‘@midnight’ season 2 official; Comedy Central renews Chris Hardwick’s nerdy gem

For all who love offbeat comedy that comes on just as you are going to bed, the following is most-likely very good news, indeed: Comedy Central has officially renewed “@midnight” for another run of episodes.

Just like with the first renewal that came after a four-week test run, this is going to be for 40 weeks (Monday-Thursday) of new episodes, which will air starting in 2015. This ensures that Chris Hardwick and company will stay an anchor as the network tries to get into some new territory with “Minority Report with Larry Wilmore.” Wilmore is slated to replace Stephen Colbert, who is leaving “The Colbert Report” after many years to host “The Late Show” over at CBS.

In his first statement confirming the news (which was announced last night on “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon”), Hardwick had the following to say:

“@midnight has been an absolute dream come true for me — a game show of Internet jokes with my comedian friends … I cannot thank Comedy Central enough for letting us continue. If they hadn’t, you can damn well bet that I would have forced people to come over to my house to play it anyway, for no audience, so everyone is thankful we dodged that bullet.”

We do feel like this show has a nice shelf life left in it, mostly because other fake game shows (see ESPN’s “Around the Horn”) have found a niche for themselves over the years. This show has especially succeeded in capturing the same audience of young males that Jon Stewart and Colbert have, which has allowed them to remain competitive in the late-night race even against some of the bigger rivals on major networks.

Are you thrilled that the show is coming back for more … at least provided that we have more Ron Funches, “Community” tribute episodes, Nikki Glaser, celebrity cameos, and Pierre the Pelican references? Share below.