Althouse: Cartoon life.

April 14, 2024

Cartoon life.

38 comments:

Wince said...: More of this kind of universal humor will improve their ratings.; 4/14/24, 10:06 AM
WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...: that was actually funny. a first in a very long time of SNL is the Democrat Party Platform TV.; 4/14/24, 10:07 AM
Temujin said...: Funny, but like all SNL skits, it dragged on beyond the point of humor. It ran into that typical place where SNL skits always go. They had a fun idea, a few good lines. Enough for 3-4 minutes. And they run the thing 6 minutes. It lost itself. Either...keep it funny, or cut it short. They still don't get that.

Keep the audience wanting more, not...when does this end?; 4/14/24, 10:18 AM
Political Junkie said...: Is the female talk show host a cast member? She is kinda cute/sexy!?; 4/14/24, 10:30 AM
WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...: Ryan Gosling is adorable - but he is a not a good actor..; 4/14/24, 10:33 AM
Friend of the Fish Folk said...: I laughed out loud at this. I still watch Beavis and Butthead from time to time.; 4/14/24, 10:33 AM
Yancey Ward said...: That was hilarious!; 4/14/24, 10:39 AM
Yancey Ward said...: The only thing missing was Daria.; 4/14/24, 10:41 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: I am still watching SNL clips of Norm Macdonald relentlessly pursuing the killer of Nicole Brown Simpson.

That was must-see TV.; 4/14/24, 10:41 AM
Jim Gust said...: It's happens that I've lately been watching YouTube clips from the early SNL years. This skit does not compare well. Not at all.; 4/14/24, 10:43 AM
Narr said...: Meh. Good concept but not very good execution.; 4/14/24, 10:48 AM
retail lawyer said...: This made my day. Thanks for filtering SNL so I don't have to.; 4/14/24, 10:54 AM
Oligonicella said...: Only thing humorous was the makeup. I had a young man from South Africa in my troop.

To quote him: "I find nothing redeemable about Beavus and Butthead."; 4/14/24, 11:30 AM
Joe Smith said...: I expected more with that premise...

The woman 'host' was terrible.; 4/14/24, 11:41 AM
Butkus51 said...: Great premise. Bad execution. All week and they come up with 6 minutes of people giggling.; 4/14/24, 11:46 AM
Coop said...: That was pretty dang awesome. Not so much that it was “funny” but I always can’t help but laugh when the players themselves can’y contain their laughter. I wonder if in rehearsals they weren’t in costume. Even Keenan was struggling a bit at the first and he’s a master of deadpan. Chef’s kiss with the King of the Hill crew.

I hope Tina Fey gets in there to replace Lorne. I know she tilts extremely left but she understands that comedy can and should appeal to all, something SNL has buried and forgotten.; 4/14/24, 12:04 PM
lonejustice said...: That was really cool and funny. SNL at its best.; 4/14/24, 12:09 PM
Geoff Matthews said...: They didn’t make the landing, but it was funny for what it was.
The crew losing it during the skit helped.; 4/14/24, 12:21 PM
RCOCEAN II said...: Amazing. Something funny. For once from SNL.; 4/14/24, 12:44 PM
Quaestor said...: Two people resemble Beavis and Butt-Head but share none of their personality traits? Is that that joke? Or is it an alleged expert exercising a Black privilege variant of "step to the back of the bus"?

I give that one 2.17 PPS units (Python Standard of Silliness, which rates sketches, skits, and routines on a logarithmic scale from 0 to 10, 10 being approximately 10 billion times funnier than a Howard bon mot (0.0037 PPS). Experts rate "Who's on First" at 8.46 PPS the highest recorded rating after "The Batley Townswomen's Guild Re-enacts the Battle of Pearl Harbor" at 9.9992 Python units.

A rather long-winded opening sketch given the inclusion of only one joke, and a rather impuissant one at that. The Pythons fielded many an anemic antic and makeshift mummery, yet they always took it somewhere, whether into Gilliam's unhinged cartoon continuum, or a screwball non-sequitur like Do you want to come around to my place?. Whereas the current SNL ensemble merely sits on their collectively laid egg as if something wittier will hatch spontaneously. I've always suspected SNL's producers tightly screen their studio audience for leftist ideological orthodoxy. This time they must have also dosed them with nitrous oxide because they titter on cue with virtually no provocation.

P.S.
I anticipate one of the professional lead balloonists, Robert Cook or Rich, taking me to task over Black privilege. Play a little role reversal game, if you will. Imagine that sketch with a white male repertory player, an endangered species on SNL, in the role of the AI expert being distracted by Kenan Thompson in a blond fright wig doing Lizzo. That wouldn't get past the SNL writers' daily struggle session, now would it?; 4/14/24, 12:44 PM
gilbar said...: other than the actress Not being able to keep a straight face.. WHAT was "funny" about it?
what point did it have?
what did it have to do, with AI?

Even More Serious Question: does Anyone UNDER 70 watch SNL?
i mean; my 92 year old mother watches it, and apparently Althouse watches it..
now, Althouse's audience has watched it.
does Anyone UNDER 70 watch SNL?; 4/14/24, 12:47 PM
Mary Beth said...: I would have thought it was funny if they had Beto O'Rourke playing Butt-Head. As it was, I thought the concept had possibilities, but it didn't go beyond that.; 4/14/24, 12:49 PM
Howard said...: Q impresses with his surgical application of a French cliché. Apparently he's not into the whole brevity thing, man.; 4/14/24, 1:35 PM
Quaestor said...: Mary Beth writes, "I would have thought it was funny if they had Beto O'Rourke playing Butt-Head."

Well spotted. Beto wouldn't need the faintest smear of makeup, and he certainly has all the costume elements in his own living-room-sized walk-in closet, including the red shorts and the death metal tee-shirt. The fatal flaw is Beto's limited communication skills. Between the sniggering and snorting the authentic Butt-Head speaks in complete sentences.; 4/14/24, 1:47 PM
Quaestor said...: It's English, Howard. Consult a dictionary.; 4/14/24, 1:51 PM
Quaestor said...: "Apparently he's not into the whole brevity thing, man."

0.0029 PPS, well below your historic mean, Howard.; 4/14/24, 1:53 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Well, you have to not only know what "Beavis and Butt-Head" was, but also have been a fan of the show to find the skit funny.; 4/14/24, 1:56 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Howard impresses with his knowledge of wit, gleaned, I suppose, from "Humor for Dummies".; 4/14/24, 1:58 PM
Quaestor said...: gilbar writes, "What did it have to do, with AI?"

Nothing obviously. The environment of a joke isn't really germane to the caper itself. Miss Anne Elk's famous new theory about the Brontosaurus had nothing to do with any member of the clade Sauropoda. That was a variant on a joke long in the tooth even in Chaucer's day, the ridiculously extended and exasperating preamble. Art Carney used to do it with his limbering-up gesticulations before endorsing a check. Jackie Gleason gave him time to milk the routine before yelling at him.

What baffles me is the context. Did the SNL writers decide to cheap out by leveraging Mike Judge's foundational material? Plausible given the feeble sludge they habitually crank out, a desperate bid to finally eak out an authentic chortle 22 years after the departure of Will Farrell. If so legal action may be warranted. Milton Berle, they're not. Or was Mike Judge the guest host and the skit was an introduction? (Guest host? The round square cupola on Berkeley College must step aside.); 4/14/24, 2:33 PM
WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...: what makes it funny is the cast cracking up at the dumb joke.; 4/14/24, 2:44 PM
Joe Smith said...: 'Ryan Gosling is adorable - but he is a not a good actor..'

He's very good with comedy...watch 'The good guys.'; 4/14/24, 4:03 PM
Aggie said...: It just became a Big News Topic a few months ago, and already 'A.I.' is the McGuffin.; 4/14/24, 6:06 PM
Jake said...: I guess I’m in the minority. I prefer professionals that can handle their shit.; 4/14/24, 7:41 PM
Leora said...: Ryan Gosling is a throwback to the kind of actor we used to have who always plays himself - like Jimmy Stewart, Fred Astaire or Humphrey Bogart.; 4/14/24, 8:22 PM
Rusty said...: Funniest SNL skit in a long time.; 4/15/24, 6:46 AM
planetgeo said...: SNL hasn't been funny for a very long time...but THAT was really funny. Classic sight-gag, laugh-out-loud funny.

Way too much over-intellectualizing going on here about this one. Sure, they're insufferably leftist, but they nailed this one.; 4/15/24, 7:36 AM
Cappy said...: First decent skit in well over 40 years, I tell you whut!; 4/15/24, 8:25 AM
JAORE said...: Kinda funny. Milked the joke WAY too long. If only it was as funny to me as it was to the cast....sigh.; 4/15/24, 2:19 PM