Posted in: NBC, Opinion, Peacock, TV, TV | Tagged: Nate Bargatze, NBC, Saturday Night Live, Season 49, SNL

After a rocky start, host Nate Bargatze, musical guest Foo Fighters, and the cast and writers of SNL corrected course for season 49 with this episode.

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The Saturday Night Live Season 49 had a pretty solid start in October 2023 with SNL alumnus Pete Davidson and musical guest Ice cream seasoning off we went. After that it was host/music guest Bad Bunny — and things started to get a tiny bit concerning. After taking the last two weeks off while NBC dedicated itself to covering the 2024 Paris Olympics, we’re back with another edition of SNL Second-Guessing — and since the third episode of the final season is being repeated tonight, we thought we’d share what happened with host Nate Bargatze and musical guest Foo Fighters this helped to correct the course of the season in a much-needed way.

Just to be clear, we are not saying that the season was perfect from this episode onwards – quite the opposite. Remember, we still had Jacob Elordi on the way in January 2024. Even the episode itself began on a worrying note, with the “Biden Halloween Cold Open” suffering from focusing far too much on “President Joe Biden (Mikey Day) is old” jokes and a forced guest appearance by Christopher Walken. But after that, so much worked in so many ways that it became an unofficial blueprint for how good SNL can be when it feels like a true ensemble effort on our screens.

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Bargatze’s monologue was a well-crafted stand-up performance that showcased his comedic skills superbly. “Washington’s Dream” proved to be a scathing look at the absurdities behind the decisions made by the United States’ founding fathers in shaping the country – and an absolute must-see for this election cycle. “The Incredible Journey on a Crazy Airplane” was an entertaining group effort (Bargatze, Day, Devon Walker, Dave Grohl, Heidi Gardner, Chloe Fineman, Andrew Dismukes, Bowen Yang, Chloe Troast) shows how the ego can gain the upper hand even in an emergency situation – even if the situation takes place at an altitude of 10,000 meters.

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In “Hallmark Horror,” Bargatze and Fineman were featured in a trailer for a horror-romance comedy that brings together the best of those Hallmark and Lifetime movies and then runs them through a Shudder blender. In “Chef Show,” Bargatzes and Ego NwodimIn a cooking show, the chefs of India compete against each other to find out who can cook the best soul food – while Punkie Johnson and Kenan Thompson are the jurors. Bargatze portrays his boss’s growing shame over his unexpected success in an effective, restrained way. Bargatze, Andrew DismukesAnd James Austin Johnson chose the shot music video route for “Lake Beach” to portray country music trio Mudpuddle, who really, really love spending their summers down by the lake.

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As we mentioned before, and as you can see from the brief recap we just offered, the third episode of season 49 was a true ensemble show in every way. Sarah Sherman was in top form in “Trick-or-Treat with Fran Drescher” as the president of SAG-AFTRA and when it came to finding a new way to torment the host of “Weekend Update” Colin Jost (this time as Jost’s “agent” JJ Gordon). Johnson was the perfect “reality check” in “Hallmark Horror” and a great comedic partner for Thompson as the two pretty much took over “Chef Show” (with bonus points for Thompson for what looked like some sort of improvisation on his part when he knocked the plate to the floor). Please Don’t Destroy (Ben Marshall, John Higgins and Martin Herlihy) went wonderfully absurd with “Dawg Food”, while Jost and co-host Michael Che continued to make “Weekend Update” the show’s central moment for wonderfully brutal laughs. Of course, the Foo Fighters were the Foo Fighters – nothing more needs to be said.

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