So I went out drinking last night. Had too much, don't really remember much of the evening. I got lost coming home and I have the worst hangover ever right now. But it was okay because the entire time I knew I'd wake up this morning and watch last night's SNL with Dane Cook. I heart Dane Cook. He's hilarious, so this is going to be the best episode ever. There is no way that this episode can be bad, right? Wrong.
Rockefeller Tree Re-Lighting - This opened the show and spoofed how politically correct things are getting. In an effort to offend no one and include everyone, Harry Connick Jr. (Jason Sudeikis), Megan Mullally (Kristen Wiig), and Al Roker (Kenan) invited the NBC Peacock Singers to belt out some holiday tunes. Essentially they changed around lyrics of Christmas carols and for the most part it just wasn't funny. Near the end I'm not sure I even understood what they were talking about - anyone else notice how the words got confusing? It had a few funny lines, especially when baby Jesus got dubbed as "random infant, religiously neutral" in their rendition of Silent Night, Holy Night.
Dane's Monologue - If you've never seen Dane Cook perform his stand-up before, then you're missing out. He's absolutely fantastic. If you have, then this was nothing special because it was 90% old material off his two albums "Harmful if Swallowed" and "Retaliation." I was surprised that the censors let his bit about flicking cashews off his wang make the cut. I'm not complaining because it's of his funniest creations and it was a great way to end his set.
West Bedford High School Morning Assembly - Whoever wrote this sketch needs to be dragged down the street and shot. Not only was it far too long but I don't think I laughed once. The high school drama club performed the morning announcements with short plays, interpretive dance, and musical poetry. Dane, Amy Poehler, and Seth Myers were a three man team who ran most of the sketch. The first thing they did was act out some scene about a father who hates his son only to inform us that there was a job fair on Thursday afternoon. See? Even writing about it doesn't make it sound funny.
Taco Town Commercial - Thank god, I love this one. This is probably the second or third time they've played this commercial spoofing Taco Bell and all the ridiculous creations they come up with. It features all three of the new guys (Sudeikis, Samberg, and Hader) eating at this restaurant which sells a taco wrapped in a tortilla, smeared with guacamole, wrapped in a another corn tortilla, filled with scrambled eggs, wrapped in a pizza, wrapped in a blueberry pancake, and then it's all deep fried. I'm probably forgetting some of the ingredients but you get the idea.
The Jay Feely Story - For those of you that missed the NY Giants game last weekend, Jay Feely missed three potential game winning field goals and the Giants ended up losing. This sketch looked at the flight home. Dane played Feely and the rest of the team hates him, but their faith is renewed after the pilot collapses and Feely lands the plane. But then he drives it into a lake so I suppose the team hates him again. Really disappointing, it hurt to watch that. The best part was when it was over and we found out that Alec Baldwin is hosting next week.
The $800 Wool Sweater - This sketch was the saving grace of the show. Dane comes to holiday party wearing a wool turtleneck sweater. The neck is huge but he wears it anyway because he wants to impress a girl. The party's host, played by Seth Myers, informs us that it's 65 degrees right now and he has no idea why Dane chose to wear the sweater. Eventually Dane gets in a fight with it and starts stretching it out with his arms while scratching his back with a fireplace poker. Hilarious to watch, reminded me of old Matt Foley sketches when Dane jumped on the table. Plus he yells out, "It's like a wookie is raping me!" Good stuff.
SNL Digital Short - Andy Samberg is sitting on a doorstep and Will Forte is consoling him. I think maybe someone died or his girlfriend broke up with him, doesn't really matter. So Will is telling him it's going to be okay and the entire time both of them are chomping down on lettuce as if it were an apple. Ends up being a commercial for the lettuce growers of America because lettuce is there for you even when the going gets rough. This could have been a lot funnier, but I did like the idea.
Target Employees - Kristen Wiig and Dane both play Target cashiers ringing up customers. Dane has a mullet and an obsession with Felicia Rashad. He claims he even made a Claire Huxtable snowman once. Kristen keeps admiring the things people are buying and walks away to go find them. I understand that they were trying to say something about the incompetence of many department store cashiers and that it gets even worse for the holidays, but man was this bad.
Weekend Update - As usual this was pretty good. I enjoyed Tina'a reference to the George Harrison hit "I've Got My Mind Set on You" when she talked about Bush and the Iraq plan because "it's gonna take time, to do it, to do it, to do it..." You get the idea. Rachel Dratch dressed up in a fat suit for one pre-recorded bit and it was hilarious because they completely exploited the stereotype that black men love big booty. I really liked the report on the tower in Buenos Aires being covered with a giant pink condom for world AIDS Day and to match it, the US covered the Grand Canyon in a giant dental dam.
Coma for a Day - What if you were in a coma for a day? Dane Cook was after he broke his toe. When he wakes up, his wife has left him, remarried, sold his car, and she broke all his records. A lot can happen in 24 hours. They even had a funeral for him. And it turns out the coma was medically induced because Dane had been harassing the nurses and the doctor didn't like that. Dane tries to attack his ex-wife's new husband and he falls over. When he wakes back up 15 minutes later, his ex-wife announces she's pregnant with the doctor's baby. This was an amusing premise but it just didn't come off too well.
Fight Back with Victor Ramos - This was the episode's token "fake talk show on a cable access network." Dane and Horatio play martial arts experts who worry about the safety of NYC so they interview Amy Poehler who I believe worked for the subway. For once Horatio didn't break character and start laughing in the middle of the sketch because this was by far the unfunniest thing ever. I wanted to stick knitting needles in my eyes.
Musical Guest James Blunt - He played two songs, but he's kind of whiny. Reminded me of Jason Mraz crossed with Jack Johnson. Am I the only one who's never heard of him though? With a name like James Blunt I really thought he was a new up and coming rapper before I saw him.
Overall, I'll give the episode a four out of ten. There was just way too much garbage which is terrible because Dane Cook had a lot more to offer I think. Hopefully Alec Baldwin will be better next week because whenever he hosts, the episode is usually an instant classic.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
12-04-2005 @ 1:57PM
Joel Keller said...
Except for Dane Cook himself (especially in the monolouge and the $800 sweater sketch), the episode was crap. What's most disappointing about this one was that the sketches had good premises; the execution on them was extraordinarily poor.
I mean, what kind of different and funnier directions could that Tree Re-lighting sketch have taken? Maybe having Pakistani quake victims, bandaged and freezing, light up the tree while begging for food and medicine (remember that the tree was lit by Katrina victims, which was beyond weird)? Or how 'bout the Jay Feely story? They completely abandoned the "kickers aren't really football players" angle for the tired "landing the airplane" gag.
And where were all these "great ideas" for sketches that Dane was going to bring with him? Did they even make it past the first meeting of the week?
I'm really starting to think we need to get together as a group and submit sketches to SNL. Who's with me?
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12-04-2005 @ 2:07PM
Ashley Boyd said...
I don't know what the situation is like that side of the pond but pretty much everyone in the UK has heard of James Blunt.
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12-04-2005 @ 2:41PM
Walt said...
"I'm really starting to think we need to get together as a group and submit sketches to SNL. Who's with me?"
I gave up on that dream circa 1979, when SNL first became chronically unfunny.
Recently, I consoled myself reading the updates from
http://saturdaynightrewritten.com/blog/snrblog.html
and imagining a better SNL.
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12-04-2005 @ 2:38PM
Tom said...
Dane Cook - worst host in years. Who is this nobody? Just some stupid stand-up guy - nothing special. Why did everyone love the monolouge? Unless you're a Dane Cook fantatic, the monolouge was crap. It was waaaayyyyyy too long. And it was stand-up?! WTF? The SNL monolouge is not the place for stand-up. It was out of place and a waste of time. The worst part of the whole show ... expcept for the end when the played that Morgan Stanley commercial *again*. Yeah, it's funny, but come on.
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12-04-2005 @ 2:43PM
Tom said...
Forgot to mention - I also disagree on the Christmas open. That was one of the funniest SNL bits this season. Very, very funny stuff.
I guess we have different definitions of comedy if you hated that, but thought Dane Cook was good.
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12-04-2005 @ 2:59PM
Tammy said...
As typical of SNL in recent years, the writing needed some work. But I thought Dane Cook gave a fine performance, even with the bad skits. I liked the stand-up monologue, it reminded me of how they used to do SNL back when it was new and funny.
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12-04-2005 @ 3:06PM
Jonathan Toomey said...
I don't know if I'd call Dane Cook a nobody. He's arguably the biggest stand-up comic going right now. He's huge.
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12-04-2005 @ 3:27PM
Joel Keller said...
Also, Tom, it's a pretty common practice when a stand-up hosts SNL to have him or her do their routine as the monologue. It's one less thing for the staff to write and it gives the comedian a pretty big platform on which to showcase his routine. I mean, everyone who hosts SNL is there to promote something; for Cook, it's his stand-up. Why would they keep him from doing it?
Walt, I've been to the Saturday Night Rewritten show. It's almost as hit-and-miss as SNL itself (they only have 8 hours to write and put together a show, so the audience cuts them some slack), but at least the funny moments are very funny. I don't know if a lot of the "rewritten" skits adhere too much to the original premise of each SNL skit, but maybe that's not such a bad thing....
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12-04-2005 @ 4:26PM
Sam Goldman said...
Dane Cook was fine, and his monologue was pretty good.
But "Fight Back with Victor Ramos" made me want to electrocute myself by smashing my head through my TV screen.
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12-04-2005 @ 5:22PM
Jeff said...
Every single sketch went absolutely nowhere. Although for some reason the Lettuce thing cracked me up.
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12-07-2005 @ 6:50AM
Tom said...
Maybe he is the biggest stand-up today. But he's hardly a household name. Maybe that's a reflection on how poor stand-up is these days.
Part of the host's job is to bring some sort of star power. I just felt like he was just another member of the cast.
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12-04-2005 @ 5:31PM
Keith McDuffee said...
The Taco Town commercial cracks me up when I see it. You forgot that it comes in a bag full of vegetable salsa!
The guys screaming "Taco Town!" in totally over the top ways is hilarious. Too bad it's one of the only good things about the show.
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12-04-2005 @ 8:10PM
Ryan said...
I discovered James Blunt after googling for the lyrics of the songs that run through Greys Anatomy. I enjoyed his set on SNL, but for some reason, "You're Beautiful" was performed at about half speed.
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12-04-2005 @ 10:12PM
Annie Wu said...
"It's like being raped by a Wookie!" was priceless. I actually laughed out loud... The drama kids sketch was a great idea but could have been done in a better way... Plus, it seemed to drag on. It would have been nice if they cut it short and just made it a recurring sketch. Theatre geeks make great comedy fodder (and as an official Thespian, I would know).
I adore Dane Cook. He did a great job with the material he was given. James Blunt, on the other hand, is annoying. I mean, I'm fine with whiny Englishmen (hell, I listen to Coldplay) but that was just too much. STFU, Blunt.
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12-05-2005 @ 12:34AM
bgdc said...
Uh, I've seen Dane Cook live and well...he sucks. his stand up is obvious and he never says anything new, challenging or smart. It's like watching a frat boy who was told he's funny. He's simply not funny. Unless you can't see where every punch line is coming from. That said, the episode, like the rest, lacks anything daring, bold or original. It's as if they refuse to do anything that might offend and instead go with simple, sacchrine humor. Much like Dane Cook...who was a perfect match for the show.
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12-05-2005 @ 8:13AM
Ken said...
"As usual [Weekend Update] was pretty good"?! What show have you been watching the past five years. It's awful every week and it's the worst when Tina and Amy make self-referential jokes like the "creative people get loads of sex" bit. And the "aggravated mcburglary" joke? Doesn't get much lamer than that. You can count on a bunch of things from the SNL writers every week -- among them are the one-joke talk-show skit and the four Weekend Update jokes that begin with "A study released this week reported ..."
And yet I watch every week still (after 30 years).
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12-05-2005 @ 6:06AM
Devon said...
Wow, and I was actually sorry I missed this episode. Not anymore. The thing that saddens me most about all of this is the sketch about the guy who was in the coma for one day. Didn't they ever watch The State? They did a sketch quite a bit like this, only it was funnier: the guy was in a coma for two hours, and his wife left him, sold their house, and remarried; his job as a computer programmer had been "phased out" thanks to the human race's newfound ability to read minds; and Martians had assumed control of the planet. Does anyone else remember this sketch?
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12-05-2005 @ 1:29PM
Jason said...
I liked the sweater skit but I think the premise was flawed. Why did he buy a $800 sweater? It seemed like they were playing off the premise that if his girlfriend bought it and he was wearing it to make her happy. But he paid for it himself and she didn't like it. I just think it was disconnected and fell slightly short. Dane's performance was dead on and I loved how the table didn't break the first time so he jumped on it a second time. Classic!
The opening skit (tree lighting) I also thought was great and well written. I think this is the (overall) the best episode of the season and they should look at the things that went right and build off of those.
Cleaning house would be helpful, yes.
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12-08-2005 @ 6:20PM
Nicki said...
I didn't think it was half as bad as you made it sound. So it wasn't great. Please, remind me when it last was. Yes, SNL is in a decline and all that jazz, but that was the best episode all season. While others have had their moments, the first two were curshed by the lack of Tina Fey and the fact that they had Horatio (shudder) replacing her, making the only constatanly funny part of the show unwatchable.
The monolouge was excessive, and I'm not tneirely fond of the stand-up during it thing, but at least it was pretty funny. I'm a little connfused as to how Dane Cook is suddenly EVERYWHERE, but oh well at that. I also wasn't aware James Blunt was popular in America. When I was given his cd last July by my British friend, no one knew who he was. However, I'm not fond of him. His voice irks me, but at least he's not, like, Korn.
There were quite a few moments this episode that made me giggle, and that's a lot more than I can say to mst of the other stuff that's been going on. This episode sort of depends on your sense of humor more than anything (as opposed to most recent episodes where it's just not funny to anyone with half a brain). I wouldn't have called the sweater sketch that much of a high point, but I was pretty amused by the morning announcements one, though that was probably because I do sit through high school morning announcements each day, which are getting progressively more horrendous, but anyway.
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12-06-2005 @ 1:06PM
The Dude said...
James Blunt was funny as hell... I didn't realize he wasn't joking until halfway through his song. He reminded me of the guy singing on the stairway in Animal House. I REALLY cracked up during his second song while he sat at the piano and made those really sincere looks on his face while doing a Monty Python Female Singing voice impression... I mean, is that how that guy really sings? They should have done an American Idol spoof skit and had him sing, THAT would have been funny.
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