Yahoo Lifestyle SNL: We Pick The 15 Funniest Sketches of Season 49 — Watch Video
Another season of Saturday Night Live is in the books… and we’re still giggling thinking about some of the sketches it gave us.
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NBC’s venerable sketch comedy institution wrapped up its 49th season earlier this month, and it showed no signs of slowing down heading into its landmark Season 50, delivering a number of laugh-out-loud sketches that have racked up millions of views online. (Hey, we get it. We can’t always stay up late on Saturday nights to watch live, either.)
We here at TVLine thought we’d celebrate the end of SNL’s latest season by looking back on the funniest sketches to air this year, from video shorts to Weekend Update characters to sketches so hilarious that even the cast members couldn’t keep themselves from laughing, with key contributions from big-name guest hosts like Ryan Gosling, Sydney Sweeney and Jake Gyllenhaal. We’ll never look at Beavis and Butt-Head the same way again. Or Jumanji, for that matter.
Read on to see which Saturday Night Live Season 49 sketches made our list of favorites — press PLAY on the video that accompanies each entry to watch the sketch in full — and be sure to hit the comments and let us know if we left off any of your favorites.
“ABBA Christmas” (Episode 8, Kate McKinnon)
McKinnon is joined by fellow SNL alums Kristen Wiig and Maya Rudolph for a highly silly fake ad for a holiday album from Swedish pop superstars ABBA, with the band members singing ridiculous lyrics directly into each other’s faces. If you like sketches where the actors crack up, well, Christmas just came early.
“Beavis and Butt-Head” (Episode 17, Ryan Gosling)
It’s funny enough that Gosling and Mikey Day play audience members at a deadly serious talk show who happen to look exactly like MTV’s brain-dead duo. But even funnier, they seem to have no idea who Beavis and Butt-Head are, and their gentle befuddlement — along with Heidi Gardner absolutely losing it every time she looks at them — takes the humor to sublime new heights.
“Coffee Commercial” (Episode 19, Maya Rudolph)
Playing a grandiose diva with an overly inflated ego is right in Rudolph’s wheelhouse, and she soars here as Dawn Farraway, an old-school Hollywood grande dame gracing the set of a coffee commercial with her presence. She doesn’t know her lines, she hates everyone on set and she has a bit of a gas problem — but dammit, she knows how to deliver!
“Detectives” (Episode 13, Sydney Sweeney)
Sweeney and Chloe Fineman team up to play the ultimate crime-solvers: a pair of bored Gen Z girls on their phones. The cops are stumped by a series of cold cases, but the girls manage to find each culprit in seconds just by digging into their social media footprints, letting out a detached “Found him” each time. As they explain: “We’re 22-year-old girls in situationships. We can find out anything about anyone with literally no information.”
“JoJo Siwa on Gay Pop and Her Bad Girl Era” (Episode 18, Dua Lipa)
Chloe Fineman applies her chameleon-like impression skills to embody child star-turned-pop singer JoJo Siwa… and she’s a bad girl now, you guys! With a hilarious youthful exuberance (and a pronounced lisp), JoJo unveils her new adult image: “I even do cigarettes!” She’s a trailblazer, too, you know: “I’m the first gay girl in the world!”
“Jumanji” (Episode 16, Kristen Wiig)
Board games can be fun! But they can also be terrifying. Wiig plays a partygoer who is reluctant to play a new game because she doesn’t want to get sucked inside it, or “Jumanji-ed.” That sets off a heated argument about the exact nature of her fear: “In Jumanji, Jumanji comes out! The kids don’t go into Jumanji! Jumanji comes out of Jumanji!”
“Little Orphan Cassidy” (Episode 4, Timothée Chalamet)
This one starts out as an old-timey Annie-esque tale about an orphan who just can’t seem to get adopted, but it gets increasingly deranged as Chloe Troast’s orphan reveals she’s actually 26 (and 18 months!), with a bizarre singing voice to boot. We kind of love Chalamet’s man in the moon, who starts out supportive but ends up genuinely disturbed by the orphan’s dark secrets.
“Old Friends” (Episode 7, Adam Driver)
Mikey Day plays a guy who comes home for the holidays and decides to reconnect with his old childhood pal Keith, played by Driver. But alas, he should’ve just left well enough alone, because Keith is a full-blown psycho now with some very troubling skeletons in his closet: “The Netflix doc made it seem worse than it was.”
“Penne Alla Vodka” (Episode 18, Dua Lipa)
Anyone who has ever attended a group function of any kind will smile in recognition at this fake ad for a culinary staple: the old reliable aluminum tray of penne alla vodka. It’s “loved by none, but tolerated by all,” we’re told, because “it’s not that good… but it’s not that bad either.” (And God, do we hate that slippery plastic serving spoon.)
“Pilates” (Episode 16, Kristen Wiig)
A fitness trend turns into a full-blown horror movie in this faux trailer, with Wiig playing a fanatical Pilates instructor who puts her students through absolute hell — and smiles while she’s doing it. One woman marvels at the excruciating workout: “It’s so hard, but also so boring.” (Guest star Kaia Gerber makes it look easy, though.)
“Roast” (Episode 10, Dakota Johnson)
The Please Don’t Destroy trio gets cut swiftly down to size in this video short, with host Johnson stopping by their office to tell them how much she does not enjoy their work. That leads to a fierce exchange of insults, but Johnson easily gets the upper hand. We honestly can’t pick a favorite between “I’ve always wanted to meet the Lonelier Island” and “What’s it like looking like the last three guys a lesbian sleeps with before coming out?”
“Scooby-Doo” (Episode 20, Jake Gyllenhaal)
At first, this video short is a spot-on recreation of the classic Scooby-Doo cartoons, with Gyllenhaal as Fred and musical guest Sabrina Carpenter as Daphne. But things get weird (of course) when Fred goes to rip off the villain’s mask — and ends up tearing off his whole face, setting off a violent bloodbath that isn’t anything like what we used to watch on Saturday mornings.
“State of the Union Cold Open” (Episode 14, Josh Brolin)
SNL’s political parodies have been spotty at best lately, but they hit a home run here, with Scarlett Johansson dropping by to mock Alabama senator Katie Britt for her infamously unhinged response to President Biden’s State of the Union speech. Johansson’s cheery demeanor while talking about horrible atrocities definitely chilled our blood. But don’t accuse her of being performative, or she’ll dramatically gasp: “I’m not!”
“Washington’s Dream” (Episode 3, Nate Bargatze)
Stand-up comic Nate Bargatze was one of SNL’s least heralded guest hosts in years, but he made a legion of new fans with this sketch, where he plays Founding Father George Washington as he lays out his vision for the new nation. It starts out stirring, but quickly gets derailed by talk of a highly confusing new system of weights and measures. (“How many liters are in a gallon, sir?” “Nobody knows.”)
“We Got Too High” (Episode 15, Ramy Youssef)
The Please Don’t Destroy guys live out their hip-hop fantasies in this music video by heading to the club with Youssef and musical guest Travis Scott for a “twisted rocking ball.” (Whatever that means.) Unfortunately, the weed they smoke proves way too powerful for them, leaving them a paranoid mess. A good reminder, as always: Never wear shorts to the club.
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