On this episode of The Colbert Report, Stephen talked turkey, government shutdown and Breaking Bad.
Stephen deemed that Monday night was the best night of his life because he was preparing for the federal government to shut down. He said that he was in favor of it shutting down and even had a clock counting down until the government closed.
He noted that FOX, CNN and MSNBC all had clocks counting down as well. However, he questioned if CNN’s timer was simply showing how quickly they were losing viewers. However, Stephen was excited that the government was shutting down.
He wondered what President Reagan would say about it and then showed the infamous sound bite of President Reagan stating that the nine (technically 11) most terrifying words in the English language are “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” Stephen joked that now the line would be, “I’m from the government and I will work for food.”
To play off the government shutting down and the fact that Stephen had the Breaking Bad creator on his show, he titled his next segment “Breaking Government” and that it was created by Barack Obama.
To explain the shut down, he said that the government began as a sympathetic character but after the 237th season, it became a self-destructive maniac. I haven’t seen Breaking Bad so I got lost in the details. I know that he was trying to do a pun but I didn’t get it.
He stated that all of the bad guys were getting eliminated. Those bad guys are the National Parks, Center for Disease Control and NASA. Stephen showed a clip of NASA closing. That closure clip was actually from the trailer from the upcoming film, Gravity.
Even though these parts of the government are putting their workers on an unpaid leave, the congress is still getting paid. Stephen said, sarcastically, that congress getting paid was a “dramatic turn” that “no one expected.” (Eye roll.)
Quoting “Republican Tomatoes,” a fake website modeled after Rotten Tomatoes, Stephen pointed out Michele Bachmann, who stated that the Republicans got what “they wanted” when closing the government. He also quoted Congressman Devin Nunes saying that Republicans were “giddy” about the shutdown.
Stephen checked on negotiations and, instead of showing the actual debate he showed a clip of someone getting strangled and said that it was “going better” than he thought.
Stephen did his Tip of the Hat/Wag of the Finger segment and it was hilarious. He gave a TOH to Butterball turkey for having men on the turkey hotline. He sarcastically noted that, when men call a hotline, they obviously want to talk to other men. Good point, bro.
Stephen gave a WOF to the New York Times science writer who wrote an article about how losing is good. He called her a loser. He also said that she wrote the article because he had just one two Emmys.
Stephen also gave a WOF to science in general. A study was released that a large percentage of holy water contained fecal matter. To fix that, scientists noted that you could clean the water by adding salt and changing the water often. Stephen disagreed.
Half of the episode was dedicated to interviewing Vince Gilligan, the creator of Breaking Bad. The two discussed the series finale and how the character had adapted throughout the series.