{"id":639006,"date":"2026-05-12T18:14:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T18:14:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/639006\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T18:14:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T18:14:15","slug":"stephen-colberts-strike-force-five-make-case-for-late-night-tv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/639006\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen Colbert’s Strike Force Five Make Case For Late Night TV"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tStephen Colbert and his guests Jimmy Fallon<\/a>, Jimmy Kimmel<\/a>, Seth Meyers<\/a> and John Oliver<\/a> made a \u201ccase for late night\u201d on Colbert\u2019s Late Show in a get-together to honor the departing CBS talk series before its final sign-off on May 21. (\u201cJon Stewart,\u201d Colbert quipped, \u201cis the designated survivor tonight \u2013 someone has to survive for the president to be mad at.\u201d)<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWouldn\u2019t it be great if Jon had to do all of our eulogies,\u201d Colbert joked, with Kimmel, who was seated on the Late Show couch furthest from the host, responding, \u201cI hope I don\u2019t get stuck on last place in that one, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe reunion for the self-named \u201cStrike Force Five\u201d included plenty of well-wishes and good-natured jibes (\u201cI figured out why you lost $40 million Stephen,\u201d said Kimmel. \u201cThere\u2019s too many in your band.\u201d) Meyers, holding an iPad loaded with sound-effects (a thunder clap for every mention of \u201cStrike Force Five\u201d) was, said Oliver, like a kid \u201cwith a tambourine\u201d as Meyers made use of the sad Debbie Downer trumpet sound.)<\/p>\n

\n\tKimmel explained the Strike Force Five moniker \u2013 it stemmed from when the hosts went on strike with the WGA and did a podcast together during the pause. The group also convened to record a special \u201cemergency episode<\/a>\u201d of the podcast last night.<\/p>\n

\n\tColbert then wondered whether his show\u2019s cancelation would mean relinquishing his spot on Strike Force Five along with its (made-up) special health insurance. \u201cYou\u2019re out,\u201d said Meyers. \u201cIt\u2019s Strike Force Four. It breaks our heart but it\u2019s like gerrymandering \u2013 nobody likes it but once the courts rule\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSaid Kimmel, \u201cDon\u2019t worry, give me a few months and it\u2019ll be Strike Force Three.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tWith the future of late-night talk shows in jeopardy, Colbert asked his guests to \u201cmake a case\u201d for the genre. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI would say look at the figures,\u201d Kimmel began. \u201cThe fact of the matter is more people are watching late-night television now than when \u2013 and I know everybody gets crazy \u2013 but that when Johnny Carson\u2026Obviously Johnny Carson had a lot of people watching one show but we have a lot of shows with 30,000 people watching each one and it adds up. And people watch us on YouTube now and people have a lot of different options and yet they still keep coming to us.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI will tell you when I got knocked off the air for a few days, people canceled Disney+.\u201d Turning to the audience and the camera, Kimmel continued, \u201cWhy aren\u2019t you people canceling Paramount+? Because you didn\u2019t have it in the first place?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tOliver, whose show is on HBO, jokingly stood up for his potential new bosses. \u201cJimmy, until the deal goest through, if I could just do a counter to that, Paramount+ might have some good programming. Unless it doesn\u2019t go through, in which case it can go f*ck itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI never thought it was a job when I was growing up,\u201d Fallon said of hosting. \u201cI just thought Johnny Carson came with the television set. People want to go to sleep having a good laugh, go to bed happy. They wake back up for Seth\u2019s show and then they go to sleep.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAsked by Colbert whether any of the hosts could ever have imagined having a job \u201cthat the president of the United States would have strong feelings about,\u201d Kimmel jumped in once again. \u201cYou know what\u2019s even weirder, we\u2019re doing a job that his wife has strong feelings about it\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMost of us have avoided that part,\u201d said Meyers, with Fallon adding, \u201cThat\u2019s why you\u2019re at the end of the couch.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWatch the entire segment above.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stephen Colbert and his guests Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers and John Oliver made a \u201ccase for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":639007,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[88,18040,17114,20991,13728,18041,92],"class_list":["post-639006","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-jimmy-fallon","tag-jimmy-kimmel","tag-john-oliver","tag-late-show-with-stephen-colbert","tag-seth-meyers","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=639006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639006\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/639007"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=639006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=639006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=639006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}