Top Late Night Talk Shows College Students Should Watch

By Elana Goodwin on August 12, 2014

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Between classes and a social life, sometimes it’s hard as a college student to stay on top of the news and what’s going on in the world, especially since when you’re on your laptop you’d rather be on Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter, etc.

While many social media sites are now used to imparting news too, it’s easy to miss out on stuff. Talk shows, especially late night ones — which you can actually watch as you’re out of class and winding down for the day — combine celebrity guests with relaying top news stories from around the globe.

Here are some of the late night talk shows college students should definitely watch.

Photo Credit: aceshowbiz.com

1. “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. British funny guy John Oliver hosts this once a week show Sundays at 11 p.m. on HBO (meaning censorship is pretty much nil, and it’s awesome).

The show premiered in April 2014 and is just a half hour long, yet has managed to cover some important topics and Oliver does a good job of thoroughly explaining issues like “Hobby Lobby,” “Net Neutrality” and “The Death Penalty.”

Fans of “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” will recognize Oliver who was a correspondent and fill-in host on the show, as will “Community” watchers as he played recurring character Professor Ian Duncan.

Though the show is still building its following, its YouTube channel already has over half a million subscribers and over 60.6 million views.

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2. “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.” Fallon, a “Saturday Night Live” alum and the former host of “Late Night” took over “The Tonight Show” from Jay Leno in February 2014.

He brought to his new gig beloved segments from “Late Night” like “Hashtags,” “Ew!” and ”Thank You Notes.”

While most of his hour-long show is spent with celebrity guests and on non-news related segments, Fallon’s opening monologue typically covers top news stories with a humorous twist.

The show’s YouTube channel has over 4.1 million subscribers and over 1.2 billion views and “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” is nominated for several 2014 Emmy Awards.

Photo Credit: thecolbertreport.cc.com

3. “The Colbert Report.” Political comedian Stephen Colbert hosts this late-night satirical news show on Comedy Central.

Like John Oliver, Colbert used to be a correspondent on “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” premiered in 2005 as a spin-off show.

On the show, Colbert plays a fictional anchorman character of the same name who he describes as a ”well-intentioned, poorly informed, high-status idiot.”

In 2013, “The Colbert Report” won two Emmy Awards — for Outstanding Variety Series and Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series.

“The Colbert Report” is set to end in 2014 as Colbert is taking over CBS’s “The Late Show” from David Letterman in 2015.

Photo Credit: thedailyshow.cc.com

4. “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.” Jon Stewart has hosted this half hour late-night satirical show since 1999.

Stewart focuses on politics and world media on this “fake news” program which opens with a monologue during which he talks about recent headlines and often interacts with various show correspondents.

While according to research by the Pew Research Center only about 10 percent of the show’s audience watches it for its news content, roughly 80 percent of regular viewers of the show are between the ages of 18 and 49.

“The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” has won 18 primetime Emmy Awards.

Photo Credit: Jimmy Kimmel Live promotional photo

5. “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” Funnyman Jimmy Kimmel hosts this late-night talk show which premiered in 2003 (and actually doesn’t air live anymore in spite of what its name implies) on ABC.

Kimmel has since made a name for himself in the late-night world with the introduction of new and interesting segments over the years, including “Lie Witness News,” “Mean Tweets,” and his YouTube challenge “I Told My Kids I Ate Their Halloween Candy.

Earlier this year, Kimmel even fooled newscasters into thinking videos he was behind were actually real when he orchestrated the “Worst Twerk Fail EVER – Girl Catches Fire” and “Epic #SochiFail: Wolf in My Hall.”

Photo Credit: NBC Studios

6. Late Night with Seth Meyers. The former “Weekend Update” segment host and head writer on SNL took over “Late Night” from Jimmy Fallon in February 2014.

Meyers’ “Late Night” follows in the fashion of Fallon’s in that each night he has on celebrity guests after kicking off the show with a monologue discussing recent news.

When Fallon graduated to “The Tonight Show,” he took his popular segments with him and Meyers has introduced new segments to “Late Night,” including “Celebrity Spelling Bee,” “Fake or Florida?,” and “Back in My Day.”

So far, the show’s YouTube channel only has around 131,700 subscribers but has garnered over 23.9 million views.

So if you don’t have time to pick up a newspaper (they still make those?) or don’t feel like wasting time on the internet (that’s an oxymoron) looking at news, check out some of these late-night talk shows. You can get your nightly dose of humor and find out what’s going on in the world, all in one place.

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