SNL Season 45 Premiere: But Who’s Going to Appear?

The hit sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live is set to premiere its

45th season, and is almost reaching 50. 45 is a pretty big number, and

you can likely expect that they will go all out for the season

premiere. 5 years ago with Season 40, I began to watch it after having

seen a rerun of the previous season and some clips online of various

sketches from throughout the years. The show has become iconic in

American television, and will often go all out and find the biggest

names possible to host the show, especially for their last show prior

to Christmas and New Year’s, and also their season premiere and

finale. Big names that have hosted and performed during past premieres

include Chris Pratt with Season 40, who hosted with Arianna Grande as

the musical guest, and he was there to promote the summer blockbuster

of 2014, James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy, and Grande had a number

of songs breaking records that same summer.

Season 40 saw many people returning for the anniversary special, but

also had James Franco and Seth Rogen appear despite their canceled

film “The Interview” which mockingly showed the two actors as

celebrity talk show hosts who are tasked with assassinating North

Korean leader Kim Jong Un, and the finale had Louis CK, which was his

second last time on the show prior to the sexual misconduct

allegations against him. Season 41 saw host and musical guest Miley

Cyrus, and then later in the season there was the controversial

hosting pick of the Republican Presidential Candidate and business

tycoon Donald Trump, who gave the show the highest ratings of all time

for the series. Fred Armisen, who was a former cast member on the

show, had returned to host the finale, and since then many big stars,

like Black Panther’s Chadwick Boseman and Matt Damon, and Star Wars

Sequel trilogy actor Adam Driver, who hosted the premiere of the

previous season, with Kanye West as the musical guest, who made the

controversial comments about slavery being a choice while wearing a

Make America Great Again ball cap in support of President Donald

Trump.

Typically, high grossing movies will have their stars appear, and last

season Brie Larson, Idris Elba, Don Cheadle and Paul Rudd all hosted

with the 4 having appeared in Avengers Endgame, although Elba was

promoting a different project at the time, and Larson was promoting

captain Marvel’s Solo film, though it does tie into Endgame, while

Cheadle and Rudd who play War Machine and Ant-Man respectively were

there to build hype for the 4th Avengers flick. Although by the time

Rudd had hosted the season finale, Endgame was already shattering box

office records, going on to beat James Cameron’s Avatar and claim the

#1 spot of highest grossing film of all time. It might be an

opportunity for SNL to continue milking the success of Endgame to gain

more viewers during the season premiere.  Additionally, Gwyneth

Paltrow who plays Tony Stark’s wife Pepper Potts in the MCU appeared

during the Weekend Update sketch during the episode hosted by Elba.

For hosts, an MCU star seems most likely, as Spider-Man: Far From Home

also made its theatrical debut on July 2nd as a follow up to Endgame,

and grossed over a billion dollars, and the director’s cut is

currently in theaters. Tom Holland plays Peter Parker in the film, and

with the Sony MCU Spider-Man debacle still going on, it might gain SNL

more attention to have a star from that film. Holland is notorious for

spoiling extremely private details about big projects, so if he is

hosting it’s surprising that we haven’t heard anything. Jake

Gyllenhaal has a play going on in New York right now which he stars

in, and could promote that along with Far From Home, as he’s a bit

more of a household name, and he plays the villain Mysterio. Josh

Brolin has hosted the show before and has had a long film career, most

notably his early work included The Goonies, and more recently in

Endgame he reprised his role as the mad titan Thanos, who really looks

like if The Rock became a California raisin. Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett

Johansen and Jeremy Renner who played Hulk, Black Widow and Hawkeye

could go on as well as Bradley Cooper and Chris Hemsworth, who played

Rocket Raccoon and Thor. Tom Hardy who is the actor for Venom in the

Sony film of the same name last year could host to help build hype for

the sequel which was announced in the summer, which has also teased

that Tom Holland’s Spider-Man is set to appear, along with Woody

Harrelson who is set to play Carnage, and he’s another candidate as

he’s got a lot hype for his character to be fleshed out in the sequel,

as we only saw a brief cameo in the last movie.

Former cast member and Tony Stark actor Robert Downey Jr could host,

and it’d be even more interesting to see him don the Iron Man armor

one last time, even if it’s as host. Having him host in character

would be great. Other potential candidates include Samuel L Jackson

who had been in both films, and also Jon Favreau, who also directed

the remake of The Lion King. Zendaya played MJ in Far From Home, and

we could see her as a host.

Other people who could host other than the prominent MCU stars

mentioned include Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson or Jason Statham who were

in the Fast & Furious spinoff movie Hobbs & Shaw. Idris Elba played

the villain in the movie, although he was just featured last season,

so I don’t know how soon they might have him back, although Chris

Hemsworth and Steve Martin have hosted more than once in less than a

year. Keanu Reeves starred in John Wick Chapter 3 earlier this year

could also be an option. Australian comedian and political cometary

show host Jim Jeffries from the Jim Jeffries Show on Comedy Central

might be another person, as Season 4 of his show is happening soon.

Millie Bobby Brown who plays Eleven on the Netflix series Stranger

Things could host, as could David Harbour who plays Hopper in the

series, as the series released its 3rd Season during the summer. John

Oliver of HBO’s Last Week Tonight could host, making him the first HBO

star since the finale of Game of Thrones to appear on SNL.


James McAvoy had been featured in the horror film IT Chapter 2 which

is based on the Stephen King horror film, but he hosted earlier this

year in January, so I don’t know that he’d be the one they choose. If

anyone were to host from that film, I’d say it’s likely going to be

Bill Hader, who was a former cast member and made a cameo earlier this

year in an episode hosted by John Mulaney. Bill Skarsgard who plays

Pennywise in the film could appear. Speaking of Stephen King, the King

of Horror has a new book coming out, so SNL may lean in a different

direction and have him as host, or they may lean towards getting him

for the Halloween special.

Will Smith took to the silver screen as the Genie from the live action

remake of Disney’s Aladdin, taking over for the iconic comedian Robin

Williams after the tragic passing of Robin in 2014, and knowing

Smith’s musical talent, it’s very possible he could be both the host

and musical guest. Naomi Scott played Princess Jasmine as well, so she

could be host. Donald Glover played Simba in Lion King Remake, and it

wouldn’t be his first time as host and musical guest, as he hosted in

Season 43 prior to the release of the Hans Solo Star Wars Anthology

Film: Solo which saw him as a young Lando Calrissian, taking over for

Billy Dee Williams, and it was around the time of his hit

controversial song “This Is America.”


Musical guests could include Beyoncé, who again was in the Lion King

remake, but for me, the most likely candidate for musical guest is

rapper Lil Nas X, whose song Old Town Road peaked charts worldwide and

became quite the meme over the summer. More than likely Kanye west

won’t be returning anytime soon after the incident last year, so don’t

expect to see him back. Former Beatles member Paul McCartney could

also be a choice for musical guest. Billie Eilish is another musician

who is going viral.

Cameos for the season premiere are hard to predict, but it’s more than

likely we’ll see Alec Baldwin returning to his role as President

Donald Trump, who is running for re-election in 2020, as well as Larry

David as Democratic Candidate Bernie Sanders, who he played

prominently in Season 41 and had a minor appearance in Season 42, and

appeared as a host in Season 43 and did an impression of Sanders for a

$100,000 Pyramid Celebrity Edition sketch. Jason Sudeikis could

comeback as former Vice President and 2020 candidate Joe Biden.

There are several new cast members set to appear, including the first

prominently Asian cast member, and the most recent Asian person to

appear, with SNL having quite a few Asian actors like Awkwafina and

Sandra Oh appear last season, and also Aziz Ansari, who is of Indian

descent, and Kumail Nanjiani who is Pakistani in the two seasons prior

to 44, and Lucy Liu, who hosted over 18 years ago, with SNL seemingly

lacking any Asian performers up until recently, which may be due to

criticism over this particular issue which creator and producer Lorne

Michaels was facing. Leslie Jones, who joined just shortly after the

start of Season 40, was reportedly not returning for Season 45. The

announcement was made on August 27th.

Whoever may appear, expect them to be big, and the musical guest will

be just as huge. My bets are on an MCU star with Lil Nas X for musical

guest, but it could be anyone who I mentioned or more. Saturday Night

Live airs on NBC at 10:30 PM central time and on Global and CTV, but

be sure to watch NBC for the latest updates on the show. The premiere

is set to happen on September 28th, this weekend, so tune in and

enjoy, unless you’re easily offended by political jokes. Then really

nothing on late night TV is funny for you.