The first of the final three episodes of Saturday Night Live’s historic 50th season kick off inside the Oval Office, where Donald Trump (James Austin Johnson) celebrates the first 100 days of his second term. In that short time that feels like a much longer, he’s single-handedly managed to help people win elections (“Mostly in Canada”) and signed 147 executive orders.
To that end, he brings out White House deputy chief of staff and “lord of the shadows” Stephen Miller (Mikey Day) who hands him a number of new orders to sign, including ones that bring back Columbus Day, reduce the number of interracial couples in TV commercials, make it socially acceptable for a man in his ’70s to date a 24 year old (“We’re calling it the Belichick law”), and a pardon for JK Rowling.
That last bit begets the funniest line of the segment – “I’m a Hufflepuff … no, bitch, you work at Staples” – but the fact that it’s directed purely at cringey Harry Potter fans and not Rowling’s repulsive transphobia is indicative of SNL’s blunted approach much of the time. The same can be said of its depiction of Miller as a stoic villain rather than the sweaty creep he actually comes off as, or Marco Rubio (Marcello Hernández) as the exhausted adult in the room. Granted, Rubio is one of the administrations whipping boys, but he is no less extreme or incompetent than Trump, so this caricature feels too sympathetic.
This cold open, which wraps up abruptly, is lacking, especially when compared to the superior Trump Easter sketch from just a few weeks back.
Quinta Brunson hosts for the second time. The Abbott Elementary star/creator pokes fun at her diminutive statue – 4’11 – singing a showtune in honor of other short celebs, including Sabrina Carpenter, who makes a surprise appearance. After a few corny jokes (“When you eat a short rib, does it just taste like rib?”) they’re also joined by NBA star Dwyane Wade, who despite being 6’4 is still kind of short by basketball standards. SNL certainly seems to be all in on Carpenter this season, to the point where it’s coming off as forced.
In the first sketch, we catch a cable broadcast of the conclusion of ‘80s time-travel stoner comedy Will & Todd’s Radical Experience. The slacker heroes (Hernández and Andrew Dismukes) say goodbye to a cast of historical figures, including Harriet Tubman (Brunson) and Frederick Douglass (Kenan Thompson), who refuse to get back into the time traveling phone booth and return to the days of slavery. A half-clever idea with zero laughs.
OnlySeniors is a life insurance policy for otherwise uncoverable old folks in this economy. It’s an aged spin on OnlyFans, where seniors perform various dirty acts for their “chat babies”. The best bit sees Brunson’s elderly mom fly off the handle at her shocked daughter, only for her husband to calm her down with the help of a remote-controlled vibrator. Overall, this is a much tamer version of a very similar Shane Gillis sketch from his web series.
At a corporate leadership summit, the speakers explain how to use a “compliment sandwich” – saying a negative thing in between two positive things – to critique an employee’s performance. Straight away, members of the audience test this out on their coworkers: “Jessica, you’re a hard worker, your kids are ugly, you’re good at the computer”; “Liz, I think you’re beautiful, you’re bad at the computer, I’d like you to wear shorter things”. The sketch completely loses the thread about halfway through, devolving into one random and overly quirky bit after another.
Next up is a new installment of the road rage hand gestures sketch. Once again, Day and Chloe Fineman play a father and daughter pair who get into it with the driver next to them. This time, both parties are parked in a ferry boat. An argument ensues over how far over the line Brunson’s motorist is, leading to lots of psychotic and sexually graphic – especially from Fineman’s teen – gesticulation. Colin Jost shows up as himself in the closing moments, begging the drivers to buy the ferry, which turns out to be the one he and former cast member Pete Davidson purchased several years back.
Forever 31 is a new clothing brand for “stylish, but tired” young women who have aged out of being “Coachella whores”. These loose-fitting garments come in a variety of styles – “Big Loose Suit”, “Big Ass Suit”, “Big Ol’ David Byrne” – and “every color of the bummer rainbow”. A harsh send-up of aging Gen-Zers, although not nearly as brutal as the similarly themed Mom’s Jeans sketch from 2003.
A recent internet meme went viral for asking who would win in a fight between 100 men and one gorilla. SNL presents another scenario for consideration: Two Bitches v a Gorilla. Brunson and Ego Nwodim play the bitches in question, two zoo goers who wind up inside the gorilla enclosure. They are not intimidated by their giant foe, hurling threats (“You think this is the first time I fought a 400-lb bitch? I used to work at a Lane Bryant”), insults (“You up here on all fours looking like the L, G, B, T and the Q”), and singing They Not Like Us, before being torn apart. Credit to the performers for rolling through a ton of tricky dialog at a breakneck clip.
Musical guest Benson Boone does a backflip off a podium and briefly serenades Brunson before performing his first song.
On Weekend Update, Jost starts out by sharing Trump’s AI generated image of himself as the Pope (“Apparently ordering a one-way ticket to hell”). Speaking of the Pope, Michael Che notes there’s speculation that the new one may hail from Africa, “Which means he’ll have to travel over Colin’s dead body.”
Jost then welcomes on cast member Michael Longfellow to discuss newly required Real IDs. Longfellow smugly declares that he won’t get one: “You know where I’d rather be than the DMV? In the hospital with a bullet in my penis.” Reminded that he won’t be able to fly without one, he scoffs, “Honey, it’s 2025, planes are barely allowed to fly.” Another good performance by Longfellow, who’s better as himself at the Update desk than he is in character sketches.
Later, Che brings on Applebee’s bar flies Darlene (Sarah Sherman) and Duke (Bowen Yang) to comment on the spate of casual restaurant chains declaring bankruptcy. You would be hard-pressed to pick to cast members more ill-suited to play blue-collar suburban boozers and it shows, with Yang breaking character after calling someone a “Fudd-raggit”. Boone pops in as their waiter and helps them sing the Applebee’s theme song.
At a Narcotics Anonymous meeting, a new member (Thompson) who has recently moved to town uses his sharing time to get the low down on where and how to score cocaine – or, as he alternatively refers to it, “sniff”, “flake”, “toot”, and “booger sugar”. An enjoyably dark premise and some decent drug humor make this one entertaining, but it peters out.
Boone returns to the stage for his second set, before the episode wraps up with a historical sports show. We look back at the career of Jerry “Jackrabbit” Tulane (Brunson in a mustache). We watch a couple of pre-fight press conference where Tulane talks smack on his much larger opponent, Muhammed Ali-style, before subsequently getting knocked, literally, out of the ring. By the final press conference, Tulane is so punch drunk he thinks he’s Elizabeth Taylor. Fun stuff.
An decent episode during this season’s final run of episodes – Brunson is a solid and reliable host – although if the next couple of episodes are of the same quality, the 50th season will go out on a whimper instead of a bang.