‘SNL’ Scorecard: Jim Carrey Does a Pretty Good Rendition of ‘Chandelier’

The first time Jim Carrey hosted ‘SNL,’ back in 1996, is still one of the most popular in the show’s history. His return in 2011 featured jokes about the upcoming 2012 apocalypse (that never happened). Carrey’s third time as host – with this heavily-themed Halloween episode -- will be most remembered for an impression of a music video that you may or may not have ever seen.

Hey, here’s an ‘SNL’ Scorecard, just for you…

Sketch of the Night

’Graveyard Song’ (Davidson, Zamata, Pharoah, McKinnon, Carrey, Killam, Moynihan, Thompson) Two kids wander into a haunted graveyard where two ghosts named Paul and Phil keep screwing everything up by being so nice. This was elaborate, taking full advantage of the music, the great set, and great concept. This was just a really great piece of sketch comedy.

Score: 8.0

The Good

’Halloween Party’ (Carrey, McKinnon, Bayer, Bryant, Bennett, Mooney, Zamata) Jim Carrey and Kate McKinnon dance around Studio 8H doing their best Sia “Chandelier” impressions. That’s pretty much it. But it’s pretty great!

Score: 7.8

’Weekend Update’ (Jost, Che, Bayer, Moynihan) This may have been Colin Jost’s best ‘Update.’ (I preface with “may” because I am going from memory and didn’t go back through all of his other shows in order to do a direct comparison.) But, he seemed calm and more himself last night than we’ve seen in previous weeks. He’s always seemed so eager to chase down that punchline while, this time, he was letting the punchlines come to him and everyone benefited. Also, his interaction with Bobby Moynihan’s Drunk Uncle was really great. Michael Che is just a natural at joke delivery. And he’s getting better at interacting with the guests, though, Vanessa Bayer (who usually kills at everything she does on ‘Update’) seemed a little off with her rom-com parody character – which still seems like a character that is a work in progress.

Score: 7.5

’Lincoln Ad’ (Carrey, Thompson) Presented as three separate segments, yes, a lot of us have been wondering why a guy who just won an Oscar is doing car commercials. Carrey does a really solid Matthew McConaughey impression (though, to be fair, McConaughey has ‘Interstellar’ coming up and Carrey has ‘Dumb & Dumber To’) and I think I could just listen to Carrey ramble on as McConaughey all night.

Score: 7.0

’Jim Carrey Monologue’ (Carrey, Killam, Strong, Zamata, Thompson, Moynihan) Jim Carrey preformed something he called “Helvis” and ... it’s wasn’t bad! It was basically an evil Elvis who likes pecan pie. There was something very Andy Kaufman about the whole thing (Carrey obviously has a thing for Kaufman) and, well, now I have a song about pecan pie stuck in my head.

Score: 6.0

’Secret Billionaire’ (Strong, Killam, Moynihan, Bennett, Carrey, Pharoah) This felt like something that was most likely hilarious in concept. For whatever reason, it felt really flat … until Jim Carrey’s Abbott Bonneville Keane (I have no idea if I’m spelling that correctly) gave his final monologue about filling a room with people named Dennis and drinking octopus urine. For the rest of my life, at every important event, I want to hear this speech.

Score: 6.0

The Bad

’Geoff’s Halloween Emporium’ (Bayer, Strong, Carrey) If you like Jim Carrey doing a demon voice, this is the sketch for you. This is a weird sketch in that, while watching it, I really didn’t love it, but as I type out the plot – a man named Geoff who owns a Halloween store has become possessed by a demon; yet still seems to care about the day to day operations of his store – makes me laugh. I wish they would have opened this one up a bit more than just the one camera commercial type format.

Score: 5.5

’Carrey Family Reunion’ (Carey, Jones, Killiam, Mooney, Bennett, Bayer, Pharoah, Strong, Moynihan, Daniels) To be fair, everyone involved – especially Taran Killam – did a pretty solid Jim Carrey impression. It certainly wasn’t the intention, but the whole thing just kind of felt like a tribute to Jim Carrey as we cycled through his greatest hits. (I do wonder how many people under the age of 30 even remember Fire Marshall Bill from ‘In Living Color.’) I’m surprised Helvis didn’t show up! (Oh my gosh, that Riddler costume was actually something someone wore in a movie.)

Score: 5.5

’Ghost Chasers’ (Killam, Jones, Mooney, Zamata, Bayer) First of all, Leslie Jones was pretty wonderful as the scared person on the ghost hunting team. Though, it felt like there should have been a little more to this one. But, no, the whole joke is that loud sounds will freak a person out. It just feels like a a bit of a wasted opportunity, because everyone is so good in this. Taran Killam’s ghost hunting leader is just about perfect. All the pieces were there; it just didn’t work.

Score: 4.5

’Cold Open: Ebola Czar’ (Pharoah, Killam, Strong, Moynihan, Bryant, Thompson) This wasn’t the worst way to address the Ebola scare without being insensitive. The problem is, in doing so, it just all came off kind of sloppy. It felt like about six different things were being attempted and I’m not sure any of them succeeded.

Score: 4.0

The Ugly

’High School’ (Carrey, Strong, Davidson, Bennett, Mooney, Thompson, Pharoah) What looked like it was going to be some sort of ‘Walking Dead’ parody instead turned into an elaborate sketch with a wonderful looking set in which not much of anything happened. The joke is Pete Davidson’s zombie is going to eat his dad, Jim Carrey. We all knew that was going to happen, it just took forever to get there.

Score: 3.5

Average Score for this Show: 5.94

· Bill Hader 6.73
· Chris Pratt 5.99
· Jim Carrey 5.94
· Sarah Silverman 5.86

Mike Ryan is senior editor for ScreenCrush. You can contact him directly on Twitter.