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I’ve grown accustomed to the slow creep of suckitude into our culture. It’s kind of like the analogy about cooking a lobster: Turn up the temperature slowly and the lobster won’t notice that he’s dying until it’s too late.
And so, the Cultural Lobster Pot has just been turned up a few more degrees…
Jimmy Fallon formally named next Late Night host | Entertainment | Reuters
Don’t get me wrong — I gave up hope that life could be a meritocracy a long time ago.
But still, despite our collectively diminished expectations, does this bum anyone else out?
Let me trace the arc of this for you quickly: The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson was replaced with Jay Leno — such a staggering slap in the face to “Funny” that people have tried to come to terms with its banal hideousness since it started. Dave Letterman’s Late Night show was replaced by Conan O’Brien — which at least eventually became a good thing….as long as you remembered to shut the television off quickly once the credits rolled, lest you caught sight of Carson Daly’s “show”.
But let’s not forget that Dave lost his funny on the way over to CBS and that his show feels like the world’s longest running production of “Waiting for Godot” at this point. Conan will hopefully survive the move with his soul intact, but let’s not kid ourselves: The Pale One is fighting some tough odds between moving to Southern California and getting the stink of Leno out of the studio.
Remember when NBC gave us “The Cosby Show” followed by “Family Ties”?
I mean — it wasn’t “Masterpiece Theater”, but at least it held up its end of the entertainment bargain and it felt like human beings were actually involved with the production of the shows.
Twenty years on — what’s the Peacock network strutting about?
The All-Steroid Olympics, perhaps?
A washed-up comic hosting another “game show concept” produced by a Dutch company which is such a shameless dumper of televised effluent that it would make Tony Soprano and his carting company proud?
Perhaps that’s the only silver lining in the Jimmy Fallon announcement: At least the crap that the world looks down its nose at us for won’t be the result of outsourcing.
This time.
