The final SNL episode of 2020 was one for the heart. It wasn’t the funniest or sharpest of what has been an impressive season; these 90 minutes had an air of fatigue about them, as if the writers might understandably be as tired as the viewers at home. What the episode may have lacked in zip and zany, though, it made up for with affection and a genuine sense of having all survived something together. As Colin Jost said with an exhale, “This is the last Weekend Update with Donald Trump still in office.” Strap 45 to a giant roll of paper towels and blast him to space.
“It’s so nice to be home for the holidays!” said host Kristen Wiig during her monologue. She quickly launched into a bizarro rendition of The Sound of Music’s “Favorite Things,” paying homage to absurd treasures. When Maya Rudolph joined Wiig on stage, the two were a sight for sore eyes. And because we deserve all the whipped cream on our sundaes right now, Kate McKinnon linked up for the final verse. Sang Wiig: “Goodbye 2020, you really did stink. And now I don’t feel…. sooooo bad!” If heaven exists, let it be filled with the spirit of these mature, dear, and hilarious women, who never need to be told how funny they are because they goddamn make each other laugh.
These are a few of my favorite things from season 46 so far: Ego Nwodim at the center of more sketches. Her Dionne Warwick impression from last week was a standout, and she anchored the best sketch of tonight’s episode as well. On season 2 of FX’s A Teacher, she played the blouse-wearing object of Andrew Dismuke’s horny student’s eye. Ms. Williams was not here for a C- child with SAT anxiety presuming the two had chemistry. “You keep circling the bubble instead of filling it in. You think that’s sexy for me?” But, but, but he couldn’t resist her hard-to-get routine! “Yeah, I’ve got the swagger you have when you’re not a pedophile.”
This season has given the show a chance to zero with a sharpness into our home fronts, and the gripes and tortures of family. In “Christmas Morning,” the kids and Dad are having a grand old time ripping through their presents. Meanwhile, Wiig’s suburban mom has to pretend she’s pleased with one gift—of a fricking terry cloth robe with the 10% off tag still attached. “I burned my arm in the oven, it hurt pretty bad. But I didn’t even scream because I keep the pain inside of me.” Oh yay, Mom’s stocking is empty again. (Hey family, they sell jellybeans and Kit Kats at the Walgreens four blocks away. There’s change in the bowl by the front door that’ll cover it.)
Some more favorites: Michael Che writing a joke for Jost that had the man suggesting his new bride, Scarlett Johansson, would be tackling the role of Sammy Davis, Jr. in a new Frank Sinatra biopic. Pete Davidson settling into a sweet spot for himself amongst the cast. He seems in on the jokes now, as opposed to the butt of them. Heidi Gardner in any basic bitch role. She turned up as an Instagram influencer during Weekend Update, swinging her S-wand curled extensions and hawking her sponsors. Bowen Yang, who’s had a more subdued season so far, but was living his best life bent over during a WWII song hall sketch, with Wiig holding his head down and Dua Lipa grinding on him from behind.
Speaking of Dua Lipa, she and her dancers looked like Robert Palmer girls who’d killed their boss backstage and were due at a Clue dinner party after the show wrapped. (Clearly, I mean that as a compliment.) For her performance of “Levitating,” Lipa wore a large feathery jellyfish on her head that does hypnosis work on the side.
The cold opens still are a problem for the show—the new springboards too obvious, the sense that the cast is lifting the material as opposed to getting high off of it—but the show pivoted beautifully into a new Joe Biden after Jim Carrey’s rather clunky goodbye on Twitter. During a bit on Mike Pence getting the vaccine, Rudolph’s Kamala Harris strutted onto the stage. “How did you even get into the White House?” demanded Pence, covering up his bare elbows. “I. Won. More. Votes.” Speak to him, Kamala! Then Alex Moffat jolly-doddered out on stage and gave a good first at-bat. His Biden already captured something Carrey’s never managed to: the earnestness, the innocence, and that looseness your uncle also gets mid-holiday meal right as everyone starts praying they get out alive before he ruins the mood.
At the end of the episode, the cast gathered on stage for their goodbye, Wiig holding back tears in the embrace of her home team. On Twitter, there’s pockets of scoffing at the cast for working together freely in sketches but then gathering in masks at the end. But it’s my most favorite ritual of season 46—and not an empty one in my book. You do your work as best you can, under the limits this crazy time has afforded us. You protect the band, and the band protects the cast and crew. When you huddle up—and anyone with a huddle right now is so, so, so lucky—you protect each other too. It’s every episode’s final message: Protect each other best you can.
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