FanFare

A place for discussion of departures, arrivals, rumors, and extracurricular activities and other projects between Season 45 (the pre-pandemic / SNL At Home season) and Season 46 (the... well, who knows? season).
posted by Etrigan on May 15, 2020 - 5 comments

Vanessa Bayer is gone. Bobby Moynihan is gone. Rumor has it that the head writers are gone. Weekend Update has a summer gig.
posted by Etrigan on May 21, 2017 - 26 comments

The U.S. politics megaposts on the Blue get gummed up with live discussion of "Saturday Night Live" whenever it's new. Should we start treating these as Special Events, pre-posting them and directing traffic over here? [more inside]
posted by Etrigan on May 21, 2017 - 6 comments

Russell Crowe shows the world why he doesn't do more comedies. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan on Apr 10, 2016 - 14 comments

Amy Schumer brings the noise in a tight stand-up monologue, and Weekend Update is finding its groove, but the rest is kind of limp. Considering that the host is a sketch artiste in her own right with plenty to say on her own show, the sketches are depressingly generic. Virtually any female guest host could have served as the overbearing friend at someone else's wedding shower, or a badly improv-ing Mary Todd Lincoln re-enactor, or even one of the flight attendants who fall out of the plane. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan on Oct 11, 2015 - 7 comments

The 41st season premiere brings us Miley Cyrus hosting for the third time (and musical-guesting for the second), only one new cast member (Jon Rudnitsky), and a not-at-all-surprise cameo from Hillary Clinton. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan on Oct 5, 2015 - 8 comments

A show that just felt... off, with a cold open that more or less just said "Kate McKinnon's going to be Hillary, so get used to her", a weird QVC sketch that didn't go anywhere, and two wheel-of-impressions sketches. On the plus side, a pretty strong Weekend Update that shows Colin Jost and Michael Che are comfortable with each other and the guest characters (including a lumpy Billy Crystal).
posted by Etrigan on Apr 14, 2015 - 14 comments

The Christmas episode hits Serial a few times and welcomes back Kristen Wiig and Fred Armisen, with all the good and ill that entails.
posted by Etrigan on Dec 21, 2014 - 21 comments

Minaj gets more screen time than expected, but Kate McKinnon gets less screen time than usual. Franco is more animated than usual, but the political bits are less animated than expected. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan on Dec 7, 2014 - 10 comments

The 39th season ends with a huge homecoming, two Digital Shorts, and a non-political cold open.
posted by Etrigan on May 18, 2014 - 42 comments

A perfectly acceptable episode, using Theron well enough and featuring a Weekend Update guest we didn't know we've been waiting for since the 1970s. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan on May 11, 2014 - 15 comments