SNL Scorecard: 'Sex Ed,' Emma Stone Lead a Backloaded Episode
They should have aired Saturday Night Live in reverse order last night: What started out pretty terribly eventually turned into the second best episode of the season. While host Emma Stone was serviceable, never really taking the lead in any of the sketches in which she appeared, the surprise of the night was the ascent of Paul Brittain (more "Sex" Ed Vincent!) and Taran Killam.
These guys were everywhere -- which, of course, means don't expect to see either of them next week when Jon Hamm hosts. You can expect both of their stocks to rise in tomorrow's Not Ready For Prime Time Player Relevancy Poll here at Movieline, but first things first: Let's head to the scorecard.
Sketch of the Night
"Sex Ed Vincent" (Brittain): This one came pretty much out of nowhere near the end of the show. Paul Brittain plays "Sex" Ed Vincent, who teaches a sex symposium. What's great is that he doesn't play the character as sketchy; Vincent is more of a misguided soul who is actually trying to conduct a seminar. Favorite tips: To avoid STDs during male-on-male sex, try poking the penis against the side of another penis or try the infinite swirl. Please, watch this.
Score: 8.5
The Good
"Souping" (Hader, Stone, Pedrad): Hader plays a local investigative reporter assigned to scare parents with stories about made up things that their teenagers are supposedly doing. These activities include eating expired soup to get high, having sex on trampolines and dirty skydiving. Every major city has this type of reporter.
Score: 7.5
"Brett Favre Wrangler Commercial" (Sudeikis, Moynihan): Yeah, there was little chance we were going to get through this week's SNL without a Brett Favre reference. And yeah, they nailed it. Playing on Favre's Wrangler jeans commercials, the now controversial quarterback unveils his new line: Open-fly jeans. Meaning there is no fly and Favre throws around the pigskin with the boys in the backyard with his penis hanging out (a strange amount of penis jokes last night). Or, as Fave says, "I'm just like everyone else, I put my pants on one leg at a time, then I pull my penis out. Sometimes I take a picture of it."
Score: 7.5
"Weekend Update" (Meyers, Thmpson, Mulaney, Hader): Strange night on "Update." Something about Meyers seemed off. His direct address to awful wife Ginni Thomas about leaving a message for Anita Hill 19 years later is the sort of segment Meyers usually nails, but instead he stumbled through it. He looked like a guy fighting a cold. The three segments more than made up for Meyers' off night. Kenen as the "Rent is Too Damn High" guys was a perfect impression even if the material was a little uninspired. John Mulaney, an SNL writer, needs to be make more appearances on camera. He's been missed since his days at Best Week Ever ended. Mulaney on the AOL-Yahoo! merger: "They may not have much time left, but at least they'll have each other." And I think the only reason Meyers brings on Hader as Stefon is because Hader breaks up every single time.
Score: 7.0
"Les Jeunes de Paris" (Killam, Stone): Was that an Abby Elliott sighting in the background? This makes the good list for (A) being completely in French and (B) being so weird. More of this. Bring us more weird, even if it doesn't completely work.
Score: 6.5
"Emma Stone Monologue" (Stone, Ensemble): It's never a good sign when SNL resorts to taking questions from fake audience members in the monologue. This usually means that the writers have no idea what to do. Killam (great night for Killam, by the way, finally) and Moynihan as Michael Cera and Jonah Hill saved the day.
Score: 6.0
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Comments
This was by far my favorite episode of the season. I thought the "Les Junes de Paris" sketch was brilliant. Why don't they do more weird stuff like that? I also really enjoyed the “My Brother Knows Everything” and "Dream Home Extreme" sketches.
Emma Stone was great! I loved her monologue, it was by far the best intro of the season. Im not sure why you think that taking questions from fake audience members is only used when the writers cant think of anything else to do? Im willing to bet you have nothing to base that on other than the fact that you think it is lazy writing. Just because it is 'the easy way out' in your eyes doesn't mean it's not funny. You cant tell me that Andy Samberg didn't make you laugh your ass off, that shit was priceless.
Emma killed it imo.
"Im not sure why you think that taking questions from fake audience members is only used when the writers cant think of anything else to do? Im willing to bet you have nothing to base that on other than the fact that you think it is lazy writing."
Why do people write things like this?
A pretty bad show overall, they didn't give Emma much to work with. In an interview, Lorne Michaels said that after the open he always starts with the strongest sketch. Really? Another Kristen Wiig oddball character? Enough already. And Nasim playing another awkward kid? Jesus, the other players must roll their eyes each week when she introduces her new big idea ("Last week I played a nine-year-old but this week I'll do a ten-year-old!"). I, too, liked "Sex Ed," but I'm sure Lorne will now beat it to death every week.
As noted above, I liked the monologue.
For me this was simply a hot mess of a show until Weekend Update with Hader as Stefon. It's so outrageously random, coupled with Hader never making it through the bit sans smile, I can't help but find it amusing. Sex Ed Vincent came out of nowhere and I love it but overall it was a disappointing show.
So far I've only watched up to Update, glad to hear it gets better after that. And no, the cold open was not fine on it's own as a sketch. It just wasn't funny. At all.
What is the name of the song played in the sketch "Les Jeunes de Paris”?
The Souping thing was awesome. Anything that makes fun of the mainstream media and how they're fear mongering tragedy-junkies is good in my book. Glad to see it graded so high here.
The song from Les Jeunes de Paris is called
"Ta Douleur" by Camille....