The Late Night Talk Truffle Shuffle of 2013/2014

Jay Leno retires for the last time, Jimmy Fallon takes over Tonight. Seth Meyers moves to Late Night in Jimmy's place.

David Letterman announces his retirement from the Late Show, Stephen Colbert will succeed him. Colbert taking over the Late Show will mean the end of not only his immensely popular Report, but also the end of "Stephen Colbert", the strawman pundit character he hasn't broken in ten years.

Now Craig Ferguson has announced he's leaving the Late Late Show.

Meanwhile, Arsenio Hall came back to late night talk, John Oliver got an HBO show, and Conan O'Brien, Chelsea Handler, Jimmy Kimmel, and Carson Daly haven't gotten much attention recently.

I've never foudn Craig Ferguson that funny, I know that's like hipster blasphemy or something. I just want them to hire a non-white person or even a white woman for his spot. Just to spice things up.

I was certain that the reason Ferguson didn't move up to the Late Show is because he didn't want to go anywhere. Taking his brand to 11:30 would be disastrous, as people over 40 are actually awake then.

Well fuck this. Letterman retiring has brought nothing but suffering.

EDIT: Oh, it was Craig's own interest to leave. I should learn a lesson from this.

edited 29th Apr '14 5:17:45 PM by Mullon

He was actually planning to leave a year ago, and then Dave's announcement was a surprise and he had to keep quiet for a few weeks after he was going to say it.

I'm catching up on Late Night and the Tonight Show. I have to say that I actually like both of them. Surprisingly, I like Late Night more than the Tonight Show. I believe that it is because I grew up with seeing Meyers on SNL. Well, if you count 'grew up with' as ever since I started watching in season 37. Also, it feels like Weekend Update.

The later slots (Late Night and Late Late) have had a younger appeal than their 11:30 counterparts for as long as I've been paying attention to them. Especially as Letterman and Leno have gone grey. Though I haven't seen Tonight since Fallon took over.

Meyers is pretty much doing Weekend Update on Late Night. That's pretty much what any talk show monologue is, and the first time I watched him, the desk segment was "Next Week's News".

edited 1st May '14 12:49:23 AM by tparadox

We have a DVR, so I'm watching them in a row. From the first one to the most recent one that I've watched (something in March), I've consistently liked it. Seth is funny. The same to Jimmy Fallon. I suspect that I would like Jimmy's show as much as Seth's if I had also watched Fallon on Weekend Update as it was airing, instead of reruns. I'm too young to have done that, though.

edited 1st May '14 6:34:26 AM by MiscellaneousSoup

Fallon's much better suited to hosting than acting. When he was on SNL, he was infamous for not being able to contain his laughter.

I didn't mind that. Well, when I see reruns with him in them.

edited 5th May '14 12:47:19 PM by MiscellaneousSoup

And as everybody knows, Colbert has now retired the Report to start working on developing his Late Show. Or probably taking a rest first, since Dave doesn't leave until spring.

I've fallen out of touch with what's going on, but I think I heard that it's been confirmed that James Corden will be succeeding Craig at the Late Late Show?

Man, this time next year, late night TV will look nothing like it did when I started college. Though that means increasingly less, since that was about seven years ago now.

edited 19th Dec '14 11:12:32 PM by TParadox

Also apparently it was Craig Ferguson's last show last night.

I know he likes to joke about his haircuts looking like lesbian styles, but was there a point where he actually started asking his stylist to make him look as much like a lesbian as possible?

I never watched Craig Ferguson religiously, but he was the best out of the Late Night talk show hosts and the only one with a natural, let alone charismatic, interview style. I'm going to miss him.

James Corden is going to suck as his replacement, if we're going off of his horrendously awkward appearances on Colbert.

It's been a couple of weeks and I'm depressed about Craig leaving. Damn that ending was fantastic (except for the guests).