Last week, Brendan Gleeson hosted a pretty solid episode with some great performances from Willow. This week, we have our first double duty host and musical guest with Megan Thee Stallion. The last time Megan Thee Stallion appeared on the show was in the season 46 premiere with host Chris Rock. Of course, I was familiar with her music but I wasn’t sure what to expect with her as a host.
The “Jan 6th Final Hearing Cold Open” felt like it was back to regularly scheduled programming after two previous cold opens that weren’t super political. I loved how it opened with “You’re watching C-SPAN. Can you believe that stands for Cocker Spaniel?”. There were also so many great impressions, especially with a lot of newer cast members taking over impressions from cast members who had left. I loved Michael as Adam Schiff, Heidi as Liz Cheney, Kenan as Bennie Thompson, Mikey as Jamie Raskin, Chloe as Nancy Pelosi, and Sarah as Chuck Schumer. I loved Heidi’s Dick Cheney jokes and that she had “Big Dick Cheney Energy”. I also loved the message board excerpts that were used as evidence. There was also an appearance from James’ impression of Donald Trump sitting on a gold toilet being brought a can of Diet Coke. I also loved how the last line before “Live From New York” was “It was a fun country while it lasted”. Even though it was expected for political cold opens to return, I thought this was a hilarious cold open and a great start to the show.
In Megan Thee Stallion’s monologue, like I mentioned earlier, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I did think the British accent/Bridgerton bit was a little weird and unexpected. I loved the plug for her website, which is a real website, and how they showed it on the screen. I also thought the Popeye’s bit where she talked about her signature sauce no longer being on the menu was also funny. Overall, I thought this was a pretty funny and solid monologue.
The first sketch of the night, “Hot Girl Hospital”, I weirdly felt like this could be an actual show. Maybe I’m saying this because I love medical shows like ER and Chicago Med. I loved seeing Punkie and Ego as leads in this sketch. I also loved the appearances from Marcello and James and later from Devon and Sarah. I thought the reviews of this show were funny and that it was “coming this Hot Girl Fall”. I thought this was a really good sketch and I could tell that they were all having fun with it, which I love to see.
I absolutely loved the “We Got Brought” music video sketch. I thought the song itself was great and very catchy. I thought everyone in this was hilarious, especially Bowen. I loved the awkwardness that was in the sketch and how relatable it was. I would love to see more of these music video sketches and I wish they would release this song as a single like they did with past song sketches.
The “Deer” sketch was absolutely hilarious. I especially loved Kenan’s character and how he couldn’t see the deer. I thought it was funny how they had an image of a bunny riding on the back of a deer. I also loved the deer puppet and that it was in the house, had a knife and pulled down the pants of Kenan’s character. I see a lot of deer where I live and I could absolutely relate to a lot of what went on in this sketch.
The “Girl Talk” sketch was great and I loved this talk show concept. I loved the name of Ego’s character “Mo’nique money Mo’nique Problems”. I also loved the line “so why don’t we get our subtitles on for any white people or men tuning in?” when the subject matter was complex. I also thought it was funny how there was an extra long subtitle about the war in Ukraine. I also thought Andrew’s character was funny.
“Please Don’t Destroy- Wellness” was a good sketch. I did think the dancing, therapist hallucination, and the teeth bits were funny. I also loved at the end that it was “sponsored” by Oral-B mouth guards. Overall, I thought it was a good sketch but not my favorite PDD sketch.
Megan Thee Stallion had two performances that night. Her first performance was for her song “Anxiety”, which I liked the pageant theme of the performance. Her second performance was a medley of her songs “NDA” and “Plan B”. I thought both performances were great and now I want to maybe start listening to more of her music.
Another solid Weekend Update had Colin Jost and Michael Che performing jokes about Trump, the January 6th hearing evidence (mostly the calls made by Nancy Pelosi), the Georgia Senate debate, and Kanye West and Elon Musk. Chloe and Heidi appeared as Debbie Hole and Stacey Bussy, two Texas moms telling families not to watch Hocus Pocus 2. I thought it was funny how they said they were for “family, church, and laughter”, called everything about Halloween demonic and Satanic (I know some people who think that), and Chloe’s character getting possessed by a demon at “SNHell”. I loved how Heidi’s character said “we sold a lot of leggings to be here” and when they had to leave at the end they had said they got tickets to see Wicked. I also loved how Devon made his first appearance at the Update desk and had some funny commentary about adjusting to living in New York. I also loved Devon’s interactions with the audience. I thought it was hilarious that when he asked the audience if he looked like a catcaller, there was an audible “yeah” from an audience member. I also thought it was funny when he asked “where my straight boys at?”, there was no response. I love how every single week they have had a new cast member at the desk and I’m hoping Molly makes an appearance in the next episode’s Update.
“Workout Class” was a pretty funny sketch. I loved the modified versions of the workouts with Heidi and Chloe’s characters. I thought the sketch made some good points about body shaming and body acceptance. I also would highly consider taking a workout class similar to the one in the sketch.
“Women’s Charity” was another funny sketch I found super relatable. The statistic they showed near the beginning, “roughly three out of ten women between the ages of 18 and 29 are single”. For reference, I’m 27 and very single so this hit very close to home for me. I also loved how they showed Kenan singing “Hallelujah” and then “Gangsta’s Paradise”. I also loved the different sweatshirt logos they showed. I also loved the name of the charity, “St. Andrew’s Center for Shivering Girls”. I also loved Heidi at the end holding a dog asking what she is going to wear now to walk the dog.
“Classroom” was a sketch that I thought was very fitting for the end of the show. I loved how Ego’s character started off with an “inspirational” speech. I also loved how the other characters were telling Ego’s character “Miss, this is an Honors level Physics class” and “this is a STEM school”. I thought Ego’s character’s reactions were funny as well as her pulling the fire alarm and not being able to work the door. I thought this sketch was a funny way to end the show.
Overall, I thought this was a pretty good episode. It was obvious that Megan was having fun doing the sketches and that’s something I like seeing. I loved seeing Ego and Punkie in a lot of sketches and that’s something I hope continues as well as the new cast members being in more sketches. There were some topics of sketches that me being a white woman wouldn’t completely understand and that’s okay! That’s the beauty of diversity and that’s one of the great things about comedy is getting to hear other points of view. I know there were a lot of people out there who got to really enjoy the episode and I really hope Megan Thee Stallion gets to host again!
This is my take on the episode with host and musical guest Megan Thee Stallion. My next post will be about the episode with host and musical guest Jack Harlow. Make sure to follow me on Twitter at @SNLBlogger for SNL news and live tweeting every new episode. Thank you all again for your continued support!
Thanks for reading!
Lauren
