'Saturday Night Live' Recap - Amy Adams & One Direction

Looking back at last week’s show, I fear I was a bit too hard on it. In fact, the last few weeks of Saturday Night Live have been on fire. And, in fact, this might be the best few weeks of SNL I’ve seen in a long time. Given the show’s host, I have very high hopes that this episode will finish 2014 with an equally strong outing. Amy Adams is one of those multi-talented hosts that, if fates were different, could probably be a full-time SNL cast member and there is so much going on in the news the writers will have a lot of foils to play off of.

Like I always do, I’ll be writing the recaps “live,” meaning I’ll watch a sketch and immediately write a short blurb reviewing and recapping it. For each segment, I’ll rate it on a scale of 0-5 stars. At the end of the piece, I’ll share some quick overall thoughts and the best/worst sketch of the night.

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Sam Smith/Dr. Evil Cold Open: * * *
I quite liked Killam’s Sam Smith and was interested to see where they would go with a non-political cold open before SNL transitioned into a direct-to-camera address from special guest Mike Myers as Dr. Evil about the Sony hacking scandal. It’s a really fun cameo (and one that makes a lot of sense politically) but except for a few good punch lines (“it’s easy to kill a movie, just move it to January!”) and a funny jab at Myers’ own “Love Guru,” the sketch surprisingly had little to say about the Sony situation, which is odd since it’s one so rife for comedy.

Opening Monologue: * * * ½
First of all, I’m probably the ownly person without an AARP card to know where the song from the monologue came from. (It’s Mame for anyone wondering.) The song was pretty good and so was the monologue despite a pointless cameo by Kristin Wiig. Why her role wasn’t played by Bryant or Strong or even Bayer (who has been needing some air-time recently), is beyond me. But that being said, there was a fun, infectious energy in the monologue and Wiig’s attempted splits made me laugh. Was this anywhere near as good as Jimmy Fallon’s Christmas monologue from a few years ago? Nope, but this was a really fun monologue nonetheless.

Asian American Doll: * * * * *
“Asian American Doll has no academic strengths or weaknesses.” What a wonderfully simple premise yet one that has so much to say about the uber-politically correct world we live in. This was a spot-on SNL commercial that was smart, funny, just biting enough and didn’t overstay it’s welcome. When they replay the retrospective on best SNL commercial parodies, I’d make a case that this one deserves a spot.

Tenderfield Christmas 2014: * * * *
Even before they started singing, I figured out this was a parody of the Holderness family videos and was so curious to see what SNL would do with this family-friendly viral holiday hit. The execution of this sketch was spot on and the dark touches of the Tenderfield’s sociopath daughter and dog-boy son were fantastic. I wish they had pushed it a little further with the dark humor, but overall a really fun holiday sketch.

Serial Christmas: * * * * ½
I was so excited for this sketch when it started. The good news is that Strong’s Sarah Koenig is scarily on-point and that the SNL writers and directors have done a great job of replicating Serial’s style down to the T (despite the weird vibe of trying to put a podcast on TV). For anyone who is a fan of Serial, this sketch is a home run despite running about a minute too long. Those who haven’t listened to Serial, though, I presume would be super confused and not very amused. I haven’t watched The Office but at least last week’s Office sketch had a killer Gollum impression and some funny jokes. This Serial sketch, on the other hand, was more style parody over set-up/punch line humor. That is all a way of saying that this skit was very insider baseball (down to a Nisha call reference) but very, very good insider baseball.

Girlfriends Talk Show: * *
This again? I thought Girlfriends Talk Show had finally run out of steam after a series of increasingly dead-end sketches. This one didn’t really need to exist and didn’t add anything to the concept except for the fact it got One Direction to dress up in track suits and dance with Aidy Bryant. It’s more of a GIF template than an actual sketch really.

Office Christmas Party: * * *
This might be the most Lonely Island-esque music video since Lonely Island left the show. Problem was, this wasn’t “I Just Had Sex” level Lonely Island. This wasn’t even “The Creep” level Lonely Island. While the idea of a music video about the goings-on in an office holiday party is a solid one, the lyrics just didn’t go anywhere besides reminding us that Carol from New Media got drunk. So, yeah, not a bomb but not memorable in any way.

Weekend Update: * * * * ½
I don’t think it’s presumptuous to say that this was the best Weekend Update so far this season. Che seemed the most relaxed he’s ever been behind the desk, he and Jost broke free from their usual WU rhythms to deliver some longer-form material and all three guests were home-runs. Even Garth & Kat (a bit that features no current cast members and has the same set-up each and ever time it premiered in since 2009) was so infectiously fun I couldn’t help but laugh along with Wiig and Armison.

A Very Cuban Christmas: * ½
So far, it’s been a really good show with no real clunkers. I mean, I guess Girlfriends was a clunker but at least it was an inoffensive clunker that kept me entertained. This Cuban Christmas Special skit featuring Tony Montana, Gloria Estefan and Elian Gonzalez just wasn’t very funny, original or entertaining.

Singing Sisters: * * * * *
This is one of the strangest sketches of the year so far and, just on sheer quirk and chutzpah alone, one of the best. The 1940s delivery was great, the sisters’ nonsensical song was weird and catchy, Strong, Adams and McKinnon were perfectly in synch and the twist at the end was so out-of-leftfield it actually worked. This is the kind of sketch that could have been written for the shows first season in 1975 – it has some of the zany energy the show used to revel in back then – which gave it a timeless feel.

Whiskers R We: * * * ½
I loved the Whiskers R We skit when McKinnon first did it with Charlize Theron. But this one was too similar and too safe. Where the first one took some dark turns that kept the audience on their toes (or paws), this one was duller, safer and, because of that, less funny.

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Best Sketch: It’s a draw between Singing Sisters and Asian American Doll

Worst Sketch: Cuban Christmas

Musical Guest: One Direction
It’s so easy to hate on 1D, but if you take away the hype and screaming tween fangirls, One Direction aren’t a bad band really. Would I ever listen to them on my own? Not really. But their two songs in the episode were tuneful and surprisingly mature given the “That’s What Makes You Beautiful” schlock that they started their career with. To a complete outsider, their music is bland and, yes, a bit too prefab but compared to Bieber or any number of pop acts out there, this was fine, inoffensive pop.

Overall Thoughts:
Adams is such a talented lady and seamlessly fits into the SNL cast. While it faltered occasionally, this capped off a really great mid-season of the show. I’ll be back in 2015 with Kevin Hart. Until then, happy holidays and happy new year!