The late night clusterfuck

When I first heard that Conan was replacing Jay as the Tonight Show host, I threw up a hell yeah. When I first heard that Jay was getting his own primetime slot EVERY night at 10pm on NBC, I threw up a Hail Mary and then a hell no for two reasons. A Hail Mary because I hoped, hoped, that everything would be okay with the death of that timeslot for all parties involved: the network, the affiliaties, and Conan. And then a hell no because I knew, knew, that there was no possible way that the network could be saved from this.

NBC has backed themselves into a corner. They had been severely lacking original scripted programming for a long time, and by granting Jay the 10pm timeslot every night of the week, they were throwing away their chances for any good scripted material. To no big surprise to anyone at all, the Jay Leno Show has been canceled. But why and what this means for everyone else involved?

Well, Jay was canceled because he simply wasn't cutting it. He was a ratings upset and he was sucking up too much valuable time for scripted programming (which NBC has finally figured out, and are now in full swing of developing many new scripted programs for the 10pm slot). Most importantly, he was upsetting the affiliates and they were threatening to take serious action. The 11pm news is a major cash cow for the local affiliate stations and it's how they make their profit. As the ratings lead-in, Jay was causing a severe drop in ratings for the affiliate news stations and that was a big no no.

Now NBC is attempting to "remedy" this by giving Jay his 11:35pm time slot back and pushing Conan's Tonight show to the 12:05-1:05 time slot. This has NEVER happened in the history of late night. The Tonight Show has always aired after the local news. Now not only has NBC embarrassed Jay by canceling his show and replacing it with a new half hour format, but they've further embarrassed Conan by asking him to be pushed into a later time slot after only 7 months in the original time slot.

Yes, you read that right. SEVEN MONTHS. Conan has only just been passed the Tonight Show torch and he's already been forced into this unimaginable situation. When Leno first took the host gig at the Tonight Show, he was still losing out in ratings to Letterman 18 months in. Now someone tell me how that's fair?

Now here's where it gets sticky for NBC: they can't simply force Conan's hand. This is highlighted by the fact that they would owe Conan $60 million if they were to break contract with him. This is also another good reason why Conan isn't so ready to jump ship, not to mention that jumping ship would only give NBC the satisfaction of a win.

There's a lot more I have to say, but for now, I'll just say: FIGHT, CONAN, FIGHT!

Next up: Conan's statement released yesterday. Read the whole thing.