Jean Smart Hosts the 50th Season Premiere of 'SNL' with Special Guests Maya Rudolph and Dana Carvey

Cold Open — The 50th Season kicks off the way it should: With a political cold open looking in on the Presidential candidates’ rallies. Was it hilarious? No, but it was amusing, and more importantly, it set the tone for the rest of the shows leading up to the election. How is Kamala Harris portrayed? As a fun-loving aunt who dances and laughs and may be a little vague on policy. She is played by Maya Rudolph. Jim Gaffigan is a solid Tim Walz, Andy Samberg does a nice Doug Emhoff, and Dana Carvey is so perfect as Joe Biden that I can’t believe they hadn’t brought him in before. As for Trump? He’s angry eating-the-dogs Trump (James Austin Johnson returns), along with … Bowen Yang as JD Vance. To whatever extent SNL can influence the election, it was definitely in favor of Harris here, and that is largely by virture of the candidates’ actual personalities. (Score: 6 out of 10)

Jean Smart Monologue — Smart kicks it off with a nice piano thing where she makes a few jokes and speaks fondly of New York. It works. Smart is a delight. There’s not much more to say, and all the celebrity cameos were in the cold open. (Score: 6 out of 10)

$100,000 Pyramid — The show wanted to use a game show to catch us up on some of the personalities in the news in recent weeks (and not so recent): Mark Robinson, the Chimp Crazy lady, the Hawk Tuah girl … and Bad Bunny for some reason. All the clues are jokes about personalities. It was all too obvious and not at all funny. Hmm. (Watch Here) (Score: 3 out of 10)

Spirit Halloween — Now this is better. An ad for Spirit Halloween, centered on the value it brings to the community by occupying abandoned real estate and energizing the local economy. For six weeks. And then it’s gone. (Score: 5.5 out of 10)

Math Textbook — A romance author decides late in her career to write a math textbook for kids. You can probably guess where this one is going: Math porn. It is thoroughly mediocre. SNL is back, baby! (Watch Here) (Score: 4 out of 10)

Weekend Update — OK, Jost and Che. Can you save the show? Maybe. The political jokes are great (just now catching that Trump called Harris “mentally disabled” last night), and the Eric Adams jokes are … existent. Devon Walker comes out as Adams to talk about his indictment, all his great work as NYC mayor, and what great friends he is with Che. I’m not feeling that (watch here). Finally, Bowen Yang plays that hippo, Moo Dang, which feels like a version of a character Yang has played before, but it works. (Score: 7 out of 10)

I Love Lucy — In a “CNN original,” a look back at the original pilot of I Love Lucy before they cast Lucille Ball. Jean Smart plays the very dramatic, angry, drunk actress they cast instead. For what it’s worth, it’s the best sketch of the night, so far. It’s also the Mat skit of the night, for lack of a better choice. Mat and I are licking our wounds after coming in second in a charity pub trivia last night because our team didn’t know who performed “Oh Yeah,” from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Still smarting. (Score: 6.5 out of 10)

Charli XCX Talk Show — Bowen Yang plays Charlie XCX and, yeah, that works better than it should. The actual skit itself — aside from Jasmine Crockett doing her mean girl thing on JD Vance, et. al, it was … not brat, exactly, but not not brat. (Score: 5 out of 10)

The Real Housewives of Santa Fe — Where has Heidi Gardner been all night? Finally! Not that she can really save this skit, which is a bunch of women yelling to each other that they’re not businesswomen while Andrew Dismukes plays a waiter trying to put down the fajitas. I thought maybe this was a joke I’d have to watch the show to understand, but there isn’t even a Housewives installment in Santa Fe. (Watch Here) (Score: 4.5 out of 10)