'Saturday Night Live': Five questions before season 51 begins

After a historic half-century ride, "Saturday Night Live" returns for its 51st on Saturday (NBC/4 at 11:29 p.m.). Here are five key questions:

Will Jimmy Kimmel turn up Saturday night?

Think about it: Guest host Bad Bunny has a few nice things to say about beleaguered late-night TV during the opening monologue when — presto! — out steps Jimmy, who by then will have wrapped a week's worth of shows at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Maybe this seems too obvious, but what if Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers and Stephen Colbert join him in a display of late-night solidarity? "SNL" honcho Lorne Michaels, 80, loves spectacle and headlines. This would confer both.

Speaking of Lorne, is this the season where he finally says goodbye?

This dreary old saw of a question comes up (almost) every season, dating back to 1980 when he actually did quit. But the record does indicate a possible transition this year. For example, he said a few years ago that after completing the 50th anniversary special (for which he just won another Emmy) "I have a feeling that'd be a really good time to leave." But not so fast: Just before that February special, he reversed course, telling The New York Times' Maureen Dowd, "I may be wrong but I don't feel I'm done."

Why the big cast turnover?

Not as dramatic as the departures at the end of season 47 — a total of eight, including Pete Davidson and Kate McKinnon — this recent spate nonetheless swept out eight-year vet Heidi Gardner, Ego Nwodim, Michael Longfellow, Devon Walker and Emil Wakim. The video crew of "Please Don't Destroy" — Ben Marshall, John Higgins and Martin Herlihy — was also disbanded. These three have been contributing popular (and occasionally viral) videos for almost five years. In a late August interview with Matthew Belloni of the online site, Puck, Michaels indicated that the 50th anniversary special and presidential election prevented major cast departures in 2024 because "there couldn’t be those kind of disruptions [to the cast], or anything that was going to take the focus off [the 50th season]. And we had an election."

Who are the new cast members?

With the (possible) exception of "Please Don't Destroy's" Ben Marshall, who will join the cast, and Midwestern stand-up Tommy Brennan, each of the others have big followings on TikTok. They are Jeremy Culhane, a regular with Upright Citizens Brigade whose TikTok handle is "Jazzyjelly"; Veronika Slowikowska — Veronika_iscool — whose TikTok videos tend to be dry (and amusing) sendups of (what else?) TikTok videos; and Kam Patterson. This 26-year-old Orlando native's stand-up routine is high-energy, free-flowing, unrestrained, and (very) blue. How will that go down on "SNL?"

Will President Donald Trump threaten NBC's TV licenses — and "SNL" — much as he has those of CBS and ABC?

Trump has thrown lots of shade at "SNL" — but nothing on the magnitude reserved for Colbert and Kimmel. In that Puck interview, Michaels said "everyone has [broadcast] licenses [but] I really don’t believe that we [SNL] affect things." He added, "Trump's "politics are obviously not my politics, but denouncing [him] doesn’t work." That comment echoes one he gave to Susan Morrison, whose biography of Michaels ("Lorne: The Man Who Invented Saturday Night Live") was published earlier this year: "It’s the hardest thing for me to explain to this generation [of 'SNL' staffers] that the show is nonpartisan." According to Morrison's reporting, some of that younger staff felt the show had gone "criminally soft" on Trump when he hosted during the run-up to the 2016 election, and that "many of them believed 'SNL' bore some responsibility for Trump’s win." She reported that Michaels later told them, "we did our best."

Has "SNL" really gone easy on him? That seems hard to believe, while it may also be worth pointing out that Trump has called for the firing of two of Michaels' hosts (and former "SNL" cast members), "Tonight's" Fallon and "Late Night's" Meyers.