This Week's "SNL" Offered a Different Kind of Election Reaction

This week’s election prompted a lot of reactions online. Elections results, especially presidential ones, almost always do. And if you looked hard enough, past the serious musings on the policy implications of Donald Trump’s win and the analysis of what the rival campaigns had done, you’d see a bit of speculation about this weekend’s SNL. The last time Trump had won, you might recall, the show opened with Kate McKinnon in character as Hillary Clinton singing Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.” Could viewers expect to see Maya Rudolph do something similar with her take on Kamala Harris?

Well, one SNL alum did show up in this week’s cold open — but it wasn’t Rudolph. Instead, the show opted to do something other than the very dour, very serious, very surreal spectacle of 2016. This time, there were jokes — both an overarching concept for the sketch and some memorable visual gags.

In last week’s Weekend Update, Colin Jost joked that a Trump win would mean that “everyone at SNL will get audited.” This week’s episode began with much of the cast on stage, discussing the election and then pivoting to explain that, no, they’d actually all supported Trump this whole time.

“So if you’re keeping some sort of list of your enemies…,” Kenan Thompson said, with Marcello Hernandez finishing the thought: “We should not be on the list.” There were plenty of cues throughout that this was not exactly a sincere attempt to curry favor with Trump — Colin Jost’s repeated attempts to blame the whole thing on Michael Che and eventually donning QAnon Shaman-esque headgear being especially notable.

The cast also announced that, henceforth, James Austin Johnson would revamp his Donald Trump impression as “Hot Jacked Trump.” Think Johnson’s existing Trump impression with a bit of John Rambo and a touch of Chippendales dancer in the mix. “They finally got the body right!” Johnson declared.

And then Dana Carvey showed up as Elon Musk, bouncing around the stage and shouting about rockets with an accent that brought back memories of the days of Hans and Franz.

Kamala Harris Wasn’t the Only Big Political Cameo on This Week’s “SNL”

All that and John Mulaney, too

The cold open wasn’t the only part of this episode to allude to the election; host Bill Burr’s opening monologue touched on it multiple times, and during this week’s Weekend Update, Michael Che had a glass of whiskey on hand that he sipped from repeatedly. The cold open is unlikely to be remembered as an all-time classic, but it had a clear point of view and some memorable punchlines; for a comedy show, that’s a good combination.