We talk about TV all the time, but we hardly talk about all the TV. This week, we're looking at the shows, people, and networks that we know people love — that we love — but typically fall outside of the critical hivemind. This is TV Airing in Plain Sight.

There is still joy, and grace, and triumph in watching a Conan O'Brien joke bomb. Failure excites him; fallout is his true medium. Craters are opportunities, in that scrambling out of them is good exercise. "Listen to this story," he begins now, readying another controlled demolition. "You're not gonna believe it."

It's a Tuesday night. His guests are Billy Gardell (a.k.a. Mike from Mike & Molly), Draymond Green, and who/whatever Finish Ticket is. Take all the time you need, man.

"A 700-pound woman — 700-pound woman — is trying to hit 1,000 pounds, to reach her goal of becoming the world's fattest woman."

A few whoops from the crowd.

"She's trying to gain — yeah." He thrusts one finger in the air. Here we go.

"Although she still plans to put '700 pounds' on her Tinder profile."

Mild laughter. Not great, not terrible. Perfectly acceptable. A replacement-level monologue joke. But Conan brushes off the crowd.

"Now." Big smile. "You know the way people lie? On their Tinder profile?" Near-silence now. "No?" He turns to his left. "Wow. Andy, that joke, man."

Cue Andy Richter, eyeglasses in one hand, paper cup of coffee in the other. The show's avatar of violent nonchalance. Eternally on the verge of blurting out a "NO!" just as emphatic as Ed McMahon's "YES!"

"Yeah," Andy says. "She wants to seem thinner than she is in real life, so she" — stammering, gesturing awkwardly with the eyeglasses — "puts less weight on the Tinder profile than what she actually is. I think it's hilarious."

Big laugh. Who doesn't love Andy?

Conan thanks him. Another pause. More awkward silence.

Conan: "There are jokes that get laughs."

Andy: "Sure."

"And there are jokes that get less."

"Right."

"But every now and then, you tell a joke."

"Mmm-hmm."

"And you hear a silence you never hear on earth."

Huge laugh. No, Conan! We love you, too, Conan!

He takes a few steps toward the crowd, toward the camera, toward you. Smiling.

"You hear — no!" Waving off the applause. "Hold on! I could hear individual hearts beating in the audience."

Hahahaha.

"I could hear cells dividing."

Hahahahahahaha.

He turns to Andy. "We should send that off. That should be studied by comedians. Because that, what you just participated in, was an incredible, once-in-a-lifetime study. Give yourselves a hand."

And the crowd does, boisterously, with Conan murmuring beneath it. "That was crazy. That was just crazy. That was — ." He does a goofy non-sequitur dance, one of thousands in his repertoire. "All right. Thank you. We're all good now. We're all good."

One last pause.

"Show's free."

True for the live audience, but not for us: It's cable. But yeah, Conan's doing fine. Not great, not terrible. Well, sometimes a little terrible. A replacement-level talk show. With David Letterman out, the towering, gangly, somehow still-youthful walking meme has been doing the late-night-host thing longer than anyone else currently doing it, closing in on a quarter-century. In November, Conan will celebrate six years at TBS; the words "Jimmy Vivino and the Basic Cable Band" are the only immediate nod to your host's reduced circumstances. His closest ratings competitors now are Adult Swim and The Daily Show, which both regularly beat him; his Monday-night lead-in, Full Frontal With Samantha Bee, has way more critical burn and of-its-time ferocity.

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But that's a skid worth leaning into: He's a throwback now, a classicist. Johnny Carson's heir in spirit if not body, presiding over a modest niche worth celebrating, or at least preserving. The long-clichéd complaint is that the big late-night