John Mulaney saves this season of ‘SNL’

SNL woke up this weekend.

After treating the first five episodes of Season 52 as practice, the show finally delivered thanks to John Mulaney hosting SNL for his seventh time.

From the cold open, it was clear that something had changed. The vibe had shifted. Mulaney grabbed the reins immediately, becoming one of the rare few hosts who appear in the cold open.

It wasn’t just that Mulaney was a competent host or that the writing in this episode was sharper. For the first time in a long time, Mulaney’s episode of SNL had something to say. Tech billionaires are morons who should be ridiculed. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a weirdo controlling our health systems. Baby boomers traded the ethos of the Woodstock era to make it so that the rest of us can’t buy a house.

You don’t become a seven-time host without being good at it. (You can, though, become a three-time host by being horrible at it.) From the moment that NBC announced Mulaney was hosting this episode, it was clear that this was the make-or-break moment for the season. Had Mulaney faltered, Season 52 would have been gone for good.

But, thankfully, Mulaney saved the season.

In the days leading up to this episode, I went back through Mulaney’s first six times hosting SNL. Unlike Ryan Gosling or Jack Black, Mulaney-hosted episodes of SNL don’t deliver viral sketches. Yes, we talk about his musical sketches. But the strength of bringing Mulaney in to host is that he elevates the entirety of an episode. As a former SNL writer, he pulls the show up to a higher standard.

And that higher standard is exactly what SNL needed as it heads into its Thanksgiving break.

COLD OPEN

CIA Meeting Cold Open

We did it. WE DID IT. A cold open without James Austin Johnson’s Donald Trump. Even better: It didn’t have Colin Jost’s Pete Hegseth. It didn’t have anyone from the Trump administration.

(Did James Talarico manage to turn Texas blue and kill the Trump cold open?)

Instead, Mulaney led a cold open that mocked the tech billionaires who are desperate for the world to not discover they’re not special.

“America needs you to learn the difference between a woman who would actually want to have sex with you and a woman who is clearly a spy,” Mulaney’s CIA agent told the five tech leaders gathered for this sketch.

“CIA Meeting Cold Open” also brought Bowen Yang back to SNL for the first time since he left midway through last season. I thought we’d get a joke about the show’s cast not having someone who could play Jensen Huang, but Yang effortlessly jumped back into SNL.

• “I can’t imagine how disorienting this has been for you to go from these bug-eyed little weirdos to being gods”: This cold open gave us Johnson as Peter Thiel, Ben Marshall as Sam Altman, Jeremy Culhane as Elon Musk, Andrew Dismukes as Mark Zuckerberg and Jane Wickline as Dario Amodei.
• “You gotta chill with the antichrist stuff”: Thank you, Mulaney. Why is Thiel obsessed with the antichrist?

No more Trump, ‘SNL’ | The Cold Open

The David S. Pumpkins debacle should put an end to the show’s obsession.

The OmnicosmBill Kuchman

also from the omnicosm

Love what you’re reading? You might also enjoy Snackology, a deep-dive into the world of snacks, fast food and limited-edition treats. Already a subscriber? Update your settings to add Snackology to your inbox.

Read the latest from Snackology

THE MONOLOGUE

How great was it to have a stand-up comedian who actually knows how to nail an SNL monologue? “I am happiest when I’m on television,” Mulaney commented during his monologue, which is totally something someone who is good at this kind of thing would say during his live SNL monologue.