Tracy Morgan made his triumphant return to Saturday Night Live on last night's wonderful episode (more on that a little later), but before he came onstage, there was another surprise former SNL employee who blew the lid off Studio 8H. Larry David played Bernie Sanders in the cold open, and he completely killed it, turning every response into a Curb-worthy rant about backpacks, banks, and geese. It was as inspired casting as Tina Fey as Sarah Palin, and he was so (pretty pretty pretty) good, he even eclipsed Alec Baldwin as Jim Webb.

This was David's first appearance on SNL since his brief stint as a writer during the 1984-1985 season—he only got one sketch on air, during the 10-to-1 slot, during that time. That was also the job he quit midseason, only to come back a few days later as if nothing had happened, inspiring a classic Seinfeld plot.

As you can see above, people were very happy about seeing David as Sander. Joyously, rapturously happy. It was perfect. No—It. Was. Perfect. It was the id that is Frank Costanza combined with the ego that is David's George Steinbrenner impression.

The whole sketch was really good—it was without a doubt the best cold open in years, and added an exciting edge to an already exciting evening—and David seemed to raise everyone's game. Kate McKinnon was great as ever as a slightly unhinged Hillary Clinton (smoking cigarettes like the cool presidents), Baldwin had some very good blustery reaction shots as Webb, and Kyle Mooney and Taran Killam were both good with their limited time as Martin O'Malley and Lincoln Chafee.

But David brought down the house. And it might be because, like with Fey and Palin, everyone had already cast David as Sanders in their heads. Just take a look at some tweets from the last debate.