Farewell for Conan O'Brien

[Will E Worm]

Conan could land on Fox after 'Tonight Show'

Shortly before agreeing to the terms of his unpleasant exit from NBC, Conan O'Brien joked on "The Tonight Show" that his plans for next week include making a big move to Fox.

"Megan Fox," he said to the laughter of fans who have made him a folk hero for losing his dream job.

A day after sealing his deal with NBC that gives O'Brien $45 million and allows Jay Leno to return to "The Tonight Show" throne, O'Brien airs his final show, with Will Ferrell, Tom Hanks, Neil Young and promised surprises.

Fox - the network - represents the most attractive landing for O'Brien if he wants to continue hosting a daily television talk show. CBS is comfortable with its late-night lineup of David Letterman and Craig Ferguson, ABC has expressed no interest in O'Brien, so Fox is the only one of the four big broadcast networks with room for the late late-night host. Fox has long sought its own late-night franchise.

Still, there are questions about whether Fox affiliates would welcome the pompadoured redhead or not.

Article

 

[J_Mags]

I cannot fucking WAIT to see how much of NBC's money he wastes tonight. I'm drinking SO much coffee to make sure I see it all...

 

[D-rock]

How the hell did Leno end up being the bad guy in all of this? It's like everybody forgets he was screwed over first years ago for the benefit of Conan,...and Conan agreed to it which I don't hold against him because pretty much any potential host would do it. There is also some double standard where Conan gets a free pass for just coming in and taking his show out from underneath him, when he didn't deserve it yet, at the same time, Leno is ridiculed for plain choosing not to walk away into the sunset. I'm neutral between both of them, but I will have to watch Leno now just to help counteract all the nonsense out there.

He paid his dues at NBC and earned The Tonight Show.

Like Leno never paid his dues.




In any case let me ask a question about all the Conan supporters. Where the hell were all of them when Conan was sinking in the ratings for the Tonight Show? Seriously, where were all of them? They bitched and moaned about him being moved back. There were whole internet movements to keep him on the Tonight Show. They practically lamented the perceived injustice. They did pretty much everything except...you know...WATCH HIS SHOW WHEN IT REALLY MATTERED. What are they going to do if Conan goes somewhere else and doesn't do any better? Will they have an excuse all nice and lined up for that when it happens.

 

[Ace Bandage]

Like Leno never paid his dues.

My conflict is more with NBC than with Leno. The network promised Conan that in four years the show would be his. They gave it to him and took it away in the span of a few months. You've got to give him more time than that to get the program going. It's not Conan's fault that Leno totally tanked in prime time.

 

[Hypergalaxy]

How the hell did Leno end up being the bad guy in all of this? It's like everybody forgets he was screwed over first years ago for the benefit of Conan,...and Conan agreed to it which I don't hold against him because pretty much any potential host would do it. There is also some double standard where Conan gets a free pass for just coming in and taking his show out from underneath him, when he didn't deserve it yet, at the same time, Leno is ridiculed for plain choosing not to walk away into the sunset. I'm neutral between both of them, but I will have to watch Leno now just to help counteract all the nonsense out there.





Like Leno never paid his dues.




In any case let me ask a question about all the Conan supporters. Where the hell were all of them when Conan was sinking in the ratings for the Tonight Show? Seriously, where were all of them? They bitched and moaned about him being moved back. There were whole internet movements to keep him on the Tonight Show. They practically lamented the perceived injustice. They did pretty much everything except...you know...WATCH HIS SHOW WHEN IT REALLY MATTERED. What are they going to do if Conan goes somewhere else and doesn't do any better? Will they have an excuse all nice and lined up for that when it happens.

I agree that NBC is deffinetly more at fault than anyone but it is also disturbing that leno would just accpet the tonight show back and screw Conan out of his show. Back when it was annouced four years ago leno was quated saying that he wouldnt have it any other way and that he thought Conan would be a great addition to the tonight show legacy. But since his new show bombed he wants to take back what he said and that is low. Even if NBC pushed it on leno he could have said no. Besides at lenos age with all the money he has and all the money he makes off of his cars I would retire and call it a day not take a job away from someone that just got their shot at making the tonight show their own. Leno Paid his dues for what? He had the show for 16 years? Whats next is retirement

As for the "where have all of Conans supporters been" I personally have recored every show since he started back in june(as I did with all the late nights for the past 7 years). You do relize that "ratings" are based off of the Nielsen Ratings system and are HIGHLY inaccurate

 

[meesterperfect]

I see most of you prefer the huge forehead guy over the huge chin guy.
me too actually

 

[TheRedHood]

In any case let me ask a question about all the Conan supporters. Where the hell were all of them when Conan was sinking in the ratings for the Tonight Show? Seriously, where were all of them? They bitched and moaned about him being moved back. There were whole internet movements to keep him on the Tonight Show. They practically lamented the perceived injustice. They did pretty much everything except...you know...WATCH HIS SHOW WHEN IT REALLY MATTERED. What are they going to do if Conan goes somewhere else and doesn't do any better? Will they have an excuse all nice and lined up for that when it happens.

Conan had the same problems with Late Night when he first started, it takes awhile for the audience to get used to him, and I'm sure that there were people who watched the Tonight Show when Jay was host who were either turned off by Conan or not accustomed to Conan. I can see some of Conan's original audience being lost because of his move, possibly because of people not being able to catch his show like they did when he was on Late Night, etc.

Another factor as to why Conan didn't do that well on the Tonight Show (and Jay Leno's primetime show as well) is the fact that there's so much competition in terms of talk shows, some generic, some successful like with Letterman's show (who also got the added bonus of the extortion scandal publicity).

Lastly, and probably the most important factor, is that all these late night talk shows just aren't standing out like they used to back when Johnny Carson was around, for example. People just aren't as interested in them as much as they once were, times are changing, and you don't have families gathering together to sit around the TV and watch the one show they've been waiting for all day. You don't really have people rushing home to catch their favorite talk show before going to sleep. Television in general is being shut down by the Internet and hurt by people Tivoing their shows or checking the reruns out on the Internet and so on. People are starting to watch TV less and less IMO.

It's a shame, but that's the way things are unfortunately.

 

[Mrs Jolly]

Lastly, and probably the most important factor, is that all these late night talk shows just aren't standing out like they used to back when Johnny Carson was around, for example. People just aren't as interested in them as much as they once were, times are changing, and you don't have families gathering together to sit around the TV and watch the one show they've been waiting for all day. You don't really have people rushing home to catch their favorite talk show before going to sleep. Television in general is being shut down by the Internet and hurt by people Tivoing their shows or checking the reruns out on the Internet and so on. People are starting to watch TV less and less IMO.

It's a shame, but that's the way things are unfortunately.

This reminds me of the Lemonheads song, "I lied about being an outdoor type"

In it the singer says .

I can't go away with you for a rock climbing weekend
What if somethings on TV and it's never shown again

That used to be true for me, especially where music on TV was concerned.

Here it live at the reading festival.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGz5DakZzf4

 

[DJCowboy]

Conan's final show (for now) was really good. I bet the whole crew there got nice and drunk after the show

 

[HELLRAISER]

It's a shame to see that Conan O'brien and his crew got shafted by Leno and the idiots at NBC

 

[DJCowboy]

It's a shame to see that Conan O'brien and his crew got shafted by Leno and the idiots at NBC

I agree that NBC has been incredibly stupid but it was good to see Conan at the end actually thank NBC for making it his home the past 20 years and that the positives that he experienced definitely outweighed the negatives

 

[HELLRAISER]

^ That's true but I feel sorry for his staff who had to move from N.Y. to L.A. before they could have a Chance to establish themselves here

 

[DJCowboy]

^ Yeah no kidding and Leno should have taken a cue from his predecessor (Carson) and leave on a high note. Now he just looks like an old man using viagra with the hopes someone will ride him


Edit: Now that I think about it, it's kind of ironic that Conan seems to be leaving on a high note with the Tonight Show, even after only 7 months but everyone is rooting for him

 

[HELLRAISER]

^ Leno screwed up big time. I don't know how he thinks he will be able to recover from the backlash over this? He pissed off alot of people by accepting to replace Conan instead of rejecting NBC

 

[PlasmaTwa2]

^ Leno screwed up big time. I don't know how he thinks he will be able to recover from the backlash over this? He pissed off alot of people by accepting to replace Conan instead of rejecting NBC

He's going on Oprah next week, so he'll be fine. Her will commands it.

 

[PirateKing]

^ Yeah no kidding and Leno should have taken a cue from his predecessor (Carson) and leave on a high note. Now he just looks like an old man using viagra with the hopes someone will ride him


Edit: Now that I think about it, it's kind of ironic that Conan seems to be leaving on a high note with the Tonight Show, even after only 7 months but everyone is rooting for him

Very accurate analogy. The way i see it things were moving forward with conan becoming the tonight show host and now it all seems like a sham. When is Leno planning on retiring? One day he will have to retire and theres not gonna be a high note because hes already disgraced himself.:thefinger

 

[shayd]

How the hell did Leno end up being the bad guy in all of this? It's like everybody forgets he was screwed over first years ago for the benefit of Conan,...and Conan agreed to it which I don't hold against him because pretty much any potential host would do it. There is also some double standard where Conan gets a free pass for just coming in and taking his show out from underneath him, when he didn't deserve it yet, at the same time, Leno is ridiculed for plain choosing not to walk away into the sunset. I'm neutral between both of them, but I will have to watch Leno now just to help counteract all the nonsense out there.

I thought the same thing for a while, but, this video changed my view substantially:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GxGsHl2g9k

While NBC certainly is the ultimate evil here, Leno didn't do himself any favors by essentially violating every single point about both The Tonight Show and Conan himself in that video.

Ultimately, Leno could have just walked and there'd be no question who the bad guy was. He pointed to the tradition of the Tonight Show as the reason why he thought Conan was a good choice to replace him in 2009, which is exactly what he is destroying by coming back. Undeniably, in his shoes, it would be difficult to make that decision to leave, but again, if he had any regard for the things he mentioned, he would have done it. Really all this is about now is his ego, and the money he wants to make.

Like Leno never paid his dues.

That's pretty debatable. Leno basically came on as a stand up comedian a handful of times, decided he wanted to host the show, and hired a publicist/manager to do all the heavy lifting for him behind the scenes. Conan hosted a full fledged show for more than a decade. Lenos manager lobbied NBC to get him the guest hosting role after fewer appearances than Letterman on the show despite Carson openly endorsing Letterman for the same role. If you'll notice in that video, Leno made sure to mention that he doesn't have a manager anymore, which just so happens to be one of the main controversies around him getting the Tonight Show in the first place.

In any case let me ask a question about all the Conan supporters. Where the hell were all of them when Conan was sinking in the ratings for the Tonight Show? Seriously, where were all of them? They bitched and moaned about him being moved back. There were whole internet movements to keep him on the Tonight Show. They practically lamented the perceived injustice. They did pretty much everything except...you know...WATCH HIS SHOW WHEN IT REALLY MATTERED. What are they going to do if Conan goes somewhere else and doesn't do any better? Will they have an excuse all nice and lined up for that when it happens.

I don't think that there is any debate that the sheer volume of pro-Conan viewers is not an accurate reflection of Conans audience at this point. The problem is, that exact same argument can be made about Leno when he started. Leno was getting absolutely demolished in the ratings, and had 2 full years of air time before he beat Letterman, and still beat him only marginally. Additionally, as I've said before, Conans rating were indeed climbing in the past month, so truncating the run of the show only really speaks to the negative impact of Lenos show versus any lack of viewers for Conan.

 

[DJCowboy]

Definitely one of Conan's best segments ever.
http://www.poetv.com/video.php?vid=20343

This is the best of that series ever (sorry, can't find one with better quality )
http://www.noob.us/humor/conan-obrien-most-random-walker-texas-ranger-moment-ever/

 

[PirateKing]

^^those walker texas ranger clips are a gift that keeps on giving.

 

[DJCowboy]

http://tv.msn.com/tv/article.aspx?news=454049&Gt1=28103

NEW YORK (AP) -- Preliminary Nielsen ratings suggest that Conan O'Brien won a hefty audience for his final hour hosting "The Tonight Show."

O'Brien scored a 7.0 rating for his farewell appearance on NBC Friday, compared to a 2.5 rating for CBS' "Late Show with David Letterman" and, on ABC, a 2.8 for "Nightline" followed by 1.3 for "Jimmy Kimmel Live!"

These early figures, which reflect viewership in roughly 70 percent of the country, can't be reliably translated into audience numbers. An accurate viewer count is expected later this week.

I know it said it's not fully accurate but I know it's gotta be around there somewhere so good for him! :thefinger @ NBC. (even though he never would have gotten those ratings without this whole fiasco)