'Saturday Night Live' had no time for 'Star Wars' sketch: Watch it here
NBC’s Saturday Night Live frequently posts cut-for-time sketches on its YouTube site, and sometimes the exclusions aren’t exactly easy to figure out. Here’s one: “Star Warriors”, an elaborate, Star Wars-themed digital short that didn’t make it to air last night.
Introduced by J.J. Abrams, the clip is designed as a trailer for a (not real) Star Wars standalone film, The Mos Eisley Five, arriving in summer of 2019. “It’s the story,” says Abrams, “of a group of smugglers hired by the rebellion who were instrumental in establishing a rebel base on Hoth.”
With just enough detail to tickle the hardcore – some of us had to Google both Mos Eisley and Hoth – the trailer begins in a cantina, with SNL‘s Mikey Day, Kate McKinnon, Kenan Thompson and guest host Charles Barkley dressed up like bizarro-world versions of characters everyone knows. Pete Davidson plays a captured pilot the team comes to rescue from Thompson’s Jabba-like Goba, and Alex Moffat leads a bunch of stormtroopers in a laser gun battle with the Five.
The recurring joke is that Barkley’s character can’t understand the many languages spoken by the various characters, not even the shaggy “dog guy” or beeping little robot.
Like his character, Barkley tries his best, but carrying the weight of anything Star Wars – and having to land the jokes as well – is a galaxy-size burden. Is that why there wasn’t time on last night’s episode? Watch “Star Warriors” above and let us know what you think.
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