The Rivermode Film Journal

Summer of Trump

I’ve liked James Austin Johnson since before he was on SNL, he does a great Trump. Unfortunately, this sketch is sort of nothing, leaving him out in the cold to make up “Trumpy” sayings (which he is fairly good at). A quick series of VP candidates come in for one joke a piece and none of them are any good. This opener has one of the smoother “Live From New York” transitions in a good while.

Monologue

As good an actor as Jake Gyllenhaal is, there is not a second of this monologue where he is convincingly playing himself. There isn’t a line that sounds natural coming out of his mouth. We’re playing Teleprompter, folks. He’s got a pretty good singing voice though.

Another thing to note: Kenan Thompson sings, “We did a lot of sketches this year, and most of them were fine.” As someone who watches this show week to week, I can promise you, they were far from fine.

Dad Has a Cookie

“Dad Has a Cookie” is the weekly sketch that exemplifies what is wrong with SNL these days. It takes one joke that would’ve been a throwaway twenty years ago and overexplains it until it begins to feel assaultive. This time, Jake Gyllenhaal plays a father who really wants to eat cookies, but is told not to. His daughter’s boyfriend is ready to propose, but he cares more about the cookies. This specific sketch tries to go for an I Think You Should Leave thing by the end, but it falls completely flat. You need the intense awkwardness and uniquely manic energy, but it’s just not here.

Scooby-Doo

This is really like some 2009 YouTube shit. Totally worthless. What if Scooby-Doo was really violent and bloody actually? What if Fred was crayzee? This is not worth the airtime.

Beautiful Girls

I’m starting to get the impression that Jake Gyllenhaal is too high to act, there’s something about him that doesn’t feel present. Either that or his comedic timing is just deathly.

The joke here appears to be that they’re in cargo shorts and a button-up? Maybe it’s a surrealist thing. It’s funny because it doesn’t make sense. Some sketches just make you sad. This is one of them.

Bike Trail

Jake Gyllenhaal appears to be doing some kind of mangled Chris Farley impersonation. The audience started wooing at the end of this sketch, I don’t know why or what they were wooing. Sometimes they confuse me.

It also just occured to me that Chloe Fineman is here. Kind of impressive considering she was in Cannes like two days ago. (Go Megalopolis!)

As for the sketch itself? What is there to say? Yeah, cyclists are annoying. Do you have a joke about it or is this just exclusively the observational part of “observational comedy?”

Fast Fashion Ad

Some sub-sub-sub CollegeHumor schtick. What if a fashion ad was poorly hiding the working conditions under which the clothes were made? This is the type of thing CH was producing when most of the cast and crew were fired and they were desperate to just put up Anything.

Musical Guest: Sabrina Carpenter (“Espresso” & “Feather/Nonsense”)

I don’t know who Sabrina Carpenter is, but I don’t want to hear any more of her music. Having said that, SNL has certainly done worse in this area lately. This is entirely inoffensive, just bland, poppy nonsense.

Weekend Update

It’s always shocking to me that Colin Jost gets more applause. Michael Che is capable of being funny, he usually has at least one good zinger. This starts with a bunch of “political” jokes, SNL should stay away from politics until they grow the balls to Say Something. The tiptoing makes all the jokes here lame and biteless. But I guess if you slam these politicians too hard they won’t cameo on your show.

Two cicadas (Kenan Thompson and Marcello Hernández) come on the show to talk about… something? The joke here is that they haven’t been out in years. They don’t mine it for anything. Hernández continues to play one note, just smile and scream, smile and scream…

The reaction to Che’s joke on Megan Markle shows why SNL is the way it is. You get something funny and it’s met with a groan. Yes, the show is awful, but it’s what The People want.

The joke swap segment works. Jost and Che write jokes for each other to garner a reaction at the offense. Che brings a rabbi to the desk to make Jost that much more uncomfortable. It’s a good set-up, sabotage encourages these two to try to be funny. Sure, it’s all shock value, but at least that’s Something. Although, disappointed by the puppet of the Jewish guy. The build-up was great, but for the punchline to be a stock “space lasers” joke… Pretty lame, could’ve gone further.

Cancelling a Flight

Somebody clearly had a bad flight recently and decided to cram all the flying jokes they could fit into five minutes. Jake Gyllenhaal is trying to cancel his flight and he keeps being transfered from customer service rep to customer service rep. There’s an opportunity there for something really funny, but it shifts gears every five seconds to fit another thing in. No attention is paid to joke structure, build-up and just what is funny and what isn’t. It’s quantity over quality, plain and simple.

NYPD Press Conference

They saw a headline and decided to devote five minutes to really dully riffing on it. “Steve Buscemi punched in random NYC street attack.” And here it’s, what if this were to happen to other character actors? Who are they? I recognize them, but don’t know who they are. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Oh yeah, and Jon Hamm is there for some reason. NEXT!

Snake Eyes

Last sketch of the night, and it’s honestly kind of refreshing. It’s bad in the way SNL used to be (when there was an off sketch). What if a guy had a funny voice? That’s the sketch. It’s doesn’t work, but it doesn’t hurt either.

I guess I’ll see you in Season 50…