'Saturday Night Live 50th Anniversary Special': Exhaustive and exhausting

Who remembers sitting through an entire edition of "Saturday Night Live" the way we once did — late on a Saturday night because your sister had borrowed your car and there was nothing else but reruns?

That old memory can only begin to capture the exhilarating — and utterly exhausting — experience of sitting through 3½-plus hours of the 50th anniversary edition of "SNL," or more specifically "Sunday Night Live." Only this time it was the illusion of nothing else on, or nothing better to do. We've all been softened up for months by the hype and buildup to this night so illusions are perfectly understandable.

To be sure, millions of digital natives will catch up with the Big "50th" this morning and in the days/weeks to follow the way they've grown up doing (YouTube). But to truly understand the unique emotion of the full frontal/blunt force effect of the 50th required a you-were-there (in front of the TV) commitment Sunday night. Only then could you fully contextualize what the "50th" meant, if anything beyond a breathtaking money grab by NBC and Peacock.

The callouts, callbacks, the rewinds. The tributes, salutes, honor rolls. The classic sketches rebooted or rehashed. There was far too much to absorb, far too many memories to assimilate, far too many A-listers to count (and way too many commercials to sit through). This overstuffed night of a thousand stars quickly became a TV monument to excess. You thought the "40th" was big? This was vast. You thought the "30th" was important? This was twice as important. "SNL" had reached the half-century mark. We'd better feel something monumental. But what did we feel really?

Critiquing "SNL" literally began the night of Oct. 11, 1975, and hasn't let up since. This blood sport typically takes the usual refrain — some sketches are awful, some good, a few passable, while "Weekend Update" has a couple solid-ish laughlines. And the same with Sunday night.

The "Black Jeopardy!" was an instant winner with Eddie Murphy as Tracy Morgan (who was on the panel right next to him) but the Will Ferrell/Robert Goulet/ Maharelle Sisters (Kim Kardashian, Scarlett Johansson, Anna Gasteyer/Kristen Wiig) sketch went on for an eternity in TV terms. It wasn't the only one. The Murphy/Kenan Thompson "Scared Straight" sketch (with Marcelo Hernandez, Mikey Day and Michael Longfellow) could have been cut for time. Tina Fey and Amy Poehler's mid-show audience Q&A seemed designed only to turn the spotlight on the really big stars in attendance.

"It's brutal out here," Peyton Manning said, referring to — what? — retirement or this?

There were some good lines that played well in the moment, and played just as well Monday morning. John Mulaney — one of "SNL's' steadiest performers over the years — got several of them in, such as "Over the course of 50 years, 894 people have hosted ‘Saturday Night Live,’ and it amazes me that only two of them have committed murder." Martin Short had another: "We wanted to make sure that Bill [Murray] would be here tonight so we didn’t invite him."

Whether the TV optics of beginning this show with Paul Simon (83) standing right next to Sabrina Carpenter (25) were advisable, they were certainly understandable because Simon was the second musical guest on the second show 50 years ago. At least Carpenter got off a solid line that underscored those optics: "I was not born then and neither were my parents."

Inevitably there's that question of what was missing, or who. Where, for example, was Dana Carvey, one of the most important players in "SNL" history? Same with Bill Hader and his "Stefon." Bizarrely nada. There was that mock "In Memoriam" for regrettable faux pas from past seasons, but absolutely nothing devoted to what is arguably "SNL's" most important contribution to American culture these past 50 years — political impersonations and sketches. And as a unique art form in its own right, the "Cold Open" was dismissed entirely.

Also missing until the closing seconds was the man behind the curtain. There wouldn't have been this 50th without Lorne Michaels, and every single, glittering, beautiful, world-famous superstar gathered in this room for this special occasion knew that. He finally arrived on stage for the close, but it took a sweeping arm gesture by Sir Paul McCartney to include him in the tributes.

Maybe Sir Lorne was exhausted too. Perfectly understandable. Everyone else was.