TVSquad

There's another Bravo to NBC crossover afoot. First, The Real Housewives of New Jersey popped over to play themselves on Mercy. Now it turns out that Kathy Griffin is on her way to Law and Order: SVU. And, get this, she's not playing herself. The queen of the D-list will be acting.

Kathy has been tapped to play a lesbian activist in the February 10 episode. As anyone who's watched Kathy on her Emmy-award winning reality show, My Life on the D-List, Kathy is a shameless over-achiever and loves to work. She's ambitious and determined to get off the D-list. As she might say, she would go to the opening of a refrigerator if it would help her career.

• At 8, ABC has The CMA Awards.
• CBS has a new Old Christine at 8, followed by new episodes of Gary Unmarried, Criminal Minds, and CSI: NY.
• NBC has new episodes of Mercy, Law and Order: SVU, and The Jay Leno Show.
• FOX has a new So You Think You Can Dance at 8, followed by a new Glee.
• The CW has a new America's Next Top Model at 8.
• There's a new Secrets of the Dead on PBS at 8, then a new P.O.V.
• Cartoon Network has a new Destroy Build Destroy at 8.
• G4 has the season premiere of Human Wrecking Balls at 8.
• At 9, TBS has two new episodes of Tyler Perry's House of Payne, followed by two new episodes of Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns.
• DirectTV 101 has a new Friday Night Lights at 9.
• Syfy has a new Ghost Hunters at 9, then the series premiere of Ghost Hunters Academy.
• Discovery has a new Mythbusters at 9.
• Fine Living has a new Whatever, Martha at 9.
• History Channel has a new Nostradamus Effect at 9, then a new Mystery Quest.
• Showtime has a new Inside The NFL at 9.
• At 10, FX has a new Nip/Tuck.
• Bravo has a new Top Chef at 10.
• Comedy Central has a new South Park at 10, followed by the season finale of Secret Girlfriend.
• Food Network has a new Dinner: Impossible at 10
• Also at 10: Spike has a new Ultimate Fighter.

Check your local TV listings for more.

After the jump, the late night talk shows.

• At 7:30, FOX has Game 1 of The World Series.
• At 8, ABC has It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, followed by new episodes of The Middle, Modern Family, Cougar Town, and Eastwick.
• NBC has Monsters vs. Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins From Outer Space, then new episodes of Law and Order: SVU and The Jay Leno Show.
• The CW has a new America's Next Top Model at 8.
• At 8:30, Disney XD has four new episodes of Naruto: Shippuden.
• At 9, DirecTV has the season premiere of Friday Night Lights.
• Discovery has a new Mythbusters at 9, followed by a new Time Warp.
• Syfy has a new Ghost Hunters at 9, then a new Destination Truth.
• Showtime has a new Inside The NFL at 9.
• At 10, Bravo has a new Top Chef: Las Vegas.
• Comedy Central has a new South Park at 10, then a new Secret Girlfriend.
• FX has a new Nip/Tuck at 10.
• There's a new Dinner: Impossible on Food Network at 10.
• Also at 10: TCM has Harold and Maude.

Check your local TV listings for more.

After the jump, the late night talk shows.

I started watching Law & Order during the Briscoe and Green days, so I don't know a whole lot about Detective Rey Curtis, Briscoe's former partner from '94-'99. What I do know is that Benjamin Bratt is pulling a Chris Noth and returning to the show that gave him his big break.

Bratt, whose A&E series, The Cleaner, was just canceled, is reprising his role as Detective Rey Curtis on the original Law & Order. However, it doesn't look like the current crime-fighting duo of Lupo (Jeremy Sisto) and Bernard (Anthony Anderson) have anything to worry about: Bratt is only signed up for one episode.

The "Ask TV Squad" column, published every Wednesday, answers your questions about current and past TV shows, as well as about the celebrities appearing on TV. Every week, I will pick a question (or more) sent to us and provide answers in the column. If your question is not picked for a column, it may be answered in a subsequent column. To submit questions to the "Ask TV Squad" column, you can post them below in comments or email them at asktvsquad@gmail.com.

This week, I answer questions about online TV shows, a new series called Miami Trauma, and NYPD Blue DVDs.

• At 8, ABC has a new Dancing with the Stars, followed by the series premieres of Modern Family, Cougar Town, and Eastwick.
• CBS has the season premiere of Old Christine at 8, then the season premieres of Gary Unmarried, Criminal Minds, and CSI: NY.
• NBC has the series premiere of Mercy at 8, followed by the season premiere of Law and Order: SVU and a new Jay Leno Show.
• FOX has a new So You Think You Can Dance and a new Glee.
• There's a new America's Next Top Model on The CW at 8, then a new The Beautiful Life.
• Cartoon Network has a new Bobb'e Says at 8, followed by a new Dude, What Would Happen?
• At 9, Discovery has a new Man vs. Wild.
• Food Network has a new Throwdown with Bobby Flay at 9.
• History Channel has a new Nostradamus Effect at 9, followed by a new MysteryQuest.
• Also at 9: Syfy has a new Ghost Hunters, then a new Destination Truth.
• At 10, Bravo has a new Top Chef: Las Vegas.
• Travel Channel has a new Man vs. Food at 10.

Check your local TV listings for more.

After the jump, the late night talk shows.

Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.

This is the first week in quite some time that I'm definitely, definitely, definitely going to buy one of the DVD sets that is being released. And that would be 30 Rock. Can't wait for the fourth season to start in October.

As for The Mentalist, I love it but I can't imagine watching the episodes again, you know?

• 30 Rock - Season 3
• Being Erica - Season 1
• Brotherhood - Final Season
• Castle - Season 1

Ah, Labor Day. Isn't it great to have the summer over (yes, I consider Labor Day as the end of summer) and the new TV season about to begin?

Here's a list of the various marathons, specials, and sports that you can see on Sunday and Monday. Let us know if we've missed anything.

Sunday

• At 8 AM, Hallmark has a Golden Girls marathon.
• At 9, USA has a Law and Order: SVU marathon.
• At 10, WE has a marathon of Girlfriends episodes.
• At 10:30, TV Land has a Beverly Hillbillies marathon.
• At 11, CBS has U.S. Open coverage.
• At 1 PM, Discovery has a Planet Earth marathon.
• Bravo has a Top Chef: Las Vegas marathon at 1.
• At 3, Spike has a Band of Brothers marathon.
• NBC has the Deutsche Bank Golf Championship at 3.
• At 5, TV Land has an Andy Griffith Show marathon.
• At 9, it's the Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon (check local listings).

If a show is good enough to get nominated for an Emmy, why not watch it for hours on end while you forget forever what the sun looks like?

USA Networks has announced that it's reaching around and patting itself enthusiastically on the back for its Emmy nomination collection with a marathon event of Monk, House and Law & Order: SVU. The chain of would-be red carpet winners runs Friday, September 4 through Sunday, September 6 and includes the episodes of each show up for awards.

Monk is all USA's baby and garnered 16 total Emmy nominations including seven nominations and three wins for Tony Shalhoub (Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series).

House is Fox and SVU is shared with NBC. But it's one big happy Emmy family for USA.

More good news out of NBC's top drama. Wentworth Miller is guesting on Law and Order: SVU, and this time he's not going to be behind bars. The Prison Break actor will star in the September 23 premiere of Law and Order: SVU, which is kicking off its 11th season on the NBC.

Wentworth Miller's casting comes on the heels of NBC re-signing of Mariska Hargitay and Christopher Meloni to two-year extensions as the show's mainstays, Detectives Benson and Stabler, as well as the return of Stephanie March as Alex Cabot and a four-show arc for Christine Lahti. I'd say that the powers-that-be are stacking the deck with prime talent to make sure Law and Order: SVU maintains its top quality status.

Well, that's a relief. After months of speculation that NBC would be bringing Law & Order: SVU back for the 11th season without the two stars that have anchored the show, there's good news. Mariska Hargitay and Christopher Meloni have re-signed with SVU. They pair agreed to stick with NBC's top-rated Neilsen drama for two more seasons.

Good news is probably an understatement. It's really great news because with SVU moving to Wednesday, 9 p.m., the show really didn't need to shake up the cast at this point in time. Stability mattered and NBC found a way to bring the two stars into the fold, offering them both the flexibility they sought.

Wow, I gotta say that this was a great season finale. I wasn't really familiar with Stuckey, but what happened still shocked me (though I guessed what was going on halfway through). It was rather Bones-ian, in a way.

This could turn out to be the last episode of Law and Order: SVU for Christopher Meloni and Mariska Hargitay, since they are holding out for more money and NBC is thinking of replacing them. Of course, I don't think that's going to happen. Sure, all of the Law and Order shows have had many cast members over the years, but I'm betting that the duo will be back for another season.

• At 8, ABC has two new episodes of According To Jim (including the series finale), followed by Earth 2100.
• NBC has a new I'm A Celebrity ... Get Me Outta Here at 8, then Inside The Obama White House: Brian Williams Reports and the season finale of Law and Order: SVU.
• Versus has the Penguins/Red Wings game at 8.
• TCM has It Happened One Night at 8, then Mr. Smith Goes To Washington.
• At 9, FOX has a new Mental.
• The CW has a new Hitched or Ditched at 9.
• G4 has a sneak peek at Web Soup at 9.
• Discovery has a new Deadliest Catch at 9, followed by a new Man vs. Wild (with Will Ferrell).
• At 10, FX has a new Rescue Me.
• Bravo has a new Real Housewives of New Jersey at 10.
• History Channel has a new Life After People.
• Sci-Fi has a new ECW at 10.
• Travel Channel has a new Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern at 10.
• Also at 10: MTV has the season premiere of Paris Hilton's My New BFF. Does she get a new best friend every year?

Check your local TV listings for more.

After the jump, the late night talk shows.

Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.

I'm not usually a big fan of these DVD box sets that take one genre and give you a variety of various series episodes (such as the sets that have a bunch of TV westerns in them). But the Saturday Morning Cartoon sets look like fun. The 1960s set includes The Flintstones, The Jetsons, Top Cat, Secret Squirrel, Atom Ant, and Quick Draw McGraw, while the 1970s set includes Josie & The Pussycats, Speed Buggy, the Batman/Tarzan Adventure Hour, and Hong Kong Phooey. OK, the 60s set is much better than the 70s set. And the 70s set for some reason also includes The Jetsons, which is odd (it ran in 1962). Still, both sets look good.

• The Closer - Season 4
• Designing Women - Season 1
• Gangland - Season 3
• Gunsmoke - Season 3, Vol. 2
• Jeeves & Wooster - Complete Series