Sunday Morning Quarterback – Jim Carrey & Iggy Azalea

Canadian Jim Carrey became a household name thanks to In Living Color, a show with a predominately Black cast. Australian Iggy Azalea is a star thanks to a faux Southern accent and a vigorous cosign by T.I. Basically both of these celebrities have realized the American dream with the aid of Black culture. 

This should be an interesting episode of SNL. 

Our Rating system

Phil Hartman – Comedic gold

Chris Farley – Definitely funny, but kinda messy

Norm MacDonald – Funny, but not for everyone

Kristen Wiig – So-so premise saved by performer.

Tim Meadows – Didn’t hate it, didn’t love it, dripping with adequatulence

Darrell Hammond – Funny, but overstayed it’s welcome

Jim Breuer- Crowd pleaser, but a bit obvious

Robert Downey Jr – Brilliant performer, not a lot to work with

David Spade – Trying too hard

Janeane Garofalo – Weird weird, not weird funny

And introducing our new Host Rating Scale;

Drake – Outstanding

Edward Norton – Impressive

Josh Hutcherson – Fine Enough

Charlize Theron – Essentially an Extra

Seth Rogen – Expectation, Unmet

Jim Parsons - Awful

Ebola Czar Cold Open – The sketch shows some promise with Obama listing the previous mistakes of the administration.  But then the new Czar steps up and messes up the press conference.  The Q&A is painful.  Fortunately Kenan’s Al Sharpton comes in and gets some laughs. 

Rating: Tim Meadows

Monologue – This starts off rocky with the Helvis premise.  The monologue is light on laughs mainly because the lyrics are lost in the Elvis impression.  It’s a huge production that goes on way too long.  First the back up singers come out, then comes the chorus.  It’s way too big and with very little entertainment value. 

Rating: David Spade

Lincoln Commercial – It’s not the best impression but the parody is spot on.  There are some pointed jabs but they work.  It’s a very well done parody. 

Rating: Phil Hartman

Carrey Family Reunion – It’s a remix of the sketch where everyone trots out the impression of the host, but with the variation of having them all play out different Jim Carrey characters.  It’s really nothing more than that.  If you’re a fan of Carrey, you may enjoy this.  On the plus side we get to see Kyle Mooney act. 

Rating: Jim Breuer

Lincoln Ad II: Dug the escalation of the bit with the kids in the backseat. 

Rating: Phil Hartman

Halloween Graveyard – I wanted to love this bit.  Actually I did like it.  I liked Paul and Phil, the relatively new ghosts to the spooky graveyard.  I dug how they weren’t caught up with the way things work in the graveyard.  And I dig that they’re from Iowa.  I didn’t care for the lack of ending. 

Rating: Norm MacDonald

Lincoln Ad III – Loved the Allstate swerve (though it was slightly predictable) again, it’s well done. 

Rating: Phil Hartman

Iggy Azalea Performance #1 – It’s kind of weird that Iggy knew she was going to be on SNL and stlll opted to lip-sync for her first song.  It’s a weird decision and not a good one. 

Weekend Update – Glad to see that Colin got a run this episode, but having him start Update with it was awkward.  That said Colin actually made me laugh with “ungood and distrue.”  Absolutely loved Daisy Rose and her segment played it perfectly.  Her play with Che was dope.  Equally dope was Drunk Uncle’s racism. 

Secret Billionaire – Some poor directing right off the bat.  But Carrey’s character is awesomely nutty.  His stories were great.  I was kind of sad that we didn’t get the conclusion of the Brian/Dennis story.  But beyond that the sketch was short on laughs. 

Rating: Kristen Wiig

Ghosts: Fact or Fiction – This is just a bad sketch.  It might have been better had it come out maybe 25 years ago, when the conceit of “Black people be like” would be refreshing and new.  Glad to see Leslie Jones stepping outside her wheelhouse.  Also, that was sarcasm. 

Rating: David Spade

Zombie Apocalypse – Wow, this sketch had so few laughs from the audience.  It’s kind of funny in that he’s trying to pretend that his son isn’t a zombie.  Granted it’s basically the same premise as the Kevin Hart zombie sketch.  That said, at least it has an ending.  Plus it was fun to see Carrey trying to make Pete break. 

Rating: David Spade

Office Costume Contest – This sketch was like a rollercoaster ride.  First we get Bayer’s clueless boss getting everyone’s costume wrong.  But then we get McKinnon and Carrey and an excuse for them to flop around.  And then things get interesting again, when they break the fourth wall and give us a tour of the studio stages.  As an SNL fan I appreciated the tour.  The Iggy cameo was unnecessary, but relatively inoffensive. 

Rating: Kristen Wiig

Iggy Azalea Performance #2 – Glad to see that Iggy’s actually using her voice this time around.  I would be lying if I said that this song impacted me whatsoever.  I’m not the target demo and I’m distracted by the front that Iggy is putting up. 

Geoff’s Halloween Emporium – Loved the cheap special effects, loved Bayer and Strong’s disaffected line readings.  They are typical employees, their boss just happens to be possessed by a demon. 

Rating: Norm MacDonald

Final Thoughts: This was not my favorite episode so far.  The writers seem to have taken an additional week off because they thought Carrey could carry the show.  That was not the case.  But Carrey did enough to keep the ship from sinking. 

Host Rating: Josh Hutcherson

Next Week: Chris Rock and Prince (as if to balance out this week)