‘Saturday Night Live’ review: ‘Star Wars’ sketch brings in Daisy Ridley, Jon Hamm in Matthew McConaughey show (video)

It was not that long ago that “Saturday Night Live” decided to start off a show with “Fox & Friends,” but they have no problem going back to this well. Not only that, but they also went right back to Jay Pharoah’s Ben Carson impression one week after it debuted.

The cold-open during the Matthew McConaughey show featured ultimately two primary topics: Syrian refugees, and the extended joke about how Carson always acts like he is angry, but nobody can ever tell. Jay’s impression is good, but we heard many similar jokes last week.

One last thing we’ll say about this sketch: HOW DO YOU NOT HAVE THE CORRECTIONS?! That’s what we really look forward to with this sketch, since most of the impressions are not even really impressions so much as people just acting silly.

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As always, we’re going to have updates on the rest of the show LIVE! Stay tuned.

Matthew McConaughey monologue – What a strange opening. It was mostly just the host talking about the origin story of “all right, all right, all right,” but we still found it oddly fascinating to listen to. Part of this may just be that we could listen to him tell pretty much a story on anything and be entertained.

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Thanksgiving and “Hello” – We’re not sure what the premise here is other than that everyone loves this Adele song so much that the mere playing of it causes everyone to stop what they are doing. Really funny, even if it was a little bit of a loose premise.

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The blues – The moment that we started to see the introductions, we had a bad fever dream to the terrible Donald Trump sketch. It actually was much better than we thought. McConaughey played the guy who wasn’t really that sad, and kept referencing random things that were only kind-of bad. No real ending here, though.

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3D printing – A funny little sketch where McConaughey got to do some physical comedy, playing the first human to come out of a 3D printer. Much like the blues sketch, there was no real ending … and yet we also didn’t really mind.

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“Star Wars” screen test – Brilliant. Great job getting cameos from John Boyega and Daisy Ridley. Meanwhile, Emma Stone and Jon Hamm turning up alongside Micheal Buble made this even better. It was almost a Hamm and Buble reunion! Also, Bobby Moynihan’s George Lucas was so good we almost thought it was George Lucas.

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Weekend Update – While it was uneven (Vanessa Bayer’s new character was hit-and-miss and a little too much like Jacob the Bar Mitzvah Boy), the jokes themselves tonight were edgy or funny. We don’t know David Ortiz well enough to know if that was great.

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Should You Chime in on This? – The answer is no, mostly because the less we saw about this game-show sketch, the quicker it will leave our memory for good.

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Right Side of the Bed – It’s grown on us! This is still a cheesy, hokey sketch, but Taran Killam and Cecily Strong are so good as these married hosts who really want everyone to know that they are into each other. Still, Kate McKinnon’s Ed Sheeran steals the show here.

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Council meeting – Our final sketch of the night was a showcase for McConaughey to do … well, something. We’re not entirely sure what this was all about other than an excuse to hear someone say “you think you’re better than me?” a few dozen times. A few laughs, but we’ve had better sketches at the end of the night.

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In the end, we’d say that this was a really hit-or-miss night. We don’t really think “SNL” used their host in the right way this time (where was the pre-tape love), but at least the “Star Wars” sketch and “Weekend Update” were both great. You can read more about Adele’s performances over here. Episode Grade: B-.

If you want to see some other highlights from “Saturday Night Live” this season, head over to the link here! Also, sign up now to get some other TV news on everything we cover, sent right to you via our CarterMatt Newsletter. (Photo: NBC.)