NBC's executives are taking advantage of Saturday Night Live's recent ratings resurgence and are bringing Saturday Night Live's extremely popular segment Weekend Update to primetime television. Beginning Thursday August 10, 2017 Weekend Update, featuring hosts Colin Jost and Michael Che, will be airing live on NBC at 9 pm for four weekly episodes. "SNL is having its best season in a quarter of a century — how many shows can say that?! — so we didn't want them to take the summer off," said NBC Entertainment's Chairman Robert Greenblatt. Although Saturday Night Live will be taking a short summer break, executives want to keep the SNL train running by giving one of the show's staple segments its own 30 minute show. They also don’t want to miss out on the “Get Trump” train.

SNL's Viewership Numbers Increase

Weekend Update, is Saturday Night Live's longest running and most popular segment. It has been around since SNL's first broadcast and is typically shown right after the first musical performance of the night. In its 42 years Weekend Update has seen many hosts including: Chevy Chase, Dennis Miller, Jimmy Fallon, Dan Aykroyd, Tina Fey, Jane Curtin, Norm MacDonald, Amy Poehler and Seth Meyers. Saturday Night Live's parody news sketch helped pave the way for similar shows like The Colbert Report and The Daily Show. Since the election of President Donald Trump Saturday Night Live, along with the previously mentioned shows, have seen their ratings grow tremendously. So much so that SNL had its most watched season in 24 years, increasing its viewership by 26% compared to last year giving them an average total of 11.02 million viewers weekly.

Weekend Update's Past Primetime Appearances

In the past NBC has brought Weekend Update to primetime for limited runs. During the weeks leading up to Barack Obama and John McCain's 2008 Presidential election Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Thursday was hosted by Seth Meyer and Amy Poehler. The following year it returned for an added six episodes and it was brought back once again in September 2012. This time around the show's name will simply be Weekend Update and will follow the same structure it has in the past. It will have its two co hosts Colin Jost and Michael Che with guest appearances from SNL cast members and possibly other special star appearances. Having the show live will help with last minute changes, additions and breaking news that the hosts and NBC executives want to address.

Weekend Update Will Fill Gap Until SNL is Back

Although it has been only a couple of months since SNL's season finale, with today's political climate it has felt like years. Many political events happened that neither Colin Jost nor Michael Che were not able to report with their particular anti-Trump slant. James Comey's Congressional testimony, Jared Kushner and Donald Trump Jr's secret meeting with a Russian lawyer, Anthony Scaramucci's rise and fall, OJ Simpson's parole, and the failed attempted to repeal Obamacare. "Missing Scaramucci was sort of like missing Christmas," commented host Colin Jost on the former White House communications director. The summer run of Weekend Update will be hosted in order to close that void and help keep the people of America informed with its hard hitting journalism, that is also known as liberal bias jokes designed to attack Trump.