SNL’s Weekend Update Thursday #1.2

If Thursday night’s second weekly edition of SNL’s Weekend Update Thursday seemed a little too quick and easy, well, then you saw what I saw, but let’s try to give them a break since they’re also trying to mount a full 90-minute edition of SNL on Saturday. And if that’s not up to snuff, then, well, we’ll just have to wonder why they tried doing two new live episodes in one week. That said…let’s get to the recap. The cold open spent 10 minutes on Wednesday night’s final presidential debate, with Fred Armisen as Obama, Darrell Hammond as McCain, and former SNL’er Chris Parnell returning again to play the moderator, this time CBS Washington bureau chief Bob Schieffer. In those 10 minutes, Hammond managed to mention "Joe the plumber" 17 times. He also captured the manic eye blinking. And revealed that Joe had a magical budget-cutting plunger, and lived in a cigar box under McCain’s bed alongside his imaginary friend, Simon, who is a unicorn. Alrighty then. What else? Most of the cast got the night off, but Kristen Wiig appeared as that "crazy lady from the McCain rally" who now not only thought Obama is an Arab, but also "cavorts with terriers," will change the White House into a pyramid and many other outlandishly false assumptions. So, yeah, the show made no attempt to hide its leanings for Obama last night, poking as much fun at McCain as they could in 22 minutes. There was a "new segment" called "WE LIKED IT" for Amy Poehler and Seth Meyers to say positive things about the debate, but most of those only mocked McCain further. Hammond reappeared during the Update segments as the Rev. Jesse Jackson to talk about "the Bradley effect" on white folks voting for a black man. And that was that. The jokes were easy. The show went quickly. Let’s hope they were conserving their comedic strength for Saturday.

If you’d like a full-episode viewing, then here it is (watch here if you cannot get Hulu):

Sean L. McCarthy

Editor and publisher since 2007, when he was named New York's Funniest Reporter. Former newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News, Boston Herald and smaller dailies and community papers across America. Loves comedy so much he founded this site.

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