Saturday Night Live, Ranked and Reviewed: Season 6

 "It just doesn't matter!"

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With the original era drawing to a close, I now approach some of the most infamously dangerous territory in SNL's history: the maligned Season 6. In the fall-out between Lorne Michaels and Fred Silverman, the show's talent coordinator, Jean Doumanian, was put in charge of helming the next era of the show and building an entirely new cast and writer's room. The results—seen at the time as a disastrous twelve-episode run that found the show in danger of cancellation—have since become the subject of legend, and in recent history, of significant re-evaluation. 

Of the infamous seasons of Saturday Night Live (6, 11, 20, 30), Season 6 has always been the one I'm most eager to explore because of the unique, nigh-impossible challenge the show has been tasked with: retool the hippest, most beloved comedy show on television without any precedent. No matter how good or bad Season 6 would end up, it was tasked with fighting an uphill battle all the way through. This is where I think the re-evaluation spearheaded by the likes of the That Week in SNL podcast, Bronwyn Douwsma, and Stooge are so invaluable; they've facilitated a broader discussion on the show, acknowledging the circumstances in which they were created but with the assistance of hindsight. Such people inspired me to begin chronicling my journey through SNL in the first place, and subsequently, I'm very excited to add to that ongoing dialogue! 

For my reviews of the preceding season, Season 5, CLICK HERE! Now, onwards, into one of the most fascinating periods in SNL's history, beginning with...

Summer Camp Island Review: A Barb is Born / Hot Milk and Careless Whispers / Nightcap (Barb and the Spotted Bears Chapters 1-3)

"I was born with the confidence of a thousand bears, but the wherewithal of a thousand blueberries."

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Welcome back, everybody! Today, I commence my coverage of Summer Camp Island's fifth season, starting with Barb's three-episode arc! As a bit of minor preamble, when the fifth season was announced, I was a bit shocked not just to see the show returning to its arc formatting from Season 3, but to feature Barb as the protagonist in its inaugural arc. It's true that she's a well-established member of the show's cast and one whose past hasn't been etched out prior, and if there's one thing I can say about SCI, it's that it'll never back down from the search for new and unexpected horizons... and yet, I was a bit skeptical of how it would shake out. Let's see how I ultimately felt about the way this season kicks off!

"A Barb is Born": And so, on the third day of life on planet Earth, Barb comes into existence. It's always a bit difficult for me to talk about these arc-starting episodes; they're an exercise in setting the stakes, as much about establishing their focal character as they are establishing the environment we'll explore. In this case, SCI cranks the clock back the furthest its ever been, exploring the island before it became a summer camp, or a witch destination, or even somewhere with the threat of inhabitation—it is merely a primordial landscape, bursting with talking ferns and miscellaneous vegetation, and on the second day, bears intent to eat them.