During the great Conan O’Brien/Jay Leno debacle of early 2010, NBC marched out the same rationale for returning Jay Leno to his original time slot: Conan’s ratings weren’t up to par. As O’Brien bristled at his mistreatment and eventually left the network, they stuck to their guns, confident they would return to a state of late-night normalcy once the unfunny Leno got everything he wanted.
The passage of time spares nothing, in this case showing NBC’s rationale to be about as valid as George W. Bush’s WMD claims. Jay Leno’s Tonight Show has reached a milestone of sorts: for the last month, he’s had worse ratings than Conan did. Are execs slamming him in public and awkwardly searching for a replacement? They should be. I hear that Jimmy Fallon kid is marginally more talented than a deformed, conniving, overpaid, over-the-hill hack.
