SNL After Party (S48 E12 - Air Date 2/5/23)
Host: Pedro Pascal
Musical Guest: Coldplay
Welcome to the second edition of the SNL After Party. I wish there were a cool word for second like there is for second-to-last. Is penpremiere a word? No. Well, there we are.
I had high hopes for host Pedro Pascal. Were the expectations met? Read on and then you tell me if this was the way.
Cold Open – Spy Balloon
The current event of the week was the Chinese spy balloon that was shot down Saturday afternoon. So if the cold open felt a little slapped together at the last minute, that’s to be expected. Chloe Fineman served in the thankless role of the news anchor interviewing guests who brought the comedy. Kenan Thompson was a military officer who described the balloon by using a grocery store birthday balloon as a prop. It didn’t kill, but was funny enough.
The whole thing was really to set up Bowen Yang to appear as the balloon itself. This had its moments, such as when Yang described the show Yellowstone as Succession, but outside. But, overall the bit was, well, a little deflated.
Monologue
Nerd project king Pedro Pascal (Mandalorian/The Last of Us/Game of Thrones) is charming, and he told some cute stories. But, was it a comedy monologue really? Probably not, but the guy is so darn likeable, we’ll give him a pass. His shirt, however, gets no such pass. It was almost like a Seinfeld puffy shirt scenario.
The Big Hollywood Quiz
Last week I complained that Bowen isn’t let out of a certain lane. This week he got to play a game show host. So, yay for that! Game shows are a staple of the SNL experience, and are often quite funny. This one fell more into the “Hey, that’s a good point!” then the “Hey, that’s hilarious!” category. The setup was a movie trivia show, where the contestants easily get questions about older movies like All About Eve, but fumble on anything released in the past few years. It was a clever take on how we don’t pay attention to our current entertainment media landscape overall. A great point, but probably not one funny enough to carry a full sketch.
Mario Kart Ad
Pedro Pascal’s current project, The Last of Us, is a gritty adaptation of a video game. So, the first taped bit imagined him in a bleak adaptation of Mario Kart. This was spot on and well-made. It is mind boggling that they could put something like this together in a week. Pascal’s “It’s a me…Mario” was delivered pitch perfectly for the piece. This wasn’t a gut buster, but one I admired for its craftsmanship.
For some reason this was one of two bits on this week’s show featuring (presumably intentionally) bad Italian accents.
Coma Patient
The premise here is that Pedro Pascal’s character wakes up from a coma, and talks funny. That’s it. But, I won’t deny that it was funny. Yang was the doctor (and again, not over the top!). Heidi Gardner, who now appears to be relegated to the wife and/or mom roles, was Pedro’s husband. In the end, she starts talking like him. It’s silly, and Gardner and Pascal cracked each other up. So, fun was had. This sketch had a non-ending, but I must say that overall this week the sketches in general found a logical conclusion.
Technology Assembly
I confess, I am too old for this one. Lots of teen lingo and phenomena here, as Pascal addressed a school assembly to discuss online safety. But this quickly turned into the use of a lot of current discussion of “fancams,” calling people “daddy” and “mommy,” and something about crumbs. Bottom line is this one just made me feel old. Somehow COVID was brought into this as well.
Also, for some unknown reason, Sarah Paulson showed up. Is she in some current project with Pascal? I have no idea.
Wing Pit Ad
This was a commercial that demonstrated the improv principles of “Yes And” and “heightening” very well. Local restaurant offers increasingly larger wing orders with escalating aggression. The results were pretty funny.
Weekend Update
The jokes were solid this week, including some good bits about the spy balloon and a well-constructed George Santos joke based on his claim that he produced the Spiderman musical that featured a strong Green Goblin payoff. There were also the usual cringe jokes designed to make Colin at least appear to be uncomfortable.
The desk guests were more clever than hilarious this week. Michael Longfellow was Punxsutawney Phil, a groundhog going through an existential crisis teetering on nihilism. James Austin Johnson and Devon Walker (when does he get his breakthrough moment?) were British rappers Millie Pounds and Shirty who were there for…I forget why they were ostensibly at the desk. But, their terrible raps were funny and an indictment on why British rap is not necessarily as pointed as it is across the pond.
Protective Mom
I don’t know. Pascal was in drag as an overly protective/judgmental mom who initially didn’t care for his son’s (Marcello Hernandez) girlfriend (Chloe Fineman). This one felt more “yikes” than funny to me, but Pascal really is so, so likeable that I couldn’t hate it.
Angelino’s
Well, it’s the second sketch with questionable Italian accents AND the first of two restaurant sketches in a row (with a Coldplay break between them). Here, the staff of an Italian restaurant serves a table of women, giving them all compliments on their beauty, except for Sarah Sherman. Pascal as the waiter tells them all they look beautiful, except for Sherman who looks “smart” and is the “funny one.” At one point he tells one guest she looks like a model, only to then tell Sherman she looks like a writer. This is a solid joke.
Because it is a Sherman heavy sketch, it did end oddly with her riding away on a motorcycle while eating chili. I am a sucker for fully committed to absurdism, so I enjoyed this one.
The Well Done Steak
Apparently in the intervening Coldplay number, Angelino’s closed and was replaced by a steak restaurant. I won’t go into this one too much, but the whole premise is that Ego Nwodim’s character likes really well done steak, which is, of course difficult to cut. In doing so, she shakes the entire table to such a degree that drinks and food fly about and make a mess. Pascal kept cracking up, and there was no hint of an ending to this sketch. But, who cares. It was really funny.
I love that they allow the sketch in this final slot to often just be nonsense.
The Goodbye Wave
Best Sketch: I’ll go with the Mario Kart ad here, just because it was so well done.
Worst Sketch: The Cold Open. There just wasn’t anything to it. Technology Assembly was a contender here.
Random Notes: I tend to watch the show with my wife, Christiana, who is far more amusing than I am. So, I’m going to try to start getting some of her observations in. She had a lot to say about Coldplay. And also Gwyneth Paltrow, but we will put a pin in that to quote from the Coma Patient sketch. Christiana wondered why Coldplay bothered having someone sign the first song, but then forced that person to wear a dumb alien mask so you couldn’t see their face. Her point is that professional sign language interpreters use their face to help project the meaning of the songs, and a Buzz Lightyear villain mask gets in the way of that. As for Coldplay’s second song, she pointed out that despite his best efforts, Chris Martin is no Paul Simon, and that he came across as a non-denominational youth pastor.
This was a middle of the road SNL episode if ever there was one. The host was game and raised up what could have been a weaker show simply by appearing to have a lot of fun. There was no absolutely terrible material here, but nothing to transform this into a great show. Overall grade: B-.