March 12, 2022 – Zoë Kravitz / Rosalía (S47 E15)

Cold Opening – White House TikTok Meeting

• Good to see James’ Biden back.
• Hmmm, an interesting conceit to this open, hopefully it will live up to it.
• Kate as Psaki?! Is Chloe missing? Oh wait, there’s Chloe.
• So, Kate plays Psaki as Kate with no change at all in her vocals or mannerism? Yet another powerhouse performance from our forever star.
• Chloe is absolutely stealing this open with her very funny take on ”actress from The CW”.
• To be fair, I’m getting my usual laughs from Kate, she’s always great as an extremely underrated straight man & her delivery remains flawless.
• A funny bit with Chris’s Jason Derulo, yet not enough to steal this sketch.
• Not caring for Aidy’s voice in this.
• Man, the audience is pretty hot in this open, unlike how they were mostly comatose during last week’s.
• A very funny bit with Kenan.
• NOT caring for Melissa’s part AT ALL. It wasn’t funny the first time, and no I’m not a TikTok person, but the others gave me good laughs.
• Ouch! the last bit with Melissa making that voice bombed HARD with the audience, oof!
• Bowen’s part felt too meh for me, and I NEVER say that about him.
• A good open overall, far better than most of this half of the season, and especially the DIRE one from last week.

Rating: ***

Monologue

• Interesting that they’re doing an ”interrupting the host” monologue.
• Kate looks hilarious in that getup.
• Wow! A very rare line flub from Kate, too bad she’s laughing her way through her part.
• Ego looks very pleasing to the eyes as Catwoman, and again is being her usual hilarious, charismatic self.
• No comment about Aidy’s part.
• Ah, here comes Chris trying to bring in some stability into this. He’s hilarious as Katt Williams.
• An overall average monologue, with some charm in it. Yet, it felt like the show didn’t have any confidence for Zoë to lead this on her own monologue, but I’m maybe reading into this too much & they might have wanted to try new things.

Rating: ***

Maid of Honor

• This seems like it has the potential of being a pretty good sketch.
• Right out of the gate, I’m enjoying Zoë’s performance and delivery.
• Sketches like this are the ones that still remind me that Cecily is still in the cast, she’s been (mercifully) very useless & expendable in these past Three seasons.
• Please stop it SNL with the REACTING/EXPLAINING portions!! I don’t need a recap for a skit that I’m watching with MY OWN EYES.
• Zoë is performing this well, and coming off great, but the material is tiresome & mean-spirited more than funny.
• This has to be humiliation sketch #3746733 in this era. A tired, lazy, pointless type of sketches that I always despise.
• Can someone please tell Kyle’s character to shut the hell up already??!! I do NOT need him to REACT to every single revelation that Zoë discloses & REPEAT THE EXACT WORDS EACH TIME!!!
• A mediocre sketch overall, and a terrible way to start this episode.

Rating: **

Amazon Go

• This is kinda reminding me of the classic Amazon Echo commercial from season 42.
• I know I’ve been tearing into her all season long, but I’m enjoying Cecily’s voice-over work in this commercial.
• A priceless twist to this commercial, I know I’m going to love this.
• Kenan is stealing this sketch with his hilarious testimonial.
• I’m loving the contrast between how white people react to this commercial & how black people are reacting to this with fear and suspicion. Some very solid commentary on racism & stereotypes.
• Chris is absolutely hilarious in his part in this, yelling to make sure that Amazon updates his status.
• Great part with Kenan giving away a tip and raising his hands in the air as he’s leaving the store.
• Great ending to a great commercial. Simply fantastic.

Rating: ****1/2

Porch Scene

• Is SNL kidding make this sketch recurring?
• Ugh, here comes another one from The Kate & Aidy Lack-of-Variety Hour.
• As always, I’m NOT caring about Aidy and Kate’s performances in this.
• I’ve been surprisingly enjoying most of Aidy’s work this season, after how she became downright unwatchable last season (aside from few exceptions of course), but with Kate’s return, I’m afraid her potential final season will turn out as bad as her previous one. She still gave us some solid work this year, with the fantastic Sleepy Town USA & the enjoyable Aidy’s Dream. Reminding me of how consistently solid, funny, creative, and brilliant she was in most of her first eight seasons on the show & how I used to see her as my favorite of the cast with Beck back in the day.
• Back to the sketch, this is starting to bore the living hell out of me! I would’ve enjoyed riffing on it if it was fun bad, like the Harassment sketch from the latest episode, but this is DULL.
• Terrible ending, simply awful.
• Aside from the fantastic commercial, tonight’s episode got off to a terrible start.

Rating: *1/2

The Princess and the Frog

• Oh boy, this setting reminds of the notorious Cinderella sketch from Nick Jonas’ episode last season.
• No comment regarding Cecily’s opening number.
• OH GOD, we’re doing dick jokes now?!?! is this an unused script from the Dafoe episode?
• Ah, here goes Chris with his reliable sketch-saving abilities.
• Chris’ line deliveries are as always a riot, but they’re not saving this sketch as much.
• Not even a potentially-sketch-stealing walk-on from Kenan is doing anything for me.
• This sketch feels like a couple of sketches put in one, it needed some editing & tighter writing to make it work.
• A solid ending with Andrew at least.

Rating: **

Please Don’t Destroy – We Got Her a Cat

• More than pleased to see these back, they’re always solid.
• Happy to see the audience’s reaction at the beginning of this short.
• Seeing this cat, as a cat lover, makes me already on board with this short.
• As usual, some solid & fun escalations throughout.
• Good laugh from the photo of Paul Rudd with an ant.
• Zoë is coming off really great in this.
• PAUL DANO!!!!!
• Love the bit with Paul doing a PDD biographical movie.
• Great part with Ben breaking his lego set.
• Great ending to the usual fun, energetic, and solid PDD short.

Rating: ****

Old Home Movies

• The setup of this reminds of the classic Bette Davis sketch with Jan Hooks.
• Chris has been all over the episode tonight, always great to see.
• An interesting mention of J.B. Smoove.
• I would’ve loved it if they cut out the reacting parts a bit, they’re hurting this sketch in general.
• I’m loving how Kenan is miming the sounds of the fast-forward & pause, he’s generally great in this.
• Got a good chuckle from the goggly eyes pump, as it reminded me of the classic Goggly Eyes Gardner sketch, an all-time favorite of mine.
• A sketch that’s not bad, but has somewhat of a hollow feel to it, despite the solid performances, I’m gonna give it a passing rating due to the solid Kenan-led portions.

Rating: ***

Weekend Update

• Always love the ”seen here” jokes from Colin and Michael, they always work for me.
• Colin: “Starbucks is shutting down their operations in order to send a message to… Vanderpump Rintin?”
• TERRY FINK!!!
• Ah, I couldn’t be happier to see this character back behind the desk, he should’ve been the new Jebidiah Atkinson. I would love one more visit to the Update desk before the season’s end.
• Terry: “You say tomato, I say godjweiojojwifjewije”.
• As usual, fantastic characterization from Alex & I’m loving the subtle sense of pathos in his commentaries as Terry.
• Fantastic & very impressive facial movements from Terry juts now, the hints of pathos and melancholy yet again are fantastic. Alex is killing this.
• Loved the part when Terry calls Colin by his own name.
• As always, A strong, memorable Alex Moffat Weekend Update commentary. Alex continues to prove himself to be Update gold each time he’s on.
• Colin: “The other option is not!”
• Great makeup on Kyle.
• YAWN, this is turning into pathetic loser role #63633 from Kyle.
• What the fuck am I watching??!! This is fucking TERRIBLE so far! How did this make it past dress, let alone the table read??!!
• Yeah, this is going the SAME EXACT route as his other 6,3633 roles as a pathetic loser, you should’ve left with Beck, Kyle. Too bad he stayed after a strong 7th & 8th seasons. He just feels even more OUT of place on the show right now.
• The vocal modifier bit is not as funny as the show thinks it is, and having some glitches as Kyle’s speaking is FAR more amusing than this snooze-inducing commentary.
• Yeah, I got nothing more to say but that this baffling piece lowered my final rating for Update by half-a-star, thanks Kyle.

Rating: ****

Word Crunch

• Andrew’s strong season continues as his natural dryness is PERFECT for a game show host.
• The set design reminds of the What Even Matters Anymore sketch from the Jessica Chastain episode in season 43.
• Huh, forgot that Aristotle is still in the cast, as his tenure is dying a miserable death.
• Big guilty laugh from the very first utterance of “momhole”.
• Solid bit with Sarah as the sound engineer.
• While this sketch seems to be going the one-joke route, it has some solid lines & performances, especially Andrew’s fantastic straight man delivery & frustration, it more than makes up for the somewhat shaky writing.
• A big laugh from the last word puzzle.
• An ok ending.

Rating: ***1/2 (The latter for Andrew)

Don’t Stop Believin’

• Pretty rare to see Bowen leading a sketch this season, aside from Update, he barely had lead roles in any live pieces.
• Right out of the gate, this is a very flimsy & uncreative premise for a sketch.
• Was this sketch written by a 50 year-old guy? Who in the world still brings up journey’s songs from over 30 years ago? Look, I love Journey, but this premise cannot sustain a four-minutes sketch.
• Yeah, this sketch is going on and on, with me NOT caring at the slightest.
• No comment about the others getting confused and trying to correct Bowen’s pronunciation of “Believin”.
• Like the professional that he is, Bowen is performing the HELL out of this sketch, but the material is too flimsy that not even his sketch-saving abilities is helping to salvage it.
• The sketch continues to drone on and on and on and on.
• Mercifully, this is over. I do not know the HELL was this sketch’s aim or comedic through line was ever supposed to be.
• A bad, pointless sketch.
• This episode died a miserable death by its end.

Rating: *1/2

Goodnights:-

• Zoë’s hug to Kate is kinda warming my heart. As much as I criticize Kate, I really like her a lot as a person.

Segments Ranked From Best to Worst

Amazon Go

Weekend Update

Please Don’t Destroy – We Got Her a Cat

Word Crunch

White House TikTok Meeting

Monologue

Old Home Movies

The Princess and the Frog

Maid of Honor

Don’t Stop Believin’

Porch Scene

Final Thoughts:-

• An overall forgettable episode. the first half, aside from the cold open, monologue, and the fantastic Amazon Go commercial, was worrisome and flat-out DIRE at many parts, before Update put the episode back in place, and even then, we barely had anything strong in this entire episode, aside from the preatpes and the aforementioned Update (Kyle’s horrid commentary notwithstanding) the rest, aside from one live sketch, was rather flat, not to mention that the episode died a miserable death with the final sketch.
• Zoë Kravitz was energetic & likable as the host, but right from the monologue, the show seemingly did not trust her enough with the material, and aside from the lead-off sketch and the PDD piece, she barely did anything of note. A real shame, as I generally enjoy her as a performer.

Coming Soon:-

• Well, I don’t know. But first, I might start doing season 46 reviews as this site has been growing rapidly in this month especially and I want to keep that growth. Tell me your suggestions in the comments, and till then, see ya soon!