During Saturday Night Live‘s 44th season premiere, host Adam Driver once again parodied Star Wars, but only with a few mentions in his monologue.
Driver jokingly said he was going to spill spoilers for the next Star Wars movie, but he was interrupted by SNL castmembers who wanted to talk about their summer. The actor also tried to reveal that Ewoks are real, but was stopped short again.
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The last time Driver hosted an SNL episode was back in January 2016 and starred in one of the best sketches from season 41. In a pre-filmed sketch, SNL‘s writers had Driver play Kylo Ren in an episode of Undercover Boss set in Starkiller Base. He had to pretend to be “Matt,” a lowly radar technician on the First Order’s superweapon. The sketch became a viral hit, with over 34.8 million views on YouTube since it aired.
“You get so caught up in restoring the galaxy to its rightful state that you miss what’s going on behind the scenes,” Kylo told the camera. “I’m looking forward to having some real talk with some real folks.”
In the sketch, former SNL castmember Taran Killam played a lieutenant who was convinced Matt was really Kylo Ren. In one scene, Killam described how his son was killed in the stormtrooper program, which really struck a chord with Kylo, especially since he killed the son. So, “Matt” gave Killam a card from Kylo apologizing for his son’s death.
Later, “Matt” admitted to everyone that he was really Kylo, which everyone else figured out. He then agreed to promote Killam’s officer. But at the very end of the sketch, we saw that Kylo strangled Killam.
SNL later released outtakes from the sketch, which have earned more than 5 million views on YouTube. In one cut scene, “Matt” gets really angry about Kylo appearing in a meme.
Driver has played Kylo Ren in both Star Wars: The Force Awakens and last year’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi. He will reprise the role in Episode IX, which comes out in December 2019. This year, Driver starred in Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman.
Driver’s musical guest was Kanye West, but the guest was initially planned to be Ariana Grande; however, SNL creator Lorne Michaels said she dropped out just days before the final guests were announced.
“We had Ariana drop out for emotional reasons two days ago,” Michaels told James Andrew Miller on Miller’s podcast. “That’s our premiere, and then Kanye [West] stepped up, and he’ll be there. So, the reach of the show and the number of people who will step forward is now somehow now, I think, probably at its peak.”
New episodes of SNL air Saturdays at 11:30 p.m. ET on NBC.
Photo credit: NBC
