I'm sorry for mentioning this......but I think SNL isn't that funny.

[a kennedy]

Love Melisa as Spicer and Alec as tRump.......but most all the others ARE really boring. Is it just me?? and has this been discussed before??

[onecent]

1. It's got my vote a kennedy!!!!

Can't stand half of them....I just use those time to work around the house..

[Wounded Bear]

2. I wouldn't know...

I've never been a regular viewer. I just see clips, which means of course that I only see the funniest parts.

It's really hard to maintain that format, week after week, doing skits and bits. Bound to be some groaners from time to time.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

3. Aside from the political commentary lately,

I can't stand it either. Hasn't been funny for a LONG time.

[Soxfan58]

4. Agree

I just watch the Mccarthy, and Baldwin clips on youtube. I think the show hit its peak in the 90s with Carvy, Hartman , Jan Hooks ect

[California_Republic]

5. I agree

Maybe it seems too serious to be made light of and also seem to lack substance and revolve around bathroom humor / lowbrow humor

[stillsoleft]

6. Leslie Jones and Kate McKinnon 2 reasons 2 watch

Ady Bryant is pretty good too. You tube twin bed and wishing boot if you haven't seen them

[OriginalGeek]

10. yes I love all those ladies

i think SNL currently has some of the strongest female cast-members it's ever had.

[PJMcK]

7. Then don't watch it (n/t)

[jrthin]

8. I agree. As always, hype substituting for substance. nt

[OriginalGeek]

9. They've had good skits and bad skits since the very beginning

Bill Murray and Dan Akroyd and John Belushi had their fair share of clunkers. Every new cast version gets people that say "the old cast was better harrumph!" Every season has detractors proclaiming the death of SNL.

Meanwhile, I just keep watching and having fun. Weekend Update is consistently good - even when it was just Colin Quinn. The cold open and the opening monologue are almost always good and sometimes great. SNL Digital Shorts - especially when Andy Samburg was doing them (Dick in a box!) - are re-watchable a thousand times and more.

SNL gave us*:

Bill Murray
Dan Akroyd
Eddie Murphy
Chris Rock
Jane Curtain
Leslie Newsome
Gilda Radner
John Belushi
Tina Fey
Vanessa Bayer
Fred Armisen
Amy Poehler
AL FRANKEN
Darrell Hammond
Chris AND Abby Elliott
Nora Dunn
Rachel Dratch
Jimmy Fallon
Maya Rudolph
Chevy Chase
Jim Belushi
Billy Crystal
The Wills, Farrell and Forte
Garrett Morris
Christopher Guest
Jon Lovitz
Norm MacDonald
Tracy Morgan
Dana Carvey
Mike Myers


and dozens more that continue to make me laugh when I see them on SNL or on new things they do... not to mention 40 plus years of musical acts some of whom I love to this day and first heard on SNL. (And, certainly, some I still don't give a flying frog fart about).

I like the current cast as much as any of the past casts and even more than some. I think SNL does have highs and lows over the years but never any season or episode that I just hated.

But I ain't mad at ya. If you don't like em you don't like em and there's nothing wrong with that just like there's nothing wrong with me still liking them after 40 years starting with sneaking out into the living room as a boy to watch after my parents went to sleep so I could have something to talk about at school on Monday with the other kids.


*some of these may have been big before joining SNL but I just wrote down who I remembered enjoying.

[cemaphonic]

16. I think that SNL, like music is at its best when you are in late adolescence/early adulthood.

Some seasons are better than others, but I've noticed that most people see the best period of SNL to be the one that was airing when they were that age. Certainly fits for me. I was born in 1974, and I think the late 80s-early 90s was on par with the original cast, and hasn't been equaled since.

Which brings me to... How can your list be missing Phil Hartman?

[OriginalGeek]

18. Unforgivable oversight

Phil was cream of the crop. I blame typing at work.

[zipplewrath]

29. Cultural references

To a great degree I think what you are seeing is that the show is loaded with pop cultural references and mostly of the type that will be known and/or resonate with people in the age group you describe. Frequently I'll see a skit and only have a vague notion of who or what is being spoofed.

Music tends a bit in that direction too. I was very knowledgeable about pop/rock music when I was young, even worked in a radio station for a bit. But once one moves on to other priorities, that knowledge becomes dated, and new groups and songs begin to become unfamiliar. Then one day you're in an elevator.....

[retrowire]

20. No love for Chris Farley. Damn. Nt

[OriginalGeek]

21. Jesus people

I was at work and in a hurry. I feel bad but not bad enough to go live in a van down by the river.

[hibbing]

31. hehehe

I was lucky enough to see him at Second City in Chicago when he fleshing out that character.


Peace

[OriginalGeek]

32. That sounds way cool

My wife will occasionally YouTube the farley/swayze chippendales skit. I tell myself she really likes to see that Chris farley dance.

[True Dough]

26. My sentiments exactly

I have watched SNL on and off for 30 years or so and it's a very rare episode that amuses me from start to finish. I usually record the show and fast-forward through the skits that don't click with me.

Sure glad they're still around.

[oasis]

11. On a 1-10 entertainment scale, I'd give SNL a solid 8. nt

[Ron Obvious]

12. Message deleted by DU the Administrators

[ashling]

13. The last McSpicey / tRump material

had a lot more potential. I thought the sketch was a bad vehicle for both Melissa and Alec

[Dave Starsky]

14. I agree. Wholeheartedly.

The Spicer and Trump sketches were funny at first, but they have absolutely run their course.

This is not a laughing matter anymore, if it even ever was. Look where we are now.

[Wawannabe]

15. Possibly

The great skits are so freakin funny that the others become like Avacado Toast. ???
Some of my favs?
Gilly. Sorry!
Rosannadannadanna
Those Wild and Crazy Guys
***Fey as Palin.*** Fuckin nailed it!!!!
Loving McCarthy and Baldwin too

Honestly. I do not know how they (kick ass makeup crew) get from Melissa to Sean but it is amazing!!! And the motorized podium!!!!!!!!!

Great topic to discuss. Btw. Took me back a few years in SNL time. I am sure there are skits I'm not remembering here.

[Mr.Bill]

17. I once heard Dan Akroyd say

that they could film a show in front of a live audience for 90 minutes, edit it down to 30 minutes and it would be the funniest show on TV every week. But that's not the premise of the show. It's a live show, it's not all going to work 100%.

[NotMyFuhrer]

19. And the MUSIC has always been terrible!! Even in the old days!!!

Last edited Thu May 18, 2017, 06:31 AM - Edit history (1)

You are right . . . I have only started watching again when they started with Hillary and now Trump.

But even in the days of Belushi, Gilda Radner, Steve Martin, Chevy Chase, etc. the MUSIC has always been terrible!! Even in the old days!!! No?


______ ** Kilroy was also here, he lives on the Internet now ! **** _____

` ` (•¿• )
` *.·.* *.·.*
______________________________________________________

[Volstagg]

30. They do a very nice job of getting some incredible indie artists on the show

and getting them some air time. Sure they have big stars, too, but I respect their desire to expose the public to the second tier of originality. Bon Iver was on there for goodness sake.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

22. It's hit or miss, like always.

I personally think the pinnacle was in the early 90's, not the original cast.

The current group is still better than some from the 80's, in my opinion.

[Yonnie3]

23. I feel the same.

Some of the skits don't seem funny, just stupid. Perhaps I've aged out of laughing at stupidity.

The political satire seems not as funny as it used to be. I'm thinking that it is not so far fetched that it couldn't be real tomorrow.

I'm burnt out on this parody of a government that we now have.

[Initech]

25. I did love when Keenan Thompson played Mugabe a couple weeks ago.

And Trump called him, that was classic!

[Initech]

24. It's hit or miss most of the time.

When it hits, it's extremely funny. When it misses, it misses hard.

[heaven05]

27. I watched in the Dan Aykroyd, Jim Belusi,

Gilda Radner, Jane Curtin, Laraine Newman, Chevy Chase, Garrett Morris, Steve Martin et al. Now, not so much, except the clips I can catch here of McCarthy, she's a real hoot.

[Fla Dem]

28. Some of the skits are funny, some not so much. I take the good with the bad.

Some of the secondary actors/comedians fall flat. Last weeks news desk skit was horrible. Didn't even seem as if they rehearsed it.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

33. It hasn't been consistently funny for many years, but

the political skits, especially lately, have usually been quite good. When they first got started back in the '70s, they were hilarious just about all the time (or maybe that was because my sense of humor was more juvenile then). I do remember laughing uncontrollably at some of the first Coneheads skits. After their original cast members were gone (Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, John Belushi, Gilda Radner, etc.), it started going downhill. The Trump skits with Alec Baldwin and Melissa McCarthy have been epic, though.