I'm not quite sure why the word "fired" is consistently used to describe his departure, but he wasn't fired in the most common sense of the word. He along with a couple of others were let go due to budget constraints (guess the recession hit NBC too). If i'm not mistaken, SNL had just hired 4 new persons on as talent at the time. Sometimes people just run their course (all though I would personally would have like Parnell to stay on even longer. I think he was still far from running his, even though he been there a good while). As disappointed as it is / was to his fans, think of it this way: if people didn't get rotated out and new talent brought in every so often, we might never had seen Parnell to begin with. And it's good that new people get what might be the chance of a lifetime for their careers. But with all that said, as a long time SNL watcher I was extremely disappointed with this decision. The good news is his credits here on the IMDB front page seems to be growing, so good for him. I also get the feeling he would be great in dramatic work. Clearly comedy is his calling, but I'd like to see him maybe as a second lead in filmI think that would be nice.