TV Review: SNL back up to adequate

While the early 2000s and late 1990s still seem like centuries ago, and even the mini-Renaissance of the past couple years has faded with the stink bomb of the early episodes, Saturday Night Live does seem to be climbing out of its funk. This week's show had some strong sketches, even though the host, Ryan Phillippe, was nothing special.

The show started out strong with the cold open, which was an always enjoyable Larry King spot. Yeah, he's still no Norm MacDonald, but King is always so ripe for parody, as were his guests, Bjork and Richard Branson (pictured above). SNL has been a lot better this season when it has strayed away from politics and stuck to mocking pop culture and celebrities. The monologue was also decent, since it starred one of my favorite characters at the end, DeAndre Cole. "Wooooo, wheeee! What's up with that?"

From there, the show replayed a commercial spoof, although it was one of the better ones, mocking the home security commercials that feature random white dudes breaking into houses. I loved the next skit though, featuring the doofy mock ESPN sportscasters shilling for female condoms during a female weightlifting competition. (I am just barely old enough to remember the days when ESPN really did show lots of crap like that. Now, the female weightlifting, bowling and strong man events are mostly confined to ESPN2 on the weekends.)

The rest of the episode was merely average to me, although an average episode of SNL is above their standard for this season. Also, this makes me potentially gay, but I actually like Ke$ha. Her music is catchy, and I'm not ashamed to say that I find her easy on the eyes as well. I have no idea what she was thinking with the American flag cape, but hey, it works for me.

Grade: B

R-r-r-random!

- Almost no one has seen the "second" Anchorman movie, Wake Up Ron Burgundy, which is cobbled together from unused footage to create an entirely new movie. It really is fantastic, and certain parts of it, like the bank robbery scene, are as good as the best scenes in the original movie. Click here to see another great scene, when Champ confesses his true feelings for Ron.

The whole movie is split into various parts on YouTube, and also available on pretty much every major pirate movie tracker. I would encourage you to buy it instead, but Will Ferrell doesn't need any more money, and I have no idea what DVD it is actually on.

- Keeping up with my trend of kind-of writing about music, lately I've been into Pavement. Yeah, this isn't 1993, so what? "Cut Your Hair" is in heavy rotation. Maybe because I need to shave. My facial hair is getting very itchy.

Other songs near the top of my iTunes playlist, meaning I've added them recently: "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots" by the Flaming Lips. "It's Hella Good Without Me" by Eminem vs. No Doubt. "How Far We've Come" by Matchbox Twenty. "Use Your Love" by Katy Perry. "Don't Want To Hurt You" by the Sounds. "All These Things I've Done" by the Killers. "Life on Mars" and "Sound and Vision" by David Bowie.

I have ridiculously bad taste at times.

- When I type entries like this, I feel like Larry King.

- I sent out two job applications today. Scanning copies of my old newspaper clippings was a much harder chore than I imagined, and it makes me want to quit newspaperin' for the simple pleasure of never having to do it again. My hands still smell like shitty newsprint, even though I've washed them like three times.

- "Girls Are Fucking Evil" by the Ataris just popped up on my iTunes. I didn't even know I had *this* emo of a song on there, I swear. Luckily, I skipped ahead to the next song, and it's "I Wish" by Skeelo. Now there is a song a white guy can properly appreciate.

- Spellcheck is telling me I didn't typo at all. Score.