The Colbert Report

For years The Daily Show with Jon Stewart has been a standard bearer for my generation’s wit and cynical outlook on current events. The ratings have continually increased, even after the presidential election, and a book by the show’s writers was a number one best seller and stayed there for 15 consecutive weeks. According to Nielsen Media Research the show draws an average of 1.3 million viewers each night.
Seeing the popularity surrounding the show Comedy Central created a spinoff with Stephen Colbert, a long time Daily Show contributor, with the self titled The Colbert Report (pronounced cole-BEAR ra-PORE). Yesterday I saw the show for the first time, watching the first and second episodes. To my pleasent surprise it actually bested Jon Stewart’s Daily Show.
Colbert’s character is much like the one he had on the Daily Show, but there’s a bit more celebrity journalist involved. His website puts it like this: “What The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is to evening news, The Colbert Report is to personality-driven pundit shows.” Imagine a satirized Bill O’Reilly or Aaron Brown and you’ll end up with something close to Colbert.
Like O’Reilly, Colbert offers more blunt opinions and “talking point” graphics, a combination that helps set him apart from Stewart. Indeed the “talking points” accompanying Colbert’s take on news reports had me rolling in laughter. The wit frequently surpassed even that offered by Stewart. And yet in the words of Colbert, he also adds Aaron Brown’s “folksiness.” The combination is a winning one.
It may be too soon to know how The Colbert Report will fare in the long run. But if the first two episodes are any indication, Comedy Central has found the perfect follow-up to The Daily Show.