Host: Inde Navarrette
Musical Guest: Gracie Abrams
Will Inde Navarrette have us obsessing over this week’s Saturday Night Live episode, or will we use our one wish to get a different host?
Let’s find out on this week’s SNL After Party!
Cold Open
This is the Halloween episode…and the set up is the Tombs of Doom haunted ride, where Jeremy Culhane and Grace Reiter strap into a cart accompanied by ride host Kenan Thompson. There’s no doubt where this is going we all hope. We are going to get to see our favorite Halloween guy, David S. Pumpkins.
And we do! Tom Hanks and Bobby Moynihan pop in to join Mikey Day and ask us once again, “Any questions?”
But, the bit is cut woefully short as James Austin Johnson pops in as Trump, causing the sketch to freeze, as he compares himself to Pumpkins, saying they both first appeared on SNL in 2016, they are both loud, orange and annoying.
Trump is ostensibly there to talk about the midterms, including his concern that Texas is turning purple “just like my hand”.
JAJ goes on to riff on Trump’s apparent fascination with mens’ posteriors of late, claiming he has gay dementia.
He goes meta and comments on the fact that Hanks and Moynihan are wasted by his interruption, adds that he is surprised Hanks isn’t narrating a World War II documentary.
Then Trump brings on his old press secretary Katie Zacharia (Veronika Slowikowska) who flubs the “Live from New York…” spectacularly, so he calls on rumored new press secretary Niki Minaj (Saidah Belo-Osagie) to bring it home.
This was some egregious trolling by SNL this week. David S. Pumpkins hasn’t been on in several years, and we were excited to see him. But, they rudely cut him off for yet another “Trump interrupts” cold open.
A sad waste of Hanks, David S. Pumpkins, and Bobby Moynihan. It’s like going trick or treating and expecting a delicious full-sized candy bar, but instead getting a slap in the mouth with a dead trout.
Monologue
Inde Navarrette is inarguably best known for playing Nicky in the surprise horror hit, Obsession.
She comes out saying she is nothing like that character, and adds her boyfriend is in the audience to support her. The camera then cuts to a guy bound and gagged in the audience.
She adds she has been cast as Rogue in an upcoming Marvel film, so she has to get in shape. So she has to wear her “little whore outfit and hit the gym,” she says taking a none too subtle shot at Shane Gillis’ controversial monologue.
The cast then comes out in various Halloween costumes.
The result is cute, if not hilarious. This is a perfectly passable opening monologue that seems more cast than host driven, but no significant missteps, and Navarrette seems at ease in her role.
Queen Mary Ghosts
JAJ leads Ben Marshall, Ashley Padilla and Kenan on a ghost tour of the Queen Mary. Immediately, Sarah Sherman appears as a 1930’s ghost who hid a fortune on the ship before she died.
Unfortunately, as she tells Marshall where the treasure lies, she is interrupted by the ghosts of two children (Navarrette and Marcello Hernandez) about to go swimming.
The children are annoying and make it so the tourists cannot hear Sherman explain where the gold is.
So, he asks her again, and once again the children appear and overtalk Sherman, this time say their father will join with his amazing swimming costume.
Finally, we get another effort to get the message, when the ghosts of the children and their father (Day) appear, and Marshall comments that the swimming costume is overhyped, driving Day’s ghost into a rage.
Finally, the children beseech Sherman to join them for a swim, and she says she doesn’t know how. But, this should be no problem as neither do any of them.
So, that solves the mystery of their deaths, but the treasure, alas, shall remain hidden.
Interlaced with this is Kenan repeatedly confusing his wife (Padilla) as a ghost due to her paleness.
It’s a goofy sketch that is sold mainly on Navarrette and Hernandez’s ridiculous performances as the ghost kids. And, an angry Mikey Day is never a losing proposition.
New Airline Class
In this pre-taped segment, Delta Airlines presents its new section for “crazy people”, Delta Disruptive. It’s the section to sit in if you are tired of “being met by law enforcement when you land.” The bit is amusing enough as it parodies various viral airplane freak outs and memes play out.
The button on the sketch is a notation that this is just being rolled out on domestic flights within Florida.
It doesn’t quite take off, but it’s no in-flight disaster.
The Uninterested Woman Game Show
Padilla is game show host, Sephora Outlet, on a show in which a female contestant (Belo-Osagie) is up front that she has no interest in dating any of the three bachelors as she is a married lesbian.
But that doesn’t stop the three contestants from having delusions. Navarrette is a bro who thinks he is vibing with Belo-Osagie. Jane Wickline is a “professional rat wrangler with COVID, and Sherman is a guy who works out only his arms, so he looks weird like a lot of his favorite podcasters.
The sketch revolves around the clueless guys thinking any and everything Belo-Osagie says or does is a come-on, when it in fact, is not.
The highlight comes when Navarrette, while making crude motions, claims that the woman is only a lesbian because she hasn’t met him yet, to which Padilla says “She has” while affixing him with a surgically precise glare. It’s hard to explain this in words, but Padilla’s performance here is next level.
This is a biting sketch about mens’ cluelessness and mistaking any form of nicety as flirtation, and it’s handled in a way that delivers laughs and a solid message.
Midnight Matinee - The Inventor’s Wife
The pre-taped “film” features Navarrette as the widow of an inventor who sadly says at his funeral, “My husband loved his invention and liked his wife.”
Upon returning home to her house full of oddball inventions, the widow finds an envelope from her deceased husband to her on top of a box. Inside the container is a robot, PD-44.
She and the cute little robot become friends, and it helps her get through her tough time by watching TV with her and laughing.
Several months go by, and the widow gets on a dating site. PD helps her select a match (Marshall), and she goes on a date.
The sweet little story takes a gruesome turn when Navarrette brings her date home to meet PD.
I won’t give this part away, but we do learn what PD stands for, and we get our homage to Obsession in the oddest way.
Like most of the Midnight Matinee pieces, this one is odd and entertaining, and has twists you just don’t see coming.
Telenovela
Hernandez and Navarrette are telenovela stars under Kenan’s direction. As they conclude an over the top take, two American ad executives (Day and Padilla) arrive on set as they have paid for a product placement for a new flavor of Sprite, cherry lime habanero.
The actors are told to just insert the product into the scenes.
In the first take, Hernandez declares that “only an obese pervert would drink this.”
Understandably, this doesn’t please the executives, so they suggest they just drink some in the scene. This repeats several times leading to such lines as “It’s bad, but they paid for this,” “It’s poison!” followed by a spit take, “The Sprite made me hit a woman” and finally “It is causing me to die”.
Throughout this, Navarrette and Day do some really fun physical comedy and ridiculously overblown acting.
The revelation at the end is that Day is enjoying the lines as he is actually an undercover agent for 7 Up.
This was a gloriously dumb sketch that earned some real laughs.
I am not sure if it will impact the ad buys NBC sees from Sprite going forward.
Weekend Update
Tuesday’s midterm elections led the news with an analysis of Trump apparently being “laser focused on men’s asses.” The President in recent days has made a number of comments on Ohio Senator Jon Husted’s attributes.
Among the political jokes, there is a story that the New York Marathon was to be run the next day, with an explanation that the race was named for a messenger who ran from Marathon to Athens so he could tell everyone that he ran a marathon.
Che brings us a story of KKK members marching in robes in El Paso, adding that would be a really smart way to sneak across the U.S. border.
The intentionally dumb jokes fly this week as well. There’s a Stevie Wonder is blind joke, a dumb joke about Van Gogh being deaf, and the story of a woman dressed as a banana who reported a car accident. Of course, by the time police arrived, she had….split.
As for desk guests, we get a weird appearance from Pennywise the Clown (Marshall) who is here to tell us “You don’t need to drink to have fun.” He claims to be reformed, no longer living in the sewer, but instead in a loft in “Austin, Texas with three other motivated young Christians.” Turns out, he’s really pitching a new AI service. He then launches an intervention for Che. This was a singularly odd and unfocused desk appearance.
The second appearance is Bobby Moynihan bringing back Drunk Uncle. It’s good they let Moynihan have more screen time after that egregious cold open. This time around, the besotted uncle is celebrating the Brewers first ever World Series victory. He declares that he has been drinking since the Brewers won, and for the 57 years before that.
Drunk Uncle bemoans the state of baseball today, including the fact that they no longer serve beer after the seventh inning as if they expect him to drive home sober.
At one point, Drunk Uncle inadvertently rips Jost’s shirt when the anchor had the temerity to ask if he watched the WNBA finals.
The appearance is capped by a visit from Brewers players Christian Yelich and Brice Turang, as well as manager Pat Murphy. Drunk Uncle mistakes Yelich for Pete Davidson, which gets a big laugh.
I was no fan of Drunk Uncle as a regular fixture, but it’s fun to see him again after a several year break. I’m just sad they couldn’t find something else for Hanks to do as well.
Paw Patrol: Special Victims Unit
The gang from the kids’ cartoon, Paw Patrol, is faced with a series of murders of beloved show characters. It turns out it was all the mayor.
This is one of those sketches that is a funny premise, but not really that funny as an entire sketch. It would have been better served as being a ten second clip in a series of very quick commercial bits. But as a full sketch, it just did not work.
Plates
Waiter Day accidentally drops a tray of plates full of Italian food on Padilla’s head.
She tries to play it off as no big deal, but ultimately admits she “can smell my blood and feel my bones.” She adds that her vision went out when she was hit with the plates.
The sketch then devolves into her farting repeatedly.
And that, my friends, is that. I guess it’s nice that SNL accepts spec scripts from junior high kids from time to time.
The Goodbye Wave
Best Sketch: This is a tough call. I am torn between the Telenovela sketch and the Uninterested Woman Show. Although the Uninterested Woman sketch is funny and smart, the Telenovela piece is just frenetically hilarious, so I am giving that one the edge.
Worst Sketch: This is another tough decision. The Cold Open was just spiteful. The Paw Patrol piece didn’t work at all, and the Plates sketch just felt like it was kinda just there. Ultimately, I think that Padilla could not save Plates which really seemed like it was still in the workshop phase. So, Plates it is.
Random Notes:
-We got an in memoriam clip for Sir Patrick Stewart with his infamous introduction of Salt-N-Peppa from when he hosted in 1994. A fitting tribute.
-Musical guest Gracie Abrams is really into Baz Luhrman’s Romeo + Juliet. In her first number she wore Claire Danes’ angel costume from the movie, and in her second song she wore Leonardo DiCaprio’s masquerade outfit.
-It really felt like a sketch got axed at the last minute. The end credits segment ran very long, and there were only two post-Update sketches. Something went awry!
Inde Navarrette proved herself to be a capable comic actress and fit right in with the tone of the show. She really disappeared into her characters in a way a lot of hosts don’t (or can’t) pull off. She seems like a likely return candidate.
Overall the show was strong with a few notable duds. Halloween shows can be fun. This one didn’t lean into the whole Halloween thing as much as some episodes have (Man, I miss Bill Hader’s Vincent Price Halloween parties), but the cast still had some fun with it.
I am giving this show a slightly lower grade than it probably deserves, mainly as a sign of my protest over the tired Trump interrupting thing and its ruination of the sanctity of a David S. Pumpkins sketch. Don’t make Pumpkins a part of your political nonsense, he’s his own thing, man!
Grade: B-
As always, we grade SNL episodes in comparison to other SNL episodes. Not TV in general. If you want to support our content, consider subscribing on Substack
