Saturday Night Live cold open: Ronny Jackson talks Donald Trump’s health

Dave Chappelle

Did Alec Baldwin’s Donald Trump return for this week’s Saturday Night Live cold open? We had a feeling that it was possible going in, mostly because there was so much potential for comedy here given what we saw with the real President Trump with the government shutdown.

So … was that a subject of conversation for the show? Well, it happened, but in a very different way than you would imagine. Instead of Baldwin turning up, we heard about the government shutdown. Then, we saw Sarah Huckabee Sanders and then an appearance from Beck Bennett as physician Ronny Jackson. Somehow, we also got an appearance from Pete Davidson as himself — apparently, SNL now has a spot in the White House press room.

There were a number of funny lines in here, including references to a certain adult film star and also the Tide Pod Challenge. We’re also glad that the show didn’t spend too long on the President’s weight, mostly because the majority of people out there mocking him for it are being grossly hypocritical since they often attack people for fat-shaming other celebrities. (We love mocking Trump as much as SNL does at times, but we can all do better than going after his weight.)

Probably the best thing about this cold open was that it was short. We mean that as both a compliment and sort of a slam. If the show had gone any longer with Jackson, the jokes would’ve started to fall flat. We got as much humor out of the situation as we possibly could. We are somewhat disappointed that there was no Trump spoof this week — maybe SNL is saving Baldwin for the upcoming Will Ferrell episode. Topically, though, this felt like the right time. Who knows if there will be as much conversation next week, especially if the shutdown persists?

Related – Read our full review of tonight’s episode

Overall, we do think that this was a solid start for this SNL episode, but the biggest thing working against it is solely that this episode is coming on the air so soon after seeing Bill Murray as Steve Bannon.

What did you think about this week’s Saturday Night Live cold open? Share now in the comments below! Remember that you can like CarterMatt on Facebook to get some other news on SNL whenever you want. (Photo: NBC.)

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