TVSquad

As Jane wrote a couple of weeks ago, CBS was hot on the heels of landing a big name star to fill the void when William Petersen leaves CSI later this year. The names bandied about included Kurt Russell and John Malkovich, and one other major motion picture star, Laurence Fishburne. Today, the network announced Laurence Fishburne will indeed be the new addition to CSI.

His character is a forensic scientist, like Grissom, but don't expect him to have Gil's fascination with insects. No, Fishburne's man has other bugs: he's a former pathologist and college lecturer who's focused on why people commit acts of violence. It should be interesting to see how his preoccupation with the why integrates with the other CSI gang who are all Grissom-trained and generally obsessed with how a crime is done and who done it.

Fishburne will be introduced in the ninth episode when his character meets members of the CSI team during a murder investigation and ends up joining them.

(S07E04) Okay, this episode was a definite reach, especially the convoluted way they came up with a climax to feature Monk doing all the things necessary to pass a fitness exam. Perhaps it was an homage to the Olympics, a twisted connection thanks to the NBC Universal. I don't know, but it took a leap of faith to buy it all.

For starters, there was no star murderer. It was an interesting case for a change, especially since the killer was a professional hit man. The planting of the bomb in the heavy bag was clever, although wouldn't a real pro make sure that the target would be hit? The set up was so random. And if you don't care about killing, why not leave a bomb big enough to destroy the gym and everyone in it? Just wondering...

Bravo's top-rated and highly acclaimed reality food show, Top Chef, has big plans for the fifth season. Like real estate, it's all about location, location, location and Top Chef has chosen a most unique place, somewhere you might not guess in a game of 20 questions. I'm not going to reveal the place until after the jump, because there may be some of you out there that want to be surprised.

Just to recap, Top Chef has already spent seasons in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Miami and Chicago. They've also had special episodes and finales in Napa Valley, Las Vegas, Hawaii and Aspen and San Juan, Puerto Rico. Traveling to interesting and even exotic locales is part of the fun, giving the contestants a chance to incorporate the regional foods and the style of that part of the world.

Okay, if the suspense is getting to you -- I know it is -- go to the jump and see where season five of Top Chef is going to be...

(S04E05) How happy am I that Jason covered the last night of auditions on Wednesday! I'm going to agree with him about the two tappers. The second girl, Liz, was fabulous. With tap, the excitement happens below the knees so performers have to be conscious of what's going on with their upper bodies.

Okay, I have a word problem for you. What do you get when you take hundreds of dancers then make them do four different styles, deprive them of sleep, critique them on national TV, and make them play some sick version of Mother May I to see if they get to the next round?

The Vegas episode of So You Think You Can Dance, of course!

Did your favorite show get canceled? Yeah, mine too. It makes you think twice about investing time into a new show, because you never know how long it'll last. Sometimes even shows with fairly good ratings are sent to the chopping block.

Here at TV Squad, we're doing our part to bring attention to cool shows that were axed in the recent upfront announcements. Last week, I put out a call for considerations for The Arrested Development Award, a.k.a. The Show Least Deserving of Cancellation Award.

You made your opinions known - thank you! - and now we're into Phase 2: The Nominees. The Squad will pick our own winner, but we're giving you the chance to pick a Reader's Choice winner. Here are the nominees, and be sure to vote in the poll at the bottom.

The TV Squad Awards are in full swing, and I have the pleasure of moderating The Arrested Development Award, a.k.a. The Show Least Deserving of Cancellation Award.

Since we're focusing on shows from the 2007-2008 season, that lets out a few contenders, like Veronica Mars , Firefly, and the award's namesake, Arrested Development. But there are plenty of recent shows deserving of the honor. Five that made my list:

1. Journeyman (NBC). This time-shift puzzle starring Kevin McKidd as deer-in-the-headlights Dan Vasser took a while to hook me, but by mid-season, I was there. I love shows that make you think, and although this one developed a formula (Dan saving someone who would later go on to change history), the logistics always had you scratching your head. I was sad to see it absent from NBC's Fall 08 schedule.

NBC's Las Vegas ended abruptly in February with two couples -- Danny and Delinda and Sam and Vic (her deceased ex-husband's brother) -- just about ready to tie the knot. But the shocking news that Cooper had died in a plane crash blanketed the ceremony in a gloomy pall -- the same pall that Vegas fans felt upon learning that the series had been canceled. Here are my top six reasons why Las Vegas needs to come back for a wrap-up movie, if not another season:

1. Spin-Off Opp. A TV movie would be a great opportunity to spin Las Vegas into a new series for Josh Duhamel and James Caan. I've sorely missed watching Caan rough up the bad guys this season, and he and Duhamel would make a great P.I. duo, collaring modern-day Vegas criminals a la Crime Story's Lt. Torello. Are you listening, Michael Mann? Pretty please, with wing-tip shoes on top?

Every time he thinks he's out, they pull him back in again! No, just kidding. It's not like that. This isn't Michael in Godfather 3. Nobody's forcing anyone.

However, it is true that William Petersen is returning to CBS's CSI for the ninth season. This is great news for fans of the show -- and the star -- because for years now he's been yelping about leaving the hit series to do other things. Last year, for example, he was written off the show for a brief hiatus in which Liev Schreiber was cast as a temporary replacement for Gil Grissom in the Las Vegas crime lab.

Well, here's hoping that the powers that be were reading TV Squad after the two-hour Knight Rider movie premiered last February. Then, at least they'll know how to fix the show, because NBC has picked up Knight Rider as a series for the 2008-2009 schedule, and it's going to need some re-tooling.

That's the phrase they love to use in the business to describe all the work that's needed to turn a turkey -- albeit one with great ratings -- into a successful series. And Knight Rider, as conceived in that TV movie/back door pilot, needs some major work.

"This place is cursed." - Danny McCoy during the Las Vegas season series finale.

Danny couldn't be more right. Over the years, Las Vegas switched timeslots so many times that I've lost counts. It also went through as many casino owners as timeslots! No matter, the show was an entertaining one. It's the type of show I enjoyed watching on Friday nights (or in most cases Saturday afternoon thanks to my old VCR) because of its lightness. I didn't have to think much while watching the gang try to catch the bad guys, Delinda put her foot in her mouth and Sam try to please her whales so they would lose big bucks on the tables.

A few days after a cliffhanger season finale, NBC decided that fans would have to do without the Montecito crew from now on; Las Vegas was canceled.

Can you recall last Friday's episode of NBC's Las Vegas, the one that was touted as the show's season finale? Well, the network made a small grammatical faux pas. You see, they really meant to say that it was the 'series-finale-because-we're -canceling-the-damn-show' finale instead. You could see where the confusion was.

Yep, you read right. Straight from the The One Known As Ausiello we hear that the casino drama is ending its run after five years on the air. It's not like they didn't try to keep the series afloat after anchor star James Caan left last season. Heck, they replaced him with a fairly stoic Tom Selleck as owner of the Montecito. However, rather than increasing the ratings, the change led to a double-digit ratings decline.

This is Spoilers Anonymous, a weekly column here at TV Squad where we'll supply you with the dirt on some of the more popular shows on the air. We'll never put spoilers up here on the main page in order to help the reformed stay unspoiled. If you have anything to add to the group, feel free to step up and let yourself be heard, either with our tips form or by emailing us at tvsquad at gmail dot com or call and leave a message at 917-421-9477 (NY) - your anonymity is guaranteed, if you wish to remain as such.

This week we have: Bones, Gossip Girl, Kyle XY, Las Vegas, Lost, One Tree Hill, Prison Break, Psych and Smallville. (SPOILERS FOLLOW!)

Now that about half of the season of NBC's Las Vegas has aired, it is probably time to analyze if the series still works, especially since James Caan and Niki Cox have departed after the September 2007 season premiere.

Back when I reported the news that both actors wouldn't report, I was pretty sure the show would do fine without Cox but I wasn't sure it could survive Caan's departure, not only because his character was a pivotal one that brought a unique flavor but also because of Caan's presence on screen. Would they do the show without replacing Caan's role? If so, who had enough small screen star power and on-screen presence to fill in those shows? Well, that person turned out to me Magnum, P.I.'s Tom Selleck.

It was NBC's turn today to announce what its winter schedule would look like. The press release states that "NBC's first-quarter primetime schedule is slated to deliver significantly more hours of original programming than was ever the case in the first quarter of 2007." Besides the expected crop of reality and game shows, NBC's winter schedule will be filled with new episodes of series like ER, Friday Night Lights, Las Vegas, Medium, Scrubs and all three versions of Law & Order. Also added to the lineup will be Lipstick Jungle, a new dramedy starring Lindsay Price, Kim Raver and Brooke Shields.

Not too long ago, our corporate buddies at AOL Television posted a fall TV scorecard featuring their grades for new and returning shows. While the list featured such shows as House, Reaper, Desperate Housewives, Pushing Daises and Ugly Betty, it missed a number of fan favorites (and non-favorites) that we talk about constantly over here at TV Squad.

How to rectify this? Well, we could all go over to the AOL Television offices and beat the staff until they agree to add the missing shows. Or, in order to keep our jobs and avoid prison time, we could just list the missing shows over here, grade them, and give you a chance to rate them as well. Since I wouldn't last more than five minutes in jail I think we'll just list the missing shows over here.

You can find the list of eleven shows, graded by myself, Joel, Keith, Brett and Brad, after the jump.