Yeah I don't take the Burn Notice thing as snobbery, I think someone on the staff was genuinely perplexed by the ratings, asked around and nobody else knew what it was either. I know I have seen commercials for Burn Notice and I knew that Bruce was on it. Still don't know what the premise is.
Still thinking about this, for some reason, but.. I think the perception of these shows to people who don't watch them is that they are all pretty much the same formulaic detective/cop show except that each show has its single quirk to draw some drama from. I.e.: Someone's been murdered, but the detective has to wash his hands every time he touches a lightswitch. Someone's been murdered, but the detective has to read a poem from a ghost. That's where Burn Notice is being elusive. What's their quirk? Do they have a quirk? Did they forget to have a quirk? Why won't they just tell us what the quirk is already?
I'm with keith and Rabbi Tandox. i didn't see the sketch as being snobby. i found it pretty funny because i'm in the "never seen it" camp.
I watch Burn Notice and found the sketch to be funny. Mostly because I know how much I struggle to explain the show to basically everyone I know who hasn't seen it. (Some who haven't even heard of it, too)
The same joke could have been made about The Mentalist, Lie To Me, Fringe, The Big Bang Theory, etc. It doesn't make someone snobby to acknowledge there's a popular show that no one seems to watch, it makes them observant.
-Nick
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No, it really couldn't have, as has been pointed out in this thread. Those are network shows watched by and/or advertised to tens of millions of people. Burn Notice is a highly rated cable show, which is like (enter fat camp/Special Olympics joke here).Originally Posted by NFox
A friend described Burn Notice to me as a cross between Miami Vice and MacGyver. Needless to say, I didn't watch it.
The guy didn't grow up with TV (which makes his description even more puzzling, maybe he was just parroting it), so he doesn't have a deep-seated disdain for the USA network and it's B-grade shlock like I do. In my book, the only the the USA network ever did that was any good was Duckman.
Reminds me of a Colbert Word from this past week:
The Colbert Report Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c The Word - Cognoscor Ergo Sum
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Economy
I can't believe more people aren't talking about this sketch. I haven't seen anything this good on SNL in years.
Would've been better if the whole band was actually playing, I think. I was wondering if the rest of the Vultures were intended to be in it.
LOVED the Punk Rock Wedding Band. Best sketch of the episode.
I think if it were all those guys it would have made it a little too obvious what was coming. You've got to admit Fred Armisen nailed it.
His band Trenchmouth was very good.
Maybe I'm being a snob about Burn Notice, then, and assigning the SNL writers my own outlook on something I think looks formulaic and brainless, the popularity of which I can't understand.
Really? I mean, Them Crooked Vultures isn't exactly a Punk band. I think they could've made it work. But even if a rehearsal version surfaces, the element of surprise is gone, so we can never really know for sure.
No argument there.
I read about Trenchmouth when Fred first got SNL. The iTunes Store either didn't exist yet, or was brand new and didn't have much in it. So I looked for them on whatever file-sharing program was popular at the time, and all I could find was a song by Rasputina from an album I already had. So I never found them, and I've spent the past several years forgetting to look. I just checked iTunes again, and they seem to have one compilation album and one album by what seems to be another band using the same name.
ANYWAY, back on track: Andy as Rahm Emanuel was pretty kickass, huh?
To clarify, by the way, I was thinking it could've been the three main guys from Them Crooked Vultures (minus Eleven) with Fred still singing.
I think this entire episode can be summed up by the phrase "Horse body with a sexy face!"
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TCV could have been the band.
Josh came from Kyuss, but played punk rock in high school.
Dave came from Nirvana, and Scream before that. He's always been a longhair, though.
John may have been the bass player in Zep, but he also produced the Butthole Surfers.
A musical guest used for more than stage decoration, and an unforced, funny, utilitarian, tight, not-shoehorned-in performance from the host in a quality sketch?
Lorne Michaels must have been out sick all week, to allow this kind of thing to happen.
Not to mention NBC allowing a sketch to stay on Youtube. Someone's really asleep at the switch!
It would've been awesome if the song could've actually been played by the cast (it was easy... c'mon, some of those guys have got to be able to play power chords), but still. It felt really different for SNL. And so simple!
I LIKED IT.
I thought Hader was actually playing his bass line...the only one who I could clearly tell wasn't playing as Ashton (his guitar didn't have strings I think). That was actually my favorite sketch of the night, to be honest. All in all, this episode was still better than January Jones' for me; but a big let-down from last week's for sure.
TCV was fucking EPIC great though.
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