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Comment by jaypeg25 | Hacker News Reader

It's been said before but I do believe that most people generally believe the 'best era' was the time around when they started watching - likely high school or around then.

I've watched for 20 years, every era is the same and it's exactly as you describe. A couple decent skits and many that don't hit. The one difference I've found lately is many of the sketches are for a terminally online generation - Bowen Yang in particular leading the charge. As someone with no social media, those sketches go over my head but I can't really hate on it, as I just recognize that I'm getting old haha.

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> I've watched for 20 years, every era is the same and it's exactly as you describe.

Virtually the entire time you've watched it has been the bad era. You're making generalizations about a show whose cultural relevance ended when you started watching. That show used to generate hit movies (and awful movies.) Of course, one has to consider that SNL suffered a loss of cultural ubiquity partially because of the internet breaking up the audience for all traditional outlets, but that show generated once generated culture. I never hear a reference to anything on it any more.

Last thing I remember that had juice was the Lonely Island songs like 15-20 years ago.

Respectfully, I never thought Lonely Island or Andy Samberg were funny. But consider them more “academic” humor because of the cultural significance. E.g. “Happy birthday to the ground” is a good/relevant line to know even if it’s not something that makes me laugh. Suppose I feel the same about SNL in general too

Interesting opinions as someone from Europe who a) never watched a full episode b) never got the stuff when it was actually recent (1-2w) c) has been bombarded with, debatably really good, best-of/classic skits on youtube.

I'm just gonna leave this here: At least there still are some quotable or good skits, if I compare this to anything on German TV the last 20 years.. there's still so much better stuff in it.

They seem to be struggling more to retain their quality actors and writers (nothing against Yang, he's not who I'm referring to). I can't say I can put my finger on why I've come to this belief. Either that or there are fewer funny people to hire, which strikes me as dubious.

Granted, I didn't even start watching clips of it until after college a couple decades ago, but the show seems a lot more guest celebrity driven recently rather than driven by favorite actors.

Oddly tiktok seems to have the strongest sketch game these days. I'm sure youtube is ok too but it's a depressing place to stay for more than a few minutes.

It's like watching a transmission from an alien civilization: zero point of reference, zero shared language … and at the end, I'm left puzzling about what I even saw.

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