TV expert reveals the next late-night host to get the boot after Kimmel suspension and who will be the last man standing

Seth Meyers is the next late-night talk host to face the axe after Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension, a TV expert has predicted.

Professor Robert Thompson, who founded the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University, shared his gloomy forecast with the Daily Mail a day after Kimmel’s show was pulled over comments he made about Charlie Kirk.

‘There is a theme going on here,’ Thompson said, discussing Kimmel’s ‘indefinite’ suspension and the looming cancellation of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.

He pointed to the clear shift away from the politically charged jokes of late-night hosts like Colbert, Kimmel and Meyers.

‘It could very well be that [Jimmy] Fallon is the last guy standing,’ Thompson said.

‘Meyers is the one guy doing this type of comedy who hasn’t been fired yet. These last stories indicate that era is over.

‘I can see a period in the very near future where Fallon is the last franchise left – the oldest franchise, at that.’

Thompson went on to compare Fallon’s ‘apolitical’ approach to that of late-night legends Johnny Carson and Jay Leno.

‘All the stuff that went on late night that was exciting and was covered the next day, the networks have given every indication that they don’t want to be in that business anymore,’ the professor said. 

‘It’s either they don’t want to lose to money, or they don’t want to “fight the good fight.”‘

Meyers has managed to fly under the radar, thanks to Colbert and Kimmel’s star-power and earlier air times, Thompson said.

That will change if Kimmel is out of the picture, the professor noted, saying it would ‘be hard for him to go back to ABC whether or not they give him the opportunity to do so.’ 

If Kimmel doesn’t return to ABC, ‘NBC will be the only broadcast network with comedy people doing this type of format’ after Colbert departs CBS next year., Thompson said. 

He added that linear television had already been deteriorating before the pandemic, and that for ‘all of the next generation who grew up watching Colbert and Kimmel, broadcast television isn’t the place for them.’ 

‘Substack and YouTube is where the action is and where the audiences are. Every decision made by legacy companies is indicating that.

‘These people will go to where these changes are happening and leave late night back to its old tradition of the Tonight Show. Carson and Leno, and now Fallon. 

‘There will people who bemoan the changing of late night and people who celebrate the changing of late night.

‘If I had to make a prediction, I think late night is, one, going back to where it used to be, where you had the Tonight Show and Carson.’

Thompson added: ‘I think the Tonight Show might actually survive the collapse of late-night television.’

Regarding Meyers, he said: ‘I don’t envy Seth Meyers going out and doing his show after something like this.

‘He’s got to feel skittish and vulnerable.’