Late Night

For the time being at least, it seems as if the sands of late night have ceased their shifting, with Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Fallon firmly settled into David Letterman and Jay Leno’s old jobs, while Trevor Noah and Larry Wilmore lead Comedy Central Daily and Nightly, and Seth Meyers will be staying in place as well. Per NBC, the former SNL writer and current Late Night host will stick with his current posting for at least another five years.

Early word of The X-Files 2016 return has been somewhat less than positive, but if nothing else, ‘90s fans can’t deny the thrill of David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson reuniting for another go. Neither can Jimmy Kimmel, it seems, watching Mulder and Scully make out in a new X-Files parody from last night’s Jimmy Kimmel Live!

Per Netflix’s overall strategy, many a subscriber undoubtedly took the holiday break to binge a few new hot-ticket items, among them the streaming service’s own true crime docu-drama Making a Murderer. Seth Meyers surely did as well, staging his Late Night return with a pitch-perfect parody of the Wisconsin murder investigation into Steven Avery.

Now that we’ve finally arrived in 2016, TV talk can safely shift to from the shows closing up shop in December, to the onslaught of premieres and returns on deck. We’ll have to wait until February the latest Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, but thankfully, the prolific host has a short segment to tide us over, and remind us it’s okay to fail New Years’ resolutions miserably.

When you’re out promoting a movie, you’re often asked to do a lot of things, most of them pretty silly. With the amount of press the cast of Star Wars: The Force Awakens was being asked to do, there were asked to do a lot of silly things, none perhaps as silly as going on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and singing a medley of Star Wars music a cappella. But the entire cast — including Harrison Ford! — actually commits, and it actually turns out to pretty fun.

It’s difficult to say if Trevor Noah has found his particular Daily Show groove after ascending the throne from Jon Stewart in September, but where Noah hasn’t generally shied away from challenging guests, at least one punch has been pulled. Following controversial announcements of a Chris Brown interview, The Daily Show appears to have quietly canceled the appearance.

Stephen Colbert was among the first late-night programs to express his emotions over the Friday Paris attacks, tagging a brief announcement (sans audience) at the close of his Friday Late Show. The Monday outing went far more in depth however, staging a heartfelt tribute as Colbert urged viewers to show support in whatever way possible, either french fries or Ratatouille.

The late Friday occurrence of Paris’ tragic terror attacks left many late-night programs without a pulpit to address the events, though weekend shows managed to extend their support. Last Week Tonight With John Oliver went just a bit further with its Sunday run, however, as Oliver laid into the attackers as “unconscionable flaming a–holes.”

Having a superpower would be pretty awesome for any of us to have, but that doesn’t mean that all superpowers are created equal. For every “faster than a speeding bullet” there’s someone like Chlorophyll Kid, who can make plants grow. James McAvoy is currently playing one of the superheroes with the best powers — the telepath Professor X in the X-Men movies — and was asked what he thought the worst superpower would be, and he quickly threw one of his co-stars under the bus.

Every year, the non sports-inclined among us await the series granted a post-Super Bowl slot, and Stephen Colbert will make history in the process. The Late Show With Stephen Colbert has landed a spot as the first late-night talk series to follow the Super Bowl, and with a live show at that.