Conan O'Brien announces microfracture surgery to stop NBC from moving his time slot

Yeah, I suspect once the newness wears off (or should I say re-newness since he's hosting the tonight show for the second time?) he'll sustain a small hit to his previous Tonight Show ratings, but he'll still probably be the late night leader. I just don't see Letterman pulling in a lot of new viewers, and a few may go to Kimmel, but otherwise Jay will keep most of his typical crowd.

A lot of them probably don't even realize just how much drama went into it, seeing as how Jay's viewers are generally an older demographic. They weren't watching Conan to hear all the bad mouthing of NBC, they lost interest in Jay's new format at 9pm, and they probably aren't reading 38 page threads on message boards about it

Now when/if Conan comes back to the same time slot, the battle will really be on for the ratings.

 

They should have moved Conan to the 9 pm slot. lol.

If they were willing to tolerate Leno's low ratings in the slot, then they could tolerate Conan's.

It figures he is back to #1 now. NBC is saved! Too bad. I wanted to see it fail miserably...and have the network go bankrupt.

 

Well that's your opinion and one irrelevant to this discussion (someone go find one of the old threads).

It's a matter of taste, but I think this entire "Blame Jay" is absolutely silly. No he's not entirely "innocent" and could have taken the "high road" here, but he was caught in the middle. And I can't have much sympathy for Conan. I like the guy, but he was just paid $40 million.

$40 million.

I'm sure just about everyone would be willing to go through the "ordeal" that NBC put Conan through for that amount of money. In fact, I would be willing to star in Asian fantasy p*rn that involves buckets of diarrhea for half as much money.

In the end, it's comedy guys. Yes it's big business, but it's all comedy. I really think everyone should stop being so vindictive and just enjoy their favorite late night program based off of amusement. And most Americans will once their two week attention span refreshes.

 

Yeah, that will certainly be interesting if/when that happens. I still think a lot of the viewership is simply different, but it will be interesting to see how big Conan's audience is.

 

The fact that he was paid a lot of money doesn't excuse NBC for treating him poorly or breaching the contract they made with him.

They are two separate issues.

Issue 1 - NBC were jerks, and screwed Conan over. Jay got his hands at least a little dirty in the affair, though he wasn't the biggest a-hole.

Issue 2 - Conan was paid a lot of money(though not all that his contract initially guaranteed him.) That's great for Conan, but still doesn't excuse the behavior of Jay or NBC. Why not call them out for being the a-holes that they acted like?

 

Does anyone watch Chelsea Handler?

Sometimes the roundtable is funny. I don't like that Asian dude Joe Koi or whatever. Tries too hard.

 

Dave2000 is gonna kill you for that last comment.

 

chelsea handler looks like a 50 yr old ugly version of elizabeth banks

 

Plenty of people over 50 "get" Conan. Conan is almost 47 yrs old himself and I think people in their 40's and 50's really like Conan. I do agree that people older than 60 probably go for Leno.

If Conan goes to Fox in September, NBC will then see what a mistake they have made as the late night pie gets cut into more pieces.

 

Except that Elizabeth Banks is actually older than Chelsea Handler. Yeah, I know. I think Chelsea Handler is one of those women who parties and drinks all the time and it's aged her noticeably. She looked pretty damned good just 5 years ago.

 

Not surprisingly, Conan fans still can't accept the fact that he has no mass appeal. He tried to hang with the big boys like Leno and Letterman, and he failed.

 

Not surprisingly, Conan haters (read: old people and old people in disguise) still can't accept the fact that he has mass appeal way above Chin and Gap Tooth.

 

I hate her show, a lot.

It isn't funny at all, its just 5 people sitting around acting like b****es.

 

One word:

ratings

 

The Ratings system is out of touch and outdated. Who even uses Neilsen boxes? Do they account for people who watch online or later on DVR?

Oh and read the article posted above for some better perspective.

NBC gave Conan the shaft and he took it in stride.

In the end this will only propel Conan to the eventual top of the Late Night Ratings war wherever he resurfaces.

 

Of course NBC handled this absolutely foolishly and are the ones to blame. What they did was basically rude and unethical, however they view it as a conservative guarantee for success (even though Zucker has taken "risks" he has certainly mishandled the situation overall).

I don't believe I'm advocating for Leno, but it's unfair to lump him on the same level as NBC.

I still don't have much sympathy for Conan; like he said, "Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get." The fact is he's going to be back on the air doing what he loves to do, and he will have the opportunity to prove he's the best, most entertaining, and most hilarious in late night.

Why should it matter whether or not Conan is on Fox or NBC or MTV or even C-SPAN? If he's the best, he'll get to prove it.

I guess it's just going to be "NBC's loss," and that's the only rational way to view it.

 

The lost point in all of this is that eventually Leno is going to retire (sooner than later, now), and the old farts who like him and his painfully unfunny garbage are going to die off.... and the Conan generation is going to turn into the largest media watching demographic, and they sure as hell aren't going to forgive NBC for this bulls***.

 

You're missing the point. The vast majority of people don't care how anyone - NBC, Conan, or Leno - handled things. It's all inside-Hollywood nonsense that the vast majority of the viewing public doesn't care about. How Conan handled it is going to make no noticable difference in his viewership when he does surface again. All that's going to matter is whether people think he is funny or not.

People like to make a big deal of it, but the reality is that NBC handled it the way they did and didn't bother commenting on it or defending their decisions because in the long run, no one cares after the initial story is over. Talking about it would just extend the story, which wouldn't help NBC at all.

 

And you are severely underestimating the All-American trait of feeling entitled to not be screwed over.

Conan gained enough fans, he'll comeback strong and then things will level off after a while and then we'll see who is left in the dust.

 

"inside hollywood nonsense"?

this was a fairly open and public thing from day 1.

and it dominated headlines for a solid month... why would it be getting so much coverage if no one cared?