The Best and Worst of Last Night's 'SNL' With Martin Short

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Last night, Saturday Night Live aired their final episode of the year, the traditional Christmas episode, hosted by legendary but not particularly relevant comedian Martin Short, with Paul McCartney as musical guest. The show started with a haunting and restrained tribute to the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School, and then dove right into all their usual shenanigans. To us, this episode seemed very sparse — maybe it was all the Christmas spirit (or Christmas spirits), but it seemed as though they barely cobbled six proper sketches together. All the same, there were some high moments, and as always, some low ones. Watch the best and worst bits of the show after the jump, and let us know if you agree with our choices in the comments.

The Best:

Martin Short’s Monologue

At the beginning of Short’s musical number, we despaired at having to listen to a self-consciously raunchy Christmas song cover for the next few minutes. But then he ran backstage, where he encountered (and tried to make out with) enough of our favorite SNL alums to make our Grinchiness melt right away.

Royal Family Doctor

This sketch was a little all over the place, once we accepted the premise — Martin Short reading off different rules and regulations for Kate Middleton’s OB/GYN — we giggled all the way through. Bill Hader’s constant almost-laughing didn’t hurt either.

Holiday Pageant

To be honest? We could have done without Martin Short-spittle filled lead-in to McCartney’s last musical number with the Manhattan Children’s Chorus, but it was nice all the same.

The Worst:

A Tony Bennett Christmas

Alec Baldwin in the first sketch of the night! Why was this not awesome? Probably because the one and only joke was about suppositories. What a waste.

Old Friends

Jokes included in this sketch: Restoration Hardware is expensive; sometimes people fail at life. That’s about all we can parse.