Support NeoGAF

[LegendOfKage]

The Team Coco you tube channel recently posted the first ever Late Night with Conan O'Brien, which aired all the way back in 1993.



I was a fan from day one. I watched each episode fascinated with the type of comedy he was putting on television. He came from Saturday Night Live and the Simpsons, he was a Harvard graduate, and nobody had heard of him. With a young bunch of writers, he aired some of the most original and bizarre comedy that late night had seen for years. I watched him every night for years. Some of my favorite comedic moments in all of television came from that show. So many great bits. Via Satellite, Actual Items, Children's Drawings, The NBC Crooner Ghost, Loser At the Beach, Andy's Sister Stacy, Guests We'll Never Have Back, If They Mated, Triumph The Insult Comic Dog, Pimpbot 5000, Joel the gleefully depressed announcer, sex creep Max Weinberg, and lots more.

Then the Tonight Show happened, Conan was screwed over, Jimmy Fallon of all people got the job, and he moved to basic cable.

And then the Conan that I loved began to slide into what he is now. It was small at first. He'd do the same bit for three or four days in a row, just changing or adding one little thing. He became political in the exact same "boo red team, yay blue team" partisan way that every other late night comedian is political, and did so years before Trump. He lost several of his best writers. He lost the right to most of all his old bits, and his new sketches couldn't compare. And now, it's been announced that TBS, a network that should be hurting to fill time with original programming that brings viewers to the station, is cutting his show in 2019 from an hour program down to a half hour.

At the same time, Conan did have some moments of quality though the mediocrity, but even some of those got old. His video game preview bit started with him and a show staffer who had some fun chemistry, but that was later abandoned for celebrities that often didn't serve the format. And of course, get him in an "on location" environment with some other comedians, or talking to fans, and you're probably going to have an entertaining bit. He's still a great improviser.

I think the best thing he did since the Tonight Show was his long-form web interview show, Serious Jibber Jabber, which also showcased what a great interviewer he truly is. Unfortunately, they only filmed about 16 episodes. Here are two of the best, which I highly recommend.





If nothing else, seeing the considerable drop in quality over the years gives me a new level of appreciation for the rest of his former staff. Even with his level of talent and showmanship, he can't do it all, and now he can't even do it for an hour.

Of course, all of this is my opinion, but I can't be the only one who feels the way. Especially considering TBS cutting his show, which I wouldn't think would be happening if he still had the ratings.

Anyone else have fond memories of Conan? Do you still watch him, or did you stop years ago like I did?

 

[Keylime]

I can't say I have been following him much at all these days. Essentially anything worth watching will show up on Reddit or YouTube trending so I can check it out, but the show as a whole just became this weird reenactment of a once great show. I remember when he first got The Tonight show I was so excited. I watched every episode. You could see him finding his way with a new audience and platform, but he was still doing good stuff.

He's just not the same anymore...there's nothing wrong with ending his career at this point considering all that he's done.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

Even though it was accidentally funny once in a while, I think his "Clueless Gamer" was where he lost it. I don't mind the type of humor, but it was the sort of stuff that had already been on YouTube for years. Conan -- of course -- thought he was being incredibly clever and original, but the shtick didn't really work.

 

[Unknown Quantity]

I like Conan, through the mediocrity you get some great bits. No consistency as the writers move on to bigger things.
Team coco channel on YouTube is good for the skits and he always gives Bill Burr time to test material so will continue to check it out.

 

[J-Roderton]

Haven't watched Conan or any late night for years, but I always watched him more than others.

 

[JimmyJones]

All US talkshows have turned to shit. Graham Norton is the GOAT.

 

[Nymphae]

Always liked that pilot he did with Adam West. He's a hilarious guy, I just don't give a shit about anyone on TV these days really, especially late night talk shows - they all toe the same line and pretty much deliver the same jokes.

 

[Dthomp]

Kind of off topic, but I stopped carrying about late night shows once Craig Ferguson left late nights. Loved him

 

[TimFL]

Clueless Gamer is the best he has to offer, that and remotes. Still bummed that no one at Sony thought it'd be a good idea to have a Spider-Man clueless gamer segment with Tom Holland (bonus points: Andrew Garfield / Tobey Maguire or all 3 of them?). Tom Holland even plays the game according to his Instagram, I'm sure he'd gladly fly there to shoot a segment.

 

[Tesseract]

Kind of off topic, but I stopped carrying about late night shows once Craig Ferguson left late nights. Loved him

yup, i feel like ferguson's subversion of the format took it to a level that was pretty much unbeatable. he conquered late night.

damn shame that he walked away, he was the most charismatic and intelligent host of our era.

 

[#Phonepunk#]

when i was in high school i was obsessed with Conan to the point where i would tape episodes of his show and watch them later. i liked how geeky he was, and all the bizarre skits they would do. Triump, the Masturbating Bear, Pimpbot, SlipNutz, In The Year 2000, Potato Judge, the silly fake interviews, all of it was so good. it had the same sense of anarchy you get from classic era Simpsons. ofc he personally wrote a number of those episodes, including single-handedly writing possibly the best Simpsons ever, the Monorail one. dude was pretty much a comedy genius.

it is sad he got screwed over. sad that he lost the rights to his characters. the years spent creating this absurd comedy world was all for naught, no doubt he would have lost all that even if he got that Tonight Show promotion. Jimmy Fallon is the ultimate talentless hack who gets through life by sucking up to be boss. if anything Conan was too good for late night.

i haven't seen his show in years but have enjoyed the few bits and pieces of stuff he's done here and there. loved the all-Claymation episode of his show back in 2003. the music video w the White Stripes is classic. the Clueless Gamer segments are great, the kind of thing you see everyone on youtube but Conan is actually a funny guy so it's worth it.

 

[mutt765]

yup, i feel like ferguson's subversion of the format took it to a level that was pretty much unbeatable. he conquered late night.

damn shame that he walked away, he was the most charismatic and intelligent host of our era.

Thank you! I totally agree but most people I know seem to like Fallon which is crazy to me.

I like Norton too but only because he gets the guests boozed up and brings them all out at the same time which creates some great genuine moments. Corden tried to copy the format but it just doesn't work as well, I think because he doesn't know when to sit back and let the guests interact like Norton does.

 

[VulcanRaven]

Conan is still great. He is the best talk show host in my opinion. The trip to Italy he did with Jordan Schlansky recently was great.

Even though it was accidentally funny once in a while, I think his "Clueless Gamer" was where he lost it. I don't mind the type of humor, but it was the sort of stuff that had already been on YouTube for years. Conan -- of course -- thought he was being incredibly clever and original, but the shtick didn't really work.

They are funny and they have a lot of views so I think most people like them. This is great for example:

 

[DeepEnigma]

I think a lot of it has to do with the overly PC watchdog nature now. Comedians are now walking on eggshells on what they can or cannot say, and it is having in impact on their creative works. This does not just effect him, but everyone across the board I notice.

Dave Chapelle's recent stand-up was tame compared to his older skits, and even then he was still raked across the coals by the fake outrage types. Comedy of the late 70's, 80's and 90's into early 00's sadly, would not fly today (and that was the best stuff). Now all you see on Netflix are every other skit, by the same boring people, talking about the same boring topic... Trump. ZZZzzzz

 

[Frank Spencer]

All US talkshows have turned to shit. Graham Norton is the GOAT.

GOAT ass kisser maybe yes....

 

[cryptoadam]

I think a lot of it has to do with the overly PC watchdog nature now. Comedians are now walking on eggshells on what they can or cannot say, and it is having in impact on their creative works. This does not just effect him, but everyone across the board I notice.

Dave Chapelle's recent stand-up was tame compared to his older skits, and even then he was still raked across the coals by the fake outrage types. Comedy of the late 70's, 80's and 90's into early 00's sadly, would not fly today (and that was the best stuff). Now all you see on Netflix are every other skit, by the same boring people, talking about the same boring topic... Trump. ZZZzzzz

Go watch Eddie Murphy RAW or Delirious. Two of the greatest comedy shows ever which would probably cost Eddie his career today and turn him into a social pariah via social media.

Comedians today have to navigate a minefield because people don't realize that they are telling JOKES, which is the job of a comedian. To point out and exaggerate the details of our day to day life to get people to laugh.

 

[Supreme Allah]

I liked his comedy during Late Night but as soon as he got the Tonight Show he stopped being funny. I also remember those shows where he used the same jokes night after night, thought I was watching a rerun.

This was almost a decade ago. He has been given enough time. He should have been cancelled. The only funny thing left is Jordan Schlansky.

 

[niveaformen]

I'd like to think he has Bill Burr on often enough because he can say things that Conan wish he could himself. But even Billy boy is not as edgy as he once was.
Watched him on and off, preferred him over Letterman because that guy seemed to be on cruise control for how many years. But Conan seems to be in that complacent territory. Or maybe it's just time to move on. Is that Scott Aukerman show still on, that was great.

 

[davepoobond]

I feel like he ought to do something else. Voice acting or a cartoon or running a tv show that isn’t a talk show

 

[Grinchy]

I can't stand the late night talk show format anymore, but some of the youtube clips I watch from Conan are still pretty damn funny. He's clearly a funny guy who is stuck with a bad format.

I miss the old days of him doing the celebrity mouth cut out bit with Arnold's face, or the Walker Texas Ranger lever. There was such a light-heartedness to that old show.

 

[WaterAstro]

Conan is still hilarious, but he just got screwed over with Tonight Show. I watch some of his stuff on youtube.

Colbert is simply slaying it since there is so much political material now.

 

[Pumpkin Seeds]

Some of the funniest stuff coming out of his show are the youtubes of him yelling at his writers during rehearsal. They follow a basic pattern of Conan and Andy going through a writer's bit until Conan points out they forgot to add the comedy part.

 

[#Phonepunk#]

 

[highrider]

Naah, I still like him. He’s never been some ultimate funny dude, he’s Conan, totally in his own lane.

 

[EverydayBeast]

He needs to get better guests man and head back to New York

 

[O.v.e.rlord]

Are you sure that this isn’t about all late night talk show hosts. Cause they all suck.

 

[Rock And Roll]

Holy hell I thought I was the only one who remembered this bit! I still show it to people and they love it.

I watched a lot of Conan for a solid decade or so, truth be told he started to taper off near the end of Late Night. I feel like he was mentally preparing for the Tonight Show so he stopped doing things like hissing at the camera and went too straight man. Most of the viral clips I see today involve Conan acting like a playful jack ass which is what he excelled at. As soon as he tried to be serious the show took a serious hit.

It sucks what NBC did to him and it sucks TBS is doing this to him. He's one of the best late night hosts of all time and he deserves to end his career on his terms, they're basically pushing him off the air st this point. Shit sucks bruv

 

[Nymphae]

I think a lot of it has to do with the overly PC watchdog nature now. Comedians are now walking on eggshells on what they can or cannot say, and it is having in impact on their creative works. This does not just effect him, but everyone across the board I notice.

Dave Chapelle's recent stand-up was tame compared to his older skits, and even then he was still raked across the coals by the fake outrage types. Comedy of the late 70's, 80's and 90's into early 00's sadly, would not fly today (and that was the best stuff). Now all you see on Netflix are every other skit, by the same boring people, talking about the same boring topic... Trump. ZZZzzzz

Comedy is so bad right now, I grew up on 80's and 90's comics. I was a huge fan of stand up comedy until somewhere in the mid 2000's, I can barely stand to listen to any of it anymore. The constant push for me to watch woke comedians made me cancel my netflix account. Yeah they occasionally have a Norm MacDonald or Dana Carvey show, but it's plain to see that the comedy landscape has been drastically altered.

The only comedians that I follow regularly now are on the Legion of Skanks podcast.

 

[#Phonepunk#]

tbh these days i watch way more classic talk shows than the new stuff. they have the Johnny Carson show and some other stuff on Retro TV. it is pretty cool. back then they were more like variety shows, had more random people on doing cool talent stuff, comedy, songs & skits. i guess they still do that but it's more about promoting movies/books/etc. culture in general is worse than it once was so the shows that promote it will be as well. nowadays it is far easier to get famous. the quality of the guests has dropped just as the barrier to entry has lowered. back in the golden era of the Tonight Show (on into the late 90s/early 00s) there were less TV channels, there was no youtube or Netflix or even Twitter, etc., folks like Johnny Carson, people that you kind of spend time with every day and they show you different things, the personality-based entertainment media, is sort of a classic concept.

i like Dave Chapelle but tbh see massive stagnation in culture and poptimism. old culture was very subversive compare to new culture imo, even though it was also more racist/sexist/etc.-ist than the "woke" culture we pretend we have now. in reality evil shit always goes down, we are just more aware of it now. it does suck in a lot of ways, and comedians have always complained about it, see George Carlin's famous dirty words. some of his acts from 10 years ago done today would be very controversial. i mean there's cool stuff now but it's all so disposable. i am pretty bored w the so-called "Best time ever for TV" whole "Prestige TV" thing. everything is desaturated and shot on a budget and all referential/ironically detached and gritty. things are very watered down and this is largely from media consolidation. Conan famously being a casualty of this culture. Conan is still one of my faves and i think he brought a very old school style to it all, the skits he did on his 90s show being beyond classic, like a DLC of prime era Simpsons.

 

[Michele]

Not to be too much offtopic...But I want to get to the point.

What's happening right now is, Conan is going to Japan because that anime is ripping him off, right?

 

[Porcile]

He's a super funny, really intelligent guy who has to be a massive arse kisser to incredibly lame actors and actresses etc, who are also massive shills.

 

[Cunth]

Celebrity interviews are boring shit unless they are long form like joe rogan and not just selling their latest shit

 

[VulcanRaven]

Not to be too much offtopic...But I want to get to the point.

What's happening right now is, Conan is going to Japan because that anime is ripping him off, right?

He is not serious about it. I think that is the reason why he went there but he did a lot of other things there too.

This was great:

 

[JCK75]

I don't think there is a single Late night show currently worth watching, Conan being Mediocre puts him leagues ahead of everyone else in the time slots.

 

[Alexander DeLarge]

I stopped watching when he dropped Norm MacDonald last week because of his #metoo comments. Really disappointed he'd cancel an appearance like everyone else when some of the best Conan O'Brien segments are the best ever.

 

[Mr Nash]

I lost interest in the show around the early 2000s. My favorite skit ever on the show was Inappropriate.

 

[Ancient Gray]

I think late night has been on a decline altogether. Singling out Conan feels a little unfair.

 

[Rock And Roll]

I stopped watching when he dropped Norm MacDonald last week because of his #metoo comments. Really disappointed he'd cancel an appearance like everyone else when some of the best Conan O'Brien segments are the best ever.

I doubt he canceled on Norm, I think Norm backed out because he didn't want to put Conan through any potential backlash. Remember he booked him after the comments so I don't think Conan had a problem with him coming on during one of his last shows.

 

[TheSadRanger]

I lost interest in the show around the early 2000s. My favorite skit ever on the show was Inappropriate.

As someone else pointed out about pc humor I don't think the last bit of that sketch would fly today.

Like there's noooooo way you could do the Artie Kendall bit today.

 

[black_13]

I had forgotten how many good segments he had on the Late Show. Masterbating bear, Max Weinberg skits, the arnold and other celebrity voice overs, the guy always playing the annoying audience member. I would laugh my ass off watching those. I stopped finding the show funny as soon as he switched to the Tonight Show. In general I did stop watching all late night talk shows tho.

 

[Sapien]

I still like the segments when he ventures outside of the studio, especially trips to other countries have been filled with good stuff. Beyond that, I just watch youtube clips if somebody posts 'em on forums I visit.

 

[TheDuskwalker]

I stopped watching all modern late night talk shows, they're all pretty boring now, and all the same political jokes over and over again. Conan was my favorite, but he seems severely toned down, and does the same skits/jokes over and over and over again.

I think a lot of it has to do with the overly PC watchdog nature now. Comedians are now walking on eggshells on what they can or cannot say, and it is having in impact on their creative works. This does not just effect him, but everyone across the board I notice.

Dave Chapelle's recent stand-up was tame compared to his older skits, and even then he was still raked across the coals by the fake outrage types. Comedy of the late 70's, 80's and 90's into early 00's sadly, would not fly today (and that was the best stuff). Now all you see on Netflix are every other skit, by the same boring people, talking about the same boring topic... Trump. ZZZzzzz

Pretty much, what I mean by he seems severely toned down, just look at his Tomb Raider Clueless Gamer compared to his modern ones, no pervy stuff and fun like in TR, just joking around with whichever B list celebrity they could get at the last second. Not surprising given it's TBS, a network that's fully behind Samantha Bee and Michael Moore, so they're all about that PC watchdog nature. There is no creative freedom with Conan now, it's just like he found what TBS doesn't find offensive and does nothing else.

 

[danielberg]

Hmm not sure about his descent or whatever but its clear that they all have now more competition amongst each other basically saying the same things.
I mean how many shows can you really have before cannibalizing each others viewership.

 

[Kenpachii]

All US talkshows have turned to shit. Graham Norton is the GOAT.

I love his interview style. Doesn't feel forced or fake even remotely. He has the same vibe as those top gear people had back in the day.

About conan, like how much content can you really create through the years. Obviously the longer you are on the less new material you gonna have. And the reason why everything is politics is simple because what else is there really to talk about?

 

[E-Cat]

I loved Hunky Newcomer:

 

[Sapiens]

Max on Max!

 

[Rock And Roll]

As someone else pointed out about pc humor I don't think the last bit of that sketch would fly today.

Like there's noooooo way you could do the Artie Kendall bit today.

Artie Kendall was always one of my favourite bits from Late Night. Notice how the audience LAUGHS at the absurd lyrics because they understand it's a joke instead of feigning outrage and making for the exits with their ears plugged while crying about how there's certain things that aren't funny.

 

[LegendOfKage]

Artie Kendall was always one of my favourite bits from Late Night. Notice how the audience LAUGHS at the absurd lyrics because they understand it's a joke instead of feigning outrage and making for the exits with their ears plugged while crying about how there's certain things that aren't funny.

I've never understood how people can't realize that the entire point of "punching down" is because you're joking about something horrible and wrong, and not that you're mocking subject of the joke.

And if the point of the joke is "this is horrible thing to make fun of," it's often actually a round about way of saying that thinking that way is backwards and stupid.

And now, a song for the ladies:

I think late night has been on a decline altogether. Singling out Conan feels a little unfair.

I'm singling out Conan only as a "how the mighty have fallen" situation. No other current late night show ever came close to Conan.

 

[NiiloPielinen]

I wonder how much of the descent is due to his smaller budget at TBS and loss of rights to characters.