TVSquad

Call me crazy, but in today's economy, I don't think anyone can be picky when it comes to getting a job.

Unless you're Matthew Fox.

According to various reports, the Lost star claims that when the sci-fi drama finally ends, it'll be the last TV show he ever does. Part of me doesn't blame him. He spent six years on Party of Five, another year trying to make something out of nothing on the abysmally bad UPN (remember them?) drama Haunted, and it'll be five more years notched for him once Lost ends.

When TV shows have made the leap to the big screen, the results have not always been great, except when they keep the same cast and come up with a good story that builds on the series, like Sex and the City and Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan. The same is true of some TV movies that have built on a show's lingering appeal even after it's been canceled. James Garner came back for a couple of Rockford Files movies, for instance, and The Return of The Man from UNCLE with David McCallum and Robert Vaughn was excellent. Of course, it doesn't always work -- the Rhoda and Mary reunion was painful to watch -- but I'm still a fan of the follow-up TV movie.

Here's my ideas for ten TV shows I'd like to see as TV movies.

Everybody loves lists, right? That's why I was attracted to this AOL Television list of the best TV shows of the 1990s. Lots of good entries, some head-scratchers, and two incredibly glaring omissions.

You can immediately guess which shows are on the list: Seinfeld, The X-Files, Sports Night, Oz, The Sopranos, The Larry Sanders Show. There are some shows that I certainly would never put on such a list, but I can understand why they were chosen, such as Party of Five, Dawson's Creek, and Ally McBeal. I think this is probably yet another example of "best" being confused with "popular" or "buzzworthy." Actually, I would never include Ally McBeal on any sort of best of list.

But what really confuses me? There are two major shows, two shows that are often mentioned in a "best of" list (not just the 90s, but all-time) that aren't on the list! Can you guess what they are? Both appeared on NBC, and one of them was created by someone who created one of the above shows.

(S02E02) Army Wives is reminding me of some of my favorite TV dramas of all time, shows like thirtysomething and Party of Five. Especially this episode where there are more feelings and reactions to the bombing at the Hump Bar. How does life go back to normal after a tragedy? How do you cope?

Time has passed and life may appear to be getting back to normal at Fort Marshall, but things are still quite unsettled among the close knit coterie on Army Wives. Chief among them are the Holdens. Claudia Joy is simply not returning to normal and it become clear as the episode progressed that she's an emotional powder keg.

In case you haven't heard, new pictures of Jennifer Love Hewitt in a bikini have surfaced on the internet. In case you haven't seen them, I'll tell you that there is nothing particularly scandalous about the shots.

There is no nudity, accidental or otherwise. She's not eating a sloppy hamburger or doing anything else "unladylike." Truthfully, the only reason these pictures are getting any notice at all is because they reveal Ms. Hewitt's "curvy, cellulite-ridden physique."

One of the best things about being the King of TV is that many times people will ask me questions about shows I have never heard of.

Last week, a young man contacted me through my MySpace page to ask me if I knew the name of a certain TV show. He described it thusly, "I believe it may have been British and/or on PBS. It was not narrated but had an eclectic cast (one of whom was deaf). The show was various vignettes, mostly science based from the ones I remember. The one I really remember is the guy who was making bubbles with cigarette smoke. The biggest clue I can give you was the logo. At the beginning of the show they would show the name, then turn it on its side and reflect it in a mirror. It looked like a cricket, then it bounced off..."

Well, I racked my brain and googled into the early morning but to no avail. I had to admit defeat. Now here is the great part.

Welcome to TV Squad Lists (formerly 'The Five'), a feature where each blogger has a chance to list his or her own rundown of things in television that stand out from the rest, both good and bad.

Last week I gave you a pretty big list of popular "drinkeries" from TV, but I think where I went wrong was trying too hard to list every watering hole possible. Since I'm covering eateries this week, I'm certain I'll miss some of your favorites, but I'm going to list what I believe to be the most popular dining spots from television, both past and present. And since there are way too many real spots on TV to mention (Hell's Kitchen, Kitchen Stadium, etc.), I'll stick with fictional spots, even if they're based on real ones.

This time let's go with 14 of them.

1) Arnold's/Al's Drive-In (Happy Days) -- I struggled for a bit with what I would call the number one eatery on TV, but I kept coming back to this spot. Arnold's/Al's was in nearly every episode as far as I can recall, and of course housed The Fonz's office. After it burned down, the signage changed to Al's.

(S32E07) I pretty much only know Matthew Fox as Jack from Lost, so I didn't really have any expectations going into the episode. As it turned out, Fox was an okay host. However, I thought the night's writing was fantastic. Even the worst sketch of the evening (usually one of those stragglers at the end of the episode) had its moments. I can't quite put my finger on what was done differently... All I know is that I was definitely laughing out loud more than usual.

A sick Jon Stewart (aww... please get well before the Oscars) opened the show by bringing up a pretty nifty story. Eight workers from a ham processing plant won a huge $365 million Powerball jackpot the other day (dude, that's, like, a million dollars every day for a year). Jon reports that many of the workers planned to go to work again the next day... not because they still wanted their jobs, but either because they wanted one last chance at the employee ham discount or wanted to put a "little something extra" in the ham. "Hmm... This ham tastes like... like a Powerball winner..."

He got down on one knee and recited Shakespeare to her.

She said yes.

Former Party of Five actress Neve Campbell is engaged to British actor John Light, according to People magazine. Light starred in the Showtime film The Lion in Winter and in the HBO series Band of Brothers. Campbell was previously married to Canadian actor Jeff Colt, they divorced in 1997 after 2 1/2 years of marriage.

Scott Grimes is actually one of the few famous people I can say I knew somewhat well at one time. Back sometime around 5th grade or so, Scott was in my class in a small grammar school in Dracut, Massachusetts. I remember his first forays into the acting world, as he sang and performed well beyond a young kid's talents in school plays, then public television talent shows and eventually commercials. I remember at one point, he'd gotten a gig with a popular (at the time) toy car company, and how jealous we were that they gave him a bunch of the cars for doing the commercial. Times sure have changed for Mr. Grimes since those days.

Every Tuesday morning here on TV Squad, we will highlight the week's TV-on-DVD releases. Some noteworthy releases today, December 20, 2005:

• The Amazing Race 7 - The The 7th Season
• Battlestar Galactica - Season 2.0
• ER - The Complete 4th Season
• Party of Five - Season 2