Saturday Night Live RapeWatch: Tina Fey Edition

This week's SNL went by relatively painlessly. While many have high expectations for Tiny Fey's reappearances on the show, I was never particular fan of her delivery on the show (or tenure as head writer), so this episode wasn't a disappointment or anything like that, merely another mediocre outing for the modern SNL. I do have to wonder what it's like for Tina Fey to come back and host, though - I think she'd be welcomed, given that her show 30 Rock is largely about how the compromises of working in a corporate structure turn all art into garbage, thereby explaining the terribleness of SNL. Of course, at the same time, it openly admits that SNL is garbage, so that could create some tensions. Guess I'll have to wait until she writes a book to find out.

What's that? She has a book? Oh, I mean a real book, not the de rigeur collection of humourous essays that comedians put out during the brief window in which they're relevant to the mainstream. No, I'm waiting for the bitter tell-all.

The show's two Bin Laden sketches were quite weak, and set a bad tone for the show overall. More successful - and surprisingly, at that, was the 'Republican Pirmary' sketch, which posited the existence of a parallel dimension where Republican politicians weren't afraid to announce that they were running for president. I knew Fey's Palin would show up at some point, and I wondered how they'd make fun of a now completely-irrelevant figure. Her complete superfluousness as a public figure was the joke, though, so it worked out nicely!

Which brings me to Stefan, Bill Hader's recurring crowd-favorite character. I don't want to go too much about this, since the Homophobiawatch part of these posts is just supposed to act as a baseline, but it irks me the way every sketch featuring the character tries to work in a little gay panic to cap things off. The character is gay - that's not a problem - but the joke of the character is the disturbing things he's into, not the fact of his homosexuality. While some could argue that he's a regressive stereotype, I don't think it counts as homophobic until he starts coming on to Seth, at which point, in every sketch, the joke becomes the gay panic "Oh my god, a man is attracted to a man!" shocker.

Kind of the thing I wish they'd just get over.

Okay, that's over with, so let's just move on to the numbers.

Rape-Themed Jokes: 0

Homophobia-Themed Jokes: 1

Super-clean, guys! Good luck for next week!