Conan O'Brien returns to TV in November

It's rare in this day and age for any major business deal to go undiscovered and unannounced. Thanks to the Internet, it seems as though any inside deal, particularly with the media, is leaked days, weeks or months ahead of time. That's why Conan O'Brien created quite the anomaly Monday (you know, other than the anomaly of being a six feet tall, gangly, redheaded pale hero, or, depending on who you ask, sex symbol to an entire generation).

For months, it seemed as though, after defecting from longtime home NBC in January, O'Brien was set to start a show on Fox in the fall. Every day on ONTD, I'd read "insider" post after post about the various stages of O'Brien's contract negotiations with the network, and it seemed as though fans were just playing the waiting game until Fox made the official announcement.

That was until O'Brien Tweeted that he inked a deal with TBS to begin a show in November. Both the general public and media industry workers were stunned; TBS was never considered a serious contender in the quest for O'Brien. Plus, as many were keen to point out, O'Brien's deal to have a show weeknights at 11 p.m. would push George Lopez's "Lopez Tonight" an hour later to 12 a.m.; in other words, he was doing to Lopez what NBC and Jay Leno did to him.

However, the stakes are different for Lopez, I believe. Lopez's show does very well already, and its lead-ins are syndicated television shows and movies, not brand-new comedy content. Imagine the types of ratings he can receive with a boost by O'Brien's high-profile show right before, as his fans will likely stick around to watch "Lopez Tonight." It's not like NBC, where an already failing show ("The Jay Leno Show") would be rewarded with a better time slot, to harm O'Brien's "Tonight Show". Instead of harming the current show, it can help it.

Lopez apparently realized this as well. According to an interview with Turner Entertainment Networks President Steve Koonin, Lopez called O'Brien personally to convince him to make the deal, and has coined the new lineup "LoCo," combining the two names. I'm not a fan of Lopez's comedy, but I have to give him credit for being savvy about his prospects, and for personally trying to make this happen. Plus, TBS deserves a lot of credit for taking such a risk and just making an attempt to court O'Brien. They saw an opportunity and took it, and they did it while blindsiding the media and public, making the story all the more exciting.

Reading Koonin's interview gives me so much hope for O'Brien's show. TBS clearly believes in O'Brien, and realizes that he is a funny man who can bring a lot of attention to the network and its programming. They know what to do with O'Brien and his brand of comedy, something NBC (and, arguably, O'Brien and his staff) lacked when O'Brien made the switch to "the Tonight Show." As Koonin said, "He can do whatever he wants to do here. We think he is an incredibly talented artist and we want him to make his show and if he wants it edgier, we are 100 percent supportive." I always preferred O'Brien's sillier antics on "Late Night" to his watered-down "Tonight Show" bits (which isn't to say that he wasn't funny on "the Tonight Show"), and if he can use this cable platform to regain some of that irreverence, it would be for the better.

This seems like a winning situation for O'Brien, his staff, TBS and their shows, as well as O'Brien's fans. While I'm not thrilled about having to make the painful choice of watching O'Brien's show versus "The Daily Show" and "the Colbert Report" at the same time (thank God for Comedy Central's 1:30 and 2 a.m. reruns of those shows), it's still exciting.

In other O'Brien news, Monday night, he also began his hyped (but too short, Midwest-ignoring) live tour last night in Eugene, Ore. To add insult to injury, and to make me all the more jealous of those people who are seeing him on this tour, Twitter user Robert Kremers has posted pictures of the event, such as this one, featuring O'Brien and one of my favorite actors/people on the face of the Earth, Jack McBrayer of "30 Rock" pulling the "Chuck Norris, rural policeman" lever (similar to O'Brien's "Walker: Texas Ranger" lever, which he likely had to change the name of thanks to his exit deal with NBC to give up certain creative properties):

Plus, guitar playing? I don't mean to sound whiny, but why am I not at this show?

(Images via TweetPhoto)

What do you think about O'Brien's new show? Will you watch? Are you crying yourself to sleep tonight knowing you're missing O'Brien's epic tour, like I probably will tonight? Leave a comment!