SNL After Party (S51 E3Air Date 10/18/25) - "I Think You Just Got Scared and Farted a Little”
Host and Musical Guest: Sabrina Carpenter
op star Sabrina Carpenter is no stranger to SNL, but this was her first time hosting the show. She also serves as musical guest.
Did Carpenter construct a show that will help out a sputtering season 51, or has just just added more rickety woodwork to a somewhat shoddy structure?
Let’s find out at this week’s After Party
Cold Open:
The show eschews the usual current events cold open for a tepid return of the Domingo sketch. I may well be in the minority on this, but I feel the whole Domingo thing was played out after the first appearance of Marcello Hernandez as the rascal Domingo whose escapades with Chloe Fineman’s character are portrayed in song by her besties. This time the shenanigans of a weekend in Nashville are extolled.
There’s nothing new here, and I don’t know why they keep doing this. But, crowd reaction would seem to indicate I am cranky and wrong, so there ya go.
Monologue
Sabrina Carpenter covered the controversies related to her “Smell the Glove” style album cover and her overall sexual nature. She did some “crowd work” that played on this.
The monologue was exceptionally weak this outing. This is not looking like a promising episode.
Boys Podcast:
Fineman, Carpenter, Jane Wickline and Veronika Slowikowski do a convincing turn as 13 year old boys doing a podcast, discussing such things as which Halloween candies are “fire”. They are then, inexplicably, joined by Trump (JAJ of course) who joins them in their brainrot coversation.
JAJ drops some good lines, extolling Little Debbie, while cryptically adding “It’s a shame what happened to her.”
He also refers to this week’s comment where the President mused to reporters that he was not going to Heaven. “Heaven? Probably not, right? Epstein!”
Overall, this was a disjointed and odd sketch, but to its credit it did seem to capture the middle-school language that’s out there now. As a Gen X’er it is funny to me to see Gen Z becoming angry oldsters who make fun of the next generation’s slang.
Time makes fools of us all.
Plans:
This pre-taped bit stars Carpenter and Ben Marshall in a movie trailer for a Blumhouse film called “Plans”. The couple is settling in for a plan-free weekend when Carpenter’s cousin (Sarah Sherman) announces she is cashing in on a promise for an evening of activities. It’s upsetting enough that she’s the cousin who runs marathons, but she’s also bringing her husband (Mikey Day), “the guy who always shows…YouTube videos.”
The “horror” builds through the trailer.
This is genuinely funny, and was, quite frankly, terrifying to me!
Shop-TV Pillow:
Ashley Padilla takes Heidi Garner’s spot as Day’s co-host on a TV shopping channel. This one involves Carpenter selling a neck support pillow that looks, well, anatomical.
The whole sketch is jokes about the pillow looking like female genitals.
That’s it. That’s the joke.
This is a single premise sketch where the premise cannot support the whole piece.
Maybe the guys from the podcast sketch wrote this one.
Girlboss Seminar:
Carpenter leads an empowerment seminar in which her backup dancers (Jeremy Culhan and Tommy Brennan) fling her around (well they throw an intentionally obvious dummy) causing her to have a concussion.
Carpenter does a great job with her non-sensical post-concussion jabbering. It’s impressive.
The biggest laugh of the sketch, however, comes when Kenan Thompson as a window repairman flings a dummy out the window that missed the mark.
This was fun.
Grind Song:
Middle-schoolers (again!) sing about the joys of grinding at a school dance. Funny enough, I guess. Bowen Yang looks shockingly young here.
Weekend Update
This week’s jokes include the expected fare. Trump finally “released what everyone has asked him to release - George Santos.”
There was also a joke about the leaked young Republican text thread that veered into Nazi humor. Che noted the thread was called “Jost Family Group Chat”.
There was a discussion of the indictment of John Bolton who just “wants people to stop coming up to him ordering chicken.”
Prince Andrew gave up his title “Duke of York” due to the Epstein scandal. He will now call himself “The King of Quinceañeras”.
And, it was noted that this year’s top Halloween costume is Kpop Demon Hunters, or as it is sold at Spirit Halloween “Asian Singing Murderers”.
The desk guests were unusually weak. Hernandez returns as The Movie Guy looking at scary movie season. In yet another bit that was funny once, this is just a repeat of the same premise as always. The Movie Guy has not seen any movies. Meh.
New cast member Tommy Brennan gets to take his turn doing stand-up at the desk. He’s funny enough, and has self-effacing charm. “I look like a locket photo from WWI.” and “I look like a guy who was really good at football before-integration.” It was cute, but overly funny. I am withholding judgment on him for now.
Appliance Store:
Andre Dismukes (apparently moving into Mikey Day’s role as the put-upon husband) and Ashley Padilla shop for a washer and dryer with salesman Thompson. He shows them a special set that has singing women (Carpenter and Slowikowski) with a “swinging 20’s vibe.”
This one is a lot of effort for little payoff, alas.
On the plus side, it does showcase Slowikowski, and gives a hint at her potential.
Surprise:
Speaking of sketches that the middle school boys from the podcast may have written…..
Marshall, Sherman, Dismukes and Carpenter surprise their co-worker Padilla on her birthday by jumping up and saying “Surprise!” when she enters a conference room.
Padilla reacts by loudly and longly farting.
The sketch goes on with Padilla expelling gas anytime she is surprised by information. This is an objectively dumb and juvenile sketch.
It is also incredibly funny, mainly on the strength of Padilla’s performance. She really sells the whole thing, and even when she messes up a line, her recovery is hilarious.
Padilla is a real MVP on the show now.
The Party City tag at the end of the sketch was really the bow on this birthday gift.
Social Experiment:
Former Ben Marshall Please Don’t Destroy co-star Martin Herlihy presents a video of a social experiment that mocks the viral YouTube clip of people reacting to a theater full of bikers. Except in this case it is Frankensteins. (Well, Frankenstein monsters.)
As people leave the theater, Marshall accuses them of being racists. That is until Kam Patterson stays in the theater and enjoys the show.
In his interview, Patterson says he does not know who Frankenstein is.
Herlihy states the he has “never been so confused by a guy in my life.”
The Frankensteins then sing a song.
This was a fun final sketch for the night.
The Goodbye Wave:
Best Sketch: Despite (or because of) it being so idiotic and immature, Surprise wins on the strength of Padilla’s performance. And also all the farts.
Worst Sketch: You could easily have swayed me to go with the Domingo Cold Open or even Boys Podcast, but I am going with Appliance Store. I love odd sketches, but this one didn’t go anywhere, and just didn’t cut it. (Unlike Surprise, amirite?)
Random Notes:
Sabrina Carpenter did two set piece musical numbers. One involved her dancing about her bedroom in her underwear, while the other had her beating up karate men in a dojo.
The new cast members are slowly getting more airtime. I have high hopes for Patterson and Slowikowski so far, but let’s see how this cast gels.
It feels like Kenan Thompson is slowly fading out. I hope he gets the sendoff he deserves when/if he leaves the show.
Cut for time was an Update desk guest with JAJ as biohacker Chuck Spyro. They shoulda cut The Movie Guy instead.
Sabrina Carpenter proved herself to be a capable comedic performer, and she did a good job as constant presence on this week’s episode. The material did not raise this episode very high this week, but it didn’t sink either. Maybe the oversized cast will find their lanes soon.
Grade: C
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