What's new
Troll Kingdom

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Things you love about South Park

Volpone said:
If you can air a show for $1.5 billion that makes you, say, $1.6 billion do you do it? If you can air a show for $100 million that loses you $40 million, do you do it?
Click to expand...

I think the issue with The Late Show is that people don’t really buy the claim it was losing money. Yeah, network TV is clearly in decline, but Colbert was still pulling the biggest numbers in late night. It’s hard to believe a show leading its category was tanking so badly they had no choice but to scrap it.

And if it really was about finances, the usual move isn’t to just pull the plug completely. Not on a flagship show. You go to the table. You renegotiate. You scale it down. You try something. Especially with how thin CBS is on original content.

The fact that this happened right after Colbert mocked Trump’s so-called “bribe,” combined with Skydance’s execs being tightly connected to the GOP donor world, makes the timing look suspect. So yeah, the whole “purely financial decision!” doesn't pass the smell test.
 
The media keeps saying that the Tonight Show had the highest ratings, but that is only in comparison to the other two late night shows on broadcast channels. They all have horrible ratings. Jimmy Kimmel's show does better with 18-49 yr olds (the advertisers want those eyes the most), Colbert comes in 2nd, and Jimmy Fallon is 3rd. Weirdly, Colbert's audience is older. Perhaps Colbert criticizing Trump made it convenient to ditch his show so they can hopefully sell to Skydance, but I don't think any of the late night shows are long for this world.

Also, how are the olds (like me :rwmad: ) staying up so late watching tv? I can barely keep my eyes open past 10:30.
 
Cassie said:
The media keeps saying that the Tonight Show had the highest ratings, but that is only in comparison to the other two late night shows on broadcast channels. They all have horrible ratings. Jimmy Kimmel's show does better with 18-49 yr olds (the advertisers want those eyes the most), Colbert comes in 2nd, and Jimmy Fallon is 3rd. Weirdly, Colbert's audience is older. Perhaps Colbert criticizing Trump made it convenient to ditch his show so they can hopefully sell to Skydance, but I don't think any of the late night shows are long for this world.

Also, how are the olds (like me :rwmad: ) staying up so late watching tv? I can barely keep my eyes open past 10:30.
Click to expand...
The other business reason that Fallon and Kimmel may still last longer is that, in addition to Colbert's audience being older, Colbert has a very small online footprint compared to the two Jimmys. When people look online the next day for YouTube or TikTok clips of the previous night's show, or for extra digital content, they look to Kimmel and Fallon, not Colbert. This may make Fallon and Kimmel a little more profitable than Colbert, even tho their ratings are lower.
 
Mentalist said:
I think the issue with The Late Show is that people don’t really buy the claim it was losing money. Yeah, network TV is clearly in decline, but Colbert was still pulling the biggest numbers in late night. It’s hard to believe a show leading its category was tanking so badly they had no choice but to scrap it.

And if it really was about finances, the usual move isn’t to just pull the plug completely. Not on a flagship show. You go to the table. You renegotiate. You scale it down. You try something. Especially with how thin CBS is on original content.

The fact that this happened right after Colbert mocked Trump’s so-called “bribe,” combined with Skydance’s execs being tightly connected to the GOP donor world, makes the timing look suspect. So yeah, the whole “purely financial decision!” doesn't pass the smell test.
Click to expand...
Wanted the quote for a frame of reference. Should pare it down to the relevant bit but I've been drinking. So I can't. I can't even remember what the relevant bit is--or if it is even in this post or just in what I've been mulling. Probably the latter. Definitely the latter.

The Tonight Show is the definitive latenite show. Literally. I think it started with Jack Parr. Then Johnny Carson. There was nothing else. ABC had Nightline (which came from the Iranian hostage crisis) and CBS had whatever CBS had. David Letterman came after. As Johnny got older, Jay Leno got brought in as the permanent guest host (that's a whole other post with Joan Rivers but we'll skip that). Fox(?) tried to elbow in with Arsenio Hall but, while it showed initial promise, it fizzled. So yeah. Anyway, Johnny eventually retired. Dave thought he should get The Tonight Show but NBC decided to give it to Jay Leno. So Dave jumped ship to CBS, creating "The Late Show." Conan O'Brian replaced him on Late Night. Eventually Jay Leno was ready to retire. So they gave it to Conan. But no. Jay came back. Then Conan left like Dave did. By this point the archetypical latenite show became irrelevant. I forget what happened to Conan. Dave (after getting increasingly bitter and partisan) stepped down.

Meanwhile cable had become a thing and Comedy Central came up with "The Daily Show" which (I think) started out fairly nonpartisan, got very partisan with Jon Stewart. So when Dave retired, CBS tapped the Daily Show for Stephen Colbert. While this is all happening, ABC (Disney) rolls out "The Man Show's" Jimmy I Forget His Last Name. At first it was fun because he focused on entertainment but after Trump was elected he veered hard Left (quite an accomplishment for someone who appeared in blackface on his previous show while girls jumped on trampolines in slow motion).

What was my point? I forget. No I don't. It was that The Late Show is (relatively) new. And doesn't have a lot to lose by cancelling. "The Tonight Show" has been around forever so NBC hates to cut bait and cancel it. Disney owns ABC and if there's anything we've learned from this year's Disney Marvel productions, Disney doesn't mind losing a bunch of money on a show if it ticks their ideological boxes.

That said, now that the piss seal has been broken it wouldn't surprise me if Jimmy Kimmel and whoever is hosting "The Tonight Show" need to dust off their resumes in coming days,
 
Volpone said:
What Volpone Said...
Click to expand...
Just cutting this, not trying to diminish what Volpone said, just wanted to help clarify certain points.

The Tonight Show started with Steve Allen in 1954, a companion in essence to The Today Show. Then Paar, Carson, Leno, O'Brien, Leno, and now Jimmy Fallon.

Late Night hasn't had as much controversy in hosting, and has gone from Letterman on to O'Brien, Jimmy Fallon, and it's current host Seth Meyers.

The Late Late Show has been a bit murky. It was popularized by Tom Snyder, and it was merely a one-on-one interview show with no audience. That was changed when Craig Kilborn from Daily Show and ESPN fame took over the show and it became a more mainstream talk show. Kilborn left and was replaced by Craig Ferguson, a Scottish comedian known at the time for playing Mr. Wick on The Drew Carey show. After LLS he's bounced around various shows including an emmy-winning stint on daytime game show Celebrity Name Game. It was believed he would replace Letterman when he left The Late Show, but when it became apparent he wasn't getting the gig, he gave even less of a fuck hosting the show until his exit. He was replaced by James Corden, a British comedian known for Gavin & Stacey and Doctor Who. He turned it into more of a Graham Norton type show, but it still pulled in fans. After he left, the show was kaput, and they went with the @ftermidnight show hosted by Taylor Tomlinson, but she wanted to go back to stand-up, so the entire time slot was vacated.

As for Conan O'Brien after the Tonight Show debacle, he would eventually start a show on cable station TBS (Turner Broadcasting System) simply called CONAN. Andy Richter returned as his sidekick, and most of his band would carry over, now known as The Basic Cable Band, led by Jimmy Vivino. He would stay with TBS from 2010 to 2021, although the last three years went from 60 minutes to 30 minutes.

Truth be told, Late Night talk shows are a dying breed. Late Night with Seth Meyers is the only one post-12:30 left, and as Volpone pointed out, mostly due to it being a Franchise like The Tonight Show. The fact that SNL's Lorne Michaels is the producer of both Tonight and Late Night may have something to do with it also, but with his eventual retirement on SNL, the writing may be on the wall for his eventual departure from the Late Night shows as well. But as for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert... yeah this is all bullshit.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top