Season 40 of Saturday Night Live has come to a close, and they’ve decided to bring back a beloved heavy hitter to clean up. Louis CK hosts his third episode of SNL, but sadly it seems to be the weakest of his appearances. For a season that saw a lot of great shows, they sadly closed out with one that fell flat with some recycled sketches. The show was not without some genuinely funny moments [Editor’s Note: An example of the rhetorical concept of litotes], and one or two cringe-worthy, but the cast, writers, and Louis have all done better before. Let’s take a look at what stood out.

Louis CK’s Monologue

Whenever Louis CK hosts, we can always expect a hilarious opening monologue. It’s basically just stand-up, and Louis has that covered. It’s also fun because Louis usually pushes what one would expect from a network television comedy show with his monologues. It really makes one have to wonder if he screens what he plans to do with anyone before doing it live. This was no different with Louis talking about his slight racism from growing up in the ’70s, comparing the fighting in the Middle East to constantly bickering siblings, and wonders how enjoyable pedophilia must be for child molesters to risk everything to do so. Yeah, that last one went over just about how you would imagine.

This Is How I Talk

In what was hands-down the best skit of the night, Louis plays a new employee at a Sprint store who is caught mocking his manager (Leslie Jones) behind her back, and has to pretend his aggressive black woman impression is how he really talks to avoid being fired. It is a rare sight to see Leslie Jones in a sketch instead of doing a small guest spot on Weekend Update and this is obviously a part she can handle, but CK kills it pretending to be her, and having to keep that charade going. Even Leslie had to fight not to smile when he would go off.

Weekend Update

Weekend Update ended the season on a strong note with jokes poking fun at George and Jeb Bush, inviting Tom Brady (Taran Killam) to answer for his role in Deflate-Gate (too bad he’s just so charming and likable), both Colin and Michael dust off jokes that got cut from earlier in the season, Pete Davidson gets some screen time (which he admits is a rare thing) and Riblet returns to prove to Michael that being an anchor for Weekend Update is not a difficult job.

Police Line Up

In a sketch that was most likely written by the cast for the cast to enjoy, Taran Killam, Kyle Mooney, Beck Bennett, and Louis play four actors in a police line up delivering the line “Let’s make this quick, give me all you have. I have a knife.” As they each try to find the character, battle their emotional connections to the work, deliver their best line, and agree that they should all work together to write and shoot something, the police officer (Kenan Thompson) and the mugging victim (Pete Davidson twice in one night) get increasingly frustrated. The sketch may not hit for those that aren’t all that familiar with the audition process, but it was one that stood out in the episode and was obviously fun for those involved.

Well, that’s it for Season 40 of SNL. We had some great laughs, and hopefully we will have even more next fall when Season 41 kicks off. We sure to check back with us in a few months for more recaps once the show starts up.

What was your favorite sketch from this episode? What was your favorite episode or sketch from Season 40? Let us know in the comments below!