A scrubbed monologue joke pulled a visceral reaction from the “Late Night” audience – one that lasted so long, host Seth Meyers admitted he briefly thought someone was piping the audio in.

Following his monologue to start the show, the NBC host kicked off another surprise inspection of his writers, noting that, like many people, they’re on edge right now because the election is just days out. But that anxiousness did not excuse some of their unused jokes.

Some were just low-hanging puns, others were just overly complicated plays on words. The joke that pained the audience the most though? Well, that centered on National Chocolate Day.

It came from writer Mike Scollins, and to preface the joke, Meyers noted that “the bigwigs at NBC” instructed him to warn audiences of a Scollins joke during surprise inspections, because “he writes the worst ones.” And indeed, it was brutal.

“Today was National Chocolate Day,...