john-oliver-TCA-press-tour-2014Filling in for Jon Stewart on “The Daily Show” for most of the summer “was a bizarre, exciting, and terrifying experience.”

But most agreed that British correspondent John Oliver pulled it off, putting his own stamp on the kind of topical humor anchoring at which Stewart excelled.

“I set myself the achievable goal of just not destroying that particular franchise,” he told reporters t the TV Critics Association winter press tour this week. “So the fact that it’s still there and Jon is still doing it, that I took that as a W in the win column. I guess it went well. Comedy is subjective. I’m sure some people thought, ‘Get that British imposter off my favorite TV show.’ ”

But not HBO.

“After seeing what he can do in the host’s chair, we knew his unique voice was something we wanted to have on our network,” said Nina Rosenstein, vice president of HBO Entertainment.

So after an emotional send off on “the Daily Show” last month, he began work this week trying to figure out what his weekly Sunday night topical show will look like when it debuts this spring.

So far, Oliver says, “The format does not exist at the moment. We’re working on that. It will be making fun of things. That is a fairly broad format. So we’re going to work that out over the next few months.”

He has hired former “Daily Show” head writer Tim Carvell, so it will have even more DNA of the “Daily Show” with him.

But, he added, “we’ll approach things in a different way. We’re going to be on once a week, so we’ll have extra have a different perspective on things.” He’ll also be able to play off things that happen Friday or Saturday, when “The Daily Show” and “Colbert  Report” are dark.

Not that there will be a shortage of material.

“America has been very generous in what it has offered up as joke subjects over the years,” Oliver said. “And American politics in particular is a circus of crazy that is unparalleled around the world.”