First airing in 1975, Saturday Night Live has become a cultural phenomenon like none other. SNL has long been regarded as the pinnacle of sketch comedy, hosting some of the world’s greatest comedic minds and attracting a cult audience. Yet, its more recent seasons have not escaped criticism. Celebrating 50 seasons this Saturday, fans are excited, but one cannot help but wonder whether it can live up to its legacy.

Resuming on Sept. 28, SNL’s 50th season is highly anticipated, with celebrities like John Mulaney, Ariana Grande and Michael Keaton hosting. SNL is clearly pulling out all the stops this year, yet their choices leading up to the season are not without controversy. Before Season 50, the show fired multiple cast members, such as Chloe Troast, Punkie Johnson and Molly Kearney after just one season to make room for newcomers. Opening up coveted cast positions every once in a while is important, but SNL has been doing this often, begging the question of whether the show is struggling to keep up with its previous standards.

SNL’s decrease in popularity has been especially evident in just the last few years. In 2021, Season 47’s pilot brought in some of the worst ratings in the show’s history, with a viewership of just 3.5 million — a 35% decrease from the previous year’s opener. Many factors could be analyzed for the reason behind this sudden plummet, but the main critique this comes down to is SNL’s change in humor with the retirement of the show’s most beloved cast members. 

Some of SNL’s most notable alumni retired only in the last decade, such as Tina Fey, Amy Poehler and Bill Hader. These members represent just a few of SNL’s stacked cast in the 2000s, but their legacies are especially notable, with Bill Hader’s recurring character, Stefon, and Amy Poehler and Tina Fey’s roles as co-anchors on Weekend Update, one of the best pairings the segment has seen. While their legacies continue on, cast members from this period retired in somewhat quick succession, leaving SNL with a rapid shift in the cast. This change clearly affected SNL’s humor and it has since struggled to get back to where it was.

This is not to say that there have not been iconic moments in SNL recently. Between Pete Davidson’s “Chad,” Michael Che and Colin Jost’s rapport on Weekend Update and honestly anything John Mulaney has touched, the series is clearly still relevant. The problem does not lie completely in the cast. Since the start of this new era, critics have argued that the humor is now flat, focusing too hard on appealing to Gen Z. Worse, the show often sacrifices originality — which was once the show’s best quality — to meet higher viewership. Keeping sketch comedy in the mainstream is important, but not at the expense of humor.

Key controversies the show has faced in recent years make this evident. In 2021, Elon Musk notoriously hosted an episode of Season 47 to the dismay of SNL’s audience and some cast members who openly spoke out against the decision. This decision clearly tried to up viewership due to the shock value, and Vox put it best: “Don’t be mad about Elon Musk hosting SNL. Be mad about SNL’s misplaced cultural relevance.” This “misplaced cultural relevance” is obvious in this case, but also in the more general complaint of SNL’s forced humor.

Pandering to Gen Z has also been a common criticism of SNL. In the last season, there was a 13% decline in viewership in the 18-30 age demographic. Some think this has to do with fewer cast members fitting this age range, but the problem lies more in the fact that many recent sketches are obviously trying to appeal to Gen Z rather than offer any cultural criticism. For instance, last year, there was a sketch in which Timothée Chalamet and Boygenius dressed up like Troye Sivan and acted as a woman’s sleep paralysis demon. This could have been hilarious, but instead of using the skit to add original humor, it just came off as pandering to Gen Z without much substance. 

With Season 50 starting this Saturday, I hope that the show can strike a balance between improving viewership and providing unique humor — humor that does not simply use shock value or pander to Gen Z to get viewers. The reason that SNL has the reputation of being a cultural touchstone is not because past seasons have simply passed off the pop culture of the time as jokes. Instead, past SNL used pop culture as a jumping-off point to create original humor and cultural commentary without being afraid of its appeal, thus separating itself from other comedy shows. Season 50 already has a fantastic lineup of hosts, so I hope the writing quality can match that of the cast and return to the reputation it once had.