TVSquad

Earlier this week, one of the big honchos at NBC was kvetching to the media about how the company hates being in fourth place. Well, the only way out of the bottom is better programming. I don't know if the network will succeed with this news, but at least it's committing to its programs. Three shows got full season pickups, Community, Parks and Recreation and Mercy. That means nine episodes more each.

I hate when football runs over. I want to watch 60 Minutes but two teams insist on ending the fourth quarter in a tie and have to go to overtime. Even when it's not OT the game often runs over, and for some reason CBS then goes to another game instead of starting the prime time shows right away. Last night they went to another game and fans of Cold Case were left in the dark because CBS didn't have enough time to show the episode.

But Three Rivers fans got to see Alex O'Loughlin and his friends try to save lives. What did you think of the episode?

[Watch episodes and clips of Three Rivers and other shows at SlashControl.]

You don't often see actual video of a celebrity hurting themselves on the set of a TV show (unless it's some YouTube thing, but even that's pretty rare), but Conan O'Brien knew that fans would be interested in seeing it so he showed footage of the accident. It also gave him a chance to make some jokes.

Here's the clip. Conan was running a faux marathon with Teri Hatcher, and it seems the floor was very slick...

[Watch episodes and clips of The Tonight Show and other shows at SlashControl.]

If you didn't hear, Conan O'Brien hit his head while doing a sketch on The Tonight Show on Friday and had to be rushed to the hospital. They stopped taping and put a rerun with Jeremy Piven on Friday night instead.

But there's good news! Conan is out of the hospital, he's fine, and there will indeed be a new episode of The Tonight Show tonight. Now the real question is this: will Conan show footage of the accident? They were filming so footage exists and I wonder if Conan will show it so fans can see what happened and so he can make some jokes about it.

[Watch episodes and clips of The Tonight Show and other shows at SlashControl.]

Remember the show Emergency? I used to love that show. Along with Adam-12, it was just about the calls that the paramedics went on and we got very little info about the personal lives of the characters. I'm sure NBC's new medical drama Trauma (say that 10 times real fast: drama Trauma, drama Trauma, drama Trauma) will have lots about the personal lives of the characters, though I think I'm going to be be more interested in the action scenes, and this one below is a doozy.

Trauma premieres on Monday after Heroes (I wonder if that will work out).

The synopsis of Mercy, the new NBC medical drama, says it's about three nurses at a hospital, but most of the previews have focused on the one played by Taylor Schilling. Here are two clips from tonight's premiere (at 8 on NBC), one Schilling-centric and one with all three.

As it's been speculated in the last months, Scrubs will not be the same when entering its ninth season. We know that Zach Braff and Sarah Chalke have both inked deals to appear in only six episodes and that, since Donald Faison's pilot wasn't picked up, rumors were going around that Scrubs 2.0 could revolve around Turk and medical school.

Confirmation has finally arrived and the show will indeed go through an extreme makeover that will take the action from the hospital to medical school.

Slight spoilers coming up!

Jay Leno returned to the Tonight Show last night after spending a couple of days in the hospital. In the two videos below, he explains that he had a 103 degree temperature but doesn't really go into what exactly was wrong, though some of the news reports they show mention food poisoning. The first clip makes the predictable joke about Octo-Mom, and then we get some desk talk about what happened. (If you can't see these videos, try these.)

Tonight Show host Jay Leno says he's fine, he's out of the hospital, and he'll be back on his show on Monday night.

Leno spoke with The Knoxville News-Sentinel and says that he's completely fine and that the internet rumors that he was secretly dead aren't true. Hmmm...as someone who writes for a TV blog I can honestly say I hadn't heard any of those types of rumors - maybe I should read more of the crazy blogs. There's still no official comment on why Leno checked himself into the hospital.

Tonight Show host Jay Leno has canceled taping of the late night show and checked himself into a Los Angeles hospital.

No word yet on what's wrong with him. Those of you expecting to see Ryan Reynolds or Big Bad Voodoo Daddy tonight will have to settle for a rerun with Prince, Paul Giamatti, and Emma Roberts. NBC co-chairman Ben Silverman is quoted as saying, "OH MY GOD WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO MONDAY THROUGH FRIDAY AT 10PM?! NO NO NO!" There's also no word on whether or not Leno will be available to tape tomorrow's show. I would guess that since it's the last day of the week they'll throw a rerun in there too (though with Leno's need to work he could do a show from his hospital room).

Now...will Letterman say something about it on his show tonight (assuming he heard by his taping time)?

UPDATE: tomorrow's show has been canceled too.

So, if you saw the preview for last night's special two-hour Brothers & Sisters, you were anticipating that someone was going to die. Then, if you surfed the net, there were all kinds of rumors and spoilers that something life-altering was going to happen. Would it be Tommy? What about Kitty and Robert's newborn, coming via surrogate mom? Would Nora keel over from all that running in the hospital hallways? Maybe it was going to be something from left field, like Uncle Saul gagging on a wine cork and kicking the bucket?

Imagine my shock and surprise when all the build up turned out to be something unexpected. If you haven't watched it yet, I'll save it for after the jump.

Two stars from two of NBC's most popular shows are in the hospital, and at least one of the cases sounds serious.

Deal Or No Deal host Howie Mandel was rushed to the hospital in Toronto for an irregular heartbeat. He was admitted to the hospital just so they could monitor him and do some tests. He's expected to be released from the hospital later this afternoon.

The other person in the hospital is Law and Order: SVU star Mariska Hargitay. She reportedly suffered a collapsed lung around the holidays, according to a spokesperson (who says it was a "partially" collapsed lung). There are conflicting reports as to how it happened, either by sledding or some other way, but TMZ says that the lung collapsed for a second time and had to be inflated again. She was nominated for a Golden Globe the other night.

By the way, Mandel is in Toronto to film scenes for his new hidden camera show Howie Do It.

Like Darth Vader before her, good things can even come out of a person like Paris Hilton. The wealthy socialite best known for her role on television's The Simple Life as well as an amateur porn video has made an "extremely generous" donation to Children's Hospital Los Angeles for the construction of a medical building. No exact amount was specified. The new building, called the Children's Center for Cancer and Blood Diseases, will open in 2010.

"The children I have met through my involvement with Children's Hospital have truly touched my heart," Hilton said in a statement. "I am proud to make a donation and lend my name to the fundraising effort to help children who are facing terribly serious illnesses."

Far be it from me to be a cynic in light of such charity, but this is a woman who has lived such a life of debauchery that the gossip rags have their own special section regarding her. I'm not sure what to think.

So what do you folks think? Actual generosity, or publicity stunt? Or maybe a little of both?

We've seen The Office as a suspense thriller. Now here's Scrubs edited as a serious drama.

Of course, it doesn't work quite as well, because Scrubs already has a lot of very serious moments. I was watching a repeat of Scrubs a few weeks ago, the episode where the woman dies and they give her organs to other patients and they die too because the docs didn't know the woman had rabies, and my roommate (who doesn't watch the show) said "I thought this show was a comedy?" And I explained that, yeah, it is, but it has a lot of serious, real moments too, and that's one of the reasons I like it. So this video isn't as good as The Office one.

But it's still well done. And they were wise not to include Dr. Kelso in the footage, because just hearing his mean, cutting voice and seeing his scrunched up face would have ruined the whole thing. Video after the jump.

(S02E09) The Adult Swim schedule grid has this episode listed as "Holy Image," but the opening credits had it as "Holy Visage," so that's what I'm calling it. At the start of this season I received an e-mail from creator Dino Stamatopoulos that said the title of the episode may change from "Holy Image" to something else. I assume it was changed so viewers wouldn't confuse it with "God's Image," an earlier episode. [Note: Dino e-mailed me and confirmed this after I posted this review].