February 13, 2021 – Regina King / Nathaniel Rateliff (S46 E12)

Cold Opening – Tucker Carlson Tonight

• Always great to see Alex front-and-center in a sketch for a change.
• As usual, Alex’s impression of Tucker is solid. I don’t really think that Alex gets enough credit when it comes to his impression skills, one of the most unheralded talents in SNL history.
• NOT caring for Kate’s Lindsey Graham’s return nor the usual unfunny dialogue that feels like it’s going on FOREVER.
• At least I’m happy that they didn’t fill Kate’s portion of the open so far with lazy gay jokes about Lindsey Graham.
• OH MOTHERFUCKING NO! The debut of Aidy Cruz, one of the more notoriously bad political impression of the current era.
• Oh god, that makeup on Aidy is freaking nightmare-fueled. Come to think of it, these prosthetic-heavy political impressions from this era are generally horrifying. And also, she doesn’t sound remotely close to Ted Cruz AT ALL. Aidy’s always been a rather limited performer in general, especially when it comes to impressions, aside from her dead-on Sarah Huckabee Sanders impression. They should’ve just given this impression to Mikey Day, who’s a solid impressionist in general and sounds close enough to Ted Cruz. ALSO, Beck Bennett played Ted Cruz previously once, and did a FAR more spot-on impression of him. Granted, Beck in general is extremely strong performer and FAR more versatile than anybody in the male part of the cast aside from Alex.
• Yeah, seeing Aidy Cruz here reminds me that we offically reached the point will start sinking as a cast member on weekly basis for the rest of the season, coming off more and more useless and expandable with barely any good material (with two exceptions in a sketch tonight, and in Carey Mulligan’s episode). That decline was painful for me to admit, as I disclosed previously, Aidy was my favorite female cast member since S40 and till her eighth season which was an incredible year for her. Seeing her as a valuable, consistent, hilarious, committed, creative, and brilliant performer. To see her slowly decline starting with season 44 till this episode that I’m reviewing was hard for me to realize. It will be difficult for me to turn on her in these coming episodes, but knowing how much better she is in the currently-airing SNL season will make me call this year a rare misfire for her in quality.
• Thankfully, Beck’s always-hilarious Mitch Mcconell is here to give me my usual laughs.
• As usual, Beck’s Mitch is funny & solid vocally-speaking.
• Good line about Mitch’s neck.
• Great to see Alex deliver the LFNY all by himself! You deserve it Alex!

Rating: **

Monologue

• Already, Regina is coming off absolutely FANTASTIC and incredibly lovable, a sign of how fun of a host she’ll be tonight.
• Some lovely words from Regina about watching Eddie Murphy on SNL during her childhood.
• Kenan looks hilarious in that getup.
• Some fun moments with Regina hyping up the already-hot audience. I just realized that this season’s crowd is generally hot whenever we have a black host, as we shall see how super hot the audience will be in the next episode.
• Fun rapping from Kenan as we go to commercial.
• An alright & harmless monologue.

Rating: ***

What’s Your Type?

• Great to see an actual game show sketch, as we barely got any this season, aside from the Supermarket Sweep (*shudder*) tripe.
• Regina is already getting laughs from me with her fun characterization.
• I feel like Cecily played this role to death earlier in her tenure, yet again she’s fine here.
• Kyle’s giving me some good laughs in his parts here, he can play roles like this to perfection in his sleep by this point of his tenure.
• Hilarious visual of Ego melting due to the cringe.
• Mikey’s voice and characterization in this are a riot.
• Alex is absolutely great in his role, his swift and flawless line deliveries here remind me of his fantastic Update commentaries as both GWJBAB and Terry Fink.
• Pretty good sketch with fun, silly, premise-driven, solid sketch concept that’s so refreshing coming off the mostly-dull and miserable first ten episodes.

Rating: ***1/2

Pelotaunt

• A hilarious premise revolving around an excersise bike that gives negative reinforcement during workout.
• Yeah, I just remembered we have new featured players! Due to how the show barely, if ever features them so far into the season. This just makes me like the current season much more, even with current featured player Aristotle Athari basically becoming a background, silent extra while Sarah & James are taking charge and establishing themselves.
• I’m enjoying Beck’s scene, for obvious reasons.
• Some actual funny lines from Cecily’s voice-over announcer, even when I FAR prefer Beck’s voice-ever than her.
• A huge laugh when the Curb Your Enthusiasm plays.
• Solid commercial overall.

Rating: ****

Commode & Commode

• A highly-acclaimed sketch from this season.
• Already, we’re getting big laughs from how Kenan & Regina look in their wig & outfit combo.
• I sense some Tracy Morgan-channeling from and Kenan & Regina’s hilarious delivery and characterization.
• The topic of this serious commercial is a riot to watch unfold with several funny lines and reveals.
• Punkie is stealing this whole sketch with her hilarious ranting, how in the world she’s never utilized well, I’ll never know.
• Great ending shot of the whole family.
• A great, memorable sketch overall. A season highlight.

Rating: ****1/2

Birthday Gifts

• A popular sketch from this season.
• It feels kinda weird seeing Chloe with the other female cast members, as this is a role that Vanessa would’ve played if she was still on the show. Chloe’s great in general, but I barely see her paired with the other female cast members in this way.
• Solid characterization from Chloe.
• Here comes the general reveal of the whole sketch: a collection of wooden signs that reference Aidy’s character drinking problem.
• Some good laughs from the various wooden signs.
• Ok, Aidy just flubbed a laugh line, she always had problems when it comes to various line flubs throughout her tenure. That’s all despite her being a highly-trained sketch performer prior to SNL.
• (*sigh*) Aidy’s flubbing her lines left & right and ruining many laugh lines, and the audience, who’s been pretty hot tonight, is laughing at her flubs more than the actual signs.
• Also, why in the WORLD is Aidy glued to the cue cards when she’s supposed to be reading the wooden signs? The direction of modern SNL is baffling sometimes.
• Thankfully, with our new director we had a sketch in which Oscar Isaac is reading fan fiction from his book DIRECTLY. Thank you very much Liz!
• A good sketch overall.

Rating: ***1/2 (Aidy made me knock down half-a-star)

The Negotiator

• Here comes yet another favorite of mine from this season.
• Regina is already coming off solid here.
• Ah, yes and here comes the main conceit of this whole short: Regina hallucinating after eating weed.
• Pete & Aidy look like what nightmares are made off in this.
• I’m LOVING all the absurdist subtleties in this, right up my alley of humor.
• The “weed gummy” is very catchy, and I’m enjoying the Tibetan musical instruments used here.
• The visuals here are absolutely great and add to the trippy, absurdist nature of this great short.
• Fantastic Marge Simpson impression from Melissa & her delivery is very solid.
• A hilarious inclusion of Beck as the sun from Teletubbies but all grown up.
• Great lyric from Beck about the moon being their mortal enemy.
• A great, great ending.
• Overall, my GOD did I enjoy this, one of the pieces that I’ll point at when I defend this era as being solid in general and a step up from not only the previous mostly-dull and by-the-numbers one, but since the Ferrell era, this one is SNL’s best time since 2002.

Rating: *****

Weekend Update

• Didn’t care for that Cuomo joke, surprisingly to me.
• The photo with Colin’s face imposed onto is priceless.
• Hey! Look everyone! It’s Kate Mckinnon’s UMPTEENTH vanity piece that would go on endlessly because it’s Kate!
• Uh-oh, this is an infamous Kate commentary from this season.
• Great makeup and costume on Kate, by the way, and this is probably the only positive I will say regarding this commentary.
• Kate’s voice here is the EXACT same as her Maggie Smith impression, and her British-accented roles in general, like the upcoming horrid Cinderella sketch.
• While the idea for this whole commentary is rather interesting, it’s both written and performed in the wrong way, a sketch would be better & with any other cast member than THIS one.
• (*sigh*) Kate’s commentary feels like it’s going on FOREVER.
• Believe it or not, the upload of this commentary on YouTube is from dress, as Kate’s performance her is not as well-delivered as in the dress version, due to Kate’s slight breaking in the live version that I’m watching. Particularly, when she rambles some witch stuff. This will be a rather hit-or-miss season for Kate in general, pretty much like how her tenure turned out after her first five seasons. She’ll be delivering some great work in the Nick Jonas episode, and her very solid Liz Cheney commentary toward the season’s end off the top of my head.
• Hilarious callback to the memorable Morgan Wallen joke from last week
• Here comes Lauren Holt’s first (and only) lead role in her entire SNL tenure.
• An ok premise with Lauren’s relationship expert character being dumped on-air.
• Good performance by Lauren, but the material is generally weak and with not enough buildup to raise it above its current level.
• Boy, the audience is DEAD so far into this commentary as Lauren’s character is delivering her angry rant, becoming downright uncomfortable to watch. Look, I hate to compare them, as Lauren was never given much of chance on the show, but Sarah Sherman’s first Update commentary KILLED with the audience and went viral online, leading to her having more and more airtime and showcases, leading SNL to eventually give her the time and budget to film a short piece showcasing her body horror style. Again, Sarah’s been getting some of the biggest laughs I’ve ever heard a newbie get, particularly how wild the audience was during her Update piece in Will Forte’s recent hosting debut. So, it might be that Lauren never gelled with the writers unlike Sarah’s alliance with PDD & her recently branching out and working with Dan Bulla with her great “Meatballs” short or that the show simply abandoned her after this commentary, because she’s NOWHERE next episode.
• Overall, a below average commentary from Lauren.
• Good to see another Beck Update commentary considering that I enjoyed his previous one.
• Solid performance & I’m sensing some Bruce Chandling vibes, but it’s going nowhere so far.
• Yeah, this commentary didn’t work for me, and it pains to criticize Beck, but he had better Updates than this one. Thankfully, I do recall enjoying his two upcoming ones more.
• An overall mixed Update, good jokes, but surprisingly I did not enjoy any of the commentaries.

Rating: **1/2

Disco Queen

• Great look on Regina.
• Very solid back-and-forth between Bowen & Regina.
• This sketch is yet ANOTHER this season that goes toward the one-joke route, without the proper escalation or the appropriate writing for it to sustain its length.
• The performances are the only saving for this sketch, as the writing is fairly thin.
• Cute voice from Aidy.
• Andrew looking particularly adorable in that getup, fancam material right there.
• An ok ending & an overall a better sketch than I remember, as I recalled this being horrible in the past. Still subpar though.

Rating: **

Women’s Theatre

• Ugh, here comes one of my least-favorite sketches from this season.
• This sketch, as I said with several other sketches from this era, epitomizes the current problems with SNL’s headwriters and particularly the writing supervision.
• Not caring with this variation of the famed monologues from the 90s and to change only a single word with “elbow” doesn’t make it funny.
• Not caring for Kate’s New York accent, nor her delivery in this.
• Oh, god, too much REACTING!!!!
• Characters literally explaining every single thing to us like we’re blind or too dumb to pay attention to our screens.
• Awful ending.

Rating: *

Cut For Time: Kyle and Friends

• Great to see yet another backstage piece from Kyle.
• I’m enjoying the aesthetic to this short, and as always, the subtle melancholic vibes work very well for me.
• Always great to see Michael outside of Update.
• Really sweet moment between Regina & Kyle.
• I don’t think Lorne gets enough credit of how naturally funny his.
• WTF with the ending?
• An ok piece overall.

Rating: ***1/2

Segments Ranked From Best to Worst

The Negotiator

Commode & Commode

Pelotaunt

What’s Your Type?

Birthday Gifts

CFT: Kyle and Friends

Monologue

Tucker Carlson Tonight

Weekend Update

Disco Queen

Women’s Theatre

Final Thoughts:-

• An alright season 46 episode overall, that aside from a mediocre cold open had a long streak of segments ranging from decent to very strong, till the episode immediately, and eerily reminiscent of the Dan Levy episode prior to it, suddenly crashed-and-burned HARD with two horrible final sketches, even Update was surprisingly subpar. Still, the good outweighs the bad here, and the fun sketch concepts tonight represent the freshness that the second half will bring, till afterwards we reach the solid current 47th season.
• Regina King was a fantastic host, elevating the material given to her, and bringing energy and charm to her roles, it’s too bad the final sketch itself did not utilize her talents well. Not to mention the great musical guest in this episode, whom immediately after his performance I became an instant fan, to this very day.

Up Next:-

• Regé-Jean Page hosts with musical guest Bad Bunny.