Jimmy Kimmel kicked off his final episode of 2025 on Thursday night with a tearful monologue expressing his support for the viewers who helped him get through one of his hardest years yet.
“Thank you for joining us here at our home in beautiful Hollywood, California, for what is our final show of the year. And this one, this has been a strange year. It’s been a hard year, we’ve had some lows, we’ve had some highs. For me, maybe more than any year in my life. But from all of us — I’m crying already, I’m sorry,” he began. “Behalf of all of us at the show, I just want to say that we appreciate your support, you enthusiasm. But not just for watching, this year you literally pulled us out of a hole and we cannot thank you enough, personally.”
That hole likely refers to “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” not only surviving a brief ABC suspension at the hands of President Donald Trump, the FCC and local broadcast owners, but also the death of his friend and bandleader, Cleto Escobedo III.
“I know there are a lot harder jobs, but this is not an easy job to do and sometimes it feels like we’re spinning our wheels. You see so many awful and destructive acts, all this damage we inflict on ourselves on purpose, and it can make you feel crazy trying to wrap your head around these things that are so clearly wrong,” Kimmel continued. “You know, you grow up reading ‘Superman’ and you learn to value truth, justice and the American way, and then you start to realize — especially over the last year — you don’t know where that all went, you don’t know what ‘the American way’ even is anymore.”
“But when I hear from people that tell me that they watch our show and the shows that my friends and colleagues do on the other channels and that it makes them feel less crazy, it makes me feel less crazy, too. And I think that’s an important thing,” the comedian added. “I also think it’s important that we as Americans let our friends in other countries who watch the show on YouTube, Instagram, Hulu, wherever, know that a lot of us are not OK with what is happening. There is still a lot more good in this country than bad and we hope that you will bear with us during this extended psychotic episode that we’re in the middle of.”
After introducing his end-of-the-year message, Kimmel then addressed Trump’s Wednesday primetime address, admitting the president was in “pretty good form” … only, the clip he played was actually from Gary Busey. Check out the whole ABC monologue, above.
“Jimmy Kimmel Live!” airs weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET on ABC before streaming on Hulu.
