I think it's a really good idea for everyone to start watching Saturday Night Live again. Last season was great, and this season has been more of the same.

Doubt they'll be able to keep much of the current cast around for a long time, but Andy Samberg, Jason Sudeikis, and Kristin Wiig are some of the funniest people SNL has ever had on the cast if you ask me.

This season has been really weak imo.

Samberg is good but Wiig plays an annoying not funny character in what seems like about half of the skits. Fred Armisen is still completely terrible and because he plays Obama he won't be gone anytime soon even though his Obama impression is surely the worst political impersonation from a mainstream source ever.

I watched some last year and pretty much the only skits that were funny either wrote themselves (Palin stuff) or were the digital shorts. There were a few good ones here or there like James Harrison during weekend update, but mostly it was awful. I've recorded a couple from this season and have found them to be bad as well.

I want to like the show but I just can't.

last season was great, this season, not so much.

I hate how every opening week is Obama now.

Like poster above me said, Wiig is over used. A 1 trick pony, who can only do annoying awkward stuff.
Samberg is good, but his songs/shorts have sucked this season.
Armisen should be used in other stuff more, as should forte.

bobby moynihan is pretty awesome, i hope he will be on the cast for a long time.

Overall, solid cast, but material and skits are a bit repetitive. Still some good bits, and this season is better than 2-3 seasons ago (awful times imo).

Wiig is terrible she can't play a supporting character and always plays the same character that has to take over sketches by repeating the same joke over and over. I dvr every episode and have started auto skipping most Wiig sketches.

Armisen is really good and probably the 2nd best cast member right now (Hader is number 1). Armisen is incredibly versatile and usually comes up with pretty original sketches.

Onion AV Club sums it up better than me
I think Sudekis is generally good and I don't really like either the new cast members. I think they should have kept Michela Watkins and Casey Wilson as I enjoyed both of them.

Kenan is terrible.

I like Wiig a lot in small doses. Playing the same character, in every skit at that is just too much. The guests have been lackluster and it's hurting overall quality. Hall and Oats ruled though

Ok, I'll concede Wiig kind of sucks now. She's been way overused since she's the only regular female cast member.

They put Sudeikis in pretty much every sketch too, but he's got a ton of range. I think the Bidenator is a pretty awesome character, and saves some of the weaker Obama sketches.

I don't feel like I even need to point to examples of awesome Samberg roles. He's great in every sketch he does. Some of the digital shorts with him are kind of dumb, but whatever.

And Kenan kind of sucks, but he's rarely asked to carry sketches, and the ones he is are usually well-written for him. The musical talk show with Al Gore in the Levitt episode was an example of a pretty awesome Kenan sketch.

The supporting cast fills out pretty well. Hader is kind of one-note, but he doesn't get annoying to me. Forte gives me nothing bad to say about him. Armisen's Obama is obviously kind of weak, but if nothing else, I'd at least say he's improving at it.


There are definitely sketches that don't work, but I've always felt it's best not to judge the show on the weak sketches. Each of the episodes I've watched have had me rolling multiple times. We'll see, I have pretty high expectations going forward.

Chris Elliot's daughter, Abby Elliot, does some pretty good impressions of obscure celebrities like Brittany Murphy and Anna Faris. So that's good.

i bet abby elliot is a freak. i'm very into her.

Link to funny skits? I don't believe you.

i'm too lazy. but some stuff that sticks out that should be easy to find on hulu....

timberlake on the boat to america and the new world.
i'm on a boat is played out, but was pretty fun on first viewing.
keenan on whats up with that?
samberg and lady gaga.

They had already done "What's Up With That" before the JGL episode it was mildly funny the first time, but mainly because of Sudekis as Rerun in the background. Kenan sings or it a token black guy is every single sketch.

Speaking of which JGL"s monologue was hands down the best sketch of the season.

Hader isn't one note. He can play straight and funny man can do tons of different impressions can do over the top silly physical humour really well. He is clearly the best castmember right now.

Samberg while funny is insanely one note and a pretty ****ty actor.

SNL sucks this season. Last season was decent but this season is terrible.

-Get rid of Keenan Thompson. He is terrible and his impressions just sound like his own self rather than the person he is impersonating. If they need a black guy on the show I am sure you could find about 10,000 different black men that could do a 10x better job than him.
-Weekend Update sucks with Seth Myers. Some of the impressions are really good but others are just AWFUL (usually when Keenan or Andy Samburg are doing them).
-Andy Samburg rivals Keenan in the pathetic impressions category but at least it seems like he can somewhat write stuff based on some of the older Digital Shorts (although he had help from Jorma Taccone and Akiva something on all these).
-Bill Hader is the best. He should be doing impressions in every skit imo.
-Fred Armisen in solid but I don't really like his Obama impression. Just not very good compared to other things he has done and as others have said it is overdone at this point.
-Will Forte is alright. Would prefer him and Bill Hader getting more time over Jason Sudeikis (who sucks as Biden).
-Abby Elliot is awesome.

I would normally agree with most of ^, but lately Keenan has been pretty good. "What's Up With That" skits and the "Reba" digital short were the best parts of those episodes.

Andy Samberg is very one note, as people have said, but his digital shorts are at the very least enjoyable and that's really the only reason he's on the show.

I like Andy Sambergs digital short videos, but other than that hes not that funny. Hope tomorrows "special" show will be at least a little funny

+1

OP - this season has been terrible imo.

-Al

A lot of words could be used to describe this season of SNL -- "funny" is not one of them. But I keep watching in hopes that it somehow becomes watchable, or that it can be some decent trainwreck TV like the January Jones episode ("which camera?").

I've mostly decided to scapegoat Seth Meyers. He's the head writer, and the writing this season has been off the charts bad. Every sketch is a rehash of something else or just not remotely funny. He's also probably the worst Weekend Update anchor I can remember, like all of his jokes flop and he has a really obnoxious, smug delivery.

Even the Digital Shorts have been noticeably weaker this season. We get it, you think it's funny when someone raps like a tough guy then turns out to be a sissy or into dudes.

Also hurting the show is that they keep bringing in teen idols/random hot chicks to host instead of people who are actually funny and can work in sketches.

while abby elliot is hella hot, and i want to bone her alot, shes not that funny imo. like in the way talented guys like armisen and forte are. very versitile..

the best is when they the italian interview thing (hosted by hader, vinny vidici or w/e) and you have those two sitting off stage eating spagetti and stuff. so minimalistic, and so funny.

armisen is prolly the most solid imo, from the days of Ferecitio (w/ haratio sanz) to now, he has always had great characters. I like the one who goes on random tangents, on weekend update (idk the name).

shame these two are used as side characters. They should really be #1 and #2.

Kenan is usually unfunny, but his newest bit, the show where he sings all the time, is hella funny.

Seth Meyers blows so hard. They don't even use him in skits anymore. IDK why he is still on the show, should be fired.

Last season was way better, but the guests were of a much better quality.

Taylor Swift was the best this season and she flubbed a fair few things (which, to be fair, isnt too surprising given she is a singer). The others had their moments and whilst a really bad idea for SNL i was majorly impressed with the ninja skills of Taylor Lautner last weekend for example, but for the most part the shows are carried by a few people doing the same stuff repetitively.

Btw, i massively agree with whoever said January Jones was terrible. Her best sketch was the close one where she just acted ******ed looking at clouds, and that was more sold by the regular cast dude (who im too lazy to look up).

+1 Abby Elliot too.

Also i really like Seth, but WU was WAY better with Amy.

The shows that are always home runs are the ones that are hosted by Justin Timberlake and Alec Baldwin.

Hader is from my hometown and I think the best thing going on the show.

I really like Samberg's Digital Shorts but everything else he does is pretty bad.

Wiig used to be really good when her characters were new but now they are getting kinda old.

I really like Keenan's What's up wit dat and when he is the guy in jail scaring the kids straight.

Sedakis is usually best when not being a main character in a sketch. He is also best dancing in the background of What's up wit dat. He could be easily replaced.

Armison's Obama is pretty bad but until they get someone who is black and not fat, he will have a job. I agree with whoever said that his comic that talks about the headlines in papers during WU is very good and probably his best asset. I also like his NY gov. impression, always making fun of NJ.

Elliot is cute but doesn't add a whole lot more than that.

Moinihan (sp?) is underutilized imo. He can be really funny but I can't really think of anything immediately.

Seth is ok at WU. I think it can work better as a duo. I don't think anyone on the current cast could do it better though. He is not the worst though. I really hated it when it was Colin Quinn.

Forte is prob my second favorite behind Hader. I love MacGruber and just his voice makes almost everything he says funny. Also the Bon Jovi opposite band is really good.

Looking at the cast list I see that Darrell Hammond is still on the show. I feel like I haven't seen him this entire season. He's a vet in his 15th season and is a great impressionist with his Clinton being the best.

Pedrad and Slate (the other two girls besides Wiig and Elliot, had to look up their names) add nothing and I wouldn't be surprised if they don't last three seasons.

I know TL;DR but that is my take.

lol, I remember Slate got in a ****load of trouble because she dropped an F bomb in one skit where they were using the word frickin' every other sentence and she slipped up. She was also good in "Bored to Death" FWIW.

Darrell Hammond left, though he has been on a few times since he left.

Also Jon Bovi is great, same for the scared straight bit they do, mainly cos its clear Keenan just spends the entire sketch doing his best to make the others laugh whilst doing it.

Btw, am i the only one who thinks the MacGruber film is going to blow hard. It surely wont work when stretched to a 90 minute film other than by changing the entire concept of the sketch.

I find it interesting that a lot of you guys think Armisen is good in his non-Obama stuff. Must be a sense of humor thing I guess since I can't think of a single thing of his that I've enjoyed other than stuff like an Obama skit where it was funny despite him being bad. He gives off such a huge trying-too-hard vibe to me. IMO his Obama impression is terrible primarily because he is trying so hard to get the delivery cadence that he turns into a total stiff, which is not like Obama at all. I think the same goes for his other stuff, just seems forced.

ya idk wtf they are gonna do for 90 minutes. I think the corny shtick is gonna get old after about 15 minutes.

most of the snl movies have blown hard, imo only waynes world and blues brothers are relevant (imo waynes world isnt funny). but... looking at wiki: they re dirt cheap to make, last 4 of last 5 movies were all under $20m to make.

though this one might cost more b/c of special effects.

I think that was her first show as well, opps. On the bright side it likely killed the "I fricken love you" franchise, thank god.