Saturday Night Live is coming to the end of its 35th season, one that began with a massive amount of Palin-related fanfare and is ending with some grumbling. The show is in one of its periodic lulls, with a mostly veteran cast that is nonetheless associated with remarkably few standout characters. In this latest edition of "Keep It Or Dump It?" we will look at some bits and pieces of the SNL experience, and deliver a verdict on whether they need to stay or go.

Solo Weekend Update: SNL head writer Seth Meyers has been anchoring Weekend Update alone since the midseason departure of Amy Poehler. While the sight of him up there by himself may look a bit awkward to those accustomed to the Tina Fey/Jimmy Fallon, Fey/Poehler, and Poehler/Meyers pairings of the last decade, solo anchors had been the norm throughout Weekend Update history prior to that. With a few exceptions (I never did figure out how Kevin Nealon lasted in the role for as long as he did), it's the writing that makes Weekend Update and not the anchor, so why not leave the segment to Meyers, who doesn't have any other sketch responsibilities, and allow the rest of the cast members to focus on acting? Verdict: Keep It.

MacGruber: For some reason, Will Forte's hapless escape artist has been making me laugh this season, whereas in the past I had always seen the sketches as an opportunity to check out ESPN for 40 seconds. But the bit has probably run its course, even leaving aside the ill-advised decision to loan the character out to Pepsi for use as an ad-in-disguise within an SNL telecast. Forte himself might be heading for the exits after this season; cast members who have stayed beyond seven years have been a rarity in SNL history. Verdict: Dump It.

Obscure Musical Acts: The early years of SNL saw the booking of a good many offbeat musical guests (I still remember my first look at Leon Redbone), but the last two decades have seen the show focused predominantly on youth-oriented hitmakers, many of whom, as we found out with Ashlee Simpson, are virtual strangers to the concept of live performance. This tendency certainly hasn't disappeared (the Jonas Brothers were on a few weeks back), but many of the musical acts this season seem to have been selected by the staff of a college radio station. Fleet Foxes, Phoenix, Ray LaMontage, TV on the Radio -- we're not talking about names that would roll naturally off the tongue of Casey Kasem. The spate of relatively obscure acts might just be a coincidence, but it has been appreciated nonetheless. Verdict: Keep It.

The Today Show: SNL has put a lot of effort into parodying the Kathie Lee Gifford/Hoda Kotb portion of Today this season, and for those who actually watch the real thing, these sketches might have some pop. But that hour of Today seems too obscure to rate a parody, and besides, Gifford has been around long enough to have been portrayed on SNL by Jan Hooks. Making fun of her in 2009 is like doing Nixon jokes. There has to be something more relevant in pop culture to serve as the basis for a recurring sketch. Verdict: Dump It.

Fred Armisen as Obama: It was one thing to have Armisen portraying Obama when he was a mere candidate, but now that SNL knows that it will need someone to play the 44th president for another four seasons at least, it's hard to imagine that the show will let this obvious problem area go unaddressed. Armisen is a pro and you can tell he worked at his much-criticized portrayal in the last offseason. He has even gotten some laughs out of his mimicry of Obama's deliberate speaking patterns. But since anyone who has visited YouTube in the past two years knows that good Obama impersonators aren't hard to find, why can't Lorne Michaels see fit to hire one, and let Armisen return to playing wacky Latin American game show hosts? Verdict: Dump It.

Fred Armisen as David Paterson: I'm not picking on Armisen, I swear. I even acknowledge the accuracy of his impression of the New York governor, which he has employed a couple of times on Weekend Update. The problems I have with it are 1) while Paterson might crack up the studio audience, he's of little interest to anyone outside New York; and 2) using Paterson's blindness as the basis of physical humor is the sort of lowest common denominator stuff that this show really ought to be above (the same goes for the lesbian jokes in their Suze Orman and Rachel Maddow sketches). Verdict: Dump It.

Abby Elliott as Rachel Maddow: Speaking of Maddow, I'm not sold on Elliott's impersonation of her by any stretch, but a parody of her program serves a couple of purposes. First, it gives one of the newer cast members a prized chance to develop a running character. And second, a recurring sketch based on a well-known interview show is a handy vehicle to address newsmakers such as Rod Blagojevich. Darrell Hammond has filled this role in the past playing Chris Matthews and the late Tim Russert, but...well, just move on to the next item on the list. Verdict: Keep It.

Darrell Hammond: John McCain's failure to achieve the White House ended any possible reason for Hammond to continue stretching his record tenure on Saturday Night Live. He's been an invaluable impersonator for much of that time, but he has been the least-utilized member of the cast for years and has long since stopped earning his keep. Hammond is like the doddering professor who hasn't published anything for 30 years and who keeps being given the least desirable teaching times, all in an attempt to goad him into having enough pride to walk away on his own terms. It's obvious Lorne Michaels doesn't want to fire him, but I'm not sentimental. Verdict: Dump It.

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