True? Not true?

So, how fun is Heroes? SO fun. Tonight’s episode is in the future. The bad future! I can’t wait. I also just wanted to point out that the only comments for this post were about how cute Peter’s new hair is. I don’t know what that means, except that apparently people have very strong opinions on Peter Petrelli’s hair.

24 continues whatever it’s doing now. Remember way back when Jack killed that guy by biting his neck? Did you ever think you’d be so disappointed in the show as you are now?

Barney goes on The Price Is Right tonight on How I Met Your Mother. Because of course he does.

We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming: A PBS documentary about the Mormons. Or Hitler’s underground lair on Cities of the Underworld on the History Channel. But seriously, just watch Heroes.

I’m really annoyed that Studio 60 is coming back. Just when I finally got those smug bastards out of my head, we have what I believe are 6 more episodes coming at us starting May 24. Without the 30 Rock antidote later in the week, I don’t think I can take Sorkin’s sodden showbiz shenanigans. Slate recently claimed that “its core audience might well have been people who actively disliked it.” If that’s true, it puts me smack in the middle of the core audience.

Just to make myself feel better, I’m going to speculate about how the show will end. Most likely the last episode they made wasn’t written as the final episode, but if we got a real series finale, here are some things we might see:

1. Matt and Danny storm onto the stage during a particularly insipid sketch and give a rambling speech about how terrible the show has gotten lately. They quit, leaving Lucy Davis in charge.
2. Guest star Tina Fey (as herself) visits the set to do research for her 30 minute sitcom about the backstage hijinks at a show very similar to Studio 60. The Universe shrinks to a singularity, but not before Matt tries to sleep with her.
3. Matt and Harriett and Danny and Jordan get married in a celebrity cameo-studded double wedding. Matt insists on writing everyone’s vows himself.
4. Lorne Michaels wakes up in bed and realizes it was all a bad dream.
5. Citing consistently poor ratings—and general lack of interest—NBS cancels the show.

Feel free to add your own in the comments.

It ruined Tostitos.

• Cracked interviews The Daily Show’s Samantha Bee.
• It’s always funny to think that former American Idol contestants end up strung out on coke and working at Hooters. Turns out, it happens.
• Studio 60 will return May 24 (aka the day after sweeps ends).
• Sendhil Ramamurthy (Mohinder from Heroes) talks to TV Guide.
• Matt Roush answers burning questions about Dancing With the Stars, etc.
• C.J.’s assistant on The West Wing, Melissa Fitzgerald, might run for Congress.
• Slate ponders the FCC situation.
• I Love New York 2 is .
• Sean Hayes is bringing a British sketch comedy show stateside.
• Puppies!

Not much happening this weekend. If it’s not raining where you are, enjoy the weather.

Saturday Night Live is a repeat of one of my favorites of this season, Peyton Manning.

More Bleak House on PBS on Sunday. Ready for Guppy to embarrass himself? For Lady Dedlock to stare pensively out a window? For Richard to continue to be a total ass? You better be ready.

The Simpsons is new. Admit it, you still have it on DVR.

We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming: Jon Stewart is on Bill Moyers’ PBS show tonight. I’m sorry, that’s all I’ve got. As rainy as it is, it’s a dry weekend for TV.

Don’t make any sudden moves, Tina.

I forgot to put this in the news, so here it is in a post all its own!  Tina Fey “live blogged” last night’s 30 Rock finale, but really it just seems like an online chat. Which is totally fine by me, so whatev.

Fun fact: did you know her real name is Elizabeth Stamatina Fey?

I use a lot of them.

• Louis from The Real Housewives of Orange County died.
• TV Guide looks at the new Glenn Close FX show.
• Oh Matt Lauer. You so crazy.
• Dave Foley tries to put lipstick on the Thank God You’re Here pig.
• Sarah Silverman will host the MTV Movie Awards.
• Scientologist crazy Jenna Elfman defends scientologist crazies Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes.
• E!’s Kristin gets to the bottom of the Lost situation — it’s not purgatory and they’re not dead.
• Lifetime expands its original material with Army Wives.
• The Law and Order: SVU executive producer is, apparently, .
• Tournament contedner Becki Newton talks about her character on Ugly Betty.
• Slate: Yay Entourage! Boo Studio 60!
• A column about how everyone on Grey’s is an ass except Addison.

Tonight’s the season finale of 30 Rock. The episode is called Hiatus, which reminds me of this episode of Home Movies with the same title. (The hiatus bit isn’t mentioned until the end, but the stuff in between is worth the time as always.) [kml_flashembed movie="" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /] This whole Alec Baldwin mess is really putting me through a whirlwind of emotion. First I was skeezed out by him and the message. Then I felt kind of bad that he had all this shit going on with custody battles. Now I’m angry because if he has to quit it would ruin one of my favorite shows. Damn you, our too-in-depth celebrity culture!

The Office is also new tonight, though it’s not their season finale yet. Thank god none of this craziness is happening to Steve Carell.

Well, it’s been seven whole days, and I haven’t bothered to watch last week’s Grey’s Anatomy. For now I will still let the DVR capture the show, and I will decide later whether it’s time for me to pull the plug. And I think I’m going to have to watch the Addison spin-off episode, next week, just to see how they manage it.

Due to the incompetence of Time Warner Cable (dead to me), I only caught half of last week’s Ugly Betty, but strangely I feel as if I haven’t missed anything at all. Hmm.

We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming: This is not new, but I was amazed by the premise of Go Figure, a Disney Channel original from 2005. It’s The Cutting Edge in reverse! I can’t believe it took 13 years for someone to think of this!

Small things are cute.  Like hamsters and those tiny bottles of vodka.

• Alec Baldwin — who, by the way, is completely out of his mind if you didn’t already know that — .
• Rosie’s off The View, but you knew that already.
• .  It’s back to Arby’s commercials for Nathan Fillion.
• The real-life A.J. and Meadow Soprano are getting too close for comfort.
• Tucker Carlson is a rash that won’t go away.
• HBO has greenlit a Spielberg epic mini-series about — what else? — World War II.

As Dan posted this morning, the FCC wants to be able to regulate violence on TV. They already have naughty words and naughty pictures, but they don’t currently have the power to fine evil broadcasters for showing people hurting each other.

Why does the FCC want this power? It’s because somebody has to protect our children. As everyone knows, there were no bad things in the world before the invention of television, and if children weren’t constantly exposed to images of violence or sex, the world would be restored to its prelapsarian perfection.

Ok, that’s a straw man, but my real point is, why should we all have to suffer just because parents don’t want their kids seeing bad stuff? Yeah, kids shouldn’t watch 24. I’m not sure anyone should watch it anymore, but the show has never been suitable for children. There are lots of ways parents can keep their kids from watching shows they find objectionable. They can use the V-chip, which apparently is built into all new TVs, and many cable boxes, although apparently nobody’s using it. The truth is though, even the most vigilant parents can’t stop kids from watching the content they want to watch. If we’d had a V-chip in my house when I was a kid, I would have had to show my mom how to set it up.

So if we can’t stop these wily kids from watching bad stuff, does that mean we need more regulation and fines to solve the problem? No!!!! I mean, it’s hard enough dealing with the FCC now when all they have control over is sex and bad words. What kind of artificial demarcations will we get with violence? Is it OK to show a fist-fight, but only if there’s no blood? If an on-screen explosion kills dozens of people is it safe as long as we don’t see any bodies? Can a gun be fired on camera? Do you really want the government to make these decisions for you?

And to make matters worse, they want to expand oversight to cable TV. Now, everyone knows that cable television is one step away from showing man-on-dog orgy/snuff films, and they get away with it because (and this is so sneaky) people choose to pay for the privilege to watch cable TV. Any innocent can accidentally turn on a television that is accidentally hooked up to an antenna receiving broadcast signals, so we can’t allow filth over the air, but you actually have to jump through quite a few hoops and pay a hefty fee to choose to receive cable programming. If you don’t want that stuff on your TV, you can stop paying your bill, and it will magically go away.

One potentially good thing to come out of this would be a la carte pricing. The argument is, “yeah I pay for cable, but I only want EWTN and Nickelodeon. It’s the evil cable company that makes me get all these filthy channels like FX.” I can see that point. I have about 7,000 cable channels. I probably watch 15 of them. And 5 of the ones I want to watch don’t come in at all thanks to our deadbeat cable company, Time Warner Cable. Now, if I could save some money by only paying for the 15 channels I want, that would be great news. If the cable companies are only forced into it to stave off the threat of content regulation, oh well.

You know, I just spent all this time pontificating, when The Onion has already done it so much better with satire: Study Finds Cable-TV Violence Leads To Network-TV Violence.

May sweeps is almost upon us and that will likely spell R-I-P for at least a few of our friends on the small screen. Last year, we said goodbye to Misha Barton’s character on The O.C., Ana Lucia and Libby on Lost and, I presume, more than a few folks on 24.

This year promises to be no different. We’ve already lost Heroes’ Isaac, as he was crucified and lobotomized (in that order) by Sylar on Monday’s episode. And, from what I hear, the rivers on Lost’s remote island will run red with heaps of dead castaways. I think someone’s even going to die on Grey’s — but it seems like Meredith’s return from the dead may be pinpointed as the show’s shark-jumping moment, so who really cares?

So here’s a little charty on who I think will die versus who we wouldn’t mind not hearing from again. A few explanations follow.

A bit of rationale:

Burke – My grand “he’ll kill himself because he can’t be a suuuurgeon!” theory is pretty much dead in the water at this point. And as much as we’ve all acquired a distaste for Isaiah Washington, if they haven’t killed off him or another central cast member so far I don’t think they ever will.

Hiro – He will never die. Ever. And that’s how it should be.

Charlie and Desmond – I can’t decide if they’re trying to fake out the audience with this Charlie death stuff. Are they going to have a magical fate reassignment somehow? Or are they going to be all “you can’t fight the future” (wait — wrong show)? Maybe they’re going to throw us a curveball and have Desmond die instead. After all, he isn’t one of the original survivors and Lost loves to kill the newbies.

And Cristin helps me out with the 24 forecasts:

Milo – Milo is new this season and recently confessed his love for co-CTU employee Nadia. We all know that’s the kiss of death (heyo!), particularly since Nadia just stepped up as his boss, and will be able to put him in many situations where he could perish in the line of duty and he could feel suitably guilty.

Morris – Our favorite member of the Chloe O’Brien love triangle (Milo and his weird facial hair being the other), Morris was forced into a life changing Sophie’s Choice early on in the season where he was made to arm nuclear weapons for a terrorist group in order to save his own life. 24 would never allow death for someone who could, instead, live out the rest of their life under the crippling weight of such guilt.

Doyle – First, you are played by Ricky Shroder. Who elects to be listed as “Ricky” in the credits. Second, we like killing off “Big Name” season guest stars (see also: Sean Astin). Lastly, you are a douche, and people keep referring to what a lunatic you were when assigned to Denver . You’ll either make a large-scale mistake that you thought was ballsy enough to warrant the risk and die honorably, or Jack will have to kill you in the line of duty.