This is not the kind of Saturday Night Live Not-Ready-for-Prime-Time-Player Relevancy Poll I like to see: The rankings of the female cast members is a concern, with the three women not named Kristen Wiig all settled into the bottom three slots. As recent history has shown, this usually doesn't end well.
Look at it this way: The last three people booted from SNL -- Casey Wilson, Michaela Watkins, Jenny Slate (Will Forte left on his own accord) -- have all been women who couldn't get airtime because of both the lack of female roles and Wiig's massive presence on the show. Ironically, tonight NBC airs its Women of SNL reunion, but unless something drastically changes the distaff dynamics on the show, the next such reunion will probably look identical like the one this evening.
Anyway, on to the poll! The NRFPTP Relevancy Poll is driven by a proprietary algorithm involving such factors as quality airtime or maybe even the fact that fatigued Movieline staffers had to read one more godforsaken Back to the Future-related post on the site. We gauge the chatter following each new episode and, based on that, create each week's NRFPTP Relevancy Poll. If your results differ, let's hear about it.
Hader claims the season's first back-to-back No. 1 ranking. And, my God, he was on fire Saturday night. His Vincent Price sketch and his turn as James Carville during "Update" alone may have been enough to keep him at the top, but after his dual roles as Al Pacino and an uncanny Alan Alda in the "Back to the Future Screen Tests," no one else was even close.
It seemed Wiig was in just about every sketch Saturday night -- which means the other three female cast members were nowhere to be seen. Wiig deserves the No. 2 spot, but her dominance of pretty much every female role on the show should be a problem for viewers and castmates alike. SNL can't afford to just keep recycling through female cast members like they are Wiig's understudies.
Huge week for Moynihan, finally. Not only did he absolutely nail Sam Kinison trying out for the role of Marty McFly, his "I Didn't Ask For This" was a desperately needed lead role. Plus, thanks to Moynihan and Jon Hamm, traffic has spiked again for the actual "Best Cry Ever." (That poor guy.)
Sudeikis appeared as Joe Biden in a pretty lackluster cold open, but he made up for it with a solid supporting role in "Audition" and somehow salvaged the "Highway Cops" sketch with Jon Hamm.
Solid night for Armisen. Garth and Kat was his highlight of the evening, followed close behind by Liberace. Also, he didn't even have to say a word as Prince to generate laughs.
Pretty much just regulated to a Digital Short, but the Digital Short was Shy Ronnie, which is one of Samberg's more solid efforts.
This seems to be the recurring theme for Pharoah: One quick part, knocks it out of the park. This time it was his spot-on Eddie Murphy impression. Why does Pharoah not get more airtime?
Best "Update" lines this week: "A 10-year-old boy in China survived after falling 20 stories from his apartment window and landing on a parked car. And since it was China, the air helped break his fall." Also: "Oh, a strange package from Yemen. Where do I sign?"
Always nice to see Kenan's Cosby impression. Unfortunately, that's about all we saw of Kenan this week.
I'm starting to figure this out. Of all the female cast members, Pedrad has done the best job of finding roles of her own that won't, by default, be given to Kristen Wiig. Unfortunately, I think that's why Pedrad winds up playing so many awkward teenagers, because Wiig doesn't do that. In a week where there's no role for an awkward teenager, Pedrad is hardly seen.
A few weeks ago Bayer had her breakout role as Miley Cyrus. Since then, unfortunately, there hasn't been much. Considering the plight of all female cast members not named Wiig, this may have more to do, unfortunately, with her gender than her rookie status.
I've been sayng it in the Relevancy Poll for quite some time, but it bears repeating: Abby Elliott's lack of productivity has reached an alarming level. She was promoted to full-time cast member this season but has had less screen time than any of the individual new featured players. The same was true last night -- a brief appearance in the Back to the Future sketch as Joan Cusack (which was good) and that was about it. What is happening here?