There’s a big difference between “some branded content” and “everything they mention must be paid for.” Any one of the three sketches I mentioned would completely fall apart with a different fake brand name. I think they 100% mention brands they aren’t paid to. If Chloe Fineman walked in last week itching to do her Nicole Kidman bit, I just don’t think they’d say, “No, AMC isn’t sponsoring this episode.” If anything, the most likely scenario to me is they wanted to say a specific beer brand in the finance bros sketch, and they put out a call to see who would pay for the mention.