Conan O’Brien wrote for the series that coined the phrase “worst episode ever.” But on Thursday, he went on Hot Ones and made it the show’s “best episode ever.”
The former talk show host, who made his glorious return to The Tonight Show earlier in the week, appeared in the season finale of the web series in which celebrities nibble on chicken wings with a small amount of hot sauce on them — or in Conan’s case, guzzle the spicy stuff like a maniac.
Early in the interview, Conan confessed, “I grew up in an Irish house. An Irish Catholic home in Boston. I never saw a spice till I was about 52 years old. So I’m terrible with hot food. I grew up on tasteless food. So this is a whole new experience for me.” Before long, however, he boasted, “I don’t think there’s a wing here that I can’t eat like it’s ice cream. Seriously, I don’t think there’s a wing on this table that I cannot devour like it’s cool whipped cream!”
Conan regretted those words when he took a swig from an extremely spicy hot sauce. “I’m fine! I’m perfectly f*cking fine!” he shouted at host Sean Evans with chicken grease and sauce all over his face.
It’s the kind of committed-to-the-bit chaos that only Conan can provide. Here are some highlights:
There are entire Twitter accounts dedicated to sharing epic clips of comedians being about half as funny as the guy you chill with at the bar after work while Conan continues to be one of the funniest guys in show business doing the silliest shit. pic.twitter.com/PVGyohlt41
— Rolo Tony (@PoorOldRoloTony) April 11, 2024
conan has a new show on max, calls it hbo max, realizes his mistake, calls it max and then can’t get past it being a dumb name, he’s so goated pic.twitter.com/L3QZdeUXl5
— Chris Alsikkan ™ (@AlsikkanTV) April 11, 2024
Couldn’t breathe I was laughing so hard. pic.twitter.com/5ACIe04Pa2
— Vikram Murthi (@fauxbeatpoet) April 11, 2024
In the first years of Late Night with @conanobrien we’d sometimes do sketches that faked putting him on “Love Connection” or the Jerry Lewis Telethon where he’d act like a lunatic. Today he did just that on Hot Ones, only it wasn’t fake. Bless you, friend. https://t.co/dTfIwBOJAV https://t.co/VsTVfC04wj
— Triumph® ᴛʜᴇ ɪɴsᴜʟᴛ ᴄᴏᴍɪᴄ ᴅᴏɢ™ Headquarters💩 (@TriumphICDHQ) April 11, 2024
this may have been the best episode of hot ones I’ve ever seen. Conan is a national treasure.
pic.twitter.com/dBdsIk4FGn— Justin Credible (@GravySauceCream) April 11, 2024
Conan understood Hot Ones completely pic.twitter.com/MxSRmcoeDN
— John-Michael (@John_Mike_) April 12, 2024
When he wasn’t smearing hot sauce on his face, Conan provided insight on the worst thing a talk show guest can do.
“Tell the audience it’s not going well,” he said. “I‘ve seen it happen many times, it’s an amateur move because the host can do a lot to let people think it’s going great even if it’s not… [the] audience wants to see a good show, they want to see a good interview and I was always amazed when someone would come out and they’d be doing OK… and then would just go, ‘This just isn’t going well, is it?’… you look out at the audience and it be 200 people sitting there and I’d see 200 souls leave 200 bodies cause they were just told they were not getting a good show.”
You can watch the video below.
