Stephen Colbert reveals date of final ‘Late Show’ episode

Hi there. Welcome to the Friday edition of Popculturology. Is everyone staying warm out? I think my soul left my body at some point this week as I chipped through and shoveled away the massive pile of ice that the plows left behind our cars.

I loved learning this week that Ryan Coogler, hot off Sinner’s record-setting haul of Oscar nominations, was converted into a soda fan thanks to the rise of Coke Freestyle machines.

But you know what I didn’t love? Learning that there’s a type of mushroom that causes people who eat it before it’s been cooked all the way to have “visions of pint-sized, elf-like figures — marching under doors, crawling up walls and clinging to furniture.” Are these pint-sized people always around but we just can’t see them? I don’t like it ...

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BOOK NOOK

Here’s what I’ve been reading this week …

• Children of Ruin (Adrian Tchaikovsky)
• Recursion (Blake Crouch)

Esquire posted its “22 Most Anticipated Books of 2026” earlier in the week. There’s a bunch on their that I’ve already preordered, including Ray Nayler’s Palaces of the Crow, Amal El-Mohtar’s Seasons of Glass and Iron and John Chu’s The Subtle Art of Folding Space.

NEWS, NOTES & TRAILERS

“It feels real now. I’m not thrilled with it.”

Stephen Colbert was a guest on Late Night this week, and he took advantage of appearing on another late-night show to break the news to Seth Meyers — and the rest of us — that The Late Show’s final episode will air on May 21.

“I would love to be there,” Meyers told Colbert.

“Do you have a show that night?” Colbert asked.

“Um, not anymore,” Meyers said.

If Colbert is unable to get Pope Leo XIV as his dream guest for the last episode of The Late Show, at least he knows Meyers will be available.

I love this era of late-night TV. We’re a long way removed from the late-night wars between Dave Letterman and Jay Leno or Conan O’Brien and, well, Jay Leno.