Miles Teller and "SNL" Doubled Down on True Crime

It’s been just over three years since the last time Miles Teller hosted Saturday Night Live. That episode, which kicked off the show’s 48th season, was uneven, but that wasn’t due to any fault of the host’s. Teller has plenty of charisma and a willingness to embrace the ridiculous in a way that’s reminiscent of his Top Gun: Maverick co-star Jon Hamm. This time out, plenty of sketches seemed to embrace Teller’s dramatic chops before heading into a much more comic direction.

One sketch took the form of a Netflix true crime documentary about three men whose wives had gone missing. The premise of the humor — that these three guys were useless around the house without their spouses around — isn’t exactly fresh. It’s 2025, and the idea that a guy can’t make instant ramen without somehow botching it is enough to inspire sighs more than chuckles.

That said, the actors playing the three husbands in the sketch — Teller, Kenan Thompson and Ben Marshall — really commit to their utter cluelessness. Thompson’s genuine terror at seeing “two small men” — in other words, his kids — emerging from the house’s basement is hilarious to behold, as is the brief glimpse we see of Teller’s character’s online dating profile.

Another sketch used Teller well as a detective giving a press conference on the aftermath of a killing that might be the work of a notorious serial killer. The standout performance here comes from Andrew Dismukes, whose reporter takes the opportunity to pitch his superhero comic, Gar-Girl. (Yes, it’s about a teenage girl with the powers of a gargoyle. No, you don’t want to know her origin story.) Also notable here is Ashley Padilla, whose character goes from amicably professional to unhinged in a way that evokes peak Will Forte.

A New “SNL” Season Began With a Very Meta Manningcast

Hopefully this bodes well for the season to come

Thus far, the show’s 51st season has been solid, though it’s notable that each of the four people who have hosted the season were all making return trips to 30 Rockefeller Plaza. The next two scheduled hosts, Niki Glaser and Glen Powell, will be doing so for the first time, and it’ll be worth watching to see how episodes built around each of them play out.

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Tobias Carroll

Tobias Carroll lives and writes in New York City, and has been covering a wide variety of subjects — including (but not limited to) books, soccer and drinks — for many years. His writing has been published by the likes of the Los Angeles Times, Pitchfork, Literary Hub, Vulture, Punch, the New York Times and Men’s Journal. At InsideHook, he has…