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SNL 51: 5 Pregame Thoughts – Teyana Taylor, Geese, Snow & More

From Teyana Taylor and Geese, to Cold Open questions, diversity concerns, and more, here are our five SNL Pregame thoughts ahead of tonight.

With a new episode of NBC's Saturday Night Live Season 51 hitting tonight, we've got Oscar nominee Teyana Taylor (One Battle After Another) as the host and Geese as the musical guest. That means it's time for our SNL Pregame, with a look at five thoughts we're keeping in mind – from how current events could impact the Cold Open and Taylor giving us good vibes earlier this week, to our diversity concerns, questions about an incoming snowstorm having an impact, and the different approach we're taking to tonight's musical guest.

Minneapolis: While we're assuming that Trump and his lackeys will be the focus of tonight's SNL Cold Open, the killing of 37-year-old Alex Pretti by a border patrol agent in Minneapolis, Minnesota, has taken over news broadcasts and social media on Saturday. As was the case in the shooting death of Renee Goode by ICE agents, there is a clear divide between what Trump's Department of Homeland Security is claiming went down and what video taken from the scene shows. It will be interesting to see if that's addressed tonight in some way, possibly as part of some bigger message.

Teyana Taylor Is Giving Us Good Vibes: With a season that's proven to benefit comedic actors, we weren't sure what to expect from a trio of episodes hosted by Finn Wolfhard, Taylor, and Alexander Skarsgård. While Wolfhard's effort went a long way to easing our concerns, Taylor's SNL "Waiting to Exhale"-themed midweek sketch and Studio 8H promos with Geese and Marcello Hernandez left us feeling good about the energy Taylor's going to bring tonight.

SNL's (Lack of) Diversity Is on Display: There's no other way to say it, because it's even more painfully obvious when the show has a host of color. SNL has a diversity problem with its cast, and it's something that needs to be addressed much sooner rather than later before it becomes the kind of recurring headline that the long-running late-night sketch comedy and music series doesn't need. The current cast is a seriously talented group, but being painfully white limits SNL's ability to cover a broader comedic range. While the focus tends to shift to the cast, the same can be applied to the show's writing team.

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow! It will be interesting to see how the incoming snowstorm and NYC being under a weather-related state of emergency will impact the audience for tonight's show. As of this writing, the standby line was still in effect, so maybe this is the night that a lot more of those folks get the go-ahead than usual. Having an audience filled with some diehard standby line squatters doesn't sound so bad.

Geese: We've heard a lot of good things from folks who love the band (Cameron Winter, Emily Green, Dominic DiGesu, and Max Bassin) when we asked around after they were announced as performing tonight. Usually, we'll do some "homework" ahead of time to get a little more familiar with the musical guest. But for this go-around, we're going in cold to see what kind of vibe we get from them live.

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