It was also, for Colbert, a distinct change in concept, if not in tone, from what the show normally embraces. The whole thing—a long segment that anchored the rest of the episode—had overtones of the Late-'80s Telethon. Can I admit that—recognizing that no conclusion to a show is ever going to satisfy its fans, and also that anything that puts Mandy Patinkin in the vicinity of an enormous yellow bird is going to be, on some deeply cosmic level, awesome—the whole thing felt ever-so-slightly like a cop-out? In spite of, and actually because of, the fact that it was so studded with stars?

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I know, I'm the worst. Because the segment, ultimately, was joyful and wacky and awkward-in-a-wonderful way: the stuff of Colbert, and TV in general, at its best. (That Steinem thing! So utterly charming!) And, really, no ending would have satisfied. That is, as a rule, one mark of a great show. So.

That said, though, the song—the "I'll Be Seeing You"-esque "We'll Meet Again"—and its performance were notably lacking in ... well, wit. Or satire. What was present, however, was the star-gazing stuff that is so extremely typical of most late-night television: Look at all those celebrities! On one stage! Singing!

You could read all that as Colbert bidding a fond farewell to irony as he leaves Comedy Central for the warm embrace of network TV. But it's hard not to note how starkly it contrasts with the thousands of episodes of Colbert that preceded it. The Colbert Report, show after show, celebrated its own scrappiness—and, by extension, scrappiness as a general state of affairs. Sure, when it comes to writing, the show has been, consistently, the stuff of sophisticated literature—the concept of "truthiness" alone will birth many a Ph.D dissertation—but in every other way, it has been the stuff of comedy shabby-chic. That dinky set! Those wonderful-because-terrible eagle graphics! Colbert occasionally breaking character to winkily fourth-wall the whole satiric enterprise! All those intentional flaws suggested the ultimate conviction of the scrappy: Heart and wit will help you win, in the end. The targets of Colbert's satire may have had lavish sets and fancy clothes and (relatively) high production values; Colbert had piercing jokes and the love of his audience and, he argued, truth on his side—and once you have those, you don't need much else.

The other bit of scrap: Colbert has been rightly celebrated for his support of authors—particularly those of Hachette, the scrappy-by-comparison publishing house that waged war against the very much unscrappy-by-comparison Amazon. This summer, he bestowed the storied Colbert Bump upon fellow Hachette author Edan Lepucki and her debut novel, California. (Lepucki, The New York Times put it, "won the literary Lotto"—the Lotto in this case being attention from Colbert.) It wasn't just Lepucki, though: Show after show, Colbert brought on up-and-coming authors to discuss their works. He was, basically, the anti-Oprah. He wasn't afraid to go niche. He wasn't afraid to go nerd.