Nikki Glaser clearly came to play and was just a clown as an energetic host while being divisive shadow and his band gave it their all during his vibrant pop-rock performances. In a volatile season, this was a relatively strong episode. That's all that happened on Saturday Night Live This week.
Cold opening
We were taken to the Oval Office, where a pharmaceutical executive passed out during a press conference, and then James Austin Johnson delivered a Donald Trump monologue. He ran through the past week and everything that went wrong for him and America, including the government shutdown, the recent election results, and more. Overall, this may have been JJ Trump's least funny script in the show's history, which was sad because his performances are usually so stellar.
Monologue
Comedian Nikki Glaser gracefully took to the main stage and grabbed the microphone to deliver her monologue. She showed off her spray tan and joked about how it could be cultural appropriation, and also suggested that RFK Jr. might have a “lung tan.” Glaser shared a little about our obsession with her appearance and manicure. This led to unexpected rumors of women being enslaved and trafficked for sex. We also learned about her short boyfriend and the pros and cons of their dynamic. Somehow this then led her to think about pedophilia, and then the funny monologue came to an end.
Family karaoke nights
The woman, played by Sarah Sherman, met her boyfriend's family for the first time at a family karaoke night. Glaser played Becky, the sister of Tommy Brennan's Petey, and they sang romantic songs in an incestuous manner, which upset Sherman. Everything went predictably, but ended quite unexpectedly.
Hudsacillin
The now-deleted fake ad featured Glaser lamenting her fear of being asked to dance in Jennifer Hudson's embarrassing perfume tunnel until she took the medicine that solved her problems. Funny thing.
Beauty and Mister Beast
Ben Marshall played the terrifying Mister Beast in the Disney film adaptation. Beauty and the Beastwhere the musical's characters have to face humiliating, brutal tests for money, which was the show's way of sharply satirizing this enigmatic scourge and pop culture trickster.
American Girl XL
In this deleted ad, we learned about a new product called American Girl XL, which were adult-sized dolls that men had tainted with their sexual deviance. It was normal.
Bachelorette party on a bull
Some young women were drunk at a bachelorette party in a country bar when (shortly before Jane Wickline made one of her early character exits) Glaser and Sarah Sherman found themselves on a runaway mechanical bull while James Austin Johnson sang a song about their time travel and intergalactic adventures in the style of a Johnny Cash tune, and it was all psychedelic and funny.
shadow
Standing in front of what could only be described as a well-stocked guitar amp salesroom at Long & McQuade, Sombre and his five-piece band performed an upbeat dance-rock tune, “12 to 12,” that looked and sounded good.
Starting solo on “back to friends” at the piano, Sombre joined his bandmates to confidently howl the song while dressed in 1970s duds, and eventually even climbed onto the scaffolding on stage. Again, it was wonderful and showed real command of the stage.
Weekend update
Colin Jost kicked off Update by mocking the pharmaceutical executive's Oval Office meltdown and was also greeted with thunderous applause when he started making jokes about Zohran Mamdani. Michael Che also spoke about the race for mayor of New York and ridiculed Andrew Cuomo. Yost was able to link Prince Andrew's connection to Jeffrey Epstein to Trump, and later told us that orcas should be jailed. Che reported on research into the use of cash while making fun of himself and telling a good joke about Michael Jackson.
Pete Davison stopped by to respond to an article about how the Staten Island Ferry he and Yost own is a money-losing proposition. Davidson used this as an opportunity to talk about a variety of things, including Lorne Michaels' upcoming retirement, the creation of the New Staten Island boat, and more, all in a rather poignant and sweet way.
Frat guy wearing hyper realistic female mask
At a sorority meeting, the leader played by Glazer recounted an incident at another sorority where a man pretended to be a woman by wearing a woman's mask. When Alice was accused of being that kind of person, her other sisters came to her defense, despite some damning and hilarious evidence that she was actually Mikey Day playing a creepy dude, which was funny.
Brad and his father
In the quirky yet dark animated film, we are introduced to Brad and his divorced father as they hang out in a sad, dysfunctional way. Voiced by Mikey Day at least, it had a Mike Judge vibe and was pretty good.
Flight Delay with Captain Dave
Andrew Dismukes and Sarah Sherman played frustrated passengers on a delayed flight, which would have been bad enough, but they also had to endure pilot James Austin Johnson's TMI news about his personal life. It did surprisingly well thanks to JAJ's outstanding skills and dedication to his character.
Imaginary meadow
In this children's story, Glaser played young Anna saying goodbye to characters she had outgrown. She gave them gifts like pinwheels, kaleidoscopes and artwork, but Mikey Day and Jeremy Culhane played weirdos who couldn't get over their pinwheels, which was very disruptive, distracting and funny.
