confusingly titled Saturday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday was fucking awesome. Call me crazy, but I think a show should have at most one day in its title. That's why that Friday Night Lights spin-off Friday Night Lights: Sunday Afternoon Monday Morning Quarterback Wednesdayfest never caught on and why Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector bombed. Is he a fucking cable guy or is he a goddamned motherfucking health inspector? Make up your mind, Hollywood eggheads!

I complained earlier that Saturday Night Live has not found a winning satirical angle on Senator Obama. But tonight the show cast him as a winningly befuddled straight man in the sad ongoing saga that is John McCain very publicly losing his goddamned mind.

I did not watch the last Presidential debate but apparently overnight a gentleman named Joe the Plumber became the most famous person in the world, narrowly beating out Monsieur Obama and his close personal friends Paris Hilton, Britney Spears and Bill Ayres. I have mixed feelings about this, as "Joe The Plumber" is also my performing name with Chippendales. Let's just say that when I whip out my plumbing snake, the tips just pour in.

In the opening debate sketch we learn that the instantly famous Joe The Plumber is in fact a three and a half inch tall magical creature that lives in a shoebox underneath John McCain's bed and will be appointed to a plumbing-related post in the cabinet of a John McCain administration. It was a supremely silly, absurd idea the show really ran with. I laughed loudly and often during this sketch and Darrell Hammond really nailed McCain's creeping lunacy.

The "Weekend Update" that followed was consistently funny as well, though I'm drawing a blank on jokes that particularly amused me. I did like the anchor's characterization of Obama and McCain as Joe Cool and Yosemite Sam however. I could have done without yet another Kristin Wiig turn as a crazy woman in a bad wig muttered gibberish in a mannered fashion. I think malapropism-based gags run neck and neck with puns and whoopee cushions as the lowest form of humor.

Amy Poehler and Seth Myers were surprisingly loose tonight. I suspect that Lorne Michaels will paddle them both for screwing up a few times and improvising slightly. As Damon Wayans will be happy to tell you, that kind of shit is not tolerated at 30 Rock. Homey don't play that so you best believe Mr. Michaels will be smacking them both with a sock.

Grade: A- Stray Observations–

–I think this is the second, and also second-to-last Saturday Night Live Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Surprise. Do you think they might pump out more if the ratings are good?
–Heck, I even liked Hammond in Bronzer as Jesse Jackson

 
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