SNL: Was Julia Louis-Dreyfus funny?

Julia Louis-Dreyfus stopped by SNL this weekend, and things were pretty mild. 

Last week’s episode of Saturday Night Live missed the mark pretty hard with host Russell Crowe, and many were hoping that Julia Louis-Dreyfus would sort of reset the balance.

That didn’t totally happen but we no doubt had more moments of bounce back than we saw on last week’s show.

SNL seemingly pulled out all of the stops to try and milk what they could out of this show, from resurrecting a Seinfeld character to trolling God — literally. There were hits and misses across the board but overall the night wasn’t worth a full watch. You know how Hulu has abbreviated versions of shows from over the years? That’s what this show will be, as hits like God Is A Boob Man aren’t worth sitting through the rest of the less than stellar sketches.

But what were the moments you need to know from tonights episode?

SNL Rundown…

1. The cold open was yet another example of why the Democrats need to win the election. Not for policy, but so that we can have either Kate McKinnon or Larry David a consistent part of our lives for the next four years.

2. We also saw the return of a non-SNL character: Elaine Benes. Host Julia Louis-Dreyfus brought the character back in a weird quasi-reunion with Larry David.

3.  The Weekend Update was once again the best thing about the show for another straight week. Part of what made this week’s Update so great was a return of Keenan Thompson and Jay Pharaoh as Charles Barkley and Shaquille O’Neal.

4. One of the weirdest sketches of the night was about Louis-Dreyfus’ MILF character breaking up with her pool boy. I’m still not sure if this is one of those sketches I have to sleep on to think is funny or if it just didn’t work.

5. If anything, this is encouraging in that it’s yet another weird sketch usually reserved for the end of the episode that airs very early on in the show. Along with Space Pants and Kevin Roberts, this has kept the weird tradition alive — which is a great thing.

6. Also, for some reason, we saw Nick Jonas in two sketches early on in the episode. That was weird in all of the wrong ways. But hey, more power to him?

7. The last sketch of the night was out of this world weird — literally. McKinnon and Louis-Dreyfus played aliens who came to Earth in order to mate with a male and save their planet. It was so unfunny that it worked, which is how these late episode sketches are supposed to go.

8. Let’s talk about how brilliant the last official sketch of the night was though. It was a biblical troll on those God Is Not Dead movies that shame non-Christians and miss the point on just about every level. SNL skewered the hell out of the pandering nature of those movies and it was the most satisfying late episode sketch we’ve seen all season.

 Next Week on SNL…

SNL is taking a break for the rest of April but will be back at the start of May with Oscar-winner Brie Larson hosting alongside musical guest Alicia Keys. It’ll be the first time that Larson has hosted Saturday Night Live, but so far it’s been a good year for first-time hosts. She has the comedic chops to keep pace with the show too, so our hopes are high for what she will bring when the show comes back in May.

Date: Saturday, May 7th
Start Time: 11:30pm ET
Host: Brie Larson
Musical Guest: Alicia Keys
TV: NBC
Live Stream: Hulu