Saturday Night Live recognizes the first year of Donald Trump’s second term with the 1st Annual Trumps – “the awards honoring the best in being or succumbing to President Trump.” Trump (James Austin Johnson) acts as host for the ceremony, which he hopes will distract from “what all my little freaks and psychos in ICE are doing” and “my dead purple hands”.
He joins vice-president (“for now”) JD Vance (Jeremy Culhane) to give himself the first award. This is followed by horrifying monsters Aunt Gladys (Sarah Sherman) from the movie Weapons and White House adviser Stephen Miller (Andrew Dismukes) handing out the award for best ass kisser to Kristi Noem (Ashley Padilla), only for Trump to interrupt her, Kanye-style, and take that one too. Then, Trump’s “close ex-friend” Elon Musk (Mike Myers) accepts an honorary award for Lifetime Achievement in Comedy (“even if he doesn’t always intend it”), glitching out while also paying tribute to some of the things we lost over the last year: the East Wing of the White House, Nato, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and more. A solid skewering of Trump’s insatiable lust for recognition, as seen by his pathetic acceptance of a re-gifted Nobel Prize from “that woman whose name I already forgot.”
Johnson and co’s focus on Trump’s obvious and grotesquely physical and mental deterioration have been a welcome addition to the character. It’s also nice to see Myers back, as he’s mostly managed to nail the second-hand embarrassment always wafting off Musk. That said – and especially in light of ICE agents killing a second civilian in Minneapolis – the show could have and should have gone harder at the administration, especially Noem, Miller and Vance, all of whom have acted as face for DHS’s campaign of terror.
Teyana Taylor hosts for the first time. The One Battle After Another actor and Harlem native celebrates her big week, during which she learned of her Oscar nomination for best supporting actress while “being fitted for a bald cap next to Mikey Day”. She reminisces about her various achievements, including starring in an episode of My Super Sweet 16 and raising her phone-obsessed children (who make a cute cameo from the first row). Nothing particularly funny or memorable, but Taylor is clearly comfortable on a live stage.
At a crowded boarding gate, Taylor and Kenan Thompson’s airport workers break the news of continuing delays to a group of frustrated travelers via smooth R&B songs. That’s the setup at least, but most of the sketch revolves around the brutally unfunny and unfocused back-and-forth between the wacky workers and the miserable flyers.
Things are immediately redeemed by the next sketch, a toy commercial for every child’s favorite movie of the year: no, not KPop Demon Hunters, but One Battle After Another. Taylor reprises her role as morally compromised revolutionary Perfidia Beverly Hills, kicking down the door of a suburban home to hand out action figures of the “heroes and villains of Paul Thomas Anderson’s critically lauded masterpiece about resistance in the face of racial tyranny”. The gag of little white kids acting out their favorite scenes from the film – armed radical Jungle Pussy proclaiming “this is what black power looks like”, the disturbing sexual proclivities of the villainous Col Lockjaw – to their horrified parents is one of the funniest bits in years. It’s also a great update of an equally hilarious Philadelphia toy commercial from 1994.
An NFL on ESPN pregame segment between Troy Aickman (Dismukes) and Joe Buck (Johnson) keeps getting sidetracked by promos for a new, ridiculous-sounding lesbian cooking drama Quefs. Meanwhile, Taylor’s sideline reporter utterly dismisses the Colts chances now that their starting quarterback is out injured. Even less focused and funny than the first sketch (although Johnson’s dead-on Joe Buck impersonation deserves kudos).
The same is true of the following sketch, about a night school confidence building class that breaks down after the students continually rag on their teacher Padilla does her best to salvage things, but everyone else seems to be struggling with their lines).
Indie rock band Geese perform their first song, then it’s on to Weekend Update, where Michael Che briefly addressees the big news story of the day: “I get that ICE agents are people – allegedly – and they have a job to do, but at some point when you’re pepper spraying old ladies or shooting at a nurse, you ever stop and ask yourselves, ‘are we dicks’?”
Their first guest is Marcello Hernández, seeking to help older folks, such as Colin Jost, understand Gen Z slang. He doesn’t have to teach it to Che though, since “Gen Z slang is African American slang … basically, black people start saying something, then young people think it’s cool, so they start saying it, then white people say it, and then once Elon Musk says it, it’s over.” I’d like to think this is a bit of overdue self-flagellation, considering the 2021 Gen Z Hospital sketch, written by Che and starring Musk, is one of SNL’s very lowest moments.
During a wedding reception, the happy couple give a shoutout to the groom’s aged grandpa (Taylor, covered in old man prosthetics, including the bald cap she mentioned earlier). Despite having just had double knee replacement, he can’t help but continually bust a move to the Earth, Wind, and Fire-filled playlist. A thinly veiled excuse to show off Taylor’s dance moves, which are undeniably impressive.
On a PBS news roundtable, a white reporter – from the Guardian, FWIW – brooks passive-aggressive reactions from two black fellow journalists when he claims that ICE’s occupation of Minneapolis is unprecedented: “You’ve got federal officers roaming the streets, just pulling people out of their cars based on how they look … this is an entire federal force weaponized against the people its supposed to protect … the difference here is these officers are marching through neighborhoods with the express mission of just stirring things up so they can arrest people. That’s new!” The black journalists also act askance at another white reporter’s protestations over Trump’s violation of international law: “You can’t just point to a country and say, ‘hey, that’s ours now’ … we’re America, this is not who we are!” Points all well taken, but this is an underheated retread of the 2016 post-election sketch featuring Dave Chappelle.
Things wrap up with a new digital short from Martin Herlihy, offering a course to guys desperate to end their relations but too cowardly to do it themselves. He teaches them the art of “Blowing It”, intentionally messing up so that their girlfriends will do the hard part and dump them. Methods include insulting her parents immediately upon meeting them, dressing like a member of the Lumineers at a family funeral, gifting her 100 tampons, and getting a botched chin replacement. Reminiscent of some of Please Don’t Destroy’s better sketches.
Overall, this was another weak episode, with most of the sketches falling totally flat. Taylor as host was a step up from last week, but she didn’t particularly shine. That said, the episode was almost single-handedly redeemed by the One Battle After Another toy commercial, which is sure to sit high atop any number of best sketches lists come the end of the season.
