Tonight Show - Word Sneak

Jimmy plays the game "Word Sneak" with guest Steve Carell.

Jacob's Patience - Steve Carell

Jimmy Fallon and Steve Carell look back on their days on the Canadian soap opera "Jacob's Patience". Justin Timberlake is also involved.

Is it Justin Timberlake or is it Justin Lumberpond?

The Ambiguously Gay Duo

TAGD IS BACK!!! I don't know how or why the skit was resurrected but I don't care. It's a classic cartoon and I've loved it ever since I first saw it on The Dana Carvey Show. That's right - it started on The Dana Carvey Show. Someday I should make a post about that show.

Anyways, it's back and aired on SNL (as well as Late Night). Here it is:

Review: I don't like the changing of Ace and Gary's voices. Colbert and Carrell had the perfect voices for the pair. But it's much more onerous to play multiple parts (as they do) in live action so it's not bad. I could identify Ed Helms, Stephen Colbert and Steve Carrell as the villains but I was stumped on the Lizard Man. Turns out it's current SNL cast member Fred Armisan.

David Brent Cameo in The Office

Brief but alright.

Between Two Ferns

I kind of forgot to keep up with "Between Two Ferns", the most awkward talk show in the world, but fortunately they don't release new episodes often. This is one of the newer ones and I thought it was particularly..... good?

Between Two Ferns with Bruce Willis

Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis: Bruce Willis from Bruce Willis

This is my favorite episode so far:

Between Two Ferns with Steve Carell

Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis: Steve Carell from Between Two Ferns

Such great acting. The reversal where Zach plays it straight and Steve makes the insults about himself is so well done and I could watch them fighting all day.

The Last Tonight Show

Last night was the last "Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien" ever. You can still see it for a limited time here.

From June 1, 2009 to January 22, 2010, the show lasted 7 months, 21 days and aired 146 episodes totaling 150 Hours, 52 Minutes of programming (counting commercials). I watched every single show.

I found the last episode oddly emotional. I mean, Conan isn't retiring, he doesn't have a terminal illness, he's still making tons of money, it only lasted 7 months - there isn't that much loss to really "mourn" over but nevertheless, I did feel very sad and nostalgic throughout the entire hour. The montage of great moments was a particular mix of laughter and melancholy. Seeing Wax Tom Cruise and Wax Fonzie being shot out of a cannon, Conan pool cleaning, Conan and Andy boating, the motorized podium, smashing the pumpkin, and so on, was liking looking through a photo album (yes, even though it's only a show that lasted 7 months).

Tom Hanks was good, Neil Young was good, Steve Carrell was funny. Conan's goodbye speech was especially good even though he did just do one 7 months ago. I can't decide if Will Ferrell playing with Beck, Billy Gibbons, Ben Harper and Conan, himself, was epic or kind of a waste of time. Probably it was a little of both. I love the song, the musicians and the return of "more cowbell" but I couldn't help but wish that there was an amazing singer to match the amazing music. The "comedic" aspect of it just didn't seem worth it.

Given that the show runs past midnight, the last show ended January 23, 2010 - the 5 year anniversary of Johnny Carson's death to the day.

There's no telling where Conan will end up - though it looks to me like FOX - or when he'll start airing shows - though all reports speculate that it will be MONTHS - but I'll be watching.

A final note about NBC: I made a joke before about them running their network like "Kruger Industrial Smoothing" and I have to say that doesn't even feel like an exaggeration. When Johnny Carson was on the air NBC basically had 100% of the audience. The other networks didn't even pretend to think that they could compete. When he retired, NBC took the good fortune of having the agreed upon rightful heir to the throne, David Letterman. Faced with a slam dunk, NBC decided to screw everyone and send Letterman to another network. So now they have %50 (let's say) instead of 100%. That's a bad business model and a huge public blunder but they learned an important lesson and moved on. Oh, no, wait, because 20 years later with a new, young, innovative host, they decide to piss him off too and send him to another network and now they can have, at best, 33% of the audience and a major P.R. nightmare where people generally think they (and their "new" host) are evil. A ratings share cut into three, an old and soon to be retired host, an ageing demographic, increased competition, bad press, it all sounds like good, solid planning.

In a nutshell, NBC's decision was "these ratings aren't good enough, let's cut them in half." Until such point that 2+2=5, there's no way that can make business sense. And yet somehow it happened. The most legendary franchise, the home of Steve Allen, Jack Paar and Johnny Carson is officially dead.

Epilogue: A lot happened in over the past week or so and there won't be any more Conan for a while so I'll probably post past clips from the show periodically.