TVSquad

Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.

Every week I hope and pray that I don't have to spend a lot of money on DVDs - or anything else, really - and each week there's something new I need to have. This week there are three DVD sets I'm going to order. How about you?

• The Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog - Animated Christmas Blast
• Alvin & The Chipmunks - Daytona Jones and The Pearls of Wisdom
• CSI: Miami - Season 6
• Casper - Spooktacular New Adventures: Vol. 2
• Grey's Anatomy - Season 4
• Gulliver's Travels - Miniseries
• A Haunting - Season 4 and Seasons 1-4 set
• It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia - Season 3
• Judge Judy - Second to None
• Kate & Allie - Season 5 (Canada only)
• Keeping Up Appearances - Life Lessons From Onslow and The Full Bouquet
• Medium - Season 4
• Riptide - Complete Series
• Smallville - Season 7
• The Spectacular Spider-Man - Attack of the Lizard
• The Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries - Season 1
• To The Manor Born - Silver Wedding Anniversary and Complete Series
• Ugly Betty - Season 2
• Wings - Season 7

HBO has found the lead for one of their roughly 658 new "Hey, remember how we used to have good TV shows before we started giving you crap like John From Cincinnati? Huh? Do ya?" pilots.Thomas Jane (The Punisher) has been tapped to star in Hung, a one-hour dark comedy about a middle-aged high school basketball coach who figures out a way to use his best asset. Now, I'm no expert, but I'm guessing that the title doesn't mean that his best asset is his ability to tie a wicked hangman's noose.

Hung is a top priority at HBO, as new entertainment president Sue Naegle has made the spec script her first major purchase and first pilot pickup. Written by the creator of The Riches and directed by Oscar winner Alexander Payne (Sideways), Hung marks Jane's first regular TV role. He has, of course, previously made TV appearances, including a stint on wife Patricia Arquette's series, Medium.

(S04E16) It's always nice when we get to see Joe's dreams for a change. Luckily for him, they aren't visions of the future.

I am constantly amazed at the strength of character shown by Joe Dubois. Generally characters on TV are very sensitive or have high moral standards. It's not often that they have both. The best part is that while Joe knows that he is doing the right thing and really has no other choice, you can see the frustration and the anxiety in his face. I wonder if Jake Weber could possibly get an Emmy nominee for this role.

(S04E15) "All right, one more time for the slow kid." - Lee Scanlon

When I was in grade school, sixth grade to be precise, everyone brought their lunch to school in a small brown paper bag, sometimes, girls used a cute version (white bag with hearts, pink bag with kitties) but other than that, there were no exceptions. If anyone was foolish enough to bring their mid day meal to school in a lunchbox of any kind, they would pay dearly. For example, my friend Lance who quickly earned the nickname "Lunchbox Lance" all because of his love for the rock band Kiss. Thankfully, it never occurred to Lance to fight back like the young man in Allison's dream. However, now that I am an adult and I collect vintage metal lunchboxes, I would pay a hefty price for the lunchbox that young man used to bludgeon his tormentor.

• TNT has NBA Playoffs all night.
• At 8, ABC has a new Dancing with the Stars, followed by new episodes of Samantha Who? and The Bachelor.
• CBS has a new Big Bang Theory at 8, then new episodes of How I Met Your Mother, Two and a Half Men, Rules of Engagement, and CSI: Miami.
• NBC has a new, two hour Deal Or No Deal at 8, then a new Medium.
• FOX has new episodes of Bones and House.
• The CW has a new Gossip Girl at 8, followed by a new One Tree Hill.
• ABC Family has a new Greek, then a new Wildfire.
• PBS has a new Antiques Roadshow at 8, then a new Nature.
• TLC has two new episodes of Little People, Big World (including the season finale) at 8.
• At 9, USA has a new Monday Night RAW.
• Discovery has a new Dirty Jobs at 9.
• VH-1 has a new Flavor of Love at 9.
• Also at 9: GSN has a new World Poker Tour.

Check your local TV listings for more.

(S04E14) Out of all the dreams Allison has awakened from this season, tonight gets my vote for "Most Likely to Make You Jump Out of Bed and Scare the Crap Out of Your Sleeping Husband."

One thing you have to get used to if you are fan of Medium, is the ever present scene where somebody doesn't understand how Allison knows what she knows. Even though Joe, Davalos, Scanlon and most of her friends are well aware why Allison acts so strange, there are still plenty of people who are baffled by her behavior and, as a matter of course, have to react with disbelief and/or confusion. It gets old but it's a necessary evil. The most genuine of these reactions, however, come from the Dubois children.

(S04E13) "Allison... close your eyes. I gotta get out of bed now and I'm not wearing any clothes." - Lee Scanlon

The opening voice over left me a bit unnerved. I'm used to Medium starting with some kind of disturbing vision. The only thing disturbing about Allison's narration was that it made me feel like I was watching Criminal Minds.

The pool of blood seeping from the head of Di Novi's dead friend was a little closer to what I've come to expect and I really liked the surrealistic way Scanlon and Di Novi repeated Allison's dream verbatim.

• At 8, ABC has a new Dancing with the Stars, followed by new episodes of Samantha Who? and The Bachelor.
• CBS has a new Big Bang Theory at 8, then new episodes of How I Met Your Mother, Two and a Half Men, Rules of Engagement, and CSI: Miami.
• FOX has a new Bones at 8.
• NBC has a new, two hour Deal Or No Deal and a new Medium.
• There's a new Gossip Girl on The CW at 8, then a new One Tree Hill.
• PBS has a new Antiques Roadshow at 8, then new episodes of American Experience and Great Performances.
• ABC Family has a new Greek at 8, followed by a new America's Prom Queen.
• USA has a new Monday Night RAW at 8.
• Also at 8: TLC has two new episodes of Little People, Big World.
• At 8:30, Food Network has a new Heavyweights.
• At 9, VH-1 has a new Flavor of Love.
• GSN has a new World Poker Tour at 9.
• At 9:30, Food Network has a new Unwrapped.
• At 10, MTV has a new episode of The Hills, then a new episode of The Paper.

Check your local TV listings for more.

Here are the weekly ratings, by number of viewers.

American Idol gets three spots this week. You know what FOX should do? Just spread out Idol over seven nights. Why not? Some episodes wouldn't be as highly-rated as others, but you know fans would tune in. They can have four performance shows and three results shows. Ryan Seacrest can drag out the results over a few nights. This will make sure that Idol takes up seven spots in the weekly top 20 and also make sure the shows that follow all get high ratings too.

1. American Idol - Tue (FOX)
2. American Idol - Thurs (FOX)
3. CSI (CBS)

(S04E12) I had all but forgotten about Kurtwood Smith. I've been a big fan ever since Robocop and this character is really fun to watch. I only wish the writers had given his character a different name. Every time someone calls him Agent Cooper, I flashback to Twin Peaks and I feel like I'm betraying Medium by wishing that Peaks was still on the air.

One of the best things about Smith is how he can be so menacing while still keeping a smile on his face. In fact, I find him scarier when he smiles. I felt the same way when Red would actually say something nice to a member of his family on That 70's Show.

• At 8, ABC has a new Dancing with the Stars, followed by new episodes of Samantha Who? and The Bachelor.
• CBS has a new Big Bang Theory at 8, then new episodes of How I Met Your Mother, Two and a Half Men, Rules of Engagement, and CSI: Miami.
• NBC has new episodes of Deal Or No Deal and Medium.
• FOX has a new Bones at 8, followed by a new New Amsterdam.
• ABC Family has a new Greek at 8, then a new America's Prom Queen.
• Also at 8: CMT has the 2008 CMT Music Awards.
• At 8:30, Food Network has a new Heavyweights.
• At 9, The CW has a new One Tree Hill.
• Stephen Colbert is the guest on a new episode of CNN's Larry King Live at 9.
• USA has a new Monday Night RAW at 9.
• There's a new Dirty Jobs on Discovery at 9.
• GSN has a new World Poker Tour at 9.
• At 9:30, Food Network has a new Unwrapped, then a new Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.
• At 10, MTV has a new episode of The Hills, then the series premiere of The Paper.

Check your local TV listings for more.

(S04E11) "What are kids for, if not to be used as excuses to get out of things you don't want to do?" - Joe Dubois (as well as Paul Goebel)

Forty may, indeed, be the new thirty but considering Rosanna Arquette is a year away from being fifty, they could have done a little more to make her look better. I always thought she was hot but seeing her in that first scene made me want to watch The Executioner's Song just so I can relive those good old days.

It's about time, Manny came to his senses and stopped trying to deny that Alison was a huge help to him as the D.A. The truth is, there are plenty of voters who would actually be thrilled to know that the Phoenix police are using any method they can to put away criminals and, as we've seen, Alison gets results.

• At 8, ABC has a new Dancing with the Stars, then new episodes of Samantha Who? and The Bachelor.
• NBC has a new My Dad Is Better Than Your Dad, followed by new episodes of Deal Or No Deal and Medium.
• PBS has a new Antiques Roadshow at 8.
• TLC has two new episodes of Little People, Big World at 8.
• There's a new Greek on ABC Family at 8, then a new America's Prom Queen.
• Also at 8: TCM has the original King Kong.
• At 9, CBS has the NCAA Basketball Final.
• USA has a new Monday Night RAW at 9.
• FOX has a new New Amsterdam at 9.
• Food Network has a new Chefography at 9, featuring Julia Child. It's followed by a new Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.
• At 10, E! has a new episode of The Soup Presents.
• MTV has two new episodes of The Hills starting at 10.

Check your local TV listings for more.

(S04E10) I suppose one of the drawbacks of a suspenseful show like Medium doing a two parter is that while waiting a week for the second part, most viewers will have come close to figuring out what's going on. In this case, I wasn't too concerned with figuring out why Suzie Keener's roommate wasn't dead until I was stuck in traffic today and started thinking about reviewing the show tonight. Moreover, the previews made it pretty clear that Joanna was the mastermind of the entire abduction.

Luckily, this was all made clear in the first fifteen minutes of the show. What followed was my favorite kind of episode. The kind where we, the audience, know exactly what happened, and we get to watch the hero snare the guilty party. It was like watching a pretty version of Columbo.

Didn't Medium's Allison see this coming? Apparently not. Kelly Preston will be joining NBC's Medium for a four-show stint. Kelly will be playing a character named Meghan Doyle, a venture capitalist who invests in Joe Dubois, Allison's husband's, new solar-based invention. Presumably her interest in Joe is all business, but by the time the first of four episodes ends, the one called Partners in Crime, you can bet that the tension between Allison and Joe will be positively palpable.