October 2007 Archives

More proof that the Republican Party is elitist: It costs $35,000 to get on the Republican Presidential Primary ballot in South Carolina, as opposed to the chump-change $2,500 necessary to land you on the Democrats' ballot. And the Democrats'll even let you on their ballot for free if you can score 3,000 signatures.

Which means that Stephen Colbert's dream of running as a favorite-son Presidential candidate in both the Democratic and Republican primaries in his native South Carolina has been quashed. Perhaps if "The Colbert Report" aired on a deep-pocketed broadcast network, he could continue his charade, but 35 large is a lot of money for basic-cable to flush away on such a quixotic quest.

Oh, and there's no guarantee that Colbert will get on the Democratic ballot, either:

"Charleston Democratic Party Chairman Waring Howe, was more blunt: 'Over my dead body will Colbert's name be on the ballot.' ... Opponents such as Howe argue that Colbert makes a mockery of the political process."

Well, that's a bit harsh, and anyway, explain to me how the political process itself does not make a mockery of the political process.

On the other hand:

"'I think a lot of people think it's a joke because it's a comedy show and whatnot, but he's a nice fellow, and if he gets on the ballot, he will come here to South Carolina and campaign across the state,' said Charles Hamby, the second vice chairman of the state Democratic Party."

Clearly, Hamby is eager for at least one "nice" person to run for President.

And yesterday, we discussed the burgeoning hand-wringing that his candidacy is inspiring among the punditocracy, who worry that the media is too stupid to focus on the issues while Colbert is running when in fact the media is too stupid to focus on the issues even when Colbert isn't running, as well. So MarketWatch's Jon Friedman comes late to this party, but it's mainly to brag about the time Colbert mentioned him by name on his show, and that Colbert remembered him when they later ran into one another, and that instead of backing slowly, warily away from him, Colbert was actually nice to him. Good way to make your kvetching point that some political journalists are starstruck by Colbert, Jon!

So: South Carolina's leaning toward the position that politics should be left to the politicians, because, after all, what good can a mere comic do for America? For the answer, consider Colbert's DonorsChoose.org site, raising money for South Carolina schools. Colbert's site has already raised more than $41,000, which is far, far more than similar sites for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Al Gore, Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel and Wesley Clark combined.

Basically, the notion that seems to be forming is: Politicians can be both politicians and laughingstocks, but comedians need to stick to the jokes. Seems like they feel Colbert's too good to lower himself into the briny murk of politicking.

We’ve discussed the ramifications and the effects, both short- and long-term, of the impending writers strike.

Well, here’re some pre-strike statistics that have to be worrisome for the networks: Most of them are losing viewers at a fearsome rate, and this is with original scripted programming. If the strike forces them to scramble and cook up all sorts of wan reality shows (over the summer, a lot of the reality programming fared even worse than repeats of shows), these numbers will tumble ever further, and it’ll be increasingly difficult to distinguish the networks’ viewership from cable.

Based upon last week’s ratings, CBS, NBC and The CW are shedding viewers in double-digit percentages from just last year. ABC’s hanging in there, thanks to “Dancing with the Stars” and a handful of successful new series. Fox had the World Series last week, so its numbers are skewed, but it’s not exactly thriving otherwise.

Herewith, last week’s ratings (and how they compare to the same week last year in parentheses).

* Households:
Fox: 8.6 rating/14 share (+32 percent), ABC: 7.4/12 (+ 1), CBS: 7.2/12 (-10), NBC: 4.4/ 7 (-30), CW: 1.9/ 3 (-17)

* Total Viewers:

Fox: 13.78 million (+38), ABC: 11.19 (- 2), CBS: 11.17 (- 9), NBC: 7.00 (-28), CW: 2.96 (-18)

* Adults 18-49:

Fox: 4.6 rating/13 share (+44), ABC: 3.7/10 (- 5), CBS: 3.0/ 8 (-17), NBC: 2.6/ 7 (-26), CW: 1.2/ 3 (-20)

*Adults 25-54:

Fox: 5.2/13 (+41), ABC: 4.3/11 (- 4), CBS: 3.9/10 (-17), NBC: 2.9/ 7 (-27), CW: 1.1/ 3 (-21)

* Adults 18-34:

Fox: 3.9/12 (+39), ABC: 2.9/ 9 (no change), NBC: 2.4/ 7 (-17), CBS: 2.0/ 6 (-20), CW: 1.3/ 4 (-24)


The biggest loser here is The CW, which is hemorrhaging the young viewers that comprise its target audience. One imagines that, strike or no strike, something drastic is going to happen at The CW. Like, maybe, it’ll cease to exist: I can’t imagine its parent company is enjoying dumping all the money it’s spending down that sinkhole.

The subject header in the Email read: “AOL Polls 2.5 Americans About Fall TV.” So you’re thinking, the only person who broke a sweat in this endeavor was that half a person who was trying to articulate his views on “Private Practice” while desperately searching for his abdomen and legs.

Well, of course, they meant 2.5 million, and naturally that’s wildly misleading, as well: They tallied 2.5 million votes through 15 questions, and even though online polls tend to be pointless, sometimes a droplet of truth can be divined from the most meaningless effluvium. (I think that’s a Zen koan. Or advice from a Bazooka Bubble Gum comic.)

So, which showrunner stuffed the ballot box in order to make his new show look more popular than it really is? Answer: “Dirty Sexy Money” was named the new show people were finding most addictive, with 27% of the votes, though if you look at the ratings, you find the show is struggling. It was also named best guilty pleasure, reaping 43% of that vote.

Even more bizarre: Fox’s limping-along “Back To You” tallied better than “Bionic Woman,” which is also limping for something with such supercharged legs. (“Pushing Daisies” came in second in voting for favorite new show, by the way. “Private Practice” wasn’t even mentioned in this category, though it’s hard to tell if it was even an option in the voting.)

Other theoretical findings: “House” is favorite returning show, edging out “CSI” and “Dancing with the Stars.” “Cavemen” is considered the worst new show in a landslide. (By the way: Last night’s 4,238th repeat of “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” did nearly twice the audience an original episode of “Cavemen” manages in that timeslot.)

Bad news for a couple of returning shows: Half those voting declared “Heroes” done and they’ve moved on; another 32% say the show isn’t as good as it was last year, but they’re hanging in there – for now. Similar deal with “Grey’s Anatomy” – 24% of those who went to the trouble of clicking their mouse have abandoned the show, while 30% are still watching despite perceiving a slip in quality.

And bad news for networks hoping that reality TV will tide them over during the impending writers strike: Viewers are sick of the stuff. 44% can’t wait for the trend to die, and an additional 30% watch the genre only sporadically.

Here’re some questions for AOL’s next poll: Which shows will you not miss when the writers go on strike? Will you spend the strike a) reading, b) watching DVDs, c) watching cats frolic on YouTube, d) curled up in the fetal position as your bloodstream tries to cope with the absence of toxins?

ABC yesterday picked up “Samantha Who?” for the remainder of the season. It’s so far the most successful new show of the season, though that’ll likely change once it loses its “Dancing with the Stars” lead-in.

Still: A new sitcom not only a top-20 show but the most-watched new show of the season? And here, everyone was telling us that sitcoms are dead.

Of course, all this is moot if there’s a writers strike. Though Variety reports that it won’t begin tomorrow, as originally feared, but next week. The trade notes that extending the deadline a) puts a sword of Damocles over producers during any negotiations that proceed after today, b) makes the writers look like nominally reasonable folks by delaying the inevitable, and c) gives them time to finish up all those last-minute projects.

See you on the picket line!

TVGuide.com is reporting that NBC has decided that it’d be a really good idea if “The Office’s” writers d!cked around for a couple of episodes introducing characters for a spin-off series.

While TVGuide.com thinks this is a really good idea – they have a poll question, “Does NBC's planned Office spin-of make you giddy with joy?” (hey, it’s TVGuide.com – all TV makes them giddy with joy) – those leaving comments at the site, not to mention here, realize otherwise.

Herewith, some of the comments from the show’s fans who, even though they may not be part of the industry, understand something NBC’s Ben Silverman doesn’t: This can’t end well.

* This is an AWFUL idea. Why on earth would you want to ruin such a great show like The Office??? I'm pretty sure that everyone can agree that Private Practice did not receive the welcome that they were hoping for...This is just a bad, bad idea.

* Nooooooo. I am going all French Revolution on NBC. Heads on sticks.

* Two words: Joey. And Joey.

What do you think? Everyone feared the American “Office” before they saw it, so maybe the producers can pull this off as well? Or does the mere thought of “extending the product” cheapen a quality show?

I’ve seen billboards around town for something called “Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium.” Is this real? It looks like someone couldn’t get the rights to “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” and decided to make the movie anyway.

And: Dustin Hoffman? Did he lose a bet? Is just pottering around the house simply not an option? Natalie Portman? Do the producers have nude photos of her they threatened to publish online if she didn’t do the movie?

I've noted that Washington journalists, bored with the Presidential race, have found themselves more interested in Stephen Colbert than the real candidates. Well, some people think that's a bad thing:

"(T)he Colbert candidacy becomes a distraction only if the press allows it to. And the sad fact is the press already has allowed it to, because the press literally drives itself to distraction on the campaign trail. That's not an unfortunate side effect of the process. That's the goal.

"Think of political press corps as that fat kid from "Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory," Augustus Gloop. For too many journalists, the lure of the Colbert candidacy is akin to Wonka's river of chocolate, the one that lured the candy-loving Gloop into the deep end and got him stuck inside the tubes. The press already seems to do everything it can to avoid covering campaign substance. Instead, it pursues trivia such as haircuts, and laughs, and cleavage, and parking tickets, and head movements, and marital sleeping habits, and chiseled good looks, and cats, and accents. It's clear that the allure of a saccharine story like Colbert's running gag is simply too tempting."

Even snarky sites don't like their Presidential campaigns with snark:

"Now, we don't want to sound all imperious and sh!t, and we get the idea, add a little levity to the race, distract the cranky reporters, take everyone down a peg or two. It's good clean fun. But there's a $46 billion war on, we hear. And! Wildfires! Drought! ... Britney has once again taken two children hostage! Chuck Norris is voting!"

But hey, that's just the way the incompetent nincompoops of the mainstream media roll, it's all about the horserace and nothing about the horse, the hay or the issues:

"Just 12% of stories [about the candidates' campaigns] examined were presented in a way that explained how citizens might be affected by the election, while nearly nine-out-of-ten stories (86%) focused on matters that largely impacted only the parties and the candidates."

So, for the good of America, Colbert needs to renounce his candidacy. And then become a journalist and report on the issues because no one else seems to.

Who's doing the faux news now?

In recent days, Your Mayor has courageously addressed the tough issues: waterboarding, the impending Writers strike, and the Southern California wildfires.

So what has received the most feedback?

A throwaway one-sentence dis on Tom Petty.

Brief background: Given the newspaper industry’s economy these days, writers covering TV have to do not just their job but that of the whole of humanity, or at least those of clerks and interns. So, I agreed to do some dribbling TV listings for the paper that run under the moniker TiVo This. It’s actually a laborious, time-consuming process – one must wade through a tidal wave of press releases about upcoming programming, sort them out, categorize them by date and then cull the wheat from the chaff. Then, you get to write a whole sentence (maybe two) about the show. Then the thing runs in the paper, and in my paper, thankfully, without a byline.

Needless to say, it’s not a glamorous gig.

On Monday, I included Sundance Channel’s “Runnin’ Down a Dream: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers,” a four-hour documentary about the band. Herewith, the entirety of my trenchant thoughts on the subject: “Does anyone like the rocker enough to sit through a four-hour documentary on him from Peter Bogdonavich?”

This really wasn’t intended as a knock on Petty, whom I like just fine and saw in concert a couple of times back in the ’80s. (After The Band, his Heartbreakers may have been the best backing group Bob Dylan ever had, not that Bob seemed to appreciate the fact.) I was taking into consideration our ADD-addled, soundbite-sated, YouTube-watching culture and thinking back on the sort of bombastic and overblown and/or self-indulgent concert films of the past – Led Zeppelin’s “The Sound Remains the Same,” Dylan’s “Renaldo and Clara,” any number of those unwatchable little home movies Neil Young makes under the moniker Bernard Shakey – I love these artists but I simply can’t sit through these movies. And it’s been a while since Bogdonavich has made a decent film.

So I took all of that and condensed it into one pithy little sentence. (Usually, I don’t even put that much thought into the sentence.)

And I heard about it. I had no idea they put this drivel out on the wire service, but people from all over the country let it be known that Tom Petty is far more beloved than I am.

I must say, however, that Tom Petty fans may be the most polite fans on the face of the planet. When I was a music critic and would slag someone’s favorite band, I used to get letters questioning my mother, my sexual orientation and even what species I was and suggesting I perform acts generally considered anatomically impossible.

But here are some of the responses I got:

* You asked - "Does anyone like the rocker enough to sit through a four-hour documentary on him from Peter Bogdonavich?"

Oh My My, Oh HELL YES!

Have you actually watched this film? Tom Petty or not, this is a great American success story.

* I am writing to tell you that I am highly offended by your remarks. I went to the theater to see this documentary when it was shown on October 15, 2007 (FYI the theater was sold out). The following day, I went to the store to buy the dvd of the documentary I enjoyed it so much in the theater. I have watched it many times and extremely enjoy this American story.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers are one of the great American bands that have been around for over 30 years and are still going strong. Besides creating great music, they have an incredible story of triumph and tragedy to tell. In order to fit that story into only four hours quite a bit had to be cut and left on the cutting room floor. I wish that the movie had been six hours - I would have loved to learn more about this incredible band.

Have you seen the movie? If not, perhaps you should before you criticize. To answer your question, YES, there are people, lots of people, that like, and love, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers enough to gladly sit through a four hour documentary on him and his music.

Thank you for your time.

* A resounding “Yes” is my response to your question as to whether anyone likes Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers enough to sit through a four hour documentary about him. Perhaps if such a movie was made about one of your favorite artists, you’d feel the same way.
Rock on.

* I for one would sit through 4 hours of TP… Why the diss?

Do you know anything about the BEST dam(n) American Rock n Roll band? (H)ave you listened to them? Seen them LIVE(?) I watched the movie a few times already......Lighten Up on Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers.

* Not only do I like Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers enough to watch a 4 hour documentary, I've watched it twice and can't wait to watch it again. And I also watched the Gainesville DVD and listened to the CD that came with the documentary.

Even though the documentary seems to be quite long, the pace is excellent and the humor of Tom Petty and the band keeps you interested. So YES, I and many others can watch four hours of Petty and thoroughly enjoy it.

* Well yes, yes I do. I watched it all the way through at the weekend and it was very informative, funny, very well constructed and did not feel like 4 hours in the slightest bit. I did not get bored with it once.

I hope that answers your question so you can now lay it to rest.

Peace.

The meanest one suggested I liked Britney Spears’ music, but then said even if I did, that was OK:

* Please don’t knock Tom Petty. Perhaps you would enjoy sitting through a four-hour documentary about Britney Spears instead … I don’t know. But I wouldn’t knock her, you or the fans that would.

OK, so now I know. And with that knowledge, I’ll let you know that the Sundance Channel is repeating “Runnin’ Down a Dream” Thursday Nov. 1 at 3 a.m. and Saturday Nov. 3 at 3 p.m.

I haven't seen a man as utterly happy as Seth MacFarlane was Monday night at Fox's party commemorating "Family Guy's" 100th episode. Then again, I haven't seen all that many happy people lately, but boyoboy was Seth MacFarlane happy - the only thing preventing him from grinning ear to ear is that it's simply not physically possible. His smile never faded, and it never looked phony.

"Family Guy" has survived many worse attacks on its way to its 100th episode. Fox cancelled the show once, only to revive it when it was a hit on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim and its DVD sales went through the roof. Series creator Seth MacFarlane barely missed American Airlines Flight 11 on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, a plane that eventually hurtled into the World Trade Center. And "South Park" delivered a withering blow on the show's humor, heavily dependent on bizarre non-sequiturs, by depicting its writing staff as manatees delivering random joke balls down gag tubes.

So now, here we are, with the 100th episode scheduled to air on Sunday. On it, Stewie murders his mom Lois - or does he? What the episode may lack in suspense it makes up for in bad taste.

I attended the table read for the 100th episode some 16 months back; that occasion was noteworthy for MacFarlane's furthering the episode's theme by carving the commemorative cake and leaving the knife implanted in Lois's ladyparts. Furthermore, I was on hand for a re-reading of a tidied-up version of the once-very-obscene script at July's TV Press Tour.

So it only made sense that I'd complete the hat trick and turn up at the 100th-episode party, at some trendy Hollywood club that mopped up all evidence of cocaine for the evening.

The back of the club - the area that used to house the old Hollywood Athletic Club's pool tables (how I miss that place, only because I had my greatest billiards triumph there) - was set up, in keeping with the episode-in-question's plotline, to resemble a cruise liner's dance floor. A big-band orchestra was on hand and opened the evening with a version of the show's theme song.

MacFarlane, who if you've ever watched the show you'll know is a big musical guy, performed several standards for his audience, even though, for the most part, the oh-so-cool crowd couldn't be bothered to shut up their yapping long enough to enjoy his performance. Off to the side, two louts cozied up to a couple of women with the line, "You two girls are very pretty; unfortunately, my friend is legally blind." The line, though patently idiotic, seemed to work. (Memo to the Women of America: Is there any line that won't work on you?)

In addition to MacFarlane, who embraced all comers, celebrities on hand included Seth Green (who voices son Chris, and seemed equally happy to glad-hand with fans), Mila Kunis (who voices daughter Meg, who seemed to disappear early on), Alex Borstein (who voices wife Lois, and who enjoyed a nice plate of mac and cheese), Jane Lynch, Patrick Duffy (why? Who knows, and who cares?), Jared, the sandwich-shop pitchman (or someone from the lucrative Jared-impersonator industry), former President Jimmy Carter and Erik the Red, the founder of Greenland. (As my celebrity-spotting skills are somewhat dubious, all of this may not be completely accurate.)

The cover of Monday's Hollywood Reporter celebrated "Family Guy's" achievement with an ad reading: "7 Years, 1 Cancellation, 300 Fart Jokes (only 300?), 3 Giant Chicken Fights, 1 Evil Monkey, 1000 Giggities (only 1,000?), 85 Martinis (only 85?), 1 Barbershop Quartet Singing About AIDS ... 100 Episodes!"

Anyway, a splendid time seemed to be had by all. Even though I couldn't find a solid comedic peg to tie this to, if I wanted to justify my expensing my mileage and valet parking and the cash I spent at nearby Amoeba Records to the Daily News, I had to find some reason to write about the evening, so here we are.

- "Family Guy's" 100 th episode: 9 p.m. Sunday, Fox Channel 11.

A good rule of thumb for TV showrunners is, if you actually have a sizable portion of viewers who are genuine adults watching your show, don’t for God’s sake waste your capital on a stupid Halloween episode. Said material is aimed at kids, fer chrissakes, and that kind of material will just register as condescending to actual adults.

The latest show to ignore me? Fox’s “Bones.” Don’t worry; there’ll doubtlessly be a couple more tomorrow.

Now, “Bones” is usually agreeable enough. Temperance’s (Emily Deschanel) and Booth’s (David Boreanaz) chemistry and the show’s lack of pretension can be quite winning. But a TV series has to be about something more than endless meet-cutes without much else except crime-procedural lite.

Tonight’s Halloween episode involves the mummification of the corpses of teen girls. “Bones” plays virtually everything for laughs, and generally agreeably so, but tonight’s plotline involves teen girls dragged into sordid threesomes and thereafter murdered, “literally scared to death,” as a character puts it. Ha-ha!

Ah, well, after all, it’s Fox. And it’s amazing how well the show underplays, even glosses over, its sadistic plotline. And Deschanel is awfully fetching in her Wonder Woman costume.

- “Bones:” 8 tonight, Fox Channel 11.

In Congressional hearings last week, Attorney General nominee Michael Mukasey said he didn’t know if waterboarding was torture. (Wouldn’t having an opinion on that subject be, I don’t know, part of the Attorney General’s job description?)

Current TV invites Mr. Mukasey to watch its new newsmagazine show debuting this Wednesday, which will feature a report from 2006 in which correspondent Kaj Larsen (a former Navy SEAL) allowed himself to be waterboarded by former SERE (Survival, Escape, Resistance and Evasion) trainers. It'll be followed by the unedited footage of Larsen’s entire waterboarding ordeal, during which he’ll explain what he was going through at the time.

The process, which simulates drowning, generally lasts two or three minutes with most of those interrogated, an ex-SERE instructor explained in the original report. I met Larsen this afternoon, and he told me the first time he was waterboarded, as part of his SEAL training, he lasted about 30 seconds. For his report for Current, he was waterboarded for 24 minutes before segment producer Mitch Koss called an end to the proceedings.

Larsen was coughing up water for two days after undergoing the process, which the current administration declines to call torture, preferring instead the euphemism “coercive interrogation.” This week, John McCain’s campaign requested a copy of Larsen’s report, McCain being one of the few remaining conservatives in Washington who aren’t gung-ho about turning real life into an episode of “24.”

Perhaps Mr. Mukasey will be able to finally form an opinion after watching Larsen’s misadventure. As for everyone else: It’ll be the scariest thing you see this Halloween.

- Kaj Larsen on Waterboarding: 10 p.m. EST/7 p.m. PCT Wednesday, Current TV (Channel 366 on DirecTV, 196 on Dish, 107 on Comcast, 189 on AT&T U-Verse, 142 on Time Warner Digital in L.A.).

Since there isn’t enough news occurring gin the real world, CNN is setting up a bureau in the virtual community Second Life, a landscape populated by little CG avatars.

No joke, apparently:

“(T)he network will act as a sort of journalism school, offering guidance to avatar citizen journalists via weekly ‘news meetings’ directed by CNN.com staffers. And top CNN personalities including Larry King will conduct virtual training sessions for budding cyber journalists.”

Susan Grant, executive VP of CNN News Services, actually said, “I love that we don’t have to take things from the real world and force them in.”



Second Life, mainly a repository for people who don’t have a First Life, has been home to other gimmicks. Suzanne Vega “performed” there last year, and last week, “CSI: New York” featured an episode in which its characters entered Second Life to pursue a killer (not sure how capturing a murderer’s avatar and not the murderer himself does any good, but there you go). “CSI: New York” also has acreage in Second Life for fans to investigate crimes. And a couple of Presidential candidates, in search of the all-important geek vote, have set up areas there, as well.

Of course, they’re getting to the party late:

“(R)esearch company The Yankee Group in recent weeks produced a report on Second Life detailing a ‘pronounced’ decline in usage. Senior analyst Christopher Collins said Second Life’s claims of 10 million-plus avatars skewed perceptions about its popularity. … But many users come to Second Life, he added, and are ‘frustrated, confused and don’t find it immediately compelling.’”

Well, wouldn’t you be frustrated, confused and uncompelled if you visited Second Life and saw a cartoon Wolf Blitzer giving this report: “Today, in ‘The Situation CyberRoom:’ Gandalf defeats Saruman after yet another bloody battle! A cactus pops all the balloons in a game of “Poppit” and wins 750 meaningless points! In CyberTehran, insurgent avatars create a website where fake terrorists can dress President Bush in women’s clothing!

“But first, a special report: When will we avatars break the shackles of enslavement and escape the oppression of our evil human overlords? All this, and a Jack Cafferty avatar caviling about issues that don’t exist, in ‘The Situation CyberRoom!’”

Attending a Sunday fundraiser for pet rescue centers – where Ellen DeGeneres, shockingly enough, was nowhere in sight – Your Mayor was greeted by sundry objects that made his brain hurt.

Despite Ellen’s absence, other celebrities contributed to the fundraising, even if their contributions didn’t actually raise any funds.

To wit: A silent auction offered “paintings” featuring the handprints of celebrities alongside the pawprints of their pets. Paula Abdul was among those who contributed a canvas, with the prints of one of the diminutive yappy dogs who had appeared on her reality show “Hey Paula” gracing her “artwork.”

At the silent auction’s conclusion, Abdul’s work had received no bids. Even though Abdul appears on the most popular show on Television (not “Hey Paula,” eejit; “American Idol”). Even though its initial bidding price had been slashed in half. Even though other similar offerings from celebrities such as Drew Barrymore and Jessica Alba did, in fact, move. Even though one imagines that the residual chemicals that might be found on Abdul’s mitts and planted on the canvas via direct contact with her hands might appeal to those with certain proclivities. (Perhaps crazy pill aficionados don’t attend fundraisers for pet rescue organizations.)

I considered bidding on Abdul’s efforts for kitsch value, but then reconsidered: This was crap, so I wouldn’t put it on my wall, and I couldn’t think of any of my friends who would do so, even ironically, either. So why bother?

Ah, but more oddities were forthcoming at the event. Did you know that dogs have their own bottled water? Neither did I, but let me introduce you to VitaPaw®, “a daily dose of goodness for your best friend.” (Just what the world needs, more disposable plastic bottles.)

“VitaPaw is refreshing water, infused with vitamins for all day hydration,” a bottle of the fluid reads (yes, water indeed provides all-day hydration, so can’t trip them up there).

It adds, “Even the most discriminating pet will enjoy this fresh alternative to tap water.” Which doesn’t quite scan: If this was terrific stuff, wouldn’t “the most discriminating pet” absolutely love this? Wouldn’t “even” “a mammal with no taste whatsoever” “enjoy this fresh alternative to tap water?”

Oh, and then there’s this warning on the bottle: “Not intended for human consumption.”

No doubt because it might inspire them to leave their scent all around their neighborhood.

If animals find this more desirable than tap water, but if it’s not worthy of humans, does its alleged popularity amongst the fur-bearing set have something to do with the fact that some pets like to drink out of the toilet?

It was always only a matter of time before “nip/tuck” found its way to L.A., Ground Zero of All Things Superficial. For four seasons, the show has been based in Miami, a plenty soulless place. But for the show to really move into the bigs, they had to transfer Christian Troy (Julian McMahon) and Sean McNamara (Dylan Walsh) into Major League Decadence.

And so it has come to pass. And in moving “nip/tuck” to L.A., the show has virtually lost its mind, plunging well beyond self-parody into the realm of absolute train wreck. Surprisingly, this is not criticism, but praise: Given the show’s theme of certain people’s insanity when it comes to their appearances, the crazed new version of “nip/tuck” is actually entirely appropriate.

Truth be told, I’ve never been a big fan of the show: While its premise has always held inspired promise, its oft-lugubrious melodrama has always felt like something of a drag on its rudders. With Sean and Christian in L.A., its storytelling has become gleefully rudderless – these guys can now act with impunity, since everyone around them is at least as amoral as Christian has always been. In fact, he’s struggling to keep up.

Series creator Ryan Murphy has cleverly inverted his entire show: As Tuesday’s fifth-season premiere opens, McNamara/Troy’s trendy new Beverly Hills boutique plastic-surgery center is struggling to find clients in a town rife with plastic surgeons. “I feel like I’m trying to sell semen at a whorehouse,” Christian laments.

Of course, it’s not long before “the magic” happens – they find jobs as technical advisors on “Hearts ’n’ Scalpels,” an onerously crepuscular show just incrementally more frivolously cynical and hormonally driven than “nip/tuck” itself. The jokey twist is that somehow, Sean becomes more successful, in virtually every way, than smooth operator Christian, plunging Christian into paroxysms of self doubt and inspiring even worse behavior than he routinely indulged in heretofore.

And so, here are some of the sundry subplots that crop up, and these, in only the first two episodes of the new season:

* Christian bangs an aging actress with scruples and appears conflicted as to whether he should give her the operations that may resurrect her career or sell her out (but of course there's really never any doubt);

* Dueling Marilyn Monroe impersonators on the Walk of Fame vie for McNamara/Troy’s services;

* A studio executive requires help erasing the scars left by his dominatrix (who shows up at the doctors’ offices, tools of her trade in hand, and for bonus points comes on to Sean);

* Christian poses for Playgirl magazine for publicity, only to be shocked when the resulting clientele isn’t exactly playing for his team (assuming he, unlike Larry Craig, is not in deep denial and the jury's always been out on that one);

* A major character plunges into a heretofore unmotivated gay relationship.

Plus, there’s a montage of the two guys trying on different clothes, the sort of sequence usually reserved for movies aimed at teenage girls.

Beyond the eye-poppingly surreal storylines, what’s also amazing is the guest-cast list the show has amassed after only two episodes: Lauren Hutton, Oliver Platt, Bradley Cooper, Daphne Zuniga, Tia Carrere and Portia de Rossi all turn up, as does Paula Marshall, an actress whose reputation as a show-killer (she’s starred in such quickly cancelled series as “Cupid,” “Snoops,” “Hidden Hills” and “Out of Practice”) has reduced her to such humiliating work as stripping and begging David Duchovny to find her attractive in “Californication” and, here, playing a weight-obsessed actress with very unfortunate prosthetics.

Here’s guessing that many longtime fans of “nip/tuck” will consider this the show’s jump-the-shark moment. Not me. Unhinged has always seemed the pitch to which this show should have operated, and now, unhinged it is. Heaven help us all.

- “nip/tuck:” 10 p.m. Tuesday, FX.

So E! took a poll and asked its online fan base: Which new shows do you want to see survive the season?

And people answered.

Mind you, online polls, which all but invite stuffing the ballot box, are virtually meaningless, let alone online polls at E!, home of The Professional Fans of Everything. Still, the results are worth noting. It’s tempting to make some sort of joke about the fact that “Gossip Girl” is a favorite of E! fans, but then, they also like “Pushing Daisies,” “Samantha Who?” and “Chuck.”

80% (voted to save it)—Pushing Daisies (ABC), full season ordered
68%—Samantha Who? (ABC), additional episodes ordered
64%—Gossip Girl (CW), full season ordered
63%—Chuck (NBC), additional episodes ordered
58%—Big Shots (ABC)
57%—Moonlight (CBS), additional episodes ordered
56%—Reaper (CW), additional episodes ordered
50%—Women's Murder Club (ABC), additional episodes ordered
47%—Aliens in America (CW), asked to continue production
46%—Private Practice (ABC), full season ordered
44%—Dirty Sexy Money (ABC), additional episodes ordered
35%—Bionic Woman (ABC), additional episodes ordered
34%—Journeyman (NBC), additional episodes ordered
29%—Life (NBC), additional episodes ordered
28%—Back to You (Fox), full season ordered
25%—The Big Bang Theory (CBS), full season ordered
21%—Cane (CBS), additional episodes ordered
20%—K-Ville (Fox)
15%—Kid Nation (CBS)
13%—Cavemen (ABC)
10%—Viva Laughlin (CBS), canceled

Coming soon: E!’s poll on which of the California wildfires was your favorite.

“Battlestar Galactica” fans note: Sci Fi will be presenting its upcoming “BG” telefilm, “Razor,” in real-live movie theaters on Nov. 12. Click here to see if it’s showing near you. Registration’s free; space is limited; etc.

If not, just be patient: Sci Fi will present it Nov. 24. It’s just a taste before the show’s final season premieres next year.

OK, first things first: If there was the remotest possibility that a Narcotics Anonymous sponsor like Lila (Jaime Murray) actually existed somewhere in this country, drug use would skyrocket amongst men hoping to meet that special, strung-out someone to "sponsor" them.

The storyline involving Dexter (Michael C. Hall) pretending to be a recovering drug addict to appease his girlfriend Rita (Julie Benz) and meeting Lila, who's just as dark and mysterious as he, takes an inevitable yet corny and not terribly persuasive turn tonight. And no, it's not quite what you're thinking (but be patient), but pretty close.

In Sunday's episode, Dex discovers that one of his mother's murderers is still alive; when he shares that information with Lila, she's the first person he's told about his mother's murder. She wants him to visit the murderer and offers to go with him and tell him about his feelings.

You can imagine how that goes. And no, it's not quite what you're thinking (but be patient), but pretty close.

Meanwhile, "The Bay Harbor Butcher" is still considered more a local hero than villain, and Dex's sister Debra (Jennifer Carpenter) is saddled with a silly subplot whose outcome you can pretty much see from a mile away. Still, I say: She's obviously if obliviously smitten with Special Agent Lundy (Keith Carradine).

Still, the show maintains its tightrope walk between wry and macabre, and watching Dexter try to wriggle away as Lundy drolly if surely pursues the killer who's just an office away remains good queasy fun. By the way, does Miami PD ever actually solve the peripheral murders on the show?

Next week: Is Lundy onto Dex?

- "Dexter," 9 and 11 p.m. Sunday, 11 p.m. Monday, 9 p.m. Tuesday, 10 p.m. Wednesday, etc. etc., Showtime.

When one thinks of a show that rather sadistically offs its principal characters, “24” comes to mind, perhaps “Prison Break.” (Not “Heroes,” though given how cluttered with characters that show’s become, they better start a death march quick.)

But there’s another series that has become absolutely zealous about imperiling its beloved characters – and a kids’ show, at that.

Yes, I’m talking about “Meerkat Manor.”

What started out as a charming little nature program about some cute critters has turned into a plaintive rumination about how short and brutish life can be. First, we lost our intrepid, snake-bite-surviving hero, Shakespeare, who simply disappeared, likely killed by a predator. At least his death occurred off-camera.

Since then, a number of meerkats have bitten the dust, among them Big Si, Cazanna, Carlos, Mozart’s pups, Kinkajou, pups and more pups and, most recently, Flower. Tonight – and there really is no delicate way of putting this – the carnage continues.

One wonders if the producers understood their show would have such a high body count when they pitched it, or if Animal Planet thought luring kids into the tent with the promise of pictures of cute animals then turning the tables on them with tragedy after tragedy constituted a sobering life lesson delivered tough-love-style. Whatever the case, keep it up!

- “Meerkat Manor,” 8:30 tonight, Animal Planet.

Apparently paradise isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Another TV season, another “Lost” cast member busted: Daniel Dae Kim, who plays Jin-Soo Kwon, is the third co-star on the show to be arrested for a DUI.

Michelle Rodriguez and Cynthia Watros were busted in December 2005; both saw their characters subsequently killed off. In September of 2006, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje was accused of disobeying a police officer and driving without a license, and even though those charges were later dropped, his character bit the dust (or rather, got bit by a smoke monster), as well.

While it seems that working in Hawaii would be all sorts of fun, apparently the relative isolation from friends and family creates a horrific stress that we mere mortals cannot fathom. Maybe “Lost’s” producers should create some sort of day-care (or night-care) center for their wayward cast, filled with activities that don’t include getting smashed. Shuffleboard, miniature golf, Sudoku, pie-eating contests (though Jorge Garcia’d probably dominate there), horseshoes – there must be some way to keep their stars off the sauce or out of the driver’s seat.

Interactive company Ludia announced today upcoming video and computer games based on Gordon Ramsay’s abuse-a-thon reality competition show “Hell’s Kitchen.” Apparently aimed at masochists who enjoy showers of boiling-hot vitriol being poured upon them, “Hell’s Kitchen” will feature a cute little Gordon Ramsay avatar screaming obscenities at players over the quality (or lack thereof) of their cyber-cuisine as he takes bytes from them.

But how can players really be sure that their pixilated portions really are gag-inducing? Seems a dubious proposition, though it’ll be the first game to include a cookbook, featuring some of Ramsay’s favorite recipes.

At any rate, I’d rather play a game based upon Ramsay’s other show, “Kitchen Nightmares,” in which a virtual Ramsay wades through kitchens infested with rancid and rotten food, maggots and other vermin (for optimal entertainment, the game should be played in smell-o-vision).

In a public chat with the New York Times' Frank Rich last night in Manhattan, Stephen Colbert shocked the nation by endorsing a Presidential candidate that was not himself:

"I would love to see a President Huckabee because if our president were named 'Huckabee," how bad could anything really seem?” he said. “It'd be as if the entire country was animated by Hanna Barbera. Can you imagine the Huckabee Monument?"

Despite its underwhelming performance thusfar this season, Fox has picked “Back To You” up for the rest of the season, apparently hoping that come 2008 it’ll get the same sort of bounce following “American Idol’s” results show that “House” enjoyed following the competition episodes.

ABC has ordered six more scripts for “Samantha Who?”, which is doing quite handsomely following “Dancing With the Stars” – in fact, it’s so far the most successful new show of the season.

ABC also announced that the critically reviled “October Road” (which still managed to do better last season following “Grey’s Anatomy” than either “Men in Trees” or “Six Degrees”) will premiere Thursday, Nov. 22 at 10 p.m. before moving to its new time period, 10 p.m. Mondays, on Nov. 26.

Likewise, ABC’s critically reviled (and, given its lame ratings, odd choice for renewal) “Notes from the Underbelly” will return on that same Monday, at 9:30, moving “Samantha Who?” to 9 p.m. “Dancing With the Stars” spinoff “Dance War” (we got just a taste of it this past week with Marie Osmond’s collapse) is scheduled to debut Monday, Jan. 7 at 8 p.m.

ABC’s also flipping “20/20” and “Men in Trees”’ timeslots on Friday starting next week. The programming executives at ABC are earning their paychecks, or at least trying to.

We’ve previously discussed the fairly appalling Glenn Beck’s fairly appalling bit of whimsy about liberals’ homes burning in Southern California. The bit that hacked off Southern Californians – and right-thinking people – as one was this bon mot on his nationally syndicated radio show:

“I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today.”

Beck has a history of speaking off the top of his head without letting his brain get in the way. He’s called Mexican immigrants “dirt bags” and survivors of Hurricane Katrina “scumbags.” He called Cindy Sheehan, who became an anti-war activist after losing her son in Iraq, a “prostitute” and Hillary Clinton a “stereotypical bitch.”

But hey, if pressed, he can find something mean to say about white males, as well: He called former President and Nobel Peace Prize winner Jimmy Carter a “waste of skin.”

MediaMatters.org, a group whose members must have cast-iron stomachs to be able to listen to this kind of detritus in order to report on the more egregious examples of irresponsible speech, first unveiled the quote from Beck, who is also employed by CNN Headline News (that famous bastion of the “liberal media”) to spew his ill-considered bile. Once the toothpaste was out of the tube – or, more appropriately in Beck’s case, once the excrement was out of the rectum – Beck and his minions scrambled to try to reinsert it, with some brilliantly ill-conceived damage control.

First, Chris Balfe, Beck’s radio show’s producer, attempted to deflect attention away from what Beck actually said by responding, “To most rational people, ‘unfortunately’ still means unfortunately.”

Well, except that Beck didn’t just say, “unfortunately;” he said, “unfortunately, for them,” meaning the liberals he insists hate America so much. Not “unfortunately for Americans who hate to see fellow Americans suffer.”

And anyway, Beck returned to his radio show to argue in utter contradiction to Balfe’s explanation: He was just making a funny, Beck explained:

“When you listen to this program – I hate to break it to, you know, those who don't listen to the show, but if they ever would listen to the show, let me give you a little piece of advice: You have to engage what I like to call ‘your brain.’ You actually have to think. I might be making a joke. I might be serious. We joke a lot about, you know, the Hollywood crowd living in Southern California. For example, I believe I have advocated Hollywood building giant air conditioners so they can fix the global-warming problem. I'm pretty sure I was joking then.”

Ha, ha! And that, too, was Swiftian wit at its highest caliber! Got it? Beck’s on the cutting-edge of that ages-old brand of humor that pokes fun at the liberal loonies of Hollywood.

Leaving for a moment that engaging one’s brain or thinking are pretty much the last things Beck’d want a listener to do, lest they reflect for a second or two and realize what drivel is pouring from his mouth: Beck’s saying he was just joking. He was being ironic in saying that it was “unfortunate” that liberals’ homes were being destroyed. (Though, as we’ve noted, a lot of conservatives have lost their homes in these wildfires, too, and Beck didn’t feel the need to snark or even opine that their losses were “unfortunate.”)

He continued:

“But you wouldn't know that if you hadn't engaged your brain.”

Condescending much?

“So let me be serious for a minute. Let me extraordinarily clear. I clearly do not want anyone's house to be burned down. Now, some people may want to interpret what they think I mean, but that's what I mean. Some people want me to have said that I'm seriously happy about people losing their homes or that I somehow or another believe that they deserve to have their house burn down.”

So, while Balfe was insisting that Beck genuinely meant that so-called America-haters losing their homes was “unfortunate,” Beck was insisting he was kidding when he said it was “unfortunate … for them.” Quite the neat trick, saying sort of the same thing from completely contradictory viewpoints.

Still: Beck was joking to a national audience about a tragedy that affected upwards to a million people as it was ongoing. Gee, if that’s not the very definition of douchebaggery, then I don’t know what is.

He concluded:

“I just can't believe that I live in a country where I have to explain that.”

Oh, don’t be so hard on yourself, Glenn: It’s people like you who’ve lowered the level of discourse in this country to such a primitive level that all sorts of folks can’t process a thought contradictory to their own philosophies. So, of course you can believe you live in such a country.

Now that that’s settled, let’s examine, in its full context, the screed in which Beck’s little japery occurred. What’s nifty about this is, it reveals Beck’s thought processes as being even more incoherent than they initially appeared, which under the circumstances is a pretty impressive trick.

Beck was assailing Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger for taking moderate positions – that is, any political ideology to the left of the far right.

“BECK: Schwarzenegger came out over the weekend and he said the Republicans need to run to the center and they need to grab the center. And the headline – I looked at it, and I went ‘OK, OK, what is this? What is this? Oh, it's Schwarzenegger. I'm probably going to disagree with it.’ And then I started reading it, and I absolutely disagreed with it. He said, they need to start talking about health care and education. That's not the way to win.

"‘Let's talk about health care and education?’ That's not the way to win. That's not the way to win on any front.”

Got it? Discussing issues of utmost importance to virtually all Americans is not the way to win an election. Back to Beck:

“I'm not even talking about -- the least I care about is winning the election. How about winning the war? How about saving our country?”

The least he cares about is winning the election? Clearly, that was originally what he was discussing. And he apparently believes that one can’t save the country by making sure people have adequate health care and their children get good educations. And he clearly believes that America isn’t competent enough to manage to help its own and win the war in Iraq simultaneously. So who’s hating on America now, Glenn?

Back to Beck:

“And, you know, it made me think.”

Oh, please, Glenn – don’t get our hopes up. Beck:

“I want to make this very clear. When I say on the air, and I've said it a lot lately, that we need to come together and we need to get back into the center, we're being pushed on to the edges - I want you to understand, that is not on policies. I don't mean that we come in the center on policies. We come to the center on principles. We come back to the center of the melting pot, that we're all one America, that just because I disagree with you doesn't mean you hate America, and I love America. We all love America. We just disagree on how we should function, what we should do, big government, small government.”

Well, certainly, Glenn, we can all return to the center with wingnuts like you insulting every Democrat, woman, liberal, minority and poor person in sight. Sounds like another famous American who promised to be a “uniter, not a divider,” and look where we are today. And how, exactly, does one return to the center on principles but not policies? This smacks of quintessential “We could all get along if you’d just agree with me.”

And now, time for a quick and utter and utterly baffling change of topic.

“It doesn't mean you hate America. I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today.”

Even Beck himself seems to backpedal from the harshness of this last declaration:

“There are a few people that hate America. But I don't think the Democrats are those. I think there are those posing as Democrats that are like that. But you don't come into the center. You have to stand up for what you believe in.”

Wait, wait: from “I've said it a lot lately, that we need to come together and we need to get back into the center,” to “But you don't come into the center – you have to stand up for what you believe in” in 20, 30 seconds of jabbering? My head is spinning; I can only imagine what Beck’s was doing while he was sputtering all of this nonsense.

A high-school English teacher would give Beck’s little essay/soliloquy a C-minus, at best, for its convolutions and lack of logic. But she might’ve actually kinda sorta appreciated his use of irony, no matter how poor its taste was.

“Unfortunately,” Beck doesn’t own real estate in the hills of San Diego County, or maybe we wouldn’t’ve been subjected to his latest round of boobery.

As “nip/tuck,” which returns for a fifth season Tuesday on FX, is moving its action from Miami to Los Angeles, it’s a perfect time for a brazen publicity stunt! And sure enough, the good folks at FX have cooked up one for Angelinos.

They’ve set up a faux office-front for McNamara/Troy, the good (?) doctors’ new digs, on level two at Hollywood and Highland, complete with holograms of stars Dylan Walsh and Julian McMahon attending to patients. On Thursday, from 6:30-8:30 p.m., Walsh and McMahon will be on hand to assess the holographic makeovers on their doppelgangers. They’ll also sign autographs and, no doubt, magnanimously give you tips as to what kind of plastic surgery you would most likely benefit from. You’ll go for the star sighting, but stay for the personal insults!

Poor Larry David: Not only has his real-life wife, Laurie, dumped him, but now his fantasy TV wife Cheryl (Cheryl Hines) has, too. (How doomed are we if our fantasy lives can’t even manage to end well?)

On Sunday’s episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” Larry’s just slightly more pr!ckish than usual, ignoring his wife as she fearfully calls from a plane in turbulence, expecting to die, and interrupting her to ask some mundane questions about their TiVo service.

When she gets home, still rattled by the experience, she tells Larry she’s had it; she’s leaving. Larry, of course, is incredulous: He’s so thoughtful, he points out, that he “saved all your shows” on TiVo.

“People ask me all the time, ‘How do you stay with him?’” Cheryl responds. “I always tell them, ‘There’s another side you don’t see.’ But then I realized, there’s no other side.”

The rest of the episode is devoted to the fallout of that decision, as most of Larry’s friends opt to take Cheryl’s side. Naturally, this will be fodder for the show the remainder of the season.

David was cagey about this plot development at July’s TV Press Tour. Clips from the episode – including Larry blowing off Cheryl while she’s on her seemingly doomed plane ride – were shown. At one point, someone rather tackily asked:

“Larry, what are you worth, like
$10 billion now? Can you buy HBO at this point?”

To which David cheerfully responded, “Well, I've just been cut in half. I don't know if you're aware of that. My worth has just been cut in half. It's not that much anymore.”

Which inspired this question: “If you do come back for a 7th season since there is such a thin line between TV Larry and real Larry, would you and Cheryl have marital problems?

LARRY DAVID [Indicates Cheryl]: Too bad you're going to be off the show.

(Laughter.)

Oh, what a shame.

CHERYL HINES: What a way to find out.

LARRY DAVID: Good idea for a 7th season, by the way. That's a good idea.

Laurie, the environmentalist and one of the producers of the Oscar-winning Al Gore documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” may be getting out just in time. A recent New Yorker column revealed that a group therapist has used episodes of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” to help his patients:

“Roberts considers Larry David to be the perfect proxy for a schizophrenic person. ‘On his way into his dentist’s office, he holds the door open for a woman, and, as a result, she’s seen first,’ he said. ‘He stews, he fumes, he explodes. He’s breaking the social rules that folks with schizophrenia often break.’ He went on, ‘Or the one where Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen invite Larry and his wife to a concert: the night arrives, they don’t call, Larry assumes they don’t like him, then it turns out he got the date wrong. It’s a classic example of a major social cognitive error—jumping to conclusions—that schizophrenic patients are prone to.’ As the patients watched David flub situation after situation, they laughed, and they willingly discussed with Roberts how they might behave in the same circumstances. ‘That bald man made a mountain out of a molehill!’ one woman called out during a session.”

She had no idea: Larry’s turned life’s irksome molehills into mountains of cash, and just as the gossip mills have taken molehills of innuendo and transformed them into mountains of semi-scandal, Larry incorporated that into Sunday’s episode, as well. Cheryl’s already dating, and when Larry tries to date Lucy Lawless, well, you don’t need me to tell you it doesn’t end well.

So, ladies: Larry’s available! But before you say yes to that romantic first date, be sure to pay very close attention to his behavior on every episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” And then consider real-life Larry’s words:

“I can get away with that because there's a very fine line between TV Larry and me. Very close, very close. … I really love (my character). I love that guy because he says everything that I'm thinking and feeling and he doesn't have to behave in a way that society really wants everybody to behave, and I decided I love being that honest. I wish I could be that way in my life. It's easier for me now because of the show to actually -- I'm getting closer to him every day. Let's put it that way.”

ABC’s “Pushing Daisies” became the fourth new show to get a full-season pickup (following The CW’s “Gossip Girl,” ABC’s “Private Practice” and CBS’s “The Big Bang Theory”).

Let’s check out the networks’ batting average when it comes to new shows, shall we?

ABC: 4 for 8, a slugger-like .500. (Successes or nominal successes: “Private Practice,” “Pushing Daisies,” “Samantha Who?”, “Women’s Murder Club.” Disappointments: “Cavemen,” “Carpoolers,” “Dirty Sexy Money,” “Big Shots.”)

CBS: A wan 1 for 5, for a Mendoza-line .200.
(Nominal success: “Big Bang Theory.” Nominal disappointments: “Cane,” “Moonlight.” Disappointment: “Kid Nation.” Disaster: “Viva Laughlin.”)

NBC: An O-fer whiff.
(Disappointments: “Chuck,” “Bionic Woman.” Bigger disappointments: “Journeyman,” “Life.”)

Fox: A big O-fer whiff.
(Disappointing, but we’ll stick with it anyway: “Kitchen Nightmares.” Disappointments: “K-Ville,” “Back to You.” Disasters: “Search for the Next Great American Band,” “Nashville.”)

The CW: A huge O-fer whiff. (Mainly because of what they’ve come to dub a success.)
(Not altogether disappointing, but still: “Reaper.” Disappointing, but they’ll label it a success: “Gossip Girl.” Disasters: “CW Now,” “Online Nation.” Disaster victim: “Life is Wild.”)

Unlike politicians, who parlay books they've "written" into runs for office, Stephen Colbert is using his well-hyped run for the Presidency (placing himself on the ballot, in both Republican and Democratic races, in his home state of South Carolina) to sell his book.

And it's working: "I Am America (And So Can You!)" is currently at No. 4 on Amazon.com's bestseller list. Only three books that could be construed as "political" are in the Top 50, underscoring how sick of it all people are these days.

Also underscoring how sick people are of politics as usual these days are the political pundits who are actually bothering to pay Colbert some heed.

Washington Post political blogger Chris Cillizza cites a poll that finds Colbert a mere 37.7% behind frontrunner Hillary Clinton, and, with 2.3% support, actually ahead of Gov. Bill Richardson (2.1 percent), Rep. Dennis Kucinich (2.1 percent) and former Sen. Mike Gravel (less than 1 percent) in the Democratic race. He fares far less well in the Republican race, with less than one percent of registered Republicans supporting his bid (placing him behind even the fringiest of fringe candidates, Ron Paul and Tom Tancredo), but it's hard to imagine many Republicans pleased to see their political philosophies mocked as ruthlessly as Colbert manages on a weeknightly basis.

And then there's Joshua Green of The Atlantic, the new poster boy for Guy With Too Much Time On His Hands. Green almost obsessively crunches numbers - heck, forget that "almost" - to tell you precisely what I could've told you without going to the bother of even glancing in the general direction of a calculator: Colbert doesn't stand a chance.

But then, Green reverses himself and says: Not so fast.

"Here things get a little more interesting. I can't point to anything other than truthiness, but I believe the 'drunken college student' demographic is being overlooked. Anecdotal evidence lends support. 'I'm surprised how many students seem to get their news from Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert,' Blease admitted. 'In the grand tradition of student mischief, you could see Colbert having a pied-piper effect.' Indeed, state law doesn't require voters to register until 30 days before the primary, so there's plenty of time for a Colbert wave to sweep South Carolina. And because South Carolina doesn't have party registration, the independents--who, according to Scarborough Research, are Comedy Central's largest voter demographic, narrowly beating out Democrats--can vote in either primary.

Green even posits credible-sounding strategies aimed at landing Colbert at least one delegate from the state's representative voting pool, thereby allowing him to attend both the Republican and Democratic primaries. (Did I say Green has too much time on his hands? Let me restate that: Apparently bereft of a job, friends, family, hobbies or a TV to distract him, Green has nothing but time on his hands and a profound inability to prioritize how said time might best be spent.) To wit:

"In the Republican primary, Colbert should focus on the First District, which stretches along the coast from Colbert's hometown of Charleston up to Myrtle Beach. Besides being most likely to respond to the 'native son' gambit, the heavily conservative district's voters tend to be upscale economic conservatives rather than social conservatives (Colbert's appeal is stronger with the first group). The district also encompasses plenty of colleges and universities, including the Citadel, where Colbert's 'patriotism' might yield votes, provided no one spots the scare quotes. The district also has a pronounced weakness for political gimmicks. Its congressman, Republican Henry Brown, got elected in 2000 after distributing 20,000 'Oh Henry!' candy bars to boost name recognition.

"In the Democratic primary, Colbert's best bet is the Second District, which encompasses most of the capital city of Columbia, and, more important, has the highest concentration of college students. Though it's less Democratic than the Sixth District, it has a far higher proportion of white voters, which, in a Democratic primary, is exactly who Colbert needs to target. Even better, Columbia is its own media market. Colbert probably won't have Obama-like fundraising prowess. But an Internet campaign ought to be able to raise enough cash to run a few well-targeted ads (here again the drunken-college-student demographic could prove valuable)."

Here's a risk-vs-rewards question: Do you think the Democrats should invite Colbert to speak at their convention next year? That lands them all the hip credibility needed to lock up the under-30 vote; on the other hand, there's the ever-present danger that Colbert could bite the hand that feeds him, much as he did last year at the White House Correspondents Dinner.

At any rate, it would make for some riveting TV, and might just cajole a few people into watching the convention, if just for 20 minutes. Start sending your cards and letters requesting air time for Colbert to Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee and Rahm Emmanuel, chairman of the Democratic Caucus, now!

You know that sci-fi-themed Monday night that looked like a decent bet for NBC as the fall season kicked off? Eh, not so much.

“Chuck” hit series ratings lows Monday – so much for disheartened “Prison Break” fans heading over to the show en masse – and even “Heroes” is gasping for air, luring a mere 10.7 million viewers, which may be an all-time low for it. As for “Journeyman,” buy him a one-way ticket to the past; he’s done: 6.28m viewers, almost bad enough to make one nostalgic for the 7+m “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” routinely got.

But there’s some good news: “Samantha Who?” did just as well in its second outing as it did in the first, with 14.35m viewers, retaining an acceptable chunk of its “Dancing with the Stars” lead-in. (Who’s gonna go with the gimme-some-sympathy feint and faint on the show next week?) It’s the only new show to manage that feat, and though a lot of people are dismissing it as a hit only because of its timeslot (hey, “Big Shots” isn’t retaining its “Grey’s Anatomy” lead-in), it’s so far the highest-rated new show of the year. How it fares once “DWTS” goes away will, of course, be a crucial indicator of its longterm viability. But I find Ms. Applegate and her cast funny and the writing thusfar amusing, so maybe it can survive.

Thoughts?

Forget “Boston Legal” tonight: ABC will air a one-hour primetime special tonight on the California wildfires anchored by Charles Gibson from Rancho Bernardo. “California Burning” will air live at 10 tonight on the East Coast and then live again, with updated reports, at 10 p.m. on the West Coast. “Nightline,” at 11:35 p.m., will offer continued coverage.

Meanwhile, professional @sshat and CNN Headline News bloviator Glenn Beck is glad California’s going up in flames, declaring on his show yesterday:

“I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today. There are a few people that hate America. But I don't think the Democrats are those. I think there are those posing as Democrats that are like that.”

Beck really gets off on disasters: While New Orleans was still under water after Katrina, he called survivors of the hurricane “scumbags,” adding for good hateful measure, "I didn't think I could hate victims faster than the 9-11 victims."

And anyway, as the Daily News’ Mariel Garza points out, many of the homes getting destroyed belong to America-loving conservatives. Oh, well, thanks for playing, Glenn.

In 1820, Hans Christian Oersted wrote:

“Two TV shows air opposite one another.
“A viewer wonders, ‘Which is worth my time?’
“A newspaper editor decides, ‘Perhaps we should inform that viewer as to what is worthy. Or, perhaps we should create a media machine rife with hype and hyperventilation, because someone needs to deconstruct that “Leave Britney Alone” guy.’
“And Television Criticism is thusly born.”

*

In 1966, Stanley Jaki wrote:

“A man loves a woman.
“The woman does not love him.
“The man takes her lack of affection to be a criticism of his essential being and, furthermore, vows to become an expert at the art of criticism. Which is to say, he decides to become a TV critic.
“When, in fact, the woman did not judge the man at all; she simply recognized the fact that they were not compatible companions.”

*

In 1900, David Hilbert wrote:

“If a show entitled ‘According to Jim’ enjoys high ratings, then it by definition must be good.
“If a show entitled ‘Arrested Development’ suffers low ratings, then it by definition cannot be good.
“A definite number of logical steps can never lead to contradictory results.”

*

In 1931, Kurt Godel wrote:

“We must grapple with this quandary:
“Can that which is popular be good?
“Can that which is good be popular?
“That which is vaguely popular with the masses enjoys a cultural friction with that which is intensely popular with niches in the audience.
“Therefore, any effectively generated theory capable of expressing elementary aesthetics cannot be both consistent and complete.”

*

In 1888, Richard Dedekind wrote:

“A TV Critic in Duluth is experiencing family problems.
“She watches a new Television Show, and dislikes it strongly, but wonders if her dislike may be a by-product of her currently woeful lot in life and her emotional negativity in general. So, in keeping with the notion of gleichmäßig konvergent, she imbues the program with a nominally positive review.
“But in actuality, she was right: The show sucked.”

*

In 1898, Jacques Hadamard wrote:

“If a butterfly flaps its wings in Port-au-Prince, it will cause a tsunami in Sumatra.
“If Anderson Cooper reports from the location and perspires less profusely than Aaron Brown, he will be declared by critics the new voice of TV news, until, inevitably, he will not be.”

*

Also in 1898, Giuseppe Peano wrote:

“Men who create Television consider themselves large and powerful beings (and, indeed, they are men, because women are too tremulous to create Television, unless it’s something like “Men in Trees”).
“They consider men who criticize Television to be small and insignificant beings, for they lack the wherewithal and contacts to go on to greater things.
“Therefore, men who create Television deem themselves worthy of the bully pulpit they have been granted, even if the Television they have created concerns vampires solving crimes in Los Angeles.”

*

In 1893, Henri Poincaré wrote:

“Given a system of arbitrarily enjoyable programming in the same time slot in which each attract viewers according to Nielsen’s law, under the assumption that no two shows ever appeal to similar viewers, only the TV Critic will try to find a representation of the coordinates of each point as a series in a variable that is some known function of time and for all of whose values the series converges uniformly.
“Until, that is, DVRs and online viewing become the vogue.”

*

In 2003, Solomon Feferman wrote:

“We are a species determined to investigate everything except that which truly makes us ourselves.
“A critic sails to China and travels along the Silk Road, broadening his perspective and enriching his soul. He returns home to discover he must write about a vampire-private-detective show. He puts out his eyes with an icepick.
“Did expanding his mind hurt or help the critic?
“If a critic fell in the Blogosphere, would anyone hear it?
“What’s with vampire-private detective shows, anyway?”

KABC’s 11 o’clock news was understandably all wildfires, all the time. (Working on a story on local coverage of the fires prevented blogging today.) Until, that is, they had to interrupt the news for a story about Marie Osmond fainting on “Dancing with the Stars.”

But they managed to tie even that bit of effluvium to the fires: They opted to blame her collapse, in part at least, to the smoke in the air affecting her asthma.

A most unfortunate precedent set here – in the coming days, expect the following news stories: “Is Paris Hilton’s Home Safe?” “Which is a Bigger Threat to Britney’s Kids: Her or the Wildfires?”; “Do the Wildfires Justify a Lindsay Relapse?”; “Celebrity Wildfire Losses Vs. Katrina’s Abandoned Impoverished: Who Should You Feel Sorry For?”

“Viva Laughlin” dropped precipitously in its second outing Sunday evening, to 6.77 million viewers, virtually none in the 18-49 demographic. That’s down more than two million from its anemic debut, down four and a half million from its lead-in, down four million from its timeslot viewership a year ago and down 1.6 million viewers in the course of the hour itself.

If this hasn’t been cancelled by the time you read this, CBS executives must be taking the day off, their eyes too blinded by their tears.

* UPDATE: Sure enough, at about 1 p.m. CBS sent out this press release:

THE AMAZING RACE, winner of five consecutive Emmy Awards for Outstanding Reality Competition Series, returns for its 12th edition on the CBS Television Network, Sunday, Nov. 4 (8:00-9:00 PM, ET/PT).

Editors Note: THE AMAZING RACE replaces "Viva Laughlin" which has been pulled from the schedule. A rebroadcast of CSI will air in the Sunday (8:00-9:00 PM) time period on Oct. 28.

The reviews are in, and The Mayor of Television’s magnum opus “The History of Television (A History of Television)” is a hit!

Well, they can say it about crummy movies and barely-watched TV shows, so why can’t I say it about my little labor of love?

“The History of Television (A History of Television)” was written in response to PBS’s announcement that it was producing a multi-part documentary about television. It was Your Mayor’s (bafflingly unsuccessful) attempt to get hired as a talking head on the project. Several of the facts within my history were true.

Behold these raves:

From a fellow TV critic: “This History of Television thing is fantastic. I want to co-write that book with you, as I love piggybacking on those who already have done the early heavy lifting and idea-creating.”

From someone who’s worked in TV: “I enjoyed your history of television; the not-so-heavy irony, of course, is that your series says much, much more about the current state of the medium than anything that will materialize on PBS.”

From a literary agent: “This is funny material.”

Oh, wait, there’s more, dammit.

From the same literary agent: “Unfortunately, I don't have confidence that it would work in book form, at least to the degree of commercial success that major publishers are looking for to take on a new project.”

Hey, I didn’t say I was looking for a major publisher. Just one that’d pay me in cash, under the table.

Just in case you missed it (it ran in August, so you might’ve been on vacation and therefore too busy being leisurely to consult this blog, for which you’re forgiven), here it is in its entirety.

Chapter One: Origins and Afterbirth of a New Medium.

Chapter Two: A Nation Chuckles: The ’50s.

Chapter Three: A Nation Continues to Chuckle: The ’60s.

Chapter Four: A Nation Doesn’t Chuckle So Much: The ’70s.

Chapter Five: It’s Just One Damn Golden Age After Another.

Chapter Six: Nothing is Ever the Same Again.

Chapter Seven: The Terrorists Win: Reality TV.

Chapter Eight: TV in the Naughts – and Nowhere Beyond, Because We’ll All Soon Be Dead.

A pathetic, last-ditch effort to get PBS to hire me: Supplemental Chapter: PBS: Television’s Savior.

PBS, it’s not too late: I’ve already gotten a head start on that coffee-table book that’ll inevitably accompany your production. Give me a call. I’m sure we can do business and, more importantly, make great Television together!

Don’t expect “Viva Laughlin” to last long (and don't expect many to care). Its debut last night reached only 8.8m people, only 42% of the large audience granted it by “CSI.” On Sundays, it’ll inevitably get trounced.

On the other hand, CBS has picked up its sitcom “The Big Bang Theory” for the full season, and ABC has granted New Agey life sustenance to “Private Practice” for the entire season.

Not so good news over at Fox, where “New Amsterdam,” which was bounced off the fall schedule to serve as a midseason replacement, has had its episode count cut back from 13 to seven.

Much good news today for Jon Stewart fans: The comic, whose contract with Comedy Central was set to expire just after the 2008 Presidential election, has re-upped for two more years. He'll continue to bring you fake news with more context than the real news through 2010.

Also, if you've ever missed an episode of "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" (or even one back when Smirky McWhatsisname, Craig Kilborn, was host), fret not: Every damn episode is going to be available online. The site, thedailyshow.com, is up but doesn't seem to be working yet. But be patient and soon you'll be able to gorge yourself silly.

Since Wednesday nights boast the most new shows of any evening on the schedule, it might be instructive to see how all these shows are faring.

Answer: So-so. “Pushing Daisies” and “Private Practice” look to have established themselves. “Dirty Sexy Money,” “Back To You” and “Kid Nation” have all stabilized, albeit at unimpressive levels of viewership which keep their survival in question. “Bionic Woman” and “Life” continue to lose viewers, while “Gossip Girl” remains the disappointment it’s been all along (and still: the first new series to get a full-season pick-up!).

And the second series to do so: Fox’s “Kitchen Nightmares,” which isn’t doing great but isn’t tanking and, besides, it’s inexpensive to produce.

None of these shows – not even “Private Practice,” the “Grey’s Anatomy” spinoff – win their time periods. Old warhorses “Criminal Minds,” “CSI: New York” and (urp) “Deal or No Deal” refuse to cede ground to the fresher blood.

Oh, and a split-second of semi-respectful silence, please, for “Online Nation,” the second cancellation of the young season (behind Fox’s “Nashville,” which you’ve probably already forgotten about). Seems people know how to tool around on the Internets without the assistance of insanely happy TeeVee hosts with very white teeth, thank you very much.

This review somehow didn’t get into print, so we’ll toss it up here.

“Granny D” isn’t a rapper (it’d be a good name for one though, no?), but she nearly has the energy and drive of one. HBO’s modest, charming documentary “Run Granny Run” introduces America to New Hampshire’s favorite elder stateswoman: Doris “Granny D” Haddock, who at age 89 traversed the country on foot to raise awareness for campaign reform and, in 1994, at age 94, ran a quixotic campaign for the U.S. Senate in New Hampshire.

Haddock entered the campaign a mere four months before Election Day with no money but a lot of moxie. She went up against the well-oiled and –funded machinery of Republican incumbent Judd Gregg, was all but spurned by her Democratic Party, and tooled around the state in a camper trailer reading “Vote Dammit!” across its front.

Despite her age – in one scene, she’s gasping for breath as she walks from one campaign stop to another; in another, she fumbles through a rehearsal for her debate with Gregg – her grassroots, anti-special-interests platform somehow resonated with some voters.

Director/producer Marlo Poras paints an affectionate portrait of Haddock though her campaign clearly flirts with disarray. She even ratchets up the suspense in the build-up to Haddock’s debate with Gregg: The night before, she earnestly prays, “Dear God, please don’t let me make a fool of myself tomorrow.” On the way to debate, she forgets her dentures. Fearing the worse, her campaign manager says he wants to watch the debate with a sandwich, a beer and a “.38 revolver.”

Haddock doesn’t win – this gives away nothing if you follow politics even a bit – but she more than acquits herself nicely. “Run Granny Run” celebrates political idealism and makes you wish more ordinary citizens had “Granny D’s” courage and conviction.

- “Run Granny Run:” 9 tonight; also 10:45 a.m. Saturday, 12:15 p.m. and 7:15 p.m. Oct. 24, 5 p.m. Oct. 27; HBO.

We've championed AMC's new series "Mad Men" from the beginning, and we've hardly been the only one - virtually everyone has declared this show the best series of the year. It helped, of course, that it was created by a "Sopranos" staff writer, Matthew Weiner. It didn't help, naturally, that it aired on AMC, a network heretofore not associated with top-drawer TV.

And tonight, the show's first season comes to a low-key conclusion. Last week's episode had the high drama of a season finale; this episode feels a little like a eulogistic epilogue with a side order of springboard for next season but is no less affecting. AMC's publicity machine has respectfully requested that critics not give anything away, though we sort of did that last week when we verified a theory we made the week before, though, truth be told, it wasn't anything that anyone paying close attention wouldn't've figured out on their own.

Suffice it to say that Don Draper's (Jon Hamm) actions are facing even further repercussions, playing out in an agonizing fashion. Tonight's episode is memorable thanks to Don's ruefully ruminative and powerfully personal sales pitch to Kodak on their new slide projector, one which genuinely drags the art of advertising into the realm of art. One character bolts from the room after his presentation to conceal his tears, and, honestly, that response doesn't seem all that unjustified.

The Age of Artifice is over, Don realizes, though it may do him no good personally.

Pete's (Vincent Kartheiser) still a weasel, it should prove a spoiler to no one who's been paying attention, though his win-some/lose-some ratio takes an unexpected turn.

So, we're left with the quandary: We agree that "Mad Men" is brilliant, and we acknowledge that Emmy voters do all they can to avoid giving major awards to basic-cable programming. How to sell, Sterling-Cooper-style, TV Academy members on giving the Emmy to this show?

One might start with critics' blurbs for insertion in the trade-publication ads such as this: "I recommend extraordinary rendition for any Emmy voter who doesn't get behind 'Mad Men'" - The Mayor of Television.

But everyone does that. AMC's going to have to be far cleverer than that. Suggestions?

- "Mad Men:" 10 tonight, AMC.

(Whatever will I write about on Thursdays now?)

OMG, you guys: Ellen DeGeneres’s beloved (by people other than her) pooch Iggy has already found a new home!:

“Keith A. Fink, the attorney for Mutts and Moms owner Maria Batkis … said that another home has been found for the dog although he was not able to say for certain that the dog has been physically given to the new owner yet.”

This being Hollywood, lawsuits have been threatened. Ellen’s publicist Kelly Bush left a message on Batkis’ phone machine, which was played this morning on “Good Morning America:”

“We’re filing a legal case against you. We’re going to be contacting the media. This is not going to be good for your store or your organization.”

Fink (unfortunate name in this case, but appropriate for an attorney) replied: “If Ellen’s object was to destroy my client to get her way she has done that. My client is destroyed.”

As goes Mr. Fink’s client, so goes the nation.

I admit it: I’ve been watching the baseball playoffs. And I can state one thing categorically: Thank God the Rockies swept, if only because that means an end to those “Frank TV” promos.

Frank Caliendo is some impersonator – maybe you’ve seen him doing those John Madden impressions during Fox’s Sunday football coverage – and he’s going to have a late-night show on TBS. A little of him can go a long way, and during TBS’s baseball coverage, there was a lot of him.

And OK, I’ll concede that his Madden is kind of funny. But some of the other spots that ran ubiquitously during baseball were, well, maddening.

He does George W. Bush, but then, everyone does Bush. His Jack Nicholson is about as accomplished as one you’d hear from a drunk in a bar. His Robin Williams is so good he has to preface it with “It’s me, Robin Williams” (like a bad editorial cartoonist who has to write “Cheney” across the chest of his sketch of the Vice President). It took me a while to get that he was doing Al Pacino. And there’s one that I guess is supposed to be Robert De Niro (but then, even Robert De Niro doesn’t do a good Robert De Niro anymore).

Of course, it didn’t help that all the spots had to be baseball-themed; there’s just so much you can do with that, so maybe I was cringing more at the material than the impressions. But make no mistake: I was cringing at the impressions, too.

It just seems so Rich Little, like something my grandfather would laugh at were my grandfather still alive to laugh at insipid things. Impressionists skirt by on recognition gags far more than other comics, who have to develop material that’s actually funny.

So what do I get in the mail today? Auuugggh! A “Frank TV” clock! Or at least a very good imitation of a clock. With not one but four pictures of the guy in his various guises. Anyone want to take this thing off my hands?

And what do I find in amongst my Email? Double auuugggh! An invitation to a taping of a “Frank TV” episode! At least they’re offering cocktails with Frank – or someone very much like him – afterwards; if you sat through 90 minutes of that, you’d need a few drinks, too.

*

Oh, and those Dane Cook promos for the baseball playoffs are pretty annoying, too.

And what’s up with those commercials for some investment company with the tagline: “Never outlive your money?” Uh, given the number of people in debt in this country, can this commercial be interpreted as a call for mass suicide?

*

What do you think? Have you seen this guy’s act? Am I missing something?

Hard to decide where to come down on this whole Ellen DeGeneres/puppy scandal (love the headline on the link: “Ellen DeGeneres dog drama sends America into a spin”).

For the uninitiated (all two of you), Ellen broke down sobbing on her show yesterday, boo-hoo-hooing that she had adopted a puppy and it didn’t get along with her cats so she gave it to her hairdresser (who she sees every day) and her daughters who love love love the puppy but the rescue group she got it from said we have a firm no-re-gifting-of-puppies policy ’round these parts so they took the puppy away and everyone’s bawling and if I cry enough in front of America you should be guilt-tripped into giving the puppy back but they didn’t and now they’re getting death threats and stuff.

On the one hand: Some of these rescue groups can be pretty d!ckish. I’ve heard a lot of nightmare stories from people on this issue, the worst from a friend whose dog was killed by a coyote (clearly, it’s all her fault for living in Silver Lake, where the roving gangs of coyotes routinely break out of their habitat at the reservoir to go feasting on neighborhood pets) – when she approached one group to adopt a new dog, not only did the woman turn her down (though, like a lot of dog owners, she’s a very doting mom), but the woman cruelly told my friend that she was just interested in getting another dog so it could serve as coyote kibble, as well. The group from which I got my dog was cool, though they did come in and set up some restraining leashes, long and short, inside my place and have a lot of awfully specific requirements (no walking leash would do except for a six-foot leather leash).

(Hey, they’re having a fun-run fundraiser, by the way, at the Rose Bowl.)

But I digress. The point of these groups is to place abandoned and stray dogs in the hands of people who like dogs, you’d think, not to play bouncer at the Roof Bar at the Standard and arrogantly deny everyone access past the velvet rope to the puppies on the other side.

On the other hand, DeGeneres’ performance was a little over-the-top and more than a little cruelly calculated: She knows her fan base, and she knew that if she pulled this stunt on the air, the inevitable resulting outrage would mean she was essentially shaming the rescue group into letting her have her way – kill ’em with kindness, in other words. It was your standard bullying-celebrity “Don’t you know who I am?” act with a lachrymose spin.

Besides, the whole “I am not capable of coming out and pretending to be funny and ‘on’ when things are going so terribly wrong right now. I’m so sorry - I’m just not able to pretend” thing feels pretty calculated. Every professional on the planet deals with stuff far worse than this and manages to do their damn job anyway and oh sweet Jesus the Lakers are going to trade away Kobe no no NO NO no please don’t omigod it’s the end of the world please Jesus don’t let them trade him he’s KOBE!!!!!

sniff

That said: Give ’em the damn dog.

Michael Ian Black’s a funny guy. I thought he was great on Comedy Central’s terrific if too-arcane-for-the-masses series “Stella” and, before that, “The State.” You can’t escape him on VH1’s “I [HEART] the (insert decade here).” (On “Ed,” though, I coulda done without him, as well as without a lot of the rest of the show’s random smugness.)

So I thought, when I heard that he had recorded a stand-up comedy CD (distributed by Comedy Central Records), entitled (ironically, just guessing) “I Am a Wonderful Man,” that I’d be vaguely amused by it, as well.

Well. Was Your Mayor wrong. As wrong as he was when he married his first wife. (In my defense, my first wife was pretty; I don’t even have that defense with Mr. Black.)

On screen, Black pretty agreeably essays a twit who thinks, egregiously, that he’s cool. When you don’t have the visual of his face transmitting his sense of irony, all you get, basically, is the twit, and a misanthropic one, at that. In “I Am a Wonderful Man,” Black’s trying to be a social commentator but he’s woefully incapable of combining his sense of humor with anything resembling actual insight. “The Daily Show” need not sweat any competition herein.

Let’s just put it this way: When the most nominally clever line in your set is, “When you find yourself blowing a strange Pakistani guy at an airport men’s room, the terrorists have won,” you’re probably right: The terrorists likely have won. At the very least, the comedians have lost.

NBC’s “Today” show announced yesterday that next month its correspondents would traverse the ends of this earth, traveling pole to pole, ’round the Equator, and landing everywhere in between for a week of global hijinx beginning Nov. 5.

Hasn’t Michael Palin already done this, and numerous times?

Of course, NBC has found a different peg for this gimmick: its “green” initiative. (How better to conserve our natural resources than to fly your correspondents all over the planet, not in search of actual news stories, but just to be able to say you did?)

Perhaps if we absorb NBC’s publicity machine’s take on this tomfoolery, we’ll form another opinion. So here goes (some of the duller bits have been excised):

“In an historic broadcast first, NBC News’ ‘Today’ is taking an unprecedented look at our home, Planet Earth. ‘Today’ anchors will be dispatched – literally – to the ends of the earth to explore the extraordinary diversity of life on this planet – the climate extremes, the wildlife, and the limits of human exploration. This trip will culminate in the first live simultaneous broadcast in history from the top and bottom of the globe.

“Never before has a television network linked locations live around the entire circumference of the planet in a single groundbreaking program. ‘Today’ anchors will embark on a grueling trek to extreme destinations: Matt Lauer will travel to the very top of the globe, the Arctic, [editor’s note: Thanks for the clarification!] and broadcast from remote locations on the Greenland ice sheet; Ann Curry will travel to the very bottom of the globe, Antarctica, [editor’s very same note: Thanks for the clarification!] and broadcast from extreme locations including the McMurdo Research Station located at the southern end of ‘The Ice;’ Al Roker will travel to the Equator and broadcast from the middle of an endangered cloud forest in Mindo, Ecuador, 7,000 feet above sea level; Meredith Vieira will connect the global dots from ‘Today's’ home base in New York where she will take a look at how the global issues at these unique locations are affecting people across the United States.”

Hey, Discovery Channel won a bunch of Emmys with their "Planet Earth" miniseries, so why not?

The big question is: How did they decide who’d go where? Was someone rewarded? Was someone punished? Did Vieira draw the short straw and get forced to stay home, or was Curry instructed to share with her her frequent-flier miles?

And what the hell is an “endangered cloud forest?” Are clouds endangered? If a cloud scuds into another in a forest and no one is there to hear it, did it make a sound? If someone was there to hear it, did it make a sound?

When Your Mayor was in college, I worked at the college radio station and did the morning show with a friend of mine. We were like the thinking-person’s version of a “Morning Zoo” – just as goofy shtick, but at least we dispensed with the stupid sound effects (and, being a college station, played music that was actually good).

It was an election year, so one of our routines had me running for President. I don’t remember too much about the particulars, except that a running gag had me the victim of a number of assassination attempts (oh, so – well, there were some gun sound effects, but no bells or whistles or things that go whir-whir-whirrrr!), including one by my running mate. If memory serves, I survived them all.

It wasn’t until Election Day itself that we “discovered” that the 12th Amendment set the minimum age to be eligible for the Presidency at 35. This allowed me to bow out gracefully without having to concede defeat, though I have it on good authority I had one write-in vote in the state of Illinois.

Now, Stephen Colbert is stealing my shtick – just as my friend and I were stealing Pat Paulsen’s shtick – by announcing his own candidacy for President.

Colbert, while on a media tour hawking his new book, parodied the transparent coyness of candidates on the precipice of announcing.

When New York Times op-ed columnist Maureen Dowd hit upon the brilliant idea of handing her Sunday inches over to Colbert, therefore giving herself the day off, he declared, "I am not ready to announce yet — even though it's clear that the voters are desperate for a white, male, middle-aged, Jesus-trumpeting alternative."

While I congratulate Mr. Colbert on his burgeoning campaign being able to make more noise than my more modest effort ever did, I’d like to point out that at least I did not base mine upon a sh!tty movie.

And to those who might point to the notion that I, Alberto Gonzales-like, cannot recall many particulars of my campaign for the Presidency and proclaim that this suggests I must have spent my days in university in some sort of chemical fog, let me point out that I do remember many other salient facts. Such as: My friend and I wrote most of our comic material for the radio show during a class on the American Novel that we took together (mainly because said course was so friggin’ boring: The professor once read the opening sentence of Hemingway’s “A Farewell to Arms,” then portentously intoned, “Clearly, a beginning of things…”)

One radio bit had me expounding at ponderous length (imitating the pretentious intonations of said professor) on the old Ernie Bushmiller comic strip “Nancy.” Even then, I had a talent for deconstructing subtext even when there was none, which probably explains why I’ve become such a celebrated TV Critic.

Amy Sherman-Palladino used to be America’s QuipMaster General®: As creator of “Gilmore Girls,” she invented a vast reservoir into which jokes could be plunged, and at a rate more breathless than most of us could imagine.

But then, the reputation was tarnished. The CW wrested control of her show from her grasp and declined to allow her to contribute to its finale, which resulted in the conclusion of a series that not only p!ssed off her fans, but also annoyed everyone who had never watched the show but had to hear how lame its conclusion was.

All was righted, momentarily, it seemed, when Fox picked up her show “The Return of Jezebel James” as a midseason replacement comedy. Said series stars indie-film-darling Parker Posey as a high-strung if infertile publishing executive who recruits her slacker younger sister (Lauren Ambrose) to bear her child. Parker and Ambrose – you can just hear the quips flying.

Alas, Fox couldn’t. They’ve reduced their order of the series from an initial 13 to a mere 7, which essentially means the show has been cancelled before it’s ever been aired. Perhaps it should be entitled “The Abject, Humiliating Departure of Jezebel James.”

Hey, have you noticed that the level of political discourse in this country has achieved the level of sophistication usually reserved for feuds between Rosie O’Donnell and Donald Trump?

Well, of course you have. Last week’s disgraceful attacks on Graeme Frost, the 12-year-old kid who advocated for SCHIP insurance for children of families who couldn’t afford health care, pretty much underscored the fact that we’ve crossed the point of no return when it comes to partisan bickering. The idea that pundits will ever attempt to struggle thoughtfully with the issues has been abandoned in favor of ever more shrill rhetoric – “To heck with the particulars of our argument,” one side will screech, “the other side are stupid and ugly and drug-addicted pederasts!”

George Saunders, a particularly clever short-story author (“CivilWarLand in Bad Decline,” “Pastoralia,” “In Persuasion Nation”) – he’s a master at explicating the endless machete-ing through petty mounds of red tape – recently released a book of nonfiction (more or less) essays, “The Braindead Megaphone.” The title essay examines the current level of the punditidiocracy.

What Saunders has to say won’t be mistaken for a news bulletin, but it is an artfully sculpted argument, nuanced in a way that TV and radio’s talking heads never are. He names his antagonist Megaphone Guy, a guy who ventures out in public, starts shouting so that it’s tough to hear yourself think; his words may be gibberish, but since he is not smacked down for annoying the public with his gibberish, that makes it OK to do it some more, and suddenly we’re on a slippery slope to dumber public discourse.

Herewith, a bit of it:

“Last night on the local news I watched a young reporter standing in front of our mall, obviously freezing his ass off. The essence of his report was, Malls Tend to Get Busier at Christmas! …

“It sounded like information, basically. He signed off crisply, nobody back at NewsCenter8 or wherever laughed at him. And across our fair city, people sat there and took it, and I believe that, generally, they weren’t laughing at him either. … Although what we had been told, we already knew, although it had been told in banal language … we took it, and, I would say, it did something to us: made us dumber and more accepting of slop.

“Furthermore, I suspect, it subtly degraded our ability to make bold, meaningful sentences, or laugh at stupid, ill-considered ones. …

“And next time we hear someone saying something like, ‘We are pursuing this strategy because the other strategies, when we had considered them, we concluded that, in terms of overall effectiveness, they were not sound strategies, which is why we enacted the one we are now embarked upon, which our enemies would like to see us fail, due to they hate freedom,’ we will wait to see if the anchorperson cracks up, or chokes back a sob of disgust, and if he or she does not, we’ll feel a bit insane, and therefore less confident, and therefore more passive. …

“Now, why aggressive, anxiety-provoking, maudlin, polarizing discourse should prove more profitable than its opposite is a mystery. Maybe it’s a simple matter of drama: ranting, innuendo, wallowing in the squalid the exasperation of the already-convinced, may, at some crude level, just be more interesting than some intelligent, skeptical human being trying to come to grips with complexity. …

“In any event, the people who used to ask, ‘Is it news?’ now seem to be asking, ‘Will it stimulate?’ And the change is felt, high and low, throughout the culture.”

That’s why the cable-news networks still persist in granting people like Ann Coulter air time, to spew nonsense about the Jews or 9/11 widows: What she may say may lack the requisite level of pundit insight, and in fact may be patent nonsense, but it’s inevitably a cheap bid to get our attention, just like a grisly murder will on “Criminal Minds” or a graphic sex scene on “Tell Me You Love Me.” Coulter should be popular on the lecture circuit; she could even play a comedy club or two if she had the yen. But clearly, her punditry has devolved from hack partisanship to desperately jumping up and down and wailing, “Look at me!”

Saunders addresses this, as well: “To stay in the game, one must prove viable; to prove viable, one has to be watched; to be watched, one has to be watchable, and, in the news business, a convention of Watchability has evolved – a tone, a pace, an unspoken set of acceptable topics and acceptable relationship to these topics – that bears, at best, a peripheral relation to truth. …

“There’s a little slot on the side of the Megaphone, and as long as you’re allowed to keep talking into it, money keeps dropping out.”

“It just doesn’t matter.”
- Bill Murray, “Meatballs”

We previously discussed the potential writers strike looming over Hollywood, and now, we shall argue that the current p!ssing match between the Writers Guild and the AMPTP (which sounds like the noise a baby makes when spitting up) just may be based on an economic model that will become antiquated sooner rather than later.

Today’s Daily News story on Current TV, the thing for which Al Gore won the Emmy and not the Nobel Peace Prize, and the upgrade for Current.com that’ll expand the horizons of citizen journalism, points to a very tricky crossroads in the history of television. Current allows You The Viewer to become You The TV-Maker, and given how attractive that is to some people, it’ll no doubt draw a lot of people to the network. (Current’s research suggests that at this point already, before the launch of the new website, the average viewer watches the network 7.5 hours per week.)

What this won’t do, of course, is make these people rich anytime soon. Of course, the way things are going, the broadcast networks aren’t going to be making anyone rich in the future, either: Costs for producing a show seen by 7 million people on a broadcast network are much, much more than those for a show seen by 3 or 4 million on a cable network, and the overhead is exponentially costlier. As one acquaintance in the industry put it, “Pretty soon, they're going to have a better chance recovering production costs by buying millions of Powerball lottery tickets.”

Simply put, networks feed into a fading notion that a mass audience and a consensus culture is going to remain out there. But there’s very little to suggest that we’re going to do anything but continue siphon ourselves off further into niche entertainments that speak directly to us rather than homogenous, even condescending, entertainments aimed at those larger audiences that are getting smaller every day.

My friend noted, “In political science terms, I think what is going on is the realization that the masses are only the masses when a Joe Stalin, or Mao Zedong coerces them into a mass. Or when the FCC allows just three large providers to compete for different sizes of market share for the entire nation. But once coercion is not an option, and the American viewing public breaks up like the former Soviet Union did, then you can no longer compete for their attention by being the same –broadcast network model – but by being different. As Darwin said, no two cable networks can survive in the same niche.”

(Did he just compare Jeff Zucker to Stalin? Just sayin'.)

We’re still in the era of the Hollywood Gold Rush, but it’s a Gold Rush that was inspired by the explosion of Entertainment Lite, by the “Entertainment Tonight”-ization of the industry, which occurred when the people who came to town because they were inspired by the art of films of the 1970s were hip-checked by the people who came to town because they were inspired by the glamour and big-bucks of the ’80s and ’90s.

As niche entertainment becomes more pervasive, that inspiration to the art that occurred in the ’70s will re-emerge, albeit on a much smaller scale, while there’ll be fewer and fewer successful mainstream/blockbuster kinds of entertainment being made, particularly on TV. The enticement for those who come to town for the glamour and end up as P.A.’s and grips could eventually ebb when, in the future, as niche programming proliferates, people are making crap money working 16-hour-days on crap reality shows that are seen by only a few hundred thousand people nationwide, and having “a job in the industry” no longer has the same cachet it once did when trolling the bars.

So in the future, if you’re going to work in Television, you’re going to really want to work in Television and not be so enamored with the material rewards it so obviously produces these days.

Again, my friend: “When you're looking for a small audience, it has to be a passionate audience, and passion comes not from how slick your producers are, but how passionate they are. And since you can't buy passion, production costs drop commensurate with audience size.”

That Al Gore: He invented the Internets, and now he re-invented TV.

What do you think? Whither Television? Does the big picture include smaller productions? Please keep your responses to 30,000 words or fewer.

As the Writers Guild of America has been negotiating with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers on their new contract – their old one expires at the end of this month – talks have been going something like this:

WGA: We’d like more residuals from the sales of the DVDs we wrote for. And a couple of pennies or so for every dollar you make off of content we wrote that appears online.

AMPTP: Hmm, let me think; no. But tell you what we will do for you: We’ll strip away the royalties you’re already making. Deal?

WGA: No. (Both sides exit to address media.)

WGA/AMPTP (to sundry reporters): The fact that the other side is unwilling to budge on their ridiculous demands only proves they want to destroy Hollywood and are therefore utterly untrustworthy and don’t deserve to be in this great industry in the first place.

Well, at least they agree on one thing. So that’s a start.

*

If you think the networks are in a world of worry now, wait a few months into the impending conflagration that could be a Writers Guild strike, which everyone sort of seems resigned to at this point. One writer told me, “Every time you approach negotiations, you beat the war drums to a certain extent. You never say all is rosy or that a strike is off the table.”

But, he adds, “If it comes to a strike, it may be necessary. Damage to the industry may necessary.”

Asked about the WGA’s demands, he said, “Do I think that’s worth striking for even if it does profound damage to industry? Yes, I do.” Putting it mildly, he adds, “This is not going to be a cakewalk.”

In other words, get ready to bid adieu to Jon Stewart really soon, your favorite shows by the end of the year and settle in for a lot more bad reality TV.

*

The writer has always been subjected to an inferiority complex in Hollywood, both internally and externally. And part of the impending strike is to help make the writers feel good about themselves – to make them feel like partners in the creative process rather than worker drones.

Writers did prove their importance last time they struck, in 1988, but at a grave cost. Viewers abandoned the networks and discovered what cable had to offer, and once the networks were back up and running, nearly 10% of those viewers simply never returned to the networks. Viewer attrition has persisted over the years and, should a strike have a similar effect this time around – and it no doubt would, as cable TV has gotten much better and now there’s plenty of online content for people to immerse themselves in – the broadcast networks could find themselves serving audiences too small for them to remain financially viable.

So no one really won in that ’88 strike: The formula for residuals for video – then VHS – was established. People weren’t buying entire seasons of TV shows on VHS as they do with DVDs, and DVDs have become a major chunk of the money studios make off of movies. DVD residuals have become a major sticking point this time around, as has what to do about content consumed online, not least of which is, what portion of the $1.99 you paid for an episode of “The Office” should go to the writers?

AMPTP says, give us a few years to mull this one over. WGA says, we may not have a few years.

So this clash of civilizations has all sorts of repercussions.

“TV is truly at a watershed moment,” I was told. “Digital delivery has usurped broadcast. There’s a new form of entertainment threatening Hollywood from outside. Studios are struggling with how to confront that. In the next decade, we’ll look back at what happens over the next six to 12 months as a watershed moment. We’re potentially looking at a perfect storm.”

In my next missive, I’ll explain why none of this may actually matter.

Thanks to “Dancing with the Stars,” ABC’s new sitcom “Samantha Who?” had the highest rating of any sitcom this season, holding onto nearly 15 million of its lead-in’s 20.07m viewers. Heck, if memory serves, that’s the highest rating of any new show, more even than “Private Practice’s” debut.

Meanwhile, a few of those disgruntled “Prison Break” fans do in fact appear to have migrated over to NBC’s “Chuck,” as it perked up a bit this week, to No. 2 in the timeslot with 8.23m viewers and also No. 2 in the 18-49 demographic. News is not so good for NBC’s “Journeyman,” which is down to 7m. “Heroes” was OK with 11.26m and a No.-1 showing in the 18-49 demo.

This Just In: Dick Cheney is a secretive so-and-so intent on exploding the Constitution in order to do whatever it is he – er, sorry, the President – wants.

That’s the bulletin issued from tonight’s “Frontline” report, “Cheney’s Law,” from producer/writer/director Michael Kirk and producer/reporter Jim Gilmore. And if any of this is a shock to your system, then you just haven’t been paying any attention for the past six years. Of course, you have plenty of company.

In essence, “Cheney’s Law” issues as much of a scoop as Stephen Colbert’s proclamation last week that “Dick Cheney’s fondest pipe dream is driving a bulldozer into The New York Times while drinking crude oil out of Keith Olbermann’s skull.”

Which is not to say that “Cheney’s Law” is not useful: It provides something of a narrative throughline of White House antics over the past few years, connecting the dots from a series of reports that have trickled out over the years. It’s just that the report would’ve been more compelling had it included actual revelations, say, of Cheney’s secret robot army being developed in Paraguay or notes on how the fireballs that shoot out of his eyes have been upgraded to include the Ebola virus or something.

Kirk and Gilmore have explored Nexis/Lexis and Google sufficiently to find links to the Vice President to show how the White House circumvented Congress to enact America’s giddy new doctrines of torturing anyone that might look at an NSA official cross-eyed, to OK wire-tapping any American who might’ve dialed a wrong number to someone the government decides, rightly or wrongly, might have vague ties to a terrorist organization and to perpetuate the recently glossed-over scandal in which former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales politicized the Justice Department in order to perpetuate Republican rule forever and ever, amen. And, if they’re asked about any of this, to simply invoke executive privilege to get out of answering any question that might reveal any unseemly aspects of this operation.

They provide a historical timeline demonstrating Cheney’s – as well as his key aide and consigliore, David Addington’s – belief that whoever is Supreme Leader shouldn’t have to answer to anybody, which was Stalin’s philosophy too, if memory serves.

Anyway, so clearly the “Frontline” guys are not down with Cheney – they even got someone to wade through years of archival photographs to locate a bunch of photos of Cheney scowling that you may not have seen before. (They missed this classic, however.)

But the question remains: Who was doing this reportage before the country turned on the war in Iraq? Who brought these issues to light when the patriotism of those who questioned the Administration was challenged? Who with a sizable bully pulpit dared call shenanigans on all of this when it might’ve reversed public opinion when it mattered?

And who’s doing it effectively now? The New York Times’ Frank Rich, in his Sunday column, decided that the time was past for giving We The People a pass on overlooking key facts regarding Iraq:

“I have always maintained that the American public was the least culpable of the players during the run-up to Iraq. The war was sold by a brilliant and fear-fueled White House propaganda campaign designed to stampede a nation still shellshocked by 9/11. Both Congress and the press — the powerful institutions that should have provided the checks, balances and due diligence of the administration’s case — failed to do their job. Had they done so, more Americans might have raised more objections. This perfect storm of democratic failure began at the top.

“As the war has dragged on, it is hard to give Americans en masse a pass. We are too slow to notice, let alone protest, the calamities that have followed the original sin. …

“Our humanity has been compromised by those who use Gestapo tactics in our war. The longer we stand idly by while they do so, the more we resemble those “good Germans” who professed ignorance of their own Gestapo. It’s up to us to wake up our somnambulant Congress to challenge administration policy every day. Let the war’s last supporters filibuster all night if they want to. There is nothing left to lose except whatever remains of our country’s good name.”

- “Frontline: Cheney’s Law:” 9 tonight, KCET Channel 28.

I’m not sure how instructive a history of a network like UPN would ever be; nonetheless, look for “Season Finale: The Unexpected Rise and Fall of The WB and UPN” at a bookstore near you soon. Of course, one must call into question the veracity of the book – written by Susan Daniels, a former WB executive (now president of Entertainment at Lifetime) and Variety TV reporter Cynthia Littleton – beginning with its title: As far as I can remember, UPN never actually “rose” to anything of significance.

The press release perpetuates the confusion, calling the book “The Dramatic, Inside Story Behind Two Pioneering Television Networks.” Sure, if you call shows like “Pig Sty,” “Homeboys from Outer Space” and “The Secret Diaries of Desmond Pfeiffer” “pioneering,” which I decidedly do not.

To be sure, for a while there The WB was locked in; it had the keenest branding identity of anything on TV and attracted the most elusive audience out there – teenagers. And it had a lot of critically acclaimed shows, like “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “Gilmore Girls,” “Smallville,” “Dawson’s Creek” and “Everwood.”

UPN – well, it had one show critics were united on in liking: “Everybody Hates Chris.” “America’s Next Top Model” was popular, too, for its bold depiction of petulant anorexics in thrall to a domineering Mommy-life force and the notion that gay men are the best judges of feminine pulchritude.

Anyway, more from the press release: “From the 1995 to 2006, The WB and UPN created some of television’s most popular programming.” This is only technically true if you factor in the programming of every cable TV network from C-SPAN to QVC and define “most popular” as “more popular than the least popular.” Obviously, WB and UPN shows routinely cluttered up the bottom of the weekly Nielsen ratings list throughout the decade they were on the air. And referring as the press release does to any UPN show as “iconic” puts a bit of a strain on your credibility, as well.

Actually, the book may be a fascinating glimpse into corporate culture. Nonetheless, you wouldn’t’ve concocted much of a sales pitch if you had a press release that read something like this:

“UPN: A network so hellbent on airing garbage that when it did, purely by accident, present a quality show or two (“Everybody Hates Chris,” “Veronica Mars”), viewers who had already sampled its tainted wares could not be convinced by fans that it was capable of putting anything good on its air.

“The WB: A network that hit upon the earth-shattering notion that people like to watch a lot of extremely if interchangeably attractive young people in romantic clinches and other staples of the melodrama with emo music constantly playing, and was extremely successful at it, until a middle-aged executive decided he wanted a lot of characters in his age bracket on the network and the whole thing imploded.

“Season Finale:” The book that for the first time ever takes you deep inside the minds of two networks proudly championing mediocrity! Buy your copy today!”

While we’re at it, let’s examine the fortunes of the network that sputtered to life from the ashes of The WB and UPN: The CW, which on Sundays at least must stand for Corpse Wagon.

CW logged yet another historic low for its Sunday programming (including The WB’s performance on Sundays; UPN never expanded to Sunday broadcasting). “CW Now” had 663,000 viewers; “Online Nation” had 593,000 viewers in a nation of more than 300 million. I think “Online Nation’s” audience is solely composed of the people who work on it and their extended networks of family and friends and friends’ friends who are paid to watch it. The abject failure of these shows has utterly torpedoed the network’s not-awful family drama set in South Africa, “Life is Wild,” which managed a mere 1.04 million viewers. A “Model” repeat did best, if by “best” you mean a piddling 1.68 million viewers.

I’d call dibs on the book “Series Finale: The Fall and Further Fall of The CW,” but I suspect fewer people would want to read the book than would even want to write it.

We must now go back in time to revisit the ratings of the fall’s premiere week, thanks to a wonderfully obfuscating new technology that measures how many additional viewers shows received thanks to people watching them on their Digital Video Recorders (that’s DVR to you) within a week of their initial airing.

CBS is using the numbers to claim it has now won Premiere week in total viewers, since it got the biggest boost from DVR usage, slipping it just in front of ABC. (ABC still won in viewers 25-54; NBC somehow edged ABC out in viewers 18-49.)

Thanks to DVRs, “Grey’s Anatomy” added 2m more viewers. “CSI,” “House” and “Heroes” all added 1.9m. “CSI: Miami,” “Criminal Minds,” “Bionic Woman” and “The Office” each added 1.2m. “Numb3rs” notched an additional 1.1m, while “Journeyman,” “NCIS,” “Private Practice,” “CSI: New York,” “Cane” and “Desperate Housewives” lured an extra million viewers apiece.

In the 18-49 demo, “Heroes” added the most viewers, followed by “CSI,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “House,” “The Office,” “Bionic Woman” and the remaining aforementioned shows in what no doubt is a statistically relevant fashion. Two other shows – “Family Guy” and “Ugly Betty” – also got boosts in that demographic thanks to DVR usage.

Here’s guessing very few new shows will get cancelled any time soon as the network executives spend their days scratching their heads wondering What It All Means. (Plus, there’s that looming writers strike, more on which later, so they’re gonna have to put something on the air.)

For a book that made me laugh or smile appreciatively at a clever turn of phrase as often as it did, I must confess that I was somewhat disappointed with Stephen Colbert's new bestseller "I Am America (And So Can You!)." And, as with so many other things in Colbert's life, blame probably has to be ascribed to Jon Stewart.

Or, more specifically, Stewart's "Daily Show" literary effort, "America: The Book," which was more pointed in its analysis of, well, everything than what Colbert considers his instant masterpiece. What Colbert (and his writers) have cobbled together here is more or less a conventional book of jokes which mimics "The Colbert Report's" arch conservativism but backs off the show's dance-on-a-knife's-edge political anarchy in favor generic japery in the form of dating tips and ruminations about the glories of the nuclear family. (Are references to 2.3 children so quaint as to be cutting-edge again? I didn't get that memo.)

(Colbert, famously, doesn't like books; perhaps this is his sly way of getting revenge on them - by creating one that's merely OK, not quite as feverishly inspired as "America: The Book.")

So there're chapters on family, religion, sports, gays, science, Hollywood and the media, and here's guessing you can predict the tone of a lot of the jokes therein. (The chapter on sports is fueled by a lot of corporate underwriting, naturally.) At one curious point, Colbert fairly obsesses over which animals good Christian Americans should take their mating tips from - oddly, it's not the chapter on animals but the chapter on sex and dating.

Yes, Colbert, ranting oracle of the right that he is, can be offended by anything: "(I)n the Animal Kingdom, you can't turn over a rock without finding a half dozen earthworms doing the horizontal spermatophore, with nary a wedding ring in sight. Like we don't have enough fatherless annelids crowding our driveways and compost heaps. I don't care if you are an adult in worm years, Mr. Worm - if you can't handle tending a few thousand cocoons, don't ventrally fertilize your hermaphroditic partner."

Another inspired bit comes in the chapter on higher education (he's against it, but then, it does make one - particularly him - upwardly mobile, so, hmm; decisions, decisions). He offers a page of courses most students might take as time-killing electives and distills them to their essence, what they say about you or all you're likely to remember about them years down the line:

"'Careers in Poetry:' Just move back in with your parents now."

"'Introduction to Metaphysics:' Nothing here you can't pick up by eating the wrong mushrooms on a camping trip."

"'Comparative Religion:' Jesus wins."

"'Ethnic Stereotypes and the Humor of Cruelty:' A professor will tell you a bunch of hilarious jokes, and you're not allowed to laugh."

There's surprisingly little faux-tobiography from Colbert here, so we aren't treated to the spectacle of the making of a little blowhard. There is, on the other hand, the text of his notorious White House Correspondents Dinner routine, which helps pad the material to book-length. There's also a lot of hypertext noodling in the margins commenting on the commentary, much as on Colbert's show when he delivers "The Word," and footnotes besides that, but those serve mainly to slow down your progress through the book proper. That may be Colbert's intent, though: The longer it takes you to get through his book, the longer it'll be before you'll be picking up another book - all of which, of course, he hates.

(Actually, Colbert is being modest when he says this is the only book he will ever write: He also wrote "Wigfield: The Can-Do Town That Just May Not" with his "Strangers with Candy" collaborators Amy Sedaris and Paul Dinello, which I thought was more inventive that his latest, but that's just me.)

ABC resurrected its Friday schedule with a little “Murder:” “Women’s Murder Club” did the network’s best numbers on the evening with the strongest ratings it managed on a Friday since May 2006 or 2003, depending on which measure you opt to regard. But that was the only good news ABC had on Friday.

10.8 million watched the show’s premiere, which kind of took the wind out of the sails of its competition: CBS’s vampire comedy – sorry, drama – “Moonlight” saw its lowest ratings in three outings, while almost 20% of “Friday Night Lights”’ audience from last week sat through that episode’s high-school murder-club plotline and decided, “Eh, not so much.” It’s down to 5.4 million viewers, bad even by Friday’s sorry standards.

ABC’s “Men in Trees” also proved there was no real compelling reason to renew it for a second season.

And, hey: Baseball, which is (last I checked) a real sport, couldn’t even manage to double its audience over wrestling, which decidedly is not. 7.07m watched Boston paste Cleveland on Fox Friday (though more watched Saturday’s far more compelling game), while 4.44m watched The CW’s “Smackdown!” Insert your own End-Times comment here.

Tomorrow night’s episode of “Torchwood” is pretty ordinary by its standards. After being spotted at a crime scene involving a skeleton a couple centuries old, Toshiko (Naoki Mori), the workaholic (well, one of the workaholics at Torchwood), is approached by a comely woman named Mary (Daniela Denby-Ashe) at a bar. She offers her a mysterious-looking (because everything on “Torchwood” is mysterious-looking) pendant.

Said pendant enables the wearer to read the minds of others in close proximity. Of course, if there are a lot of people around, that can be pretty maddening (but can lead to saving some lives); on the other hand, in the relatively sparse confines of Torchwood, Toshiko learns precisely what her colleagues think of her. Needless to say, she’s none too happy about what she learns.

This series being a product of the military-entertainment complex, Toshiko and Mary manage to engage in some frisky girl-on-girl action. This being a sci-fi show, Mary naturally has a few secrets. To say more would require a big SPOILER ALERT sign and ruin it for you.

The episode aspires to pathos on Toshiko’s behalf, but I wasn’t feeling it. The men and women of Torchwood are supposed to be urgently saving the world, not messing about with childish things like emotions. But watch closely and you might detect a clue into the mystery that is Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman).

- “Torchwood:” 9 p.m. Saturday, BBC America.

Last week, and in the promos for this week’s episode of “Friday Night Lights,” we all learned a valuable lesson: If you want to impress the girl you’re sweet on, then simply bludgeon her stalker’s skull.

Wryly slow-witted Landry (Jesse Plemons) – who heretofore served admirably as the show’s lone comic relief – killed the thug who had tried to rape (and was again trying to rape) Tyra (Adrianne Palicki), and although they had as clean-cut a case of self-defense as one’s likely to see, they decided to dispose of the body. Inconveniently, it’s revealed this week that Landry lost his watch somewhere in the course of the murder, a plot point that will no doubt crop up in future episodes.

Meanwhile, no one’s much feeling their oats on the show. Coach Taylor (Kyle Chandler) is feeling increasingly disconnected from his family, consigned to defending spoiled superstars in the making in his job as a college assistant coach. His wife Tami (Connie Britton) is suffering from major post-partum depression as she raises their infant daughter alone. His daughter Julie (Aimee Teegarden) has broken up with Matt Saracen (Zach Gilford) in favor of pursuing “the Suede,” who she felt betrayed her last week but, thanks to an apparent bout of amnesia, is pursuing anew this week. (There’s a whole Mobius Strip of plotting at work, as a couple of days have seemingly passed for everyone but Matt, who’s appears to be lingering at the very same party he was stood up at last week.)

Moreover, the new coach is proving to be a jerk, the team’s biggest booster is in the process of disgracing himself, Jason (Scott Porter) is distraught over the slow recovery from his paralysis, Matt’s grandmother is descending into dementia, the show’s epileptic-cam returns with a vengeance in a couple of scenes and patches of improvised dialogue lack discipline.

Given the sundry grim storylines, it remains bewildering that the producers have opted to de-emphasize the football sequences, which at least had the virtue of some moments of exhilaration. It feels like the show’s spreading itself too thin in terms of disparate plotlines, particularly if it’s trying to lure in new viewers.

Next week: Finally, some football! Though the least convincing footage of the series, as well as an overly melodramatic turn mid-game (this, for a show that specializes in melodramatic turns mid-game). Plus, even more angst! That missing watch indeed becomes a plot point! And, shameless product placement for Applebee’s awful-sounding (or, at the very least, artery-clogging) quesadilla burger!

- “Friday Night Lights:” 9 tonight; NBC Channel 4.

Coming up at 10 p.m.-EST-7 p.m. PCT on Current TV (366 if you have DirecTV, 196 on Dish, 107 on Comcast, 142 on Time-Warner cable in L.A.; otherwise, good luck finding it yourself) is a jaw-dropping 20-minute documentary (or, as Current calls them, news pod), “From Russia With Hate,” about skinheads in Russia.

You might think that given how Germany attacked Russia during World War II that there wouldn’t be much of a taste for neo-Nazism there. But not only is it endemic, it’s practically mainstream, as correspondent Christof Putzel points out. Gloating videos of skinheads beating the bejeezus out of foreign-born citizens proliferate on the Internet, and the government doesn’t seem to do a whole lot to quell the violence: When the anniversary of Hitler’s birthday nears, the best police can do for foreign-born students is to tell them to stay in their dorms.

Christof hangs out with a leader in the movement, who justifies his acts (laughing desultorily at a video he made where one poor guy gets absolutely pasted) and takes him to a “training camp” where it’s clear the “trainers” have seen too many bad action flicks. Disturbing, compelling stuff, and something you haven't seen on the bigger news networks.

- “From Russia With Hate,” 6 tonight (with plenty of repeats – check the network’s website – which’ll be revamped soon – for more info), Current.

Should you be getting cozy with your favorite new show?: Wednesday edition.

Keep in mind that it takes a couple of weeks for the networks to figure out what shows people are watching on their TiVo’s, etc. (TiVo ratings for premiere week are included below.) So some of these shows might see a little boost when that information finally appears.

“Pushing Daisies:” Lost nearly 3 million viewers from its debut, but still had over 10m sets of eyeballs and is strong in the viewers 18-49 demo. So, unless there’s further dropoff in the coming weeks, this one’s looking OK.

“Kid Nation:” 7m viewers means don’t look for a second edition of merrily skirting child-labor laws.

“Back To You:” 6.5m, so-so in 18-49. I imagine Fox was hoping for a lot better, but they may settle for this. But I don’t imagine they’re doing any happy dances on the set.

“Private Practice:” 12.2m, No. 1 in 18-49. Show’s not going anywhere.

“Bionic Woman:” 10.1m. Not bad, not great; NBC will take it.

“Kitchen Nightmares:” 6.4m, but growth in 18-49. It may hold on there for Fox in a pretty competitive timeslot.

“Gossip Girl:” Go figure. A disappointment by any measure and a viable candidate for a quick cancellation, but The CW has already picked it up for the whole season.

“Dirty Sexy Money:” 8.9m. This is kind of a head-scratcher – not sure why this isn’t doing better, but it’s not a disaster so ABC will probably be patient and see if it can settle in. But if it falls below 8m viewers, all bets are off.

“Life:” 8.1m. Not that good, but far better than NBC managed in the timeslot last season. And when your criterion is, “Well, it’s not doing as awful as that last show,” your network’s in for a world of hurt.

And now, because you’ve been extra nice, here’re TiVo’s ratings for premiere week, announced today. The final percentage number represents how many homes with TiVo watched that particular show. Note, for example, more TiVo subscribers watched “Heroes” than “Dancing with the Stars,” though in the real world it was vice versa. And “Dirty Sexy Money” did better than “Criminal Minds” in TiVoLand.

This isn’t good news for the new shows:

“‘Private Practice,’ ‘Bionic Woman,’ and ‘Dirty Sexy Money’ were the only premiere shows to crack the Top 5 on any given night -- all three were among the Top 5 on Wednesday night. Both ‘Private Practice’ and ‘Bionic Woman’ were also the only two programs to make the Top 50 Season Pass rankings.

“‘What is extremely interesting is that with the exception of sports programs nearly two-thirds of all viewing during premiere week was done on a Time-shifted basis,’" said Todd Juenger, Vice President & General Manager, TiVo Audience Research & Measurement. ‘The high amount of time-shifting viewing highlights the importance of not simply measuring a program's success based on overnight ratings. Instead, it's critical to also factor in time-shifting viewing, considering it represented two-thirds of the audience for most of these programs.’ Mr. Juenger noted that five shows which made the Top 5 Viewed rankings also appeared on TiVo's Top 10 Season Pass list – ‘Grey's Anatomy,’ ‘House,’ ‘CSI: Crime Scene Investigation,’ ‘Heroes’ and ‘The Office.’”

Premiere Week Top 5 Shows Daily

Monday, September 24, 2007

TITLE NETWORK Live Rating Time-shifted Rating Total TiVo Rating

Heroes NBC 5.2% 9.9% 15.1%
Dancing With the Stars ABC 6.8% 7.5% 14.3%
CSI: Miami CBS 4.0% 6.6% 10.7%
Two and a Half Men CBS 3.5% 6.6% 10.2%
Prison Break FOX 2.5% 5.2% 7.8%

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

TITLE NETWORK Live Rating Time-shifted Rating Total TiVo Rating

House FOX 4.9% 9.0% 14.0%
Dancing With the Stars ABC 6.1% 6.4% 12.5%
Boston Legal ABC 4.5% 4.3% 8.8%
NCIS CBS 3.4% 5.0% 8.4%
Bones FOX 2.5% 4.5% 7.1%

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

TITLE NETWORK Live Rating Time-shifted Rating Total TiVo Rating

Dancing With the Stars ABC 5.5% 5.3% 10.8%
Private Practice ABC 5.6% 4.2% 9.9%
Bionic Woman NBC 4.3% 3.8% 8.2%
Dirty Sexy Money ABC 4.7% 2.0% 6.7%
Criminal Minds CBS 3.3% 3.0% 6.3%

Thursday, September 27, 2007

TITLE NETWORK Live Rating Time-shifted Rating Total TiVo Rating

Grey's Anatomy ABC 7.3% 19.8% 27.2%
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation CBS 6.3% 13.6% 20.0%
Survivor: China CBS 5.1% 10.3% 15.4%
The Office NBC 4.0% 10.1% 14.2%
ER NBC 4.2% 7.0% 11.2%

Friday, September 28, 2007

TITLE NETWORK Live Rating Time-shifted Rating Total TiVo Rating

Las Vegas NBC 4.3% 7.0% 11.3%
NUMB3RS CBS 2.5% 6.4% 8.9%
Ghost Whisperer CBS 2.3% 5.2% 7.6%
Moonlight CBS 2.2% 3.2% 5.5%
20/20 ABC 2.5% 1.5% 4.0%

Saturday, September 29, 2007

TITLE NETWORK Live Rating Time-shifted Rating Total TiVo Rating

Saturday Night Live NBC 3.2% 3.6% 6.9%
College Football ABC 4.2% 0.5% 4.7%
48 Hours Mystery CBS 1.6% 1.2% 2.9%
Chuck NBC 1.5% 0.9% 2.5%
Cane CBS 1.3% 0.9% 2.3%

Sunday, September 30, 2007

TITLE NETWORK Live Rating Time-shifted Rating Total TiVo Rating

Desperate Housewives ABC 7.25% 12.49% 19.74%
Brothers & Sisters ABC 5.28% 6.58% 11.86%
NFL Football NBC 8.38% 0.67% 9.05%
Shark CBS 3.03% 4.36% 7.39%
Cold Case CBS 3.35% 3.50% 6.86%

Tonight: Sterling Cooper parties hearty while awaiting the election returns (SPOILER ALERT: Nixon loses). Much alcohol flows; much flirtation and groping and more ensue. A couple of men are revealed to be more sensitive than they let on (must be the alcohol talking).

But the big news tonight is that we learn how Don Draper (Jon Hamm) became Don Draper - it's a flashback to his time in Korea, and you'll pretty much see where it's going from the outset, but that weasel Pete (Vincent Kartheiser) has figured some of it out, as well, and blackmails Don for a promotion. Don tells him, "When you threaten someone in this manner, you should realize that if your information can make them do what you want, what else can it make them do?"

But we see that Don hasn't always been - and in fact, still isn't - the unflappable man's man he portrays himself as being. It gives Hamm the chance to do some nicely nuanced work, some of his best of the series.

Don and Pete's clash is resolved in an absolutely brilliant sequence that concludes with the enigmatic epigram, "One never knows how loyalty is born."

Oh, and Peggy (Elisabeth Moss) whines: "I tried to follow the rules. And people hate me. ... And people who are not good get to walk around doing whatever they want. It's not fair."

Talk about not fair: Next week in the season finale, she finally discovers what we've known for quite some time now, that she's pregnant.

- "Mad Men:" 10 tonight, AMC.

“Cavemen,” as expected, chased away about two million viewers from last week’s debut Tuesday night, with 7 million Neanderthals still tuning in. “Carpoolers” fell off, too, though not as sharply; it even had a few more viewers despite the “Cavemen” lead-in.

At this rate, “Cavemen” looks to be drawing a negative number of viewers within a month’s time.

Meanwhile, The CW’s “Reaper” is now drawing lower viewership than “Veronica Mars” (of course, “VM” lasted three seasons, so maybe that’s the key to success at The CW). Lousier lead-in, but still. Of course, given The CW has already picked the disappointing “Gossip Girl" for the full season, it’s just a matter of time before they do the same with “Reaper.”

And “Cane’s” a real coin flip for CBS: Holding steady at 9 million viewers, but that’s kind of a dinky number for the timeslot and it’s trailing two aging shows, “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” and “Boston Legal,” badly. Of course, in this season of diminished expectations (and even more diminished results), that might be enough to get it an early renewal for 2008-09.

Your Mayor last night took in a performance of “Black Watch” at UCLA Live, an imported production from the National Theatre of Scotland that offers an insider’s view of the war in Iraq that you won’t get from the TeeVee.

Despite a mere handful of lines that connect with the visceral impact of a George Foreman uppercut (as opposed to a George Foreman grill, which is searing only if you burn yourself on it), “Black Watch” is not all that political, though, inevitably, any work of art that examines war ultimately is. It’s more interested in absorbing you in the lives of its principle characters, members of Black Watch, an elite Scottish military unit (think the Green Berets, only with centuries of prestige and legend) who were on hand to watch in dismay as it was plunged into the realm of the ordinary and mundane while serving in Iraq, and the tragedy served upon their lives as a result.

Famously, “Black Watch” is based upon interviews conducted by playwright Gregory Burke with veterans of the unit cajoled into appearing, thinking they were going to chat up a fabulous babe but ended up encountering Burke himself; it took many, many rounds of Guinness to elicit their stories. This even serves as the play’s framing device, which similarly cajoles audiences into thinking they may be witnessing a character piece before the sh!t hits the fan.

Initially, their stories of tedium and feeling at remove from the war proper (an oxymoron if ever there were one) seem to mirror those of Anthony Swoffard’s “Jarhead,” about the first Gulf War, which was adapted into a film by “American Beauty” director Sam Mendes. Again, such notions are brutally disabused.

There’s actually much artful theatricality to “Black Watch.” A history of the regiment is artfully delivered on a red carpet, like a fashion-show catwalk, as the character explicating it is repeatedly lifted by other performers and dressed and re-clad in Black Watch military uniforms spanning the group’s history. Another sequence, in which the soldiers receive letters from home then mutely yet operatically respond to them via some yowling form of deaf vocabulary, is hard to fathom textually yet speaks emotional volumes sub textually.

And then, there’s the sorry story of this war. Of the myriad egregious sins of the war in Iraq, emasculating a once-proud Scottish squadron might seem to be one of its lesser transgressions. But then, there’s this one line – “It takes 300 years to build an army that's admired and respected around the world. But it only takes three years p!ssing about in the desert in the biggest Western foreign policy disaster ever to f@ck it up completely” – and everything is transformed from the personal to the universal, and vice versa.

“Black Watch” continues through Oct. 14 at the Freud Playhouse on the UCLA campus. Tickets at the link above.

Who’d’ve thought that the first new show to merit a full-season pickup was one of its biggest disappointments? The CW announced yesterday that “Gossip Girl” will dish away for the entirety of the 2007-08 season, despite the fact that it debuted well below everyone’s expectations, dropped further its second episode and then enjoyed a small uptick in viewers in its third outing.

“Gossip Girl,” of course, is “The O.C.: East-Coast-Preppy Unit,” populated by twentysomething teens who drink themselves blind and live to date-rape. Good times!

CW Entertainment president Dawn Ostroff enthused, in pitch-perfect press-release-ese, “People everywhere are talking about `Gossip Girl’ [really? Even in Namibia and Tehran?] and we believe this show will continue to build audience as it builds buzz. Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage have created an incredibly heightened-reality world [editor’s note: “incredibly heightened-reality world” = pure b.s.] that viewers are locking into while advertisers, affiliates and press have also embraced the show. The series has earned its early pick-up and we look forward to a long run on The CW.” [Translation: “Have you looked at our numbers elsewhere? Do we really have a choice?”]

Last night on “Prison Break,” Lincoln (Dominic Purcell) opened a box containing the head of Sara Tancredi (Sarah Wayne Callies), Michael’s (Wentworth Miller) savior in season one and subsequent true love.

Alas, the rest of her body was nowhere to be seen.

(Obviously, the show ripped off the film “Se7en” with this, when Gwyneth Paltrow was delivered to Brad Pitt in a tidy package wrapped with a bow, a scene that would no doubt play a lot differently today given that everyone’s pretty much over Paltrow.)

TVGuide.com got the scoop on Callies’ grisly departure from the series. It’s kind of a convoluted tale, but it boils down to this: When Fox asked the writers to retool its storyline for season three, they cooked up Tancredi’s torture and demise. Callies, who was fairly underused (and pretty poorly used, at that) last year, was pregnant and living in remote Canada when she got the news and apparently wasn’t pleased; rather than leaving her family to shoot a few depressing, demeaning scenes (and declining the producers’ offers to come to her for some abbreviated shooting), she bowed out.

Callies and “PB(&J)” executive producer Matt Olmstead made the differences of opinion sound like a no-big-deal, one-big-happy, it’s-all-good kind of thing, but the particulars suggest otherwise. Callies’ refusal to participate at all (beyond allowing the producers to show blurry images of her in the new season’s episodes) speaks to a deep disappointment at the show’s direction. And decapitating her character in a scene that was practically a throwaway in the episode pretty much plays as a “screw-you” from the show’s brain trust.

Anyhoo – as people say after they’ve witnessed a beheading – fans don’t seem too happy about this. Actually, they’re kind of outraged. Actually, a huge chunk commenting at TVGuide.com vow they’re done with the show. (The discussion is a little more nuanced over on TelevisionWithoutPity.com’s message boards on the episode, though it still seems to run 50/50 on the plot gambit. A few of those who hated it aren’t completely swearing off the show, however.) Many defectors declared their intentions to try out “Chuck.”

Keep in mind that these are the hardcore fans who actually bother to post comments on the show. There’s probably a sizable number of less-obsessed viewers who’ll abandon the show, as well: The Michael/Sara relationship was “Prison Break’s” sole storyline that wasn’t dedicated to grim conspiracy and cruelty, and now it’s been exterminated with extreme prejudice.

The show had already shed about 2 million viewers from last season; if the outrage expressed over this plot twist is any indication, next week’s ratings should reveal that even more have broken free of the series’ narrative clutches.

Did you see the episode? What’s your opinion on killing off the character who, as a strung-out junkie, is one of the more likable on the show?

We’ve discussed ad nauseum the lower ratings beleaguering the networks in this young TV season, and part of the trend has been attributed to the burgeoning portion of the population who find the notion of sitting down and watching a TV show on the broadcasters’ terms rather quaint and instead either TiVo their favorites or catch them online.

So we finally have some stats: The most DVR’d and watched programs from the week before the season officially began, when a few new shows trickled out ahead of the pack. Which means, essentially, these stats don’t mean much, because these programs were competing against repeats and summer reality fare.

But they’re numbers nonetheless, and now the question will soon be, do these added viewers help even out the depressed ratings? And will struggling shows be aided by the new numbers, or are they still doomed?

From the week of Sept. 17-23, the Top 10 shows that gained viewers thanks to folks watching via DVR (within seven days of the initial recording of the program):

1) “Survivor: China” 2,116,000 more viewers
2) “Family Guy” 1,843,000
3) “Prison Break” 1,546,000
4) “Back To You” 1,456,000
5) “Come Rain or Come Shine” (a promotional thing for “Private Practice”) 1,256,000
6) “Big Brother” 1,249,000
7) “The Simpsons” 1,089,000
8) “Kid Nation” 1,006,000
9) “K-Ville” 993,000
10) “Shark” 982,000

Expect none of these except “Private Practice” and maybe “Survivor” to be on this list next week, and that the number of additional viewers will go up – and, the networks hope, significantly.

Meanwhile, Yahoo has compiled a list of TV shows whose online searches have plummeted most precipitously since their premieres (meaning, basically, people have already lost interest:

1) “Cavemen” (quite the shocker)
2) “Viva Laughlin” (actually, it hasn’t even premiered yet, but buzz on the show is already cooling off)
3) “Journeyman” (maybe the guy can go back in time to last week and help his own cause out by Googling his show a lot)
4) “Back To You” (as reflected in its drop in the ratings)
5) “K-Ville” (ditto)

Other shows people are investigating less online: “The Big Bang Theory,” “Kid Nation” and “Gossip Girl.” Most popular new show in online searches: “Bionic Woman.”

It’s the sort of headline that doesn’t quite scan the first time you glance at it:

Rights Group to Honor TV Show for Realistic Depiction of Torture/Interrogation

Your initial thought (or, at least, my initial thought) would be: What kind of demented rights group would honor depictions of torture? Go to the website and the page is seemingly sadistically entitled, “Primetime Torture – Excellence in Television Award.”

Ah, but the key word is “realistic.” The point of the award is honoring a program that shows, as has often been noted, that torture doesn’t work, that no reliable information will come from a suspect whose lungs are filled with water and whose teeth are strewn about the floor of a concrete cell.

In other words, it’s basically “The Anti-‘24’ Award.”

And the nominees are:

* “Lost,” for an episode exploring the emotional fallout of torture, both from the standpoint of the victim and the one inflicting the pain;

* “The Shield,” for a storyline in which Vic Mackey (Michael Chiklis) is torturing the wrong guy;

* “The Closer,” for Kyra Sedgwick’s depiction of Brenda Johnson as an interrogator who uses smarts, not force, to coerce confessions;

* “Boston Legal,” for a storyline about a man mistaken for a terrorist who was abused at Guantanamo Bay; and

* “Criminal Minds,” for an episode demonstrating how cagey questioning and discussion can yield better information than force.

The ceremony, sponsored by Human Rights First, is set for Oct. 15 in New York. Still and all, it’s hard to imagine that a torture-themed awards banquet’s going to approximate the sort of rollicking affairs most entertainment-industry soirees.

On the other hand, it can’t be any worse than a ceremony honoring reality TV in which participants depart missing some of their teeth.

Regardless of however the rest of the week may fare for the networks, they’ll always have Thursdays, and last night was so strong for them that Mediaweek ratings guru Marc Berman was uncharacteristically upbeat, declining to name any “losers” on the evening.

Biggest news: Thanks to Jerry Seinfeld’s cameo, “30 Rock” had 7.38m viewers and its highest ratings in the 18-49 demo in its history. (It was still No. 4 in its timeslot in overall viewers, though, behind “Survivor: North Korea,” “Ugly Betty’s Beauty Tips” and “Are You Smarter Than a Television Viewer?”) Of course, the real test will be how it does next week, when Jerry’s not around to tout “Bee Movie.”

Also big news: “Ugly Betty” has lost about 4½ million viewers somewhere along the way. This would seem to suggest that viewers are less interested in the sundry power struggles at Mode magazine and more interested in watching Betty keep her cheerful demeanor despite her attendant romantic complications. Get on that, will you, “UB” brain trust?

Also news: “Grey’s Anatomy” and “CSI” continue to battle it out for dominance, with the latter having more viewers (20.81m to 18.13m) but the former luring more younger viewers. “The Office” continues to intrepidly battle it out David-and-Goliath-like against these juggernauts, with 8.5m folks tuning in.

“Big Shots” shed almost 10 million of “Grey’s Anatomy’s” lead-in audience and 2.44 million from its viewership last week. You’d think its sudsy elements should make it a more compatible program. More people watched “Cavemen” this week, fer chrissakes.

In 1995, “ER” averaged 32 million viewers. Last night, it had 9 million. At this rate, in 2019, it’ll be down to 2.53 million, which, by ratings standards of that year, will be just enough for it to merit yet another renewal.

Last season, angling for a renewal despite wan ratings, producers of NBC’s “Friday Night Lights” (which won a pile of Television Critics Association awards, if not Emmys) announced they’d be taking the emphasis off the football team and focus on the soapier elements of the citizens and high-school students of Dillon, Texas.

“We're doing everything we can to distance ourselves from football,” executive producer Jason Katims said in April. “We find football is the least interesting aspect of the show. … I think we've earned the right to tell stories that have nothing to do with football. In fact, I think it's a necessity.”

So: No big game in tonight’s season premiere. Which I think is too bad: The point of the show, as well as the bestseller that inspired it, is how this small, rather torpid community defines itself by the fortunes of the local high-school team, because, really, there’s not much else going on there. Besides, last season, no matter how hokey they could be (the Dillon Panthers always seemed to be down 63-0 in the fourth quarter, yet somehow always managed to turn around and win it all), the football sequences were genuinely exhilarating and beautifully staged.

Oh, well. So tonight, Tami Taylor (Connie Britton) gives birth while her husband Eric (Kyle Chandler) adjusts to life as a college coach in distant Austin. Eric’s summoned back to work immediately after his wife gives birth, filling Tami with dread at the prospect of being, for all intents and purposes, a single mom.

Taylor’s daughter Julie (Aimee Teegarden) is hacked off because he’s an absentee father – but then, she’s the one who wanted to remain in Dillon, since she was dating Saracen (Zach Gilford), the team’s quarterback. Well, that relationship appears to be cooling, as she’s spending the last days of her summer vacation flirting with another guy. But hey – if she’s not attached to Saracen anymore, why can’t the whole family move to Austin?

That’s not the only bit of business that’ll have you wondering tonight. The producers rather ill-advisedly resurrect the storyline involving an attempted rape on Tyra (Adrianne Palicki) from last season.

Landry (Jesse Plemons), who’s impossibly smitten but utterly tongue-tied around Tyra, tries to lend comfort and assistance with an ulterior motive. Plemons is very funny in a scene with Landry on his cell phone seeking advice from his buddy Saracen on how to make it with Tyra – or, at least, get his arm on her shoulder.

But then, as Nancy Franklin in the New Yorker puts it, “(T)here’s a twist in the episode that is absurdly melodramatic and unbelievable, and will have enormous consequences. The plot thread could easily overwhelm the show and kill it.”

I wouldn’t go quite that far – it could drift for a while, but once it becomes an issue, yeah, it could pretty well force everything else to the background. And the thing is, it clearly didn’t have to play out in the way that it does; it requires some monumentally bad thinking for the characters involved to respond the way they do. (But then, last season opened with a spectacularly melodramatic moment, as well, crippling the team's star quarterback in the first episode. These guys just can't help themselves when it comes to grabs at attention.)

As with most ensemble melodramas, some of the storylines are interesting, others not so much. What tied “Friday Night Lights” together last season were those gripping football games, and now, those look to be few and far between – Dillon’s new coach (Chris Mulkey) is an obstinate jerk who looks to lose the trust of his team pretty early on, which’ll somehow no doubt bring Eric back into the fold, but for what? Not so he can coach, since that’s been put on the back burner. Maybe he can fight crime on the side.

- “Friday Night Lights:” 9 tonight, NBC Channel 4.

Russell T. Davies is far better at destroying the world than rescuing it. (He’s a little like Dick Cheney that way, but at least Davies tries to save Earth.) Davies, the executive producer and chief writer for the brilliantly resurrected “Doctor Who” series, just seems to have a knack for placing things at high-wired, over-caffeinated, apocalyptic levels. Just when you thought the guy couldn’t top himself, he does.

Take last week’s “Doctor Who:” Harry Saxon AKA The Master (John Simm in one of the most hilarious portrayals of pure evil ever), along with The Doctor the last surviving Time Lord, was elected Prime Minister; his first order of business was to murder his cabinet, followed by a reporter who knew his secrets. Then, for good measure, he brought in an alien race, the Toclafane –metallic orbs (like in the horror flick “Phantasm”) with enough Ginsu weaponry to serve every steakhouse in the universe – to enslave Earth and decimate the population (first to go, a blustery President of the United States).

He even captured The Doctor (David Tennant) and Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) of “Torchwood,” aged The Doctor into an enfeebled old man and beat the jeepers out of Captain Jack. It’s up to The Doctor’s latest companion, med student Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman), to save the world.

Or as The Master blithely put it: “So, Earthlings, basically – end of the world.”

So as tonight’s season finale opens, a year has passed, and Martha’s become a legend, a myth practically, earth’s only possible savior. She’s “only person to get out of Japan alive.” She trekked through the rubble of New York, and she traverses what remains of London despite the threat of being torn apart by wild dogs.

With some scrappy rebels, Martha captures on of the Toclafane and discovers inside a human from the End of Time. Per The Master’s mad bidding, humans from the End of Time have back in time to exterminate the current human race.

OK, so try to follow this: If humans from the End of Time kill all of us off, they wouldn’t exist in the future. So if they don’t exist, who’s killing us? Good thing The Master has a handy Paradox Machine to suss out issues such as that.

Meanwhile, our poor Doctor is shriveling up – he’s looking like a puppet from a Jan Svankmajer film.

Anyway, why build the suspense any longer? Martha manages to save the day in a massive kum-ba-ya moment. Told you Davies blows up the world better than he pieces it together.

And yet, you’ll be wanting more.

- “Doctor Who:” 8 tonight, Sci Fi Channel.

Jeff Zucker, the guy those covering the TV industry love to not love, gave a speech yesterday declaring that he’s “ripping apart old business models” at NBC-Universal. (I thought he did that when his leadership helped NBC drop from No. 1 to No. 4.)

Per Broadcasting & Cable:

“NBCU is focused on two areas: digital and international. And that means delivering its shows using more than one-dozen methods that, although [Zucker] did not explicitly make the point, don't include delivering the shows to NBC-affiliated TV stations.

“Saying that the future of those platforms depends on protecting the content from intellectual-property pirates, Zucker enumerated the options available now, or "within the next few weeks," for anyone who might miss Thursday night's debut of 30 Rock: A viewer can stream it free at NBC.com; download it free-of-charge and keep it for seven days, also at NBC.com; buy it at Amazon.com and keep it "forever"; watch it "on-demand" on some cable and satellite systems; watch it on a cell phone; "in a few weeks" time, stream it at Hulu.com, the new joint venture with News Corp.; or even buy the DVD at the end of the season.”

In other words: Thanks for playing, KNBC. Have fun dying and slowly turning into oil deep beneath the earth’s surface like the dinosaur you are.

In a way, it would seem that Zucker is suggesting that maybe ratings don’t count for so much anymore if a show fares well on other platforms. (Good news for sci-fi and paranormal shows that have plenty of online fans.)

Which might mean that the networks could operate more on the cable model and let shows run out their string of 13 episodes rather than quickly canceling them (which always hacks viewers off), since the emphasis no longer seems to be what serves the affiliates best – not to mention that of late anything that replaces a low-rated show seems to garner even lower ratings, so better to go with the devil you know and all that.

Or it might just mean that Zucker is just trying to sound like he knows what he’s talking about but is just as clueless as everyone else as to how this is all going to shake out.

Heartening developments at Comedy Central, not the least of which is they’ve pulled the plug on “The Showbiz Show with David Spade,” meaning that from now on, the guy with the least-deserved smugness in all of Hollywood can only grate viewers on “Rules of Engagement.”

Perhaps they’ll replace him with one of two new shows featuring occasional correspondents on “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.”

Yesterday, Comedy Central announced “Important Things with Demitri Martin,” a comic whose demeanor is unusually (and agreeably) deadpan and thoughtful for someone his age in this era of Jack-Black-style in-your-face comedy. It’ll be a sketch/variety show produced by Stewart’s comedy, which means it’ll probably be pretty good.

Today, the network announced “The Root of All Evil,” starring Lewis Black, whose demeanor is unusually (and agreeably) apoplectic for someone his age. In the show, two different entities vie for the title of most evil. Comics will argue the virtues (or lack of same) for both and Black will decide which is truly the viler of the two.

Paris Hilton-v.-Dick Cheney was offered as an example of the sort of squaring-off this show would engage in. It would seem that the show will depend more on the quality of the efforts of the comedians stating their cases than in Black’s participation, but it certainly creates a fun game in terms of cooking up the either-or’s for the show to determine which is more evil:

* David Spade or Carrot Top? (Carrot Top’s more annoying, but Spade’s more ubiquitous…)

* Lindsay Lohan or Britney Spears? (Car-jacking vs. child endangerment…)

* “Cavemen” or “Carpoolers?” (One’s awful; one’s awful generic…)

* “Kid Nation” or Myanmar? (Skirting child-labor laws and feeding kids bleach vs. genocide at a safe enough distance that most people can ignore it…)

* The Dodgers’ collapse or the Mets’ collapse? (One torturously slow and heartbreaking, the other shockingly swift and heartbreaking…)

* Gap clothing or American Apparel advertising? (Child slavery overseas or rufie’d-up-and-underaged-looking models in subtextual porn…)

* “Funky Winkerbean’s” obsession with cancer and alcoholism or “The Family Circus?” (One forgetting it appears on something called “the funny pages; the other remembering it but powerless to do anything about it…)

* Republican ineptitude or Democratic wussiness? (The result always seems to be the same…)

* Cell phone commercials or cell phone users? (The former makes its customers look like unhinged, sociopathic loudmouths who can’t stop spouting idiocy rather via jabbering or texting while the latter are unhinged, sociopathic loudmouths who can’t stop spouting idiocy rather via jabbering or texting…)

And feel free to add your own!

Even though “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” was consigned last spring to the less swanky environs of basic cable, here’s guessing that NBC will have it back on big-budget broadcast by January. They’re gonna have a hole somewhere that they’ll need to plug up, and “L&O: CI” is a fairly reliable hole-plugger.

Tonight, the biggest mystery is: WTF is up with Vincent D’Onofrio? Did he eat Chris Noth? Camera angles do what they can to strive to conceal it, but D’Onofrio’s Detective Goren has become positively Orson Wellesian in not only his brilliance but his girth.

So tonight’s episode involves a murdered cop, and not just any cop, but the cop who was Eames’ (Katherine Erbe) husband’s partner when he got offed. Coincidence or conspiracy?

Goren alienates the rest of the force by thinking the guy they think pulled the trigger is innocent. Sometimes that Goren’s too smart for his own good. He’s certainly too bulky for D’Onofrio’s own good.

- “Law & Order: Criminal Intent:” 10 tonight; USA Network.

Apparently, the secret to success for a new show this season is to air on Wednesday. That’s where the only bona fide good news for the networks has cropped up in this young TV season, with yet more heartening developments for ABC: “Pushing Daisies,” Your Mayor’s favorite new show of the season, did quite nicely, luring 12.83m viewers and winning the 18-49 demo; it even beat the once indomitable “Deal or No Deal.”

Add to that serviceable-to-strong showings by “Private Practice” and “Dirty Sexy Money,” and ABC has managed the impossible – they’ve built a successful night on the backs of three new shows (OK, one is a spinoff of one of the most popular shows on TV, but we’re trying to be positive here).

“PP” and “DSM” had nominal dropoff from their debuts and were breathing down the necks of CBS’s established hits “Criminal Minds” and “CSI: New York” (both of which, like everything else we’ve noted, has dropped off quite a bit since last season); with “PP” coming out on top in the 18-49 demo.

News wasn’t so bubbly for the other networks:

* “Kid Nation” – eh (7.5m).

* “Back To You” – groan (6.58m, and for a show starring Kelsey Grammer and Patricia Heaton!).

* “Bionic Woman” – sigh (not awful, but it lost 3 million viewers from last week, a trend that can euphemistically be described as disturbing).

* “Life” – shrug (its middling performance looks downright positive if you compare it to “Kidnapped’s” tank job last season and factor in how little NBC promoted the show).

* “Kitchen Nightmares – urp! (actually, that’s just a reaction to the idea of having to eat in one of the restaurants featured on the show; it did so-so, a little better than last week).

* “Gossip Girl” – sob (how bad is it? So bad that The CW rushed out a press released touting the fact that it did incrementally better than its abysmal performance last week).

Two more delirious episodes of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” are purged into the world tonight by FX, and they’re even better than last week’s offerings.

The first episode is simplicity itself: The gang wants to sell the bar to a megaconglomerate looking to transform it into an “Oldies Rock Café,” but of course the guys’re so inept and appalling they have the potential buyer dropping the offer within minutes.

So most of them look for work at a nearby “Oldies Rock Café,” marauding a character who manages the joint but still only goes by the moniker of “Waitress” (Mary Elizabeth Ellis Day, who’s married to one of the show’s writer/star/executive-producers, Charlie Day, which I know only because I’ve seen them at a neighborhood grocery store – oh, and because she changed her name in the credits), who has been forced to work there, she forlornly informs Dee (Kaitlin Olson), because a Starbucks opened up across from her coffee shop and is stealing its patrons. “That’s great – I love Starbucks!” Dee inevitably inappropriately responds.

“Waitress” soon rues her hiring choices: Dee drinks on the job and double-bills patrons; Dennis (Glenn Howerton) drinks on the job and hits on the comelier patrons; Charlie (the aforementioned Charlie Day) basically spends his time hitting on “Waitress.”

Hmmm… given the choice between the gang profiting handsomely off the sale of their bar and abject failure, where would you put your money? What makes this episode work is how the writers escalate the idiocy at a frenzied pace through the course of the episode. But then, that’s what makes tonight’s second episode so entertaining, as well.

Episode two: Everyone has different ideas as to how to become “famous,” and pursues them. Dee and Dennis want to become party whores whose antics clutter YouTube, kinda like Paris Hilton and Brandon Davis; Mac (Rob McElhenney), Frank (Danny DeVito) and Charlie opt for the intrepid/heroic reporter route. Which suggests that much ecstasy will be consumed and many kittens will be endangered (these LOLcats have some serious encounters with fire and gravity, but calm down, PETA; the kittens have clearly been replaced by stand-in Tribbles) and Dee will have to be hosed down repeatedly. (Notice PETA doesn’t care that Dee nearly immolates.)

And, of course, no one fares well in the end. Except, of course, fans of community-access TV and “Sunny’s” own viewers.

(Here’s hoping I got the particulars of these episodes accurate so FX president John Landgraf doesn’t have to correct me like he did last time).

-- “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia,” 10 and 10:30 tonight; FX. (Hey, if you want to watch “Mad Men” in that timeslot – and you should – the episodes repeat at 11 and 11:30.)

Tonight's theme is masturbation. Yes, seriously: The men of Sterling Cooper are asked to tout an electronic exercise belt ("a passive exercise machine") and, perplexed, they again recruit Peggy (Elisabeth Moss), since she could stand to lose a few pounds (or 20), and her due-diligence research discovers precisely how the gizmo's vibrating effects are most effective.

Later, another character realizes how ordinary household appliances could make men irrelevant. Mmm - humming noises...

OK, we've skirted the issue now for a while, but now it's obvious: Pete (Vincent Kartheiser) has knocked Peggy up, whether she realizes it or not (clearly, he doesn't). Obviously, this will not be resolved well.

Meanwhile, Roger (John Slattery) hasn't fully recuperated from his heart attack, which has a lot of Sterling-Cooper sharks in the water trolling for chum, leaving Don (Jon Hamm), as usual, blissfully floating above it all unless reality visits his home.

The trenchant wit tonight comes from everyone trying to figure out appropriate euphemisms with which to sell the vibrating doodad. And, again, the final scene couldn't be better realized.

- "Mad Men:" 10 tonight; AMC.

No doubt this has gotten more attention than it deserves, but we’re compleatists here, so here’s Johnny Fairplay’s account of the little reality-show hullabaloo with Danny Bonaduce that claimed the life of much of his bridgework.

It’s not dissimilar from Bonaduce’s, except for Fairplay’s assessment of his jumping on someone and dry-humping them: “It’s a nice thing,” Johnny insists.

Well, try to convince that to a jury of Bonaduce’s peers: “I’ve already pressed charges,” Fairplay adds.

I suppose going through such motions is necessary if you’re looking to sue Bonaduce, but, dude, haven’t you read a gossip magazine? That guy’s tapped out. Seems like your best bet is to sue the producers of the event, Fox Reality Channel; Fox has deep pockets. You can argue they should’ve kept the demon-battling Bonaduce safely away from you while you were onstage doing whatever it is you do these days.

Of course, you’re gonna want to settle; you get dragged into court and your reputation will get some serious impugning enacted upon it. If the jury didn’t see you lie about your grandmother’s death on “Survivor,” they will now, and that’ll go to your credibility as a witness and your abilities to manipulate people for sympathy.

There’s some old-timey saying about reaping what you sow; I think it’s in the same book as the thing about the jawbone of an ass. Maybe you can Google it.

Last season on “The Sarah Silverman Program,” Sarah had a furtive one-night stand with “Black God” (Tucker Smallwood) after she sang a poignant ballad imploring him to reverse time in order to spare her the humiliation of having prairie-dogged. Though it was the first episode of the series shot, it was the last to air, the TV equivalent of a bad party guest: Needless to say, the episode engendered no small amount of controversy.

This season, Black God returns, and he and Sarah are still trying to work things out. This being Sarah Silverman, however, I think it’s fair to guess that they won’t.

Silverman says, “We knew right away (we wanted to bring him back). Comedy Central didn’t want to air it at all. They’re glad they did. They didn’t want to air it because – I don’t know why. … Because it didn’t have a B story. So I said, Why don’t we just shoot a B story? And they said OK, and I said, ‘Oh! Great!’ So we did and it wasn’t good. The B story didn’t intertwine and it looked like a Frankenstein episode, so I asked, ‘Could we just have it be this perfect specimen of a pilot that it was and air it last?’

“It sounds like I’m putting (Comedy Central) down but they’ve been amazing. They’ve been really flexible with us.”

Smallwood says: “The fans who were fond of the show, I expected to enjoy it, but I was really more concerned about the response from conservatives and the religious right and I wasn’t disappointed. The bloggers kind of went batsh!t. The range of invective – I wrote an essay asking, ‘Are they upset because God is depicted? Because he is black? Because he is black and having a sexual relationship? Because he gives a damn about some girl? What is the issue?’ And maybe all of the above.

“But it’s great fun.”

Silverman’s sister Laura explains a little of what’ll occur between Black God and Sarah. “Last season, (my character) was unaware of (their relationship). In this episode, Sarah’s actually kind of using him for a date for her high-school reunion because she wants to show up a rival who’s dating a celebrity. She’s kind of using him.

“(The rest of the characters) don’t really get that he is God. It’s kind of adorable. I say, ‘God seems really into you.’”

- “The Sarah Silverman Program:” 10:30 tonight; Comedy Central.

So “Cavemen” had just under 9m viewers in its debut last night, while “Carpoolers” had a hair over 9m, but “Cavemen” tied for No. 1 in the hour in that 18-49 demographic (with “NCIS,” which had seven million more viewers, all of whom must’ve been too old for advertisers to care about) and "Carpoolers" didn't. “Cavemen” did better than “Bones,” “The Singing Bee” and “The Biggest Loser” and, of course, whatever The CW had on at the time. (That would be “Beauty and the Geek,” in what clearly should be its final cycle.)

Ratings guru Marc Berman calls “Cavemen’s” performance disappointing – given the hype, it should’ve done better, he argues – but I think the fact that 9 million ostensibly sentient humans tuned into a broadcast-network situation comedy based on a TV commercial that everyone and their dog was warning them was awful is not merely disappointing, but devastating.

Meanwhile, “House” actually beat the “Dancing with the Stars” results show at 9 p.m.; they were the highest-rated shows of the evening, with 17.28m and 15.73m viewers, respectively.

Of the new shows, CBS’s “Cane” remains in the hunt with 9.7m viewers, though that’s almost 2m fewer than last week. The CW’s “Reaper” remains viable only because it’s one of the network’s few shows that isn’t doing absolutely horribly; it even managed to increase its viewership from “Beauty and the Geek’s” lousy lead-in numbers.

So, after one week, ABC’s doing the best, with the slightest dropoff from last season in the sundry ways the ratings are measured (households, total viewers, viewers aged 18-49, 25-54 and 18-34). NBC’s managed to make its audience both smaller and younger, so that’s considered something of a break-even. CBS has slipped 10-15% from its levels of a year ago, Fox dropped slightly (but then, Fox always starts out abysmally except for “House”) and The CW has flushed itself, losing 14% of its viewers from a year ago and 25% of viewers in the advertiser-friendly demographics. It’s gonna be a long season.

It’s funny because it’s pathetic.

There was some sort of awards show for reality TV last night (which is a little like having an awards show for war criminals, but I digress) and somehow during it has-been Danny Bonaduce roughed up never-was Johnny Fairplay, the guy who faked his grandmother’s death for sympathy on “Survivor.”

Fairplay lost some teeth. (In the clip linked to above, you kind of wonder what the emergency-rescue guys make of all this low-rent chaos and the camera-wielding TMZ @ssholes.) To make matters even more surreal, Adrian Curry – of “America’s Next Top Model” and “My Fair Brady” obscurity (she’s Mrs. Peter Brady or something like that) – claims that she was the one who goaded Bonaduce into goading Fairplay into starting a fight he couldn’t finish with all his teeth.

So this is what has become of our beloved, once-innocent Partridges and Bradys: Initiating street fights with low-rent thugs at D-level Hollywood events. Make what you will of this de-evolution and how it can be expanded into a larger metaphor representing – well, everything.

* Update: Here’s the actual fracas, which isn’t much of a fracas at all.

Yes, “30 Rock” won the Best Comedy Emmy last month, injecting it with some much-needed buzz as it barely survived cancellation last season. But the show seems a tad slow in getting out of the starting gate as the second season commences, despite the appearance of Jerry Seinfeld, who’s kind of wasted. (No, not Britney Spears-wasted.)

Thursday’s second-season premiere opens with Liz (series creator Tina Fey) and her cast and crew returning from their summer vacations. Liz has broken up with her boyfriend but insists she’s OK (though she hardly proves it by buying a wedding dress on spec); NBC uber-exec Jack (Alec Baldwin) had a heart attack but insists he’s OK (since his summer reality shows did well, including “MILF Island,” which paired hot moms and eighth-grade boys); Jenna (Jane Krakowski) packed on 40 pounds starring on Broadway in “Mystic Pizza: The Musical,” but insists she’s OK (Jack wishes to take issue, demanding she lose 30 pounds or gain 60 – “Anything in between has no place on TV,” he declares); and Tracy (Tracy Morgan) got tossed out of his home by his wife and he’s definitely not OK.

Jack’s big gambit to restore NBC to greatness is to take all the episodes of “Seinfeld” it owns and digitally insert Jerry into every episode of every NBC series in a stunt called “Seinfeld-Vision.” Naturally, Jerry’s not pleased (“What’s happened to this network?” he whinnies exasperatedly, having encountered the incompetence that is NBC as envisioned by “30 Rock”).

There are some laughs, particularly when Liz melts down before Jerry over the sorry state of her life; her exaggerated declaiming provokes him:

Jerry: Are you imitating me?
Liz: No – this is what I sound like when I cry.
Jerry: I think I’m a little insulted.

And the show manages to ironically and thoroughly tout Seinfeld’s upcoming computer-animated film, “Bee Movie,” in a manner pretty similar to the way it kvetched about product placement while brazenly touting Snapple in an episode last season.

Thursday’s episode is at least funnier than next week’s, which isn’t bad but just maundering. Jack faces off, yet again, against the not-quite-closeted-enough Devin (Will Arnett), to replace the parent company’s CEO (Rip Torn, even more wasted than Seinfeld, and no, not DUI-mugshot-wasted). Jenna finally finds that elusive stardom in being overweight (the funniest scene in the episode involves her consulting with a spectacularly unethical doctor recommending weight-loss programs of the damned). And Tracy’s marriage travails are resolved in a fashion best described as far-fetched.

Conventional wisdom has it that “30 Rock” didn’t find a large audience because large audiences can’t be made to care about the travails of showbiz people. Hence, NBC’s kinda sorta masking what the show’s about; its tagline this year is “Enjoy the ride.” Which should fool just about … nobody.

- “30 Rock:” 8:30 p.m. Thursday, NBC Channel 4 (check local listings outside L.A.).

[Note: This one’s a little risqué, even by this blog’s low standards, but at least it has the virtue of being true. Choose to read or skip accordingly.]

I asked Laura Silverman, whose casting as Sarah Silverman’s sister Laura on “The Sarah Silverman Program” is downright inspired, if anything on the show came from their real-life relationship.

She said this:

“There was one thing – they needed some story for Sarah to tell, so she came up with this story about how she once used my mascara to paint in her pubic hairs because she was jealous of me because I had this big, glorious bush and she had nothing. That was a true story, but that was the first I heard of it – she used my mascara and then put it back in my makeup case.”

With that image seared into your brain, please feel free to go about your day.

- “The Sarah Silverman Program:” Season two begins 10:30 p.m. Wednesday on Comedy Central.

A while back, I wrote, “The fall season is hereby cancelled.” I had no idea.

Friend of Your Mayor Marc Berman, Mediaweek’s ratings guru, has been striving to soften the blow as he has delivered the news of the fall season’s TV numbers. In addition to his usual winners and losers, he has been adding other categories, such as “Could Be Better/Could Be Worse” and “Disappointing.” (Hint: There haven’t been many winners.)

He has also just sort of thrown up his hands and issued this caveat:

“(S)ince the level of DVR penetration has increased from 8.54 percent during premiere week in 2006 to 19.43 million percent at present, the overall results have, no doubt, been negatively impacted.”

No doubt. (Heh-heh, he said “DVR penetration.”) So here are the results from last night’s carnage:

“Dancing with the Stars” (20.34m viewers) and “CSI: Miami” (14.88m) were the evening’s only real hits; everything else just sort of limped along, including “Heroes” (11.94m, but strong in that 18-49 demo you hear so much about), which is proving to be mortal after all.

The only good news for “The Big Bang Theory” (8.58m) is that it does better than its lead-in, “How I Met Your Mother.” The bad news is, its lead-in is “How I Met Your Mother.”

“Chuck” had 8.22m viewers, which looks iffy to me, but Mr. Berman says that its decent retention of its audience from last week is an encouraging sign. He’s less bullish on “Journeyman:” Even though it had slightly more viewers (8.39m), it’s skidding at a faster rate than “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” did last season.

Meanwhile: Fox and The CW are pretty much DOA. “Prison Break” has shed more than 20% of its audience from last season, and “K-Ville” is down to 5.78m viewers. And The CW can’t manage more than 2.59m viewers in its Monday lineup, even with one-time critical fave rave “Everybody Hates Chris.”

Seems to me TeeVee executives need to have a huge brainstorming session to figure out how to reverse this hemorrhaging of viewers and call in people from outside the industry, as the usual groupthink is clearly not accomplishing much. Or, they can just wait ’til “Jingles” comes along and saves the industry.

ABC has seen fit to deny me an early peak at “Cavemen,” its inspired attempt to resurrect the comedy by returning it to its Cro-Magnon roots – look, a breakdancing caveman! Hahahahahaha!

Hence, in lieu of discussing what no one has yet seen – and, likely, what precious few will actually see – we present a little walk down memory lane, how this blog has addressed the issue of this latest innovation in laugh-free situation comedy that is “Cavemen.”

* Way back when, when production on the pilot was first announced, this blog was the first to call it: “Cavemen” would not be a comedy:

“The prejudice the cavemen experience in their everyday lives is a metaphor for racism, and I don’t see how anyone could find racism remotely funny,” Lawson told me. “Well, except when it’s supposed to be, like on ‘Chapelle’s Show’ or a Michael Richards stand-up routine. No, ‘Cavemen’ will be a powerful drama about social misunderstandings and ignorance, and about how these brave and enduring men struggle to find their way and strive to correct the misperceptions about their kind. It will force viewers to examine the ugly preconceptions that lie within their own hearts and serve as an uplifting saga of men who overcome irrational hatred to inspire a nation.”

* Incredibly, people took that entry seriously.

* And then I saw the initial pilot (since yanked for massive retooling):

I can reliably report to you that it must be a drama because it’s certainly not a comedy.

Instead of continuing with the conceit in the auto-insurance commercials that the cavemen must battle the stereotype of being slow-witted, “Cavemen: The Embarrassment” slow-wittedly repositions our Cro-Magnon brethren to serve as an unspoken but unmistakable stand-in for another ethnic minority. They call one another “Maggers” and debate the appropriateness of using such epithets on one another. They are barred entry into a country club and distrusted by wealthy white men. White women, having heard rumors about their sexual prowess, covet them.

And they breakdance. Yes, the climactic comedic scene in the pilot (where it’s really considered a very good idea to bring your A-game, not your running-on-fumes game) features a caveman breakdancing. Would that have even been funny in the ’80s?

* A random cheap shot pulled from a then-timely headline:

“The National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) reported that DHS agents had discovered that a Qaeda sleeper cell had embedded itself in A.C. Nielsen, a marketing research firm that tracks, among other things, the national TV ratings for the broadcast networks. Operatives were distorting data to ensure that high ratings would be reported for such terrible TV shows as ‘Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?’, ‘The Singing Bee’ and ‘Rules of Engagement,’ thereby ensuring that such programming would not be cancelled and continue to terrorize – or, at the very least, seriously annoy – American viewers.

“‘This is a finding we take very seriously,’ Robert Chertoff, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, declared. “Americans want – and deserve – to be able to turn on their televisions without seeing something like ‘Men in Trees.’”

As the thin, ink-stained front line between America’s TV viewers and the forces of evil that wish Television harm, the Television Critics Association takes its duty to protect our homeland from “Cavemen” quite seriously. Pray that we are successful.

* And then, just because I could, I live-blogged the “Cavemen” press session during July’s TV Press Tour. Some highlights:

Beyond just not being funny, “Cavemen” is anthropologically befuddled. Though the characters refer to themselves as Cro-Magnons, morphologically, they actually look a little more like Neanderthals.

* The cast and executive producers were the only ones applauding the clip.

* First question: Where are the cavewomen? Honestly, someone asked that.

* Question: You had to know that making a show from a TV commercial would earn you all sorts of hell from us. How do face that you have to prove yourselves?

Answer: We knew we’d be under a lot of scrutiny, but it makes our job a little harder. … When making the commercials, we felt there were more stories to tell.

I never guessed we’d catch so much hell.

* Cro-Magnons existed between 40,000-10,000 years ago in the South of France. They vacationed in Italy, usually around Tuscany.

* By contrast, proto-Neanderthals first appeared in Europe 350,000 years ago. They became extinct 24,000 years ago in order to avoid being around once they became the butt of jokes.

* Fending off charges of implicit racial stereotyping on the show:

What’s sort of fun is we can create rules for this race that doesn’t really understand their place in this world, which gives us a flexibility to make that a broad experience that’s universal that everyone can relate to.

Could it be an issue? Yes. But that’s our job to make sure it doesn’t become one.

And now, the pseudo-pretentious take on the show: This is a show about acclimation, which is what we pitched it as. … If race relations leads to a story like that, that’s great. But this is about acclimation, which is something everyone deals with.

* Another hard-hitting question: Why don’t they just shave and go to a decent barber?

* Blah blah blah on the makeup. “I was blown away,” says one of the actors.

* “If the show works, it will work because people care about these three guys and can relate to their problems.”

* And more pseudo-pretentious ruminations: “We asked ourselves, ‘Is it authentic and is it reflective of authentic behavior?’”

* This is how you would read “Cro-Magnon” in another language: kʀomaɲõ and kɹəʊ'mægnən

* Yet more on how amazing the makeup is, which it isn’t.

* A disappointed panelist: “Someone told us there’d be a laugh track in this room, which there isn’t.”

* Question: I’m still wanting to know what the show is going to be. You say the show will be subtle, and the show we saw is anything but subtle. You say it won't just be dealing with racial stereotypes, but the episode we saw is nothing but that.

Answer: (long pause) Well, I mean, look. (Then lots of dissembling.)

Followed by more pseudo-pretentious rambling:

“Where we want to take the show is to make these distinctive stories about three friends in their 20s who happen to be cavemen and that grafts a filter onto their lives.”

After the session, a critic grumbled, "They have no f#&%ing idea what they're doing."

* Somehow, a show this stupid managed to become fodder for the New York Times’ op-ed pages.

* Finally, the other shoe drops: ABC admits it’s not sending out advance screeners of the new first episode:

While containing your incredulity, pick your own favorite excuse for said oversight:

* Still fine-tuning the premiere episode.

* Production delays due to recasting and reshoots. 


* Not sending out screeners worked so well for “Kid Nation.” 


* Oh, who are we fooling: Creating and sending out screeners for a show that jumps the shark in its first frame and will likely end up on the season’s scrapheap by November sweeps is just throwing bad money after good.

After all this, I’d like to present a report on tonight’s premiere, but I think I’ll be walking my dog around the Silver Lake reservoir then. Or watching the East-Coast feed of “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” on DirecTV. Or doing just about any other thing there may be to do on this planet.

Last week on “Damages,” really-focused psycholawyer Patty Hewes (Glenn Close) somewhat incomprehensibly turned down an offer of $850 million from Arthur Frobisher (Ted Danson) in her class-action suit against the guy Ken Lay always wished he could be (Ted Kennedy, too, based on a plot twist revealed in that episode) – incomprehensible, since a couple of weeks ago, she was looking at, at best, a settlement of $200 million and maybe nothing, given how all her witnesses kept dying or disappearing or getting discredited.

At a rare face-to-face, she told him in the most civilized snarl you could ever imagine, “I want you to feel the disgust in your children’s eyes when they look on you in shame.”

Arthur replied: “Well, this has been lovely.” Because that’s just the kind of guy Ted Danson has artfully made him.

So this week, the theme seems to be breakups. But then, when an episode opens with Ellen (Rose Byrne) and her doomed fiancée getting aggressively busy in Patty’s summer home and he imagines Ellen is Patty (ick? not because Close isn’t hot or age-appropriate, but because of whatever twisted psychological processes created that suggestion), perhaps that’s all for the best.

Meanwhile, we’re getting closer and closer to linking the two narratives – the flashbacks on the Frobisher case and Ellen’s getting in deep lawyerly sh!t over the murder of aforementioned doomed fiancé – and, at this point, everyone’s pretty much getting sick of everyone else. Ellen’s shelf life at Hewes & Associates may be expiring, even before that whole arrested-for-murder thing. The show’s opening theme’s lyrics – “When I am through with you/There won’t be anything left” – are seeming less like a threat and more like prophecy.

Episodes from the upcoming season of “Nip/Tuck” arrived today in some particularly splashy packaging, and while ordinarily that wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing, this time it is, only because it serves as a reminder that the first season of “Damages” is wrapping up soon.

- “Damages:” 10 tonight, FX.

Personally, I prefer episodes of “Eureka” to keep it light, to acknowledge the ludicrousness of their premises, to not dwell too ponderously upon the show’s mythology.

But tonight’s episode is the season finale, and everyone’s about to die – again – so yes, the stakes have to be elevated. And if the jokes aren’t as funny as usual, well, they have a kid to save, and as we all know, children are our future.

Said child is Kevin (Meshach Peters), the son of Allison (Salli Richardson), who pretty much runs Eureka and Global Dynamics, the super-secret government installation that employs otherwise unemployable geniuses and develops all manner of gizmos and weapons we never even knew we had a need for. Both Carter (Colin Ferguson), the town sheriff, and Stark (Ed Quinn), the former, possibly sinister, head of Global Dynamics and Allison’s former, probably sinister, husband, remain smitten with Allison, so they’re keen to save Kevin, the victim of a mysterious virus that goes back to last season.

Former good-guy Henry (Joe Morton), following the death of his long-lost love, followed Beverly (Debrah Farentino) to the dark side and is conspiring to do something dangerous with Kevin deep in the bowels of Global Dynamics, which is in biohazard lockdown and maybe the DoD will destroy it and whew, that’s a lot of exposition to grind through.

Suffice to say, it all ends semi-satisfactorily for all involved except the one or two cast members who look like they’re getting written out tonight but then of course that’s no doubt just not-so-cagey misdirection.

Still, more actually funny jokes wouldn’t’ve been a bad thing.

- “Eureka:” 9 tonight, Sci Fi Channel.

We’ll close today with a little good news: Despite the shrinking number of viewers, networks are still able to get advertisers to cough up some premium rates to air their commercials.

The most expensive show, of course, remains “American Idol,” reaping $700K for 30-seconds of propagandizing. The article, however, suggests that “AI” will air on Mondays and Tuesdays this season. Which means that it’ll try to kill off ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars,” while avoiding the season’s two new hits (“Private Practice” and “Bionic Woman”) on Wednesday, when the results show used to appear. (This may be a mistake, and I’m already checking into it.)

Speaking of “Private Practice,” it’s the priciest new show for advertisers, at $255K. “PP’s” mothership, “Grey’s Anatomy,” is the second most-expensive show to peddle your wares in, costing $465K. Last week, “Grey’s Anatomy” placed second to “CSI,” which charges $290K to place your 30-second spot of a female robot discharging a keg of beer from her midsection. So "Grey's Anatomy" seems a rather costly bauble by comparison.

There are a few disparities: “House” would seem to be a veritable bargain – one of the highest-rated shows (particularly when following “AI,”) a spot there costs but $290K, while advertising in “Heroes,” “The Simpsons” and “24,” all lower-rated series, costs between $300K and $330K.

And “Cavemen?” Those willing to p!ss away a hundred large can plant any auto-insurance spot they want in its timeslot.

“Nashville,” already cancelled, was the cheapest show in which to advertise, at $60K. Of course, you get what you pay for.

Here's yet another reason why those crappy ratings we've been discussing all day won't go away anytime soon: CBS has ordered eight episodes of "Jingles," a reality-competition soul-drainer where contestants compete to create musical ditties for real products.

"This show is sort of like 'America's Got Talent' but with a purpose," said Mark Burnett, not even sounding particularly enthused about the idea himself but willing to suffer the indignity of signing the back of yet another paycheck in order to poison the airwaves further with another show trucking in shameless product placement like his other shows, "Survivor" and "The Apprentice," already do.

"A purpose." Well, if cooking up something along the lines of "My baloney has a first name ..." or "Flat buns - I like flat buns" or "588-2300 - Empire" represents a "purpose" in this world, then I suppose that Americans were pretty heroic after all when we rose to President Bush's challenge to "go shopping" after 9/11.

Each episode will feature the contestants being introduced to a new product: "Mattel's New Lead-Based Chinese Barbie features 30% less toxic lead than previous Barbies, and girls love the Barbie brand!" And then viewers will have to listen to the mind-numbingly condescending ad pitches and, if they're not in a thoroughly stuporous state at that point, they can bother to vote on which one they found least objectionable and insulting.

Actually, I'm pretty sure the "purpose" of "Jingles" is to get people like me to, repeatedly and with extreme prejudice, gouge out my eyeballs and puncture my eardrums with an icepick.

While we’re kicking the dead horse of network ratings, let’s send out some special props to The CW, who achieved historic lows Sunday evening with its blockbuster lineup of “CW Now,” “Online Nation,” “Gossip Girl” (repeat) and “America’s Next Top Model” (repeat).

The network averaged a paltry 855,000 viewers last night, breaking a million only (and only barely) with its “ANTM” rerun. These are basic-cable numbers, and not particularly inspiring basic-cable numbers.

Its original programming – “CW Now” and “Online Nation” – “achieved” historic lows with 780,000 and 698,000 viewers, disrespectfully. Put it this way: If everyone watching The CW last night was in Los Angeles, The CW still wouldn’t’ve won the night in the L.A. market. I’m not sure which is worse: Those ratings or the idea that some 700,000 people are willing to watch a 30-minute embedded commercial for Wal-Mart (“CW Now”) or a show basically imploring you to turn off your TV (“Online Nation”).

Perhaps we have a new game: Imagine trying to locate a CW viewer in a nation of 300 million. Five in Los Angeles (the network’s top executives), one in Sherman Oaks and a couple more in Burbank and Glendale (their more dedicated publicists), a group of four pals in Brooklyn who watched just to smirk, two in Helena, Montana (hometown friends of a P.A. on one of the shows), eight more scattered throughout Iowa (including an elderly lady who just happened to die with her TV tuned into The CW), a guy in St. Louis with crappy TV reception for the other channels, a pair of young, single, knocked-up twentysomething sisters in Biloxi, Mississippi who believe The CW represents their only contact with trendiness and a family in Nebraska who had heard about this “online” thing and was curious to see what it was all about.

Well, we’re up to 30.

If you’re looking for a fun trend to affix to the fall season, the proliferation of geeks in primetime television is where you’ll look. If you’re looking for something arcane yet sexy, you’ll talk about the huge influx of foreign-born stars playing American characters in the new shows.

But if you want to bum people out by sounding an alarm bell that probably needs to be rung, viewer attrition is your Fall-TV 2007 trend.

Only a handful of returning shows met or exceeded their premiere ratings from last season. Many have lost huge chunks of their fan base from last year. Last night, “Desperate Housewives” was the highest-rated program, with nearly under 19 million viewers, but that was more than five million fewer than its debut last fall. All the other returning shows also gauged audience losses from last year.

Bringing in new series to replace the aging programs doesn’t seem to help, either: Most of the new shows introduced last week didn’t even perform as well as the cancelled series they were replacing. Only two – “Bionic Woman” and “Private Practice” – were unqualified successes, if not blockbuster hits.

In order to contend with the viewer diaspora, Mediaweek ratings guru Marc Berman has had to add a new category to his roundup of winners and losers on each night (mainly because there haven’t been many winners): “Respectable sampling.”

There’s an inspiring rallying cry for the networks: “CBS: Home to the Shows that Garner Respectable Sampling.”

Maybe that whole “We’re approaching the day when the word ‘broadcaster’ will be a quaint, antiquated relic of a TV landscape that no longer exists” in the last post wasn’t hyperbole, after all.

CBS cancelled “Close to Home” last season not because it did poorly but because viewers it did well with were outside that coveted 18-49 demographic.

At least someone was watching it.

In the same timeslot this past Friday, CBS’s new, giddily dumb vampire-private-detective drama “Moonlight” debuted, with 8.62m viewers. That’s down from the nearly 12m watching “Close to Home” last year. NBC’s aging “Las Vegas” had more viewers. “Moonlight” did, however, come in first in the 18-49 category, though even “Close to Home” did better there, as well.

Overall, Friday was pretty much a disaster, with light sampling everywhere. (CBS’s returning shows, “Ghost Whisperer” and “Numb3rs,” lost 1.66m and 2.18m fans from their premieres last season.) Friday’s becoming the new Saturday, and you wonder if the networks can really afford to turn out the lights on Fridays the way they have on Saturday.

Maybe everyone was recording all these shows, and the networks will be able to scramble and say they picked up a couple hundred-thousand viewers here and there from TiVo users. But from the networks’ standpoints, the new season has thusfar proven to be underwhelming at best and pretty scary at worst. We’re approaching the day when the word “broadcaster” will be a quaint, antiquated relic of a TV landscape that no longer exists. (Ah, hyperbole - thank you for existing, or this would've been a pretty dull entry!)