1/24/26: Teyana Taylor | Geese

 

The 1st Annual Trumps

• It’s always nice to see the show do something new with JAJ’s Trump impression. This award show premise has some promise.

• Trump: We got a 6 hour show ahead of us, so let’s keep things spiraling!

• Trump to JD: Speaking of your beard, how’s your wife?

• Ok, we didn’t need JAJ explaining the joke I just quoted right after the joke.

• I like the split screens of JAJ as all the nominees are just different camera angles of him.

• Decent moment with Marcello entering to announce the winner for Best Foreign Language Film, for it to be revealed to not be one.

• I love how all the nominees for “Best Kiss” are being nominated for “Trump’s Ass”.

• Decent reference to the Kanye/Taylor Swift award show moment.

• Nice to see Mike Myers’ Elon Musk impression return, since it feels rare nowadays for the show to have an impression within the political landscape that actually has a fun energy.

• Mike’s impression is still a half-british accent, but his energy is making me enjoy the impression. 

Rating: ***

Monologue

• Very fun entrance, with Teyana dancing down the stairs, and dancing to the ending note to the opening theme.

• Teyana has lots of energy so far, and I remember really liking it when this episode first aired, and I wanna like it now, but knowing how she will perform for the rest of the episode, it feels more like foreshadowing.

• Typical Charm-ologue so far, but Teyana is coming off great here, and very affable.

• For some reason, the audience is pretty dead for moments of this.

• Ha, I love Teyana talking about her kids being on their phones during her Golden Globe speech.

• Funny cutaway to Teyana’s kids on their phones in the audience.

Rating: ***½

Gate Agents

• This concept with Kenan and Teyana telling people at the airport bad news through songs doesn’t seem horrible, but I have a feeling it’s gonna get one-note really quickly.

• Teyana is overacting a bit too much here in my opinion, with lots of body movements and exaggerated facial expressions. Which, if I recall correctly, is a theme for basically the rest of the night.

• Kenan: My name is Parfay, as in, the Parfay don’t start til I walk in.

• Ehh, the “accept the nuts” moment with Kenan throwing nuts at the people in the airport didn’t work for me.

• Teyana is overdoing it during the 2nd song her and Kenan sing.

• Weird blocking here, with Kenan and Teyana talking to Chloe and Mikey, but not even facing them.

• Ha, I do really like JAJ’s walk-on as the pilot, and revealing he’s drunk. His song about how he can’t fly the plane is really funny, but Teyana is trying WAY too hard with her dancing during the song.

Rating: **

One Battle After Another Action Figures

• I haven’t seen One Battle After Another, so I’m not sure if I’ll get this pre-tape.

• Ok, the actions the children are doing with the action figures are pretty funny.

• “My name is Jungle Pussy.”

• This is good so far, but it’s starting to lean into the cliched “haha, kids cussing!” trope that I don’t really care for.

• That was good overall, though.

Rating: ***

NFL on ESPN

• Nice to see JAJ and Andrew paired up, this duo has been missed this season, since Andrew’s been having a disappointingly weak season so far.

• JAJ’s delivery for the advertisement of the Lesbian Hulu show “Quefs” was great.

• Teyana is continuing to overact, and it’s particularly frustrating in this role, since this reporter role is meant to be played somewhat straight.

• Ha, I like that “Quefs” is becoming a runner in this.

• Eh, I didn’t care for Teyana’s interview with Tommy.

• Wow, Jane appearing as one of the “Quefs” looks VERY tall compared to Veronika.

• Ha, Quefs having an aftershow called “Talkin’ Quefs” is great.

Rating: ***

Confidence Class

• The student’s questioning of why Ashley didn’t get a job is really funny. Everyone here is giving a really good performance so far.

• Teyana: She takes selfies like an Uber Driver.

• The student’s criticism of Ashley’s resume is great. I’m loving the “writerly” vibe this has.

• I love the reveal that Ashley was Michelle Obama’s former speech writer, and the reveal that Ashley wrote Michelle doing crowd work and told her to ad-lib the rest of the speech.

• The photo of Ashley’s bathroom selfie is really funny.

• I remember this sketch having some really weird timing issues when it aired, but since I’m reviewing the Peacock version of this episode, they are thankfully gone, and helping me enjoy this much more.

• The prolonged bit with Ashley skipping through the rest of the slideshow is great, and some of the slides we see are really funny, one of them being an unexplained photo of Michelle Obama.

• Ashley’s Dolly Parton impression is so dumb, but it worked for me.

Rating: ****

Weekend Update

• Surprise, surprise, none of the jokes have been noteworthy so far.

• I did like Colin’s spiel of hypothetical dating app texts between Trump and Greenland.

• The concept of Marcello being a Gen Z translator feels like a throwback to when Pete Davidson would be referred to as “Resident Young Person” whenever he came on Update.

• Marcello, about Colin: You went from busted, to hear me out, though.

• Colin, to Marcello: That’s cap.

• Colin’s interests being a Real Housewives show and World War 2 is hilarious.

• Colin: I guess you could say Hitler was chopped.

• Colin, about Marcello: Stop playing in my face, be so for real. You come to my desk trying to drag me, when you're the one sipping the “dumb bitch” juice. You must be delulu boo boo, cause I’m bout to crash out right now FAAAA!!!

• Che, about Dorito-shaped aircraft: It’s called a triangle fatass.

• Nice to see Jeremy make his debut at the Update desk.

• I love Jeremy’s “on blast” dance, and Jeremy’s smug smile after doing it every time is great.

• I love how after each time Jeremy puts something “on blast”, the dance gets longer and more elaborate.

• Colin putting Jeremy “on blast” was great. It’s nice to see Colin get some fun moments during both Update commentaries in this episode.

Rating: ***

Grandpa at the Wedding

• Ha, I love the reveal of Teyana as Kam’s Grandpa. This type of role actually welcomes Teyana’s hamminess.

• Teyana: They playin’ my song.

• Teyana’s dancing as Grandpa is great, and this is already my favorite performance of Teyana’s of the whole episode so far.

• This sketch isn’t much on paper, but Teyana is genuinely great here.

• Kenan, to Mikey: STOP PLAYING EARTH, WIND, AND FIRE DUDE.

• Great sketch overall.

Rating: ****

Backstab Island

• Eh, this sketch seems like it’s coming 2 decades too late.

• Teyana being there to make friends because she “loves people” is pretty good on paper, but Teyana is STILL overacting.

• Everyone throwing drinks at Jane was okay.

• Chloe: I’m off my meds, and on my period. My strength? I’LL LITERALLY BITE YOU.

• Overall, this had some good moments, but Teyana’s performance, and the somewhat muddled execution brought it down quite a bit for me.

Rating: **

Beyond the Headlines

• I got a good laugh from Teyana and Kenan’s simultaneous “Mmm…”

• Ok, so that’s all Kenan and Teyana are gonna do? Just say “Mmm…”?

• This isn’t bad, but this feels too much like it’s trying to recreate the classic Mid-Day News sketch from Season 45 with Ego Nwodim. Except without the great writing.

• This is too one-note to fully work for me, but everyone involved is giving a good performance.

• I like the cutaway to Kam doing the “Mmm…” sound.

• Thankfully, this was short.

Rating: **½

Blowing It

• Martin’s insanely exaggerated southern accent was HILARIOUS.

• Ha, I really like the reveal that Martin planned Sarah to break up with him.

• Martin’s methods to get your girlfriend to break up with you.

• I loved the cutaway dressed up as a member of The Lumineers.

• I LOVE Martin’s shirt that says “This is a man who believes women” with the back of the shirt saying “... and Kevin Spacey”. The inclusion of a clip of Kevin Spacey introducing Nelly Furtado when he hosted SNL in 2006.

• Another great piece from Martin Herhily.

Rating: ****

Thoughts

A better episode than I remembered it being. Aside from a few weak sketches throughout (none of them being flat-out bad), this was a pretty enjoyable episode with a good amount of solid stuff throughout. My one major issue with this episode was Teyana Taylor. In the majority of her roles in this episode, she gave a distractingly overacted performance. She didn’t severely hurt any sketches but it was still a bit frustrating by the episode's end.

Segments ranked Best to Worst

Grandpa at the Wedding

Confidence Class

Blowing It

Monologue

Weekend Update

NFL on ESPN

The 1st Annual Trumps

One Battle After Another Action Figures

Beyond the Headlines

Backstab Island

Gate Agents

6.1/10