When you’re watching late night television, I think we can all agree that it’s supposed to be funny, otherwise you’d just go to bed. But sometimes you get stuck with the Jimmys, either by choice or because you lost the remote. Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon are two sides of the same coin – one can’t stop droning on about Donald Trump in what can loosely be described as comedy and the other one is only moderately funnier than appendicitis. It doesn’t help Fallon that he reportedly fosters a toxic workplace environment and is known to be intense and intimidating. He acts like someone who isn’t on coke but still acts like he’s on coke, and everyone’s too polite to ask. He definitely doesn’t deserve a Ben and Jerry’s flavor.

Conan O’Brien, on the other hand, is a popular host who’s widely known as magnanimous, generous and kind. More importantly, he’s funnier than the two Jimmys combined. Arguably. Some people, including my girlfriend, view Conan as an irritant. Luckily, she’s not writing this rant.

Conan wrote for the Simpsons and is personally responsible for some of the show’s best episodes. He’s been on the air for over 30 years and has been successful (almost) the whole way (we won’t talk about the whole Jay Leno thing). On the other hand, Kimmel was on The Man Show, some of the worst television in history. With a cast like Joe Rogan, Adam Carolla, and Doug Stanhope, it’s no wonder it sucked. And I wouldn’t be the first to point out that Kimmel has made a living in recent years shitting on toxic male culture but once starred in a show that reveled in it. It’s appalling that that puddle of diarrhea got more than one season. Just put Crank Yankers back on.

But my opinion that Conan is funnier than Jimmy and Jimmy is rooted in his branding success. He’s a recognizable comedy icon. He hosts the Oscars and is well known at conventions, while people still get confused which Jimmy is on the Tonight Show and which Jimmy shows parents trolling their kids with fake Christmas gifts – a very funny thing to do when you want to watch the joy drain from a child’s face and humiliate that child in front of millions of people.

Conan’s jokes don’t always land, but he and the cast have always rolled with it. In fact, sometimes the funniest part of his comedy was that if it were any other host, the crowd would be booing. And on Jimmy Fallon, they almost are. I’ve been watching old Conan tapings for days but every time I switch to a Tonight Show monologue, I listen to people barely laugh at an awkward act performed by someone who isn’t a stand up comic and doesn’t have the confidence of one either. It’s like they’re being held hostage. Conan, conversely, inspires hysteria in his audience, even (sometimes especially) the weird segments with the cast of actors he’s been working with for years. Everybody knows their faces, so it’s no surprise when they show up that something idiotic but hilarious is about to happen. That’s established charm.

As for Kimmel, the only reason that he’s scraping the bottom of the barrel is that his delivery is terrible. I suppose the Trump obsession can be excused in a fierce election year, even if people would like to hear jokes about any other subject once in a while, but mostly, he reads off the teleprompter and just kind of exists to have a sound bite the next morning. Scratch that. Right now he’s supposed to be pissed off at his parent company so he’ll be reading jokes someone else wrote about that for a while. Conan won the Mark Twain prize for American Comedy. Jimmy Kimmel won a Critics Choice award for Best Talk Show in January 2026. One of these things is not like the other, and I’m guessing the only reason he won is because Conan has a podcast now.

Don’t think I forgot Stephen Colbert. Colbert has the distinction of being slightly elevated in my humble opinion because he does tend to talk about a variety of subjects with a variety of guests and doesn’t appear to be on any drugs and doesn’t abuse his staff. He’s a Catholic, but I don’t hold that against him. He has lighting fast delivery and he’s very personable. But he’s also not a Jimmy. Maybe he’ll get more mentions when another Stephen enters the late night arena.

Overall, I give the late night Jimmys three stars, but they’ll have to share.

Exo