Saturday Night Live Returned This Weekend

Nora Iadarola ‘25 / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer

Saturday Night Live kicked off its fifty-first season this weekend with host Bad Bunny and musical guest Doja Cat. This season, the show is facing a major staff shakeup, with the departure of five cast members and five writers, as well as the entrance of five new cast members and seven new writers.

Leaving the cast this season is Emil Wakim (one season), Michael Longfellow (three seasons), Devon Walker (three seasons), Ego Nwodim (seven seasons), and Heidi Gardner (eight seasons). Additionally, the popular comedy trio Please Don’t Destroy has been axed, with Ben Marshall joining the official cast as a featured player, Martin Herlihy remaining as a writer, and John Higgins leaving the show entirely. Joining the cast along with Ben Marshall are Tommy Brennan, Jeremy Culhane, Kam Patterson, and Veronika Slowikowska. These are familiar faces for comedy fans, as Veronika Slowikowska and Kam Patterson have well-established audiences online, and Tommy Brennan recently performed stand-up on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. 

Seasons where a large chunk of staff enter/exit are not uncommon on SNL, with the most recent major turnover being season forty-eight in 2022. While staff changes often disappoint fans, they open the door for new talent and for the show to pivot in a different direction. The new cast members also have the potential to reach a younger, more modern audience; especially with this crew, where most of them already hold decently sized audiences online. Veronika Slowikowska, for example, already surpasses many long-tenured cast members in terms of online audience, with around two million followers across Instagram and Tiktok. Kam Patterson is also a well-established online comedian, and has made appearances on the popular podcast Kill Tony. Giving them more airtime could help SNL grab some new fans.

Despite its new staff, there was nothing new about this episode when it came to writing or formatting. This episode was not bad by any means—it’s actually one of the better episodes in recent memory. The jokes were punchy, the sketches felt complete, and Weekend Update was great as per usual. But with the major cast shakeups and the changing dynamics of the show, I can’t help but feel like there could have been more done to show that SNL is evolving.

The first sketch is a great example. The show kicked off with a parody of Pete Hegseth’s recent speech to military personnel, starring new cast member Jeremy Culhane, Weekend Update anchor Colin Jost, Trump-Impersonator James Austin Johnson, and 10-season veteran Mikey Day. Anyone who watches the show regularly will tell you this sketch was standard SNL fare. Jeremy Culhane makes an appearance at the beginning, but the sketch is ultimately taken over by longer-tenured cast members. 

Again, the sketch itself is completely fine. Colin Jost is a fantastic pick to play Hegseth, and he absolutely nails the voice and cadence of the speech he was parodying. James Austin Johnson is one of the show’s biggest assets as a near-perfect Donald Trump impersonator, and Jeremy Culhane managing to get into the cold open as a newbie is a promising sign for his future on the show. 

But you could copy and paste this sketch into an episode from Season 50 and no one would know. There have been so many cold opens where a Trump impersonation leads to the ever-familiar, “Live from New York it’s Saturday Night!” 

Season 49 newbies Ashley Padilla and Jane Wickline also remained underutilized in this episode. Ashley had a fantastic sketch, but it aired 80 minutes into the show. Jane Wickline didn’t make a single appearance in the entire episode, which is especially surprising considering Lorne Michaels and crew usually try to use the entire cast for season premieres. The featured cast members do well in the appearances they have, with a standout performance by Kam Patterson as himself on Weekend Update. 

Overall, I would have loved to see more of the featured cast, especially considering that they make up seven of the fifteen regular players (excluding Weekend Update anchors). Without them being featured more prominently, the show is left with just eight main cast members, making it feel more repetitive. 

Still, there were some really fun moments throughout the episode, such as a cameo from the K-Pop Demon Hunters and an appearance by Jon Hamm in the monologue and closing sketch. Bad Bunny is a fantastic SNL host—he’s funny, charismatic, and you can tell that he genuinely loves being there. Sketch highlights include Bad Bunny flexing his comedy chops on “Jeopardy with Bad Bunny,” “ChatGPTio,” and “Parent Teacher Conference” (in which Ashley Padilla finally takes the wheel). While they aren’t doing anything necessarily new, they’re funny and use the standard sketch formats quite well. 

Overall, if you’re looking to get into SNL, this is a good starter episode for a taste of everything the show has offered over the past three seasons. If you’re already familiar with the show and its typical sketches, you’ll have a fun-yet-familiar time. With such a large staff turnover this season, the episode almost felt like SNL telling its audience, “We’re still the same show as before”—without asking if we even want it to be. However, there’s still an entire season ahead, and the new staff will hopefully find their places and add their voices to the season as it moves forward.

SNL returns this Saturday with host and former cast member Amy Poehler with musical guest Role Model.