"Will Jay Leno and Conan O’Brien make it 'Last Call with Carson Daly?'"

By Bob Zerull

You have to love NBC. First they screw over David Letterman by giving “The Tonight Show” to Jay Leno. Then they screw over Jay Leno by giving “The Tonight Show” to Conan O’Brien. Next they screw over their affiliates and give Leno a prime time show that’s profitable yet gets terrible ratings leading into their local news. Now they’re screwing O’Brien over and giving Leno his time slot back. My question is how does this affect Carson Daly? Will he be the next one screwed over?



According to Ain’t It Cool News Carson Daly could be the odd man out if Conan decides to stay with NBC. What will Carson Daly do if he loses his show? The poor guy has no talent. That’s not fair I shouldn’t say no talent, but he’s not a comedian. When he was young and on MTV he was the cute frat boy that the girls wanted and the college guys wanted party with. Now he’s in his 30’s, he’s not young anymore and there’s no place for him in the entertainment industry if “Last Call with Carson Daly” goes off the air.



Daly is famous for being the host of “Total Request Live” on MTV. He made N’Sync, Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, Kid Rock, and Limp Bizkit stars. Fast forward ten years and N’Sync and Backstreet don’t exist. Britney Spears suffered a mental break down due to the success Daly gave her. Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit became jokes. Kid Rock had to go country to maintain success and Limp Bizkit became the most hated band in the world. Even the guitar player Wes Borland hated the band and quit. They’ve since reunited and are trying to take over the world again. Thanks to Carson Daly that’s going to be a huge mountain to climb.

What’s unfortunate for Daly is that this was the era that ruined the music industry. It’s not Daly’s fault or any of the groups mentioned above. Napster came out. People were downloading music for free. At the same time the music industry became over run with corporate greed. It was less about the music and more about the bottom line. There were more one hit wonders. Groups weren’t given a chance to develop.

What I’m wondering is what will Carson Daly do? I guess maybe he could get a radio show like Adam Curry or Riki Rachtman before him, but Carson Daly was supposed to be better than that. He was supposed to amount to something. He wasn’t the next Adam Curry; he was Carson Daly. He became part of the highest rated late night team in television. Granted he was benefiting from the success of Leno and O’Brien, not to mention the lack of competition in his time slot, but still he was part of that team. Now what’s he going to do?

Carson, I just want to let you know that we here at Zoiks! Online have you in our thoughts and prayers. If you’d like to contribute to our website we’d be happy to have you. Granted we couldn’t pay you anything, but we definitely wouldn’t screw you over like NBC might do.

BYLINE:

Bob Zerull is the Managing Editor of Zoiks! Online. He writes pop culture commentary, does interviews with bands, and reviews music and stand-up concerts. He also administers Zoiks! Online's Facebook page. Follow Bob on twitter at bzerull.