Late Night With Jimmy Fallon

[tominator89 0]

Who saw it last night?

 

 

[The Ghost of bps21 0]

I did. Outside of the Conan appearance in the opening "Jay's not leaving" that was a tough watch.

[tominator89 0]

Jimmy looked very nervous out there, that's for sure.

[The Ghost of bps21 0]

They had months to prepare his first show and they landed on "have people lick things for ten dollars".

 

Fail.

[Mecha Mummy 0]

I did. Objectively speaking he wasn't good, but considering it was his first night he showed some potential. His biggest enemy is going to be the fact that he's quite clearly one of those guys who has a thought, begins to try to articulate it in words, and then sort of loses sight of how to complete that thought halfway through (which I can sympathize with because I'm one of those people too).

 

I'm still baffled that he'd choose to interview Robert De Niro first. Your first night on the job and the first guy you choose to interview and you go with a guy who's not exactly known for being chatty in that format? He was far more comfortable when interviewing Justin Timberlake, unsurprisingly enough since they had done so much stuff on SNL together in the past.

 

EDIT: Yeah, the "Lick It for Ten" thing was really odd. It seems like the sort of thing you'd do a couple months in when you're out of fresh ideas, not on the first night. I guess they needed a way to fit in product placement for that printer.

[bob_barron 0]

I thought he was decent, especially given that it was his first show

[The Ghost of bps21 0]

bob's sure to hate tonights though. Tina Fey is on.

[bob_barron 0]

I prob won't watch b/c of hockey, but it will be fun to see the gang back together

[Jaxxson Mayhem 0]

Jimmy's studio looks like the set of In Living Color.

[strummer 0]

Pretty rough first show

 

The Timberlake interview was the highlight.

 

I would agree with one of the posts above that Jimmy has a lot of problems articulating his thoughts. It's like he gets a good idea to riff on and then putters out before the bit even starts

[bob_barron 0]

His interviews seemed awkward at times, lots of pauses and silences when there shouldn't have been

[RedJed 0]

He most definately is nervous as hell, at least was on the first show. He's still getting all uncomfortable and tongue-tied on the second show I'm watching right now too. In some weird way I feel like Fallon is doing a totally unintentional parody of a talk show in some ways, if that makes any sense. Kind of similar to how TNA is unintentionally a parody of pro wrestling alot of times. Holy fuck though, he's bombing this Facebook segment. Oh, Mayor Bloomberg, snap.

 

At least he has The Roots as house band for now.

[bob_barron 0]

It's going to be rough at the beginning. I think doing one of these talk shows is harder than people think.

 

Conan was cancelled a few times in his first few years

[The Ghost of bps21 0]

None of this is an excuse for people licking things.

[RedJed 0]

Yeah, it's gotta be hard, but I thought it was going to be a little more natural for him than it has ended up being, considering his history on you know what. I expected the writing to be better here too overall and not so full of really forced humor. At least the little skits are bombing is what I mean. He can at least shoot the shit with the guests, though.

 

I wonder how weird/surreal this is for him and her right now (Fallon interviewing Tina), by the way.

[Jaxxson Mayhem 0]

I think tonight was better than last night though.

 

 

 

EDIT: ..............alright............I might have to take that back.

[RedJed 0]

That chair segment, absolutely horrible. Like I said, it feels like a parody of a talk show....how could anyone think that was good to greenlight?

 

Hell, even that weird band to end the show seemed like a joke in itself, including seeing the crowd geeking out in the stands on the sides. Totally weird. Brutally strange.

[Jaxxson Mayhem 0]

I don't even think Tina Fey knew what to make of the sketch. She looked really awkward up there for the whole thing.

[tominator89 0]

I get the feeling Vince Russo is writing this show. There is far too much nonsense going on.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

I meant to DVR the Fey show but forgot. Oh well.

 

Conan got very lucky in that he was bad for two years and had no ratings, but this was television landscape in 1993 and they had no one else to replace him anyway. I think it helped his opposition was Tom Snyder, man that show was boring. The only thing I remember really well was him asking John Lithgow if the "3rd Rock from the Sun" was the planet the alien he played came from, ha!

 

Will 2009 allow Fallon to be terrible for 2 years and give him a chance to live and learn? Time will tell, but if ratings are bad due to the show not being funny enough to capture an audience, maybe NBC will decide they could just air "Classic Conan" and still sell ads for that.

[Mecha Mummy 0]

The Fey and Bon Jovi interviews were fun, but man was everything else awkward. The Facebook stuff was cringeworthy, the Bloomberg stuff was mildly funny, showing internet videos is just like one of the lowest forms of comedy much of the time, and I get the distinct impression I missed the chair segment and that's probably for the best (... and yet I will almost certainly end up watching it on Hulu anyway to see how bad it gets).

 

EDIT: Admittedly, I did laugh at Fallon's introduction to the internet video thing where he started off with "as you know, this segment..." and then immediately riffed on himself or saying something that presumptuous on the second show.

[bob_barron 0]

I meant to DVR the Fey show but forgot. Oh well.

 

Conan got very lucky in that he was bad for two years and had no ratings, but this was television landscape in 1993 and they had no one else to replace him anyway. I think it helped his opposition was Tom Snyder, man that show was boring. The only thing I remember really well was him asking John Lithgow if the "3rd Rock from the Sun" was the planet the alien he played came from, ha!

 

Will 2009 allow Fallon to be terrible for 2 years and give him a chance to live and learn? Time will tell, but if ratings are bad due to the show not being funny enough to capture an audience, maybe NBC will decide they could just air "Classic Conan" and still sell ads for that.

 

That's correct- they did cancel Conan a few times, but had nothing to replace him with.

[strummer 0]

Fey and Bon Jovi interviews were both good. (Tina and Jimmy still have incredible chemistry together)

 

the writing and the bits have been awful so far

[bob_barron 0]

Tina was hilarious in the interview, but Jimmy's so awkward in the interview at times

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

I watched a 3 minute "Conan in Toronto" clip on youtube (making fun of everyone for chanting "Go Leafs Go") and now I really wish they'd just air blocks of classic Conan episodes.

 

Does Jimmy still break and look at the camera?

[bob_barron 0]

Conan in Toronto was the best. Canadian Small Talk Moment was amazing, I once asked Max if they could make that a regular bit.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

So you're taking credit for "<Subject> Small Talk Moment"?

[bob_barron 0]

No, I wanted them do it outside of Toronto, do it while on the regular show. Which I don't think they did

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

It became a regular bit.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sketches_from...Conan_O%27Brien

 

Small Talk Moment - Conan and Max make small talk about a particular subject. The result is usually that both Max and Conan, bantering back and forth, end up going into extreme detail or citing obscure people and events. Once they have exhausted the subject, Max stops and says, "Wow, Conan! Talking about (this subject) sure is interesting," to which Conan enthusiastically responds, "It sure is, Max!" They then stare at one another in dull fashion as the camera cuts back and forth between them.

[King Cucaracha 0]

Video proof!

 

Beijing Olympics Small Talk Moment w/extremely tall audience guy