What Did You Miss on the Saturday Night Live Season Premiere Last Night?
Saturday Night Live returned this week with their Season 43 Opener. The pressure was on, this episode follows up what many are calling Saturday Night Live‘s most successful season ever, and two of the show’s head writers recently left the series to move on to other projects. With three new cast members, three featured cast members moving ahead to their sophomore season, and seven brand new writers, the show seamlessly transitioned into a Season 43 that matched its previous season in tone.
As you might expect, Alec Baldwin returned to open the show as Trump. The cold open parodied Trump’s response to the San Juan mayor. There were a few other familiar bits in the season’s first ep– guest host Ryan Gosling reprised his role in the popular alien abduction sketch with Cecily Strong and Kate McKinnon (and also reprised his role as the guy who couldn’t stop breaking during the sketch). Weekend Update characters Angela Merkel and Guy Who Just Bought a Boat returned as well. Baldwin’s Trump is largely the same, although he seems to be going deeper in the facial contortions department. SNL fans who loved the Trump sketches last year will continue to be very pleased with the bit, while Trump fans will not.
Overall, the entire episode felt like the team is determined to repeat a successful formula found in Season 42. It’s as if the directive is “change nothing” for Season 43 and the result is a solid but not necessarily exciting start.
The brightest spot of the night came from Weekend Update‘s returning Michael Che and Colin Jost. The writing continues to have real teeth. Jost and Che’s chemistry is better than ever, and Che went after Trump hard for complaining that the Mayor of San Juan has been nasty. “Oh really Donald? You bitch? Was she nasty to you? How nasty? Are you shaking? You want to go smoke a Virginia Slim until your hand stops moving?” He told the President “This isn’t that complicated man, it’s hurricane relief. These people need help. You just did this for white people twice. Do the same thing. Go tell Melania to put on her flood heels, get some bottled water, some food, pack up some extra Atlanta Falcons Super Bowl t-shirts, and write them a check with our money, you cheap cracker.”
Later, Che announced that the Obamacare repeal keeps coming back like a Jason movie. “At this rate, we’re only a few years away from Freddy vs Healthcare…which really scares me because we all know who dies first in those movies.” While Jost remarked about Hugh Hefner’s passing, “He will be buried in a folder marked work stuff.” There was also commentary about Hurricane Maria, Trump’s attempt to define an island, Blindness Awareness Month, fatberg, STDs and Saudi Arabia’s decision to allow women to drive.
SNL‘s digital shorts continue to provide some of the best and funniest social commentary of the night. A parody jeans ad for Levi’s Wokes tops our list of the best SNL segments this week. Ryan Gosling starred in the fake commercial for style-neutral, gender non-conforming denim for a generation that defies labels. With Mikey Day, Kenan Thompson, Leslie Jones, Pete Davidson, Kate McKinnon, Chris Redd and Heidi Gardner.
A second digital short starred Gosling as a man obsessed with the font choice for the movie Avatar. Newcomers Chris Redd and Heidi Gardner make appearances in the short along with Gosling, Cecily Strong, Kate McKinnon, and Kyle Mooney, with appearances by former cast members Bobby Moynihan and Vanessa Bayer.
In live sketches, a trip to an Italian restaurant causes problems for a couple played by Ryan Gosling and Cecily Strong. When they are fooled into eating food from Pizza Hut, things go badly. That’s three hits for new cast members Chris Redd and Heidi Gardner who join Gosling and Strong along with Beck Bennett, Melissa Villasenor, Kyle Mooney and Mikey Day.
Gosling was also featured in a sketch so bizarre we’re not even sure we know what the hell we watched, but it’s gotta be in our top five clips to watch this week. In Henrietta and the Fugitive, Gosling’s on the lam character falls in love with Henrietta, a hen played by Aidy Bryant who helps him hide from the cops in this gumshoe detective-esque parody.
Reprising their roles as alien abductees, Gosling, Cecily Strong, and Kate McKinnon star in “Another Close Encounter.” It’s just a retread of 2015’s hit sketch, but the writing is strong and it’s worth it to watch just to see Gosling have zero ability to contain his laughs.
Saturday Night Live returns live next week, with Gal Gadot hosting.
