TVSquad

As December rolls around, your kids will want to watch the usual line-up of holiday specials. But, I'm guessing they wouldn't mind watching a T-Rex hunt down and tuck into a Triceratops, whatever the time of year.

Discovery Channel will put cutting-edge imaging technology to bring giant lizards to life inside and out with Clash of the Dinosaurs. Premiering December 6 at 8 p.m. (ET/PT), the four-part series looks inside the body of a dinosaur to with cinematic photo-real 3D graphics.

According to Discovery's announcement, consulting anatomy and paleontology experts help to peel back the skin, muscles and bones of the creatures to show how they thrived. So, on second thought, maybe the kids should stick with A Year without a Santa Claus.

Nothing says "holiday season" like tornadoes, ghosts and animal dung. So, Discovery Channel is running marathons of their reality shows to make the yuletide season gay.

The network's scheduling release states that Mythbusters, Deadliest Catch, Dirty Jobs, Storm Chasers and Ghost Lab will each get a turn offering guys something to watch while they undo their belts after the big meal (and while the ladies do the dishes).

Here's the programming slate for when you're not watching football or A Year without a Santa Claus:

Nov. 26: Thanksgiving Day: Mythbusters – 9 a.m. ET/PT – 3AM ET/PT
Nov. 27: Day after Thanksgiving: Deadliest Catch – 9 a.m. – 3 a.m.
Nov. 28: Dirty Jobs – 10 a.m. – 3 a.m.
Nov. 29: Storm Chasers – 1 p.m. – 3 a.m.

Dec. 24: Christmas Eve: Dirty Jobs – 9 a.m. – 3 a.m.
Dec. 25: Christmas Day: Mythbusters – 9 a.m. – 3 a.m.
Dec. 26: Deadliest Catch – 9 a.m. – 3 a.m.

Dec. 31: New Year's Eve: Ghost Lab – 10 a.m. – 3 a.m.
Jan. 1, 2010/New Year's Day: Mythbusters – 9 a.m. – 3 a.m.

The Mythbusters crew aren't scientists, but they sort of play them on TV -- submitting everything from movie stunts to common household sayings to proven analytic methods.

Of course, it's more fun to determine whether you can cut a tree in half with a machine gun than it is to test the effectiveness of a new polymer, so Mythbusters gets a TV show -- and your average scientists don't.

To celebrate Mythbusters' completion of its seventh series of episodes on Discovery Channel, series stars Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage hosted a set visit of their testing and production facilities in an industrial park just outside San Francisco's Mission District.

Hyneman led the tour himself through M5 Industries -- a former visual effects house turned production shop for the popular debunking series.

I don't know how true this axiom is, since I just made it up out of thin air. But it seems to me that, in the world of reality TV, you can edit a nice person to look like a jerk, but it's much tougher to edit a jerk into looking like a nice person. It's just harder to fake being a good person than it is to fake being a jerk. And what I learned by the entire season of Pitchmen, including last night's tribute episode, was that Billy Mays was a good guy.

Sure, he had an ego. Sure, there are probably production staffs out there who think the guy was a jerk because he was having a bad day when he worked with them. But, the entire season of Pitchmen showed that Mays was a fun-loving guy that seemed to be a dedicated family man; he also seemed to be truly committed to helping people realize their dreams through their inventions. Considering how many different people teared up during the tribute episode last night, I could tell the guy was loved and admired.

Jessica Alba could be facing vandalism and tagging charges for gluing several "shark conservation posters" all over Oklahoma City in an organized stunt.

Alba apologized for her participation in the incident after she was busted online. She's in Oklahoma City shooting her new movie and somehow got lured into this sticky "save the shark" poster campaign.

The city wide display is an obvious move for shark preservationists, as millions of the large fish are slaughtered every year by heavy hunting off the Oklahoma coast. Also, the classic film Jaws was set near Tulsa.

The show that transformed the Discovery Channel from a stuffy science documentary network that even A/V club nerds found drab and dull into the media franchise it is today is returning to the network that birthed it.

Monster Garage will return to the cable network for a new series run set in Detroit called MG: Motor City. It is set to debut in the fall.

The new series will gather a gaggle of gearheads to task them with turning a timid Ford Model T into a fire-breathing, fuel-guzzling, Firestone tire-eating race dragster. What's the grand prize? What else? A multimillion dollar government bailout!

Regular watchers of American Chopper will look at the picture to the right and immediately ponder the following question: is Paul Sr. giving Paulie Jr. a big hug or a meaty, larynx-crushing choke hold?

I've been notoriously anti-reality TV for a long time, but I gave American Chopper a grace chip when it ran on the Discovery Channel for the first few seasons. It can get just as over-the-top as most reality shows tend to do, but it still had a genuine level to it somewhere in just about every episode, and it offered viewers something more than just grown men fighting. I'm also a pathetic wanna-be gearhead and would watch a custom Buick LaSabre build contest if I thought I could generate an ounce of knowledge from it over my rich, car-building friends.

So imagine my surprise when the New York Post broke the biggest spoiler in the show's history, other than the fact that it is still on the air.

One of the most frustrating things of blogging about US TV series is the fact that I can't watch episodes or most of the webisodes on the official network sites because I live in Canada. I can't even have access to content on Hulu and the like because of International Internet laws (or lack thereof) and distribution rights issues. I don't know all the legalities behind this but I find it weird that on my basic cable set up I have access to US-based channels for all major networks (except The CW) and yet, I can't access the full content of US-based network websites.

Since I've started blogging here on TV Squad, I've read many comments from international readers saying that they can't watch episodes or videos we embedded in our posts. It's irritating to follow a link to a video and see "This episode is currently only available to viewers living in the United States." Therefore, I researched the web to find websites where Canadians could watch US TV series online and in all legality (of course, people in the US can watch episodes online at AOL TV, Hulu, etc.).

Here is a list of "Canadians welcomed" websites that stream US TV shows. You can thank me later.

Discovery Health will be showing a four-part series about the human body this September. Body in Numbers will show viewers how the body functions throughout the day and how it adapts and reacts to things humans do.

From the press release, the show sounds like it will be a lot of astounding statistics. The surface area of the lungs is about the size of a tennis court. And the fastest sneeze was clocked at 100 miles per hour (those are some fast boogies). So, if you're into cool graphics and interesting facts or just like learning about the human body, this sounds like it could be for you. However, as I read the press release, I couldn't help but wish that Discovery Health got the kid from Jerry Maguire to narrate the program.

Body in Numbers premieres Wednesday September 3rd at 8 p.m. ET / PT and will continue every Wednesday night in September.

When I saw the headline that Discovery Channel was working on a Da Vinci series, my first thought was that they were finally dipping their toes in the scripted drama pool. Because, really, there's some mileage to be had with a show about Da Vinci, don't ya think? And with other cable channels having success in the fiction department, it doesn't seem an unreasonable idea for Discovery to join the fray.

Alas, that's not what we have here. It's still a pretty good idea though. A team has been assembled and they will be tasked with taking the original designs of Da Vinci and building them with modern tools to see if they really work. The team will be comprised of a rocket scientist, a special effects expert, and an in-the-garage inventor. The show is tentatively titled Doing Da Vinci, but I suspect that will change. Somewhere in the development process someone is going to point out that, "It might mean something different than what you think it means."

Last week I had the pleasure of interviewing Andy DeHart, a shark expert who currently works at the National Aquarium in Washington, D.C. Dehart talked to me about his first experience with sharks (when he was five!), about his interest in conservation of the species, and about Shark Week, Discovery's annual documentary series (in its 21st year this summer). Other than Big Brother, Shark Week is the only reason I turn on the TV in the summer. I was pretty excited to talk to him about this year's event.

The late Steve "The Crocodile Hunter" Irwin's daughter will be getting her own doll. Bindi Irwin stars in Bindi the Jungle Girl on the Discovery Channel, a more child-friendly version of her father's show.

The rubber doll will cost $15 to $20 with a portion going to efforts to breed endangered species and rescue animals. The doll will come with accessories including binoculars, a camera and other outback gear, as well as a cockatoo, wombat and python.

The talking version of the doll will speak catchphrases including "Crikey! Let's go help wildlife," and "You can make the world a better place." The doll is being developed by Wild Republic, a division of K&M International Inc., based in Twinsburg, Ohio who also marketed the Steve Irwin doll shortly after his death.

I am somewhat torn about this news. On one hand, her fame (of which this is a part) seems mildly exploitative due to the tragedy of her father's passing. On the other hand, a girl has to eat.

Something tells me this isn't going to happen, but you can be sure plenty of us would tune in if it did.

Over on Discovery's MythBusters forums -- where fans regularly congregate to discuss previous episodes, disagree with Adam and Jamie's conclusions and offer suggestions for future myth-busting -- someone has made the suggestion that the MB's take on the task of not only obtaining but also fully testing the capabilities of one of Scientology's most exclusive devices: the E-meter.

After making Deadliest Catch a huge hit for the Discovery Channel back in 2006, and still going strong, Thom Beers' Original Productions struck gold again with The History Channel's adrenaline rush Ice Road Truckers. Catch chronicles the real-life adventures of Alaskan crab fishers, considered one of the most dangerous jobs in the world, while Truckers is about one of the most dangerous jobs on land, driving big rigs in the Northern Canadian provinces over frozen lakes.

Now, according to Zap2It, Beers has inked an aggressive deal with NBC for three new shows. The network has given a 10-episode commitment to all three and guaranteed they will run at least two in prime time. So what are they about? Apparently, it didn't matter because Beers is working with the network now to figure out the subjects for all three.

Would you play a Meerkat Manor video game? I sure would--I would love to play as Flower leading her massive group of offspring around. I'm sure the fight scenes would be good too. Those meerkats have some pretty sweet moves.

Well, if you love Meerkat Manor and you love video games, you're in luck because Activision (the same people who brought you the immensely-popular Guitar Hero 3) has teamed up with Discovery Communications. The two companies are in talks to produce a series of video games based on cable network's shows.

They decided on Meerkat Manor for the first game (it is Animal Planet's highest-rated show) and more titles will be released in early 2008. I wonder what other shows they will turn into video games? Discovery Communications has several cable networks so they have a wide array of shows to serve as the basis for a multi-media project (i.e. Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet, Travel Channel). I have a few suggestions: Man vs. Wild (or Survivorman if you like him better), Orangutan Island and Deadliest Catch.