Goldberg74

Here's a promo with Chris Rock and F.A.N.:

<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/Q-BoweC1m0c" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

... and since we knew that Prince wouldn't actually do a promo, here's another one with Chris Rock:

<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/ViY_FxcvyYg" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

With Prince on the show tonight, he's being allowed to do an unprecedented 8-minute Jam Session. He will be backed by his all-female band 3RDEYEGIRL consisting of guitarist Donna Grantis, bassist Ida Nielsen, and drummer Hannah Ford Welton.

<fieldset style="width: 500px; margin: 0px auto; font-size: smaller;"><legend>SNL Season 39</legend>
SNL (s40e01) -- 09/27/14 -- H: Chris Pratt -- MG: Ariana Grande
SNL (s40e02) -- 10/04/14 -- H: Sarah Silverman -- MG: Maroon 5
SNL (s40e03) -- 10/11/14 -- H: Bill Hader -- MG: Hozier
SNL (s40e04) -- 10/25/14 -- H: Jim Carrey -- MG: Iggy Azalea
SNL (s40e05) -- 11/01/14 -- H: Chris Rock -- MG: Prince

</fieldset>

Goldberg74

In case you missed the TODAY show sporting SNL Character Costumes yesterday, here's their write up on it.

http://www.today.com/news/see-today-...014-1D80257859

Shannon Nutt

My prediction: it will still suck eggs, but at least they should get the ratings back up this week.

Coladar1

Here's hoping last week's episode wasn't an aberration, and the halfway decent quality of the sketches continues tonight. Rock should be a decent enough host, although the musical guest is... a big question mark, if not an outright head scratcher. Especially since he was just on in 2006, without the current relevancy/new repertoire of hits enabling other contemporary musical guests relatively frequent appearances.

And Rock... damn is it hard to believe this'll be his first stint back in *eighteen* freaking years! The last time Chris Rock graced SNL for a full episode (albeit with cameos in 97, 98 and 2007), the world hadn't even heard the name Monica Lewinsky yet! Crazy. Although perhaps not quite as crazy as this fact: In three months time, Rock will be fifty goddamned years old. It's scary how all those breakout SNL stars from the early-to-mid 90's are approaching their golden years already... okay, maybe not quite "golden" yet, but definitely silver.

Sorry, when I heard this yesterday it made me shake my head, so I can't resist going off on that today: Does NBC suck, or does NBC suck? In my mind, Halloween doesn't equal "Let's all dress up to promote another NBC show/corporate synergy for the win!" It's crap like this that makes me loathe the fact I still do watch SNL (and L&O: SVU), as seemingly everything NBC Universal touches gets hopelessly tainted in the process.

[CrazyRant]No wonder NBC has floundered and faced abysmal ratings -and even worse press- for years (keeping things going quite nicely already this season as their two Thursday comedies become among the first of the year's cancellations)... NBC/Universal is the perfect example of a company letting clueless non-creative types in suits dictate creative policies/content - you simply don't see that which is rife with all their properties elsewhere, whether Disney, Fox, CBS, Warner, Turner, etc.

Lest I seem totally out in left field here: The Weather Channel? Now, when anyone isn't asleep or at work, no longer showing... the weather, but instead home to such lovely reality tripe as "fat naked dudes being eaten by a bear alone in the park after dark!" When that isn't the case? It's All Al Roker, All The Time!

*shudder just typing this* "SyFy." (I'd still, years after the fact, like to shoot whoever decided on rebranding with that name... oh, and wrestling. On the once but no longer Science-Fiction channel. Genius, that.) TechTV become G4 become Cops 24/7 become... *poof!* R.I.P.! Most recently? These same jackasses buy out and utterly rape the corpse of FearNet, what had been a halfway decent network for horror genre fans - just so they get their own Chiller Network, which has always been a goddamned joke (Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction marathons daily!), in more markets... and now enjoying zero competition. This, rather than build around the far, far, far superior FearNet brand and programming, one day FearNet's there... the next, no merger, no borrowing content, nada - just Chiller, Chiller, and more Chiller. (Still waiting for the renaming to C#!1134 any day now.)

Four channels that, at one point, were decent to amazing - then, once Universal gobbles them up, half of them were rendered extinct while the other half simply turned into total garbage. As soon as I overheard someone mention the Today gimmick yesterday, it just seemed so... stupid? When was the last big *ongoing* SNL character to be a hit in mainstream American pop culture? Aside from a couple during Ferrell's time on the show, the early-to-mid '90s? Or perhaps I'm just still bitter over losing FearNet last month (as if you can't tell.)[/CrazyRant]

astrochimp

Great monologue

auto

Pretty decent so far. Staying up for Prince and probably WU.

astrochimp

Killer performance by Prince.

auto

Meh on Prince.

Double_Oh_7

OMG, this show is fucking terrible.

astrochimp

So just the one song from Prince?

mike7162

Yeah, looks like his royalty chose to give a mini concert, rather than lower himself with a second performance.

Pretty bad episode, and everyone seemed under-rehearsed - a lot of flubs tonight.

Hazel Motes

lot of fuck ups on the show tonight. That old married couple sketch was a fucking disaster.

anomynous

Chris Rock forgot how to be funny. Then again, the monologue was decent.

slop101

Rock is a gifted stand-up comedian (as evidenced by all his great stand-up material), but not so great in sketches (as evidenced by his horrible movies and TV shows).

Prince was great, except for that intro song where he was on keyboard (and that was some weird, messed up camera/directing during that segment), but I dug it when he got on the guitar. Also, his drummer was really hot.

BTW, I just heard that Rock was actually fired from SNL back in the day - anyone know why?

Count Dooku

He did not get fired. He was on the show for a couple years alongside Sandler, Farley and Spade but never gained any traction that was commiserate with his talent.

I loathe to pull out the race card, but the middle-aged white writers just did not conceive of comedy sketches that would feature Rock and his comedic sensibility. Everything you need to know is explained by that fact that Rock left SNL right in the middle of one of the show's most popular periods to join the sinking ship of In Living Color.

Double_Oh_7

Rock himself has said that he got fired from the show.

slop101

Oh, really? He was on SNL with those guys?

Give me a fucking break; I'm pretty familiar with his work on SNL.

Like 007 says above, Rock himself said he was fired from the show, which I hadn't heard before.

ezln94

I thought the story (non story, really), according to Chris, was that he was going to leave SNL for In Living Color but the SNL heads found out and fired him before he could quit.

Matthew Chmiel

This is correct.

Outside of the Nat X character, Rock really never had memorable characters during his tenure at SNL (and the same goes for the brief period of time he made guest spots on In Living Color). If I was Rock, I'd feel thankful that I missed the debacle that was the 94-95 season in which all of his friends were fired.

Either way, last night's episode sucked. Rock's monologue wasn't offensive, just unfunny. The sketch where Jones and him played the married couple might've been the worst sketch I've ever seen on SNL.

Like always, Pete Davidson knocked it out of the fucking park during Weekend Update and executed a better 9/11 joke than Rock did (“Is my dad coming back?”).

magiccmom

I laughed out loud at the Go Probe segment. Struck me as really funny. Then I cringed at the married couple segment. It was uncomfortable to watch, so I didn't.

TGM

the Shark Tank/ISIS skit was painful to watch...

Count Dooku

If you were as familiar with Rock's tenure at SNL as you claim, and you knew that HE was the one who said he was fired, then you should have been able to piece the story together without any help.

And I would still say that letting your intention to quit be known, and getting fired for saying it, is quitting and not being fired.

GoldenJCJ

I give them credit for having the balls for such a skit but I would have appreciated it more if it were actually funny. Not even the studio audience was one board judging by the audible groans as soon as the ISIS logo was revealed as well as the lack of laughs.

I also though Rock's "Freedom Tower" monologue was very funny in a "everyone was thinking it but no one wanted to say it" kind of way.

Troy Stiffler

Not for me. I thought it was hilarious. My criticism is that Barbara is the only one who was given a good impression. The other three were trying their best to get by with an impression.

As usual, there were a few good sketches.

Bill Needle

Especially after he remembered to plug it in!