The Late Late Show/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Acceptable Targets: Canadians (the wacky next-door neighbor), the French (they enjoy fornicating and judging you), the Germans (they like pooping on each other), and West Hollywood.
  • Non Sequitur Scene: Occurs every so often when-(ding-dong!) "Hey, who's that at the door? (checks door) IT'S SECRETARIAT!!!"
    • Craig had Wilford Brimley on the show only because he thought he'd seen the retired actor getting salad at his local grocery store. Brimley openly stated in the interview that even he didn't know why he was there, since he didn't have anything to promote.
  • Crowning Music of Awesome: Any of his lip-synching openings — Istanbul, Wonderful Night, Say Hey (I Love You), White Lines, and Look Out, There's a Monster Coming.
    • In one of the more obscure references he's ever made, the theme from Fireball XL5.
    • Craig's version of the Doctor Who theme, which took a while before it actually aired on The Late Late Show itself and got leaked to YouTube in the meantime.
    • Billy Connolly proved to be the first guest on the show to actually know how to play a harmonica (which every guest gets an opportunity to play at the end of their segment). Of course, Craig was prepared for such a day, awarding Billy with a golden mouth organ for his efforts.
    • David Pogue became the second Golden Mouth Organ recipient in the coda of his interview, immediately after pretending to have no clue what he was doing.
    • As did the aforementioned Wilford Brimley.
  • Dude, Not Funny: Entertainment media took note when Craig said during his monologue that he would not joke about Britney Spears, citing his own struggles with alcohol and drugs. He made a similar statement recently about Charlie Sheen. At first, some saw the Britney stance as a ratings ploy, but with the Sheen statement he may be legitimately trying not to go after some obvious Acceptable Targets.
  • Ear Worm: "...Okay? Hey, hey! Tomorrow's just your future yesterday..."
    • Secretariat's leitmotif. It's probably just production library music, but it sure can get stuck in your head.
  • Genius Bonus: Not many late-night talk shows throw in jokes about Søren Kierkegaard or Gustave Flaubert. Even fewer do so while maintaining a full quota of poop and fart jokes. And probably none except Craig can do both within the same joke.

Craig: I know what you're thinking. You're thinking "Craig, wasn't Nietzsche the father of Existentialism?" Well, he might be. Others say the father of Existentialism was [Jean-Paul] Sartre, perhaps even [Arthur] Schopenhauer. There's only one way to find out — all three of them should go on The Maury Povich Show and take the paternity test.

    • September 2, 2011: Craig and Geoff manage to build a running gag out of the phrase "careful, Icarus."
  • Growing the Beard: Geoff Peterson became much funnier and more interactive with Craig after Josh Robert Thompson began voicing him live in lieu of Geoff's original batch of canned responses. More specifically, the segment where Geoff started the "I've got a place there" running gag and made Craig totally lose it marked the point where Geoff really began to shine.
  • Ho Yay: Pretty much Geoff's raison d'etre.
  • What Do You Mean It Wasn't Made on Drugs?: Some of the special effects cards. Also, Craig sometimes does tricks directly into to the camera to screw with the stoned people watching.
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