Larry Wilmore ended "The Nightly Show" on Thursday with a little help from Jon Stewart, who stopped by to give the host a touching goodbye, along with a few words of advice.
"I just decided to stop by and tell you I love you," Stewart told Wilmore in the show's final episode, adding that he should not "confuse cancellation with failure.'"
Wilmore previously worked with Stewart, a "Nightly Show" producer, on "The Daily Show," where he appeared as the show's "Senior Black Correspondent." Stewart left "The Daily Show" last August after a 16-year stint as the show's host.
"The Nightly Show" itself began in January 2015. The show took over "The Colbert Report's" time slot as Stephen Colbert moved to "The Late Show" on CBS. As Stewart noted Thursday, Wilmore's show "gave voice to under-served voices in the media arena."
Comedy Central canceled the show earlier this week, with network president Kent Alterman saying that it had not "resonated" with the network's audience. Stewart, for his part, disagreed, telling Wilmore that the show resonated "in a way you don't even realize yet."
"You started a conversation that was not on television when you began, and you worked with a group of people who you invited to that conversation to collaborate with you," Stewart said Thursday. "And what you don't realize is that when you walk out of here, that conversation doesn't end."
"You did it, my mishpocheh," Stewart concluded, echoing Wilmore's words to President Barack Obama at the White House Correspondents Dinner earlier this year, but using the Yiddish term for "family."
Wilmore, meanwhile, closed out his show with a message about the map situated behind his desk, which viewers see as being "upside down" because "as a culture, we've all agreed with the opinion that the world should be seen in a certain way." The show's purpose, he continued, was to "disagree with that premise" and "see the world in a way that may not make everybody comfortable."
"On that front, I feel that we've been very successful," Wilmore concluded, "and I couldn't be prouder of what we've accomplished."
Comedy Central will temporarily replace Wilmore's Nightly Show with Chris Hardwick's @Midnight in the 11:30 p.m. time slot.
