Observe The Evolution Of 41 Seasons Of ‘Saturday Night Live’ Opening Credits In One Dazzling Video

Saturday Night Live will outlive us all and tap dance on our graves and our grandchildren’s graves. NBC’s immortal comedy show has put in over 40 seasons of existence with no end in sight, and likely with Lorne Michaels transformed into a cyborg to keep things running smoothly and arranging cameos for Paul Simon.

Before we look too far into SNL‘s future, let’s marvel at an awesome retrospective looking at an element of the show’s past and present. Editor Dominick Nero has crafted a fascinating video for the AV Club looking at the assorted eye-catching credit sequences the NBC staple has used through the years. (The accompanying Crosstalk discussion is pretty enlightening, too.) Typefaces come and go, tropes are revisited and comedy folks smile at you so you know everyone is having a lovely time in New York City.

Opinions will vary about the highs and lows on SNL‘s approach to credit design, and that’s likely a mixture of personal taste and the effects of nostalgia brainwashing. Are you partial to the dot-matrix cast renderings that arrived in the ’70s? Maybe the black-and-white NYC goofs and spoofs of the 1988 cast are more your scene? How about Jason Sudeikis (JaSu!) shooting some hoops? Mileage for each era will vary, but you can’t deny that the show has a distinctive way of doing their intro visuals. It’s worth a gander and also drives home how accurate the Tim & Eric SNL credits parody is.

(via AV Club)

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