A comeback to where? Even at her peak, Lindsay Lohan was not yet a 'movie star' or a box office draw. So don't expect her to become one now.

Come what may, last weekend's Saturday Night Live was memorable if only for the uncommonly creative "Real Housewives of Disney" sketch (embedded above).  The not good/not bad hosting job by Ms. Lohan is beside the point, as the whole gimmick was intended to show off that Ms. Lohan is apparently sober, sane, and ready to work again.  And if for no other reason than I don't want to see the gossip industry 'win', I am certainly hopeful that Lohan is indeed back on the 'straight and narrow' (or at least to whatever extent allows her to work in the profession of her choice, plenty of actors engage in vices while maintaining artistic careers).  But the meme that Lindsay Lohan is trying to 'reclaim her stardom' is a false one.  Lindsay Lohan, at her career peak, was never a movie star.  She was, like a lot of actors and actresses at a given point in their career, on the brink of true stardom.  She was ready to capitalize on a few years of popular films (Freaky Friday, The Parent Trap) and just coming off of a massive critical and commercial success (Mean Girls) which had her poised to truly break out.  But she was not yet a star.

Jim Carrey's best sketch in a relatively strong Saturday Night Live: Amusement Park Ride

Yes yes, Carrey was quite amusing in the Black Swan sketch, and I laughed out loud at Bill Hader's constant 'white swan = good/black swan = bad' pronouncements, but the best sketch of the evening, and one of the best of the season, was this quick and brilliant little piece of creepiness. We all know that Saturday Night Live gets most of its press from its political sketches and film parodies. But the best stuff is always the off-beat, completely out-of-left field sketches that simply spring from a good idea. Be it a police procedural written by a class of elementary school Spanish students, or a game show based on how little we know about the people we interact with on a daily basis, the truly sharp stuff simply springs from genuinely simple idea.

Scott Mendelson