Confessions of a Closeted Otaku

*artwork credited to Mike Mitchell

This is a little different from my usual blogs about anime and video games, but I just felt that I needed to express my feelings and thoughts about the whole Tonight Show fiasco. Don’t worry, I’ll try to keep it as short as possible.  And yes, the above image shows that I’m on TEAM CONAN, but I’ll start off this entry by giving a quick recap of the whole story.

As most of you, NBC’s The Tonight Show has been a very important part in American late-night television since the 1950s with Johnny Carson currently holding the longest streak of hosting the show for 30 years.  When he retired in 1992, Jay Leno took over and would host until 2009 when Conan O’Brien, after hosting Late Night with Conan O’Brien (which followed Tonight) for 16 years would take over.  Still wanting him to stick around, NBC thought of the idea of having Leno host his own show on primetime called The Jay Leno Show with a similar layout to Tonight but with a few changes here and there including an earlier airtime of 10PM.  So, Leno left Tonight in May of 2009 and O’Brien made his debut as host on June 1st, 2009.

O'Brien at his desk on The Tonight Show set.

However, O’Brien’s stay wouldn’t last long.  The ratings that O’Brien was puling in was only half of what Leno brought in; surprisingly (or maybe not, depending on your point of view), Leno’s primetime show was turning out to be a huge flop, which in turn caused NBC-affiliated late-night newscasts to lose viewers since Leno wasn’t bringing them in with his show that aired before the newscasts.  To save grace, the executives at NBC thought up of a plan: bring Leno’s primetime show back to the 11:35 PM slot (the time Tonight usually airs in) and bump up Tonight a half-hour later to 12:05 AM.  O’Brien was against the idea, saying that the move will, “seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight Show at 12:05 simply isn’t the Tonight Show…” The only other option for O’Brien besides changing time slots?  Resigning from NBC.

After a week or so of talks and negotiations, O’Brien and NBC reached a severance deal which would grant O’Brien $44 million dollars ($32M going to him and the rest is split among his Tonight Show staff) and end O’Brien’s short run with his last show airing on January 22nd, 2010.  In addition to the deal, Conan is not allowed to do interviews for the next three months and would have to wait until after September 1st to have a show on another network.  As a result of all of this, Jay will return to his job as Tonight Show host starting March 1st after NBC runs the 2010 Winter Olympics during the last two weeks in February.

Conan on guitar with friends performing Lynyrd Skynyrd's 'Free Bird' on his last Tonight Show airing.

To start off, let me preface by first saying that I both watch Leno and O’Brien. Well, to put it more accurately, I used to watch Leno. I’d usually choose Leno over David Letterman for my late-night fix but to be honest, neither caught my attention like Conan O’Brien did whose show I started to watch back in junior year of high school and I’ve been a fan for the last 7-8 years or so. There was just something about him that I really liked and I wanted more of him.  When it was announced that Conan would take over The Tonight Show, I was ecstatic and eagerly awaited for his arrival. I was even more happy that he would be moving from New York City to Los Angeles which is just two hours away from my hometown so being able to see him was an added bonus. Now, sadly, it looks like I won’t be going to see him any time soon until he is able to have his own show after September and even then I won’t know if he’ll remain in LA or if he’ll move back to New York.

When news of Conan leaving Tonight broke out, I was devastated. What’s more was that I was angry at NBC executives and even angry at Jay Leno who said back in 2004 that he would retire and give the show to Conan (which, after a January 28th ’09 interview with Oprah Winfrey, we’re now learning was a complete white lie). NBC hadn’t given enough time to Conan for him to gain his audience and footing in hosting Tonight. When Conan started out on Late Night, he was on a week-by-week contract basis; in other words, he was at risk of getting canceled each week if he wasn’t attracting viewers. It took him three years before he found his audience and he would successfully host Late Night for the next 13 years.  Conan was more than ready to take over Tonight and Jay was at the point where he was ready to retire and return to doing stand-up comedy regularly.  Or so we thought, it seems.

So after everything that’s happened, what do we have left?  We have: a network that was once at the top and is now in the very bottom due to their poor decision-making skills (among a number of other problems), a man who could have retired with his reputation still intact (and not be hated by a good part of America) and another who had finally attained his dream job after years of hard work only for it to be taken away in an instant.  “Where do we go from here?” is the question on everyone’s mind.

With most issues I try to stay impartial, but I just can’t help but feel anger towards both NBC and Leno.  And you have to feel for Conan; when it was time to take over for Tonight, he and his crew from Late Night made the cross-country move to put on the show.  And now that the show’s no more, they all remain in Los Angeles away from home and trying to figure out what to do next.  It’s easy to be bitter and negative during this time especially when hearing about additional back story to this including other late-night hosts taking jabs at Jay Leno (ditto for Letterman, who was actually set to host when Carson retired in ’92 only to find out that the position would be given to Leno).

However in spite of all of this, a quote comes to my mind; it comes from Conan himself on his last show.  He made a statement towards the end of the last show to share his feelings about everything that’s happened.  He was happy that he was given the chance to host The Tonight Show, even though it was only for seven months.  He didn’t show any anger towards NBC even going as far as thanking them for giving him the opportunity to work with them for the last 20+ years which started with a writing gig at Saturday Night Live.  The last thing he said was mostly directed to the younger fans and it’ll continue to stay with me for a long time: “Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen.”

So for the next few months, a huge number of fans and I will be waiting for Conan’s television return.  We will also not be watching The Tonight Show again now that Leno has resumed his hosting duties.  I used to watch him, but after everything that’s happened I just can’t stand to watch the guy.  I agree with everyone saying that Leno could have said, “No” to the time change and accept the fact that his primetime show was a failure and leave it at that.  It all really comes down to choices; Leno could have said, “No” when NBC told him that it was time for him to pass on the Tonight Show hosting duties.  Conan could have chosen to move time slots but decided to keep Tonight at the same time slot it had been in for more than 50 years and was willing to leave just to prevent that from happening. Had the NBC executives thought of this out better, none of this would have happened and everyone would still have a job.  And as I’ve read from many commentators, this whole ordeal was not necessary and could have been completely avoided.  For now, we’ll have to see what happens and we’ll keep up with supporting Conan O’Brien.

/tonight show soapbox

Okay… I think that should do it for now.  There is actually a lot more to this story, but it’s best for you to search them out yourselves as it would take me forever to try and dig for every detail.  I’ll go back to my usual, otaku self in the next blog.  Sorry for the sudden change of subjects… I just love Conan O’Brien and wish him nothing but the best in his life after NBC.  I guess you could say I’m a Conan O’Brien otaku?  Yea, going a little bit too far, but it fits, right?

I actually have big news involving me and an upcoming anime convention!  Stay tuned for details!