Saturday Night Changes: What Fans of SNL Expect from Season 48

The finale of Saturday Night Live’s 47th season, which aired May 21 of 2022, saw the emotional departure of long-time cast members Aidy Bryant, Pete Davidson, Kate Mckinnon, and Kyle Mooney. These shocking exits were followed by summer press releases that Aristotle Atari, Melissa Villaseñor , Alex Moffat, and most recently, Chris Redd, would also not be returning to the NBC comedy show.

Cast exits were put on hold when the COVID-19 pandemic forced an at-home and then limited in-studio production of the show. Show creator, Lorne Michaels, had asked the veterans to stick around and ensure a proper goodbye to the show.

With a full back-to-normal season under their belt, the long overdue transition period for Saturday Night Live is finally underway and kicking off with a bang, finding Twitter fans of the show overwhelmed with nerves and excitement alike for what to expect from the show’s 48th season.

Out With The Old

The eight departed cast members mark the biggest turnover on the show since an overhaul in 1995, making this drastic change unfamiliar to more recent viewers of the show. Some audiences have seen the same faces on stage in Studio 8H for as long as they’ve been watching, leaving them worried about the future of the program.

Fans took to Twitter with their worries ahead of the season 48 premiere with worries, one of which was @shachin asking “How do you replace Kate Mckinnon?”

And while Mckinnon’s ten-year tenure on the show was an impressive one, the longevity of her and fellow cast mate’s time on the show is not the norm for the series.

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Sources: NBCUniversal, NBC News, Alan Singer/ NBC

In fact, when considering the time that each of SNL’s 162 cast members spent on the show, the average person was only around for about four years. This falls in line with some of SNL’s best performers, such as John Belushi (1975-1794), Eddie Murphy (1980-1984), and Julia Sweeney (1990-1994), all of whom made resounding impacts on the show in under five years.

Chris Redd’s leave, which was announced just one week before the new season, was jarring as his five years on the show came to an abrupt end. Twitter user @Joe_A_Belvins writes that “Redd's departure caught me off guard. I feel like he was just hitting his stride.”

To put this into perspective, this tenure and ill-fated exit are akin to Adam Sandler’s time on SNL. Though the smaller cast sizes of the 1990s and previously shorter-term careers on the show allowed him to impact the comedy landscape much differently.

Long-time SNL viewer and recent graduate of Chapman University’s TV Writing & Production program, Charlie McTavish feels that the most recent goodbyes are a sign that this previous approach to cast turnover is returning.

“Usually I would be sad when a show has major cast exits,” McTavish writes, “but when it comes to Saturday Night Live, they are a major factor in how the show reinvents itself.”

In With the New

Even Lorne Michaels himself claims that “The way [Saturday Night Live] has survived is by that level of renewal,” something that the upcoming season will once again prove.

This year, the new talents come in the form of Michael Longfellow, Marcello Hernández, Molly Kearney, and Devon Walker. Longfellow, Kearney, and Walker all come from stand-up backgrounds, while Hernández was scouted from viral social media.

Another member of SNL’s audience Arielle, @jesterbestie on Twitter, believes this social media platform has been crucial to the show’s relevance, appealing to more demographics than ever before.

“The previous seasons they seemed to really be leaning into ‘younger’ humor—restarting the digital short format with Please Don’t Destroy, and hiring writers and cast who have primarily found an audience through YouTube and TikTok,” she writes.

Kearney has already made history as they are the first non-binary cast member on Saturday Night Live. Hosts of the SNL Standby Line podcast, Jill Goucher and Amanda Scott, are most excited about their presence on the show and for the queer comedy scene to infiltrate Studio 8H.

The prospects of new cast members leading into a transitional season are something Twitter user @mossmchale finds exciting, citing the addition of Will Farrel, Cheri Oteri, Molly Shannon, and Ana Gasteyer in ‘96 after the exit of Dana Carvey, David Spade, Chris Rock, and Adam Sandler as one of her favorite times in the show’s history.

Golden Forever

Overall, it seems that behind any nervousness and questions to be had is faith in the future of Saturday Night Live.

After attending the live taping of Season 48’s premiere episode on Saturday October 1st, Margot @broadwaygirl13 tweeted that she was “excited to make loving Michael Longfellow [her] new personality.”

When asked about the upcoming episodes, she writes “I expect this season to be a little clunky and maybe even awkward at times… Every year there are peaks and valleys but we all still love it and learn to adapt to new styles.”

Charlie McTavish is hoping that Weekend Update will remain mostly the same as the active players find their footing, keeping audiences grounded in that fan-favorite segment through the 2024 election (which would also mark the 10-year anniversary of the duo reporting from behind the Update desk), looking for stardom in Chloe Fineman, Sarah Sherman, and Punkie Johnson as they continue to move up the ranks from featured to repertory players.

A former intern with NBC’s Peacock streaming service, Harley Atchison, is ready for whatever the show has to offer. Feeling the impending change coming for a few seasons now, she is bracing for the glimpses of gold.

“For the first time in years I’m cautiously optimistic,” Atchison writes after watching the season premiere episode, “Saturday Night Live has survived a lot of shifts, and it will survive this one. It always will.”

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