TVSquad

If you haven't seen our game before, we give you a picture from a recent episode of a TV series and you provide the caption!

Last week's winner is miles with this: "The sign says 'To Serve Man. That seems innocent enough."

This week's picture is the meeting between Jon Gosselin and Levi Johnston:

You probably heard that ABC's V premiere got off to a big start in the ratings. In fact, it was the biggest drama series premiere of the season, seen by 14.3 million viewers and netting a 5.2 rating among adults 18-49. What does all that mean? To me, it says that even without the skywriting promotion that was canned, ABC marketing had raised awareness and drew the curious, the sci-fi fans, the nostalgic and a few more watchers for the launch.

Despite the big number, there's a good chance that V will sink in future outings because viewers like me were not hooked. I wanted to fall in like/love, but it didn't happen. Here's five reasons why:

Did you miss the series premiere of V last week? If so, no need to despair, because it's on SlashControl and I've embedded it below. The show scored good ratings, and Jason had great things to say about the premiere, noting some similarities to Battlestar Galactica. He was also glad to see how the writers updated the storyline from the classic 1980s miniseries.

"I wasn't sure how they could modify the storylines from the series I remembered to accurately find parallels to our war on terrorism, and the terrorist movements themselves, but they did," writes Jason. "And they did it all while staying true to the struggles and fears that's kept the original series fresh in our minds for 26 years now."

Have the Visitors arrived on Earth with a message of peace? Time will tell, but not before they fully and irretrievably embed themselves into our society.

If you haven't seen our game before, we give you a picture from a recent episode of a TV series and you provide the caption!

Last week's winner is Fred with this: "She has eight babies but she ought to have nun."

This week's picture is from the series premiere of V:

The cast of ABC's new sci-fi drama V have nothing to worry about. That is if you don't count the fact that the show just replaced their showrunner, got caught launching a sneaky skywriting campaign and opened with a "split launch."

Last night's episode got off to an "out of this world" start scoring a 5.0 rating and a 13 share of 13.9 million viewers. It gave ABC its highest rating among 18-34 year-olds in three years for its timeslot since 2004's Lost. I guess you could say they had a really successful "launch" and the show really "took off." (Insert rimshot here.)

Of course, this is just the opening episode and could be the result of successful marketing. Do you think V's winning streak will last?

Despite only having one episode broadcast (the official TV Squad review is here) and four episodes in the can, V is already changing showrunners. They are trading one Scott for another. Rather than Scott Peters, the new guy calling the shots will be Scott Rosenbaum of Chuck and The Shield fame.

The switch is not a good sign. On the other hand, I watched the pilot and was underwhelmed. Among other problems, things moved too fast. Also, why do people cheer when aliens land on Earth and give a PSA? Wouldn't they more likely be running for their lives? The pilot would have worked better as a two-hour premiere. However, I enjoy Chuck and hear that The Shield was good. Any talent from either show going could only benefit V. Hopefully I won't be proven wrong.

Will V become more Chuck-like and add humor? Could a concept like that work? An alien invasion comedy?

• TBS has a marathon of The Office all night.
• At 8, ABC has the series premiere of V, followed by new episodes of Dancing with the Stars and The Forgotten.
• CBS has a new NCIS at 8, then new episodes of NCIS: Los Angeles and The Good Wife.
• NBC has a new, two-hour Biggest Loser, followed by a new Jay Leno Show.
• FOX has a new, two-hour So You Think You Can Dance at 8.
• The CW has new episodes of 90210 and Melrose Place.
• PBS has a new Nova at 8.
• ESPN has a new 30 For 30 at 8, followed by two new episodes of The World Series of Poker.
• At 9, History Channel has a new episode of The Universe.
• Bravo has Kathy Griffin: Balls of Steel at 9, then the season premiere of Tabatha's Salon Makeover.
• Syfy has two new episodes of Scare Tactics at 9, followed by a new ECW.
• BBC America has a new Dragon's Den at 9.
• At 10, FX has a new Sons of Anarchy.
• Food Network has a new Chopped at 10.
• A&E has two new episodes of Parking Wars at 10.
• Also at 10: MTV has a new episode of The Hills, followed by a new episode of The City.

Check your local TV listings for more.

After the jump, the late night talk shows.

Dear Bob,

I'm writing you because I read in Dan LeBatard's column today that you've had a horrible week since your slip-up on national television last weekend. You know, that comment about a taco and NASCAR driver Juan Pablo Montoya during the ESPN football broadcast you were calling? It was definitely a bad joke and some people have gone so far as to suggest that you're a racist for having said it.

I don't think you're a racist based on this incident. Neither does LeBatard. I think you're not a very funny person. You were a great quarterback. You've been an excellent analyst of college football. But you're no Shecky Greene when it comes to off-the-cuff guffaws.

To prepare for next week's debut of the remake of V, I picked up the V: The Complete Series DVD of the weekly 1984/85 series that followed the original two mini-series, V and V: The Final Battle. I remember loving the original as a kid, sparking my imagination that anyone I saw could be an alien lizard making plans to haul my carcass to a warehouse for storage.

I tore the plastic off of the package with a bit of trepidation. Not everything you loved as a kid holds up to your scrutiny, or even your tastes, when you watch it all grown up. Which is why I'm sure some people cringed when they heard about the remake.

Would it stink? Would it be just as good as I remembered it? Should I have left well enough alone and saved my fifteen bucks?

About two weeks ago, with much fanfare, ABC issued a press release about a big promotion for the new sci-fi remake of V. The idea was skywriting giant red "V's" over national monuments around the country. When I read about it, I thought it was pretty clever.

Like ABC media, I didn't contemplate the environment hazard posed by spraying the skies with red skywriting materials. The skywriting stunt has been canceled because one clever reporter did. She snagged ABC in its own press net.

ABC's remake of V starts on November 3 (for four episodes, then it's going to take a break). Here are the first ten minutes of the pilot (even though the video says eight minutes, it's over 9 minutes long).

It's an effective opening, introducing all of the characters and showing us how the aliens come to our planet. If something happened like this in real life, would people really stand in the street and point and go to the top of buildings to get a better look or would we see a big ship and completely freak out and run out of town?

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 Flash Forward, Eureka, NCIS, The Philanthropist, and V.

I'm a little worried about ABC's thinking behind this latest move. As announced, the remake of the classic '80s mini-series V will launch on November 4th. But now, after four consecutive episodes, it's going on an extended hiatus. The reason, per ABC, is the expected ratings dominance of the Winter Olympics.

And though they're announcing the hiatus, they've not yet said when we can expect the show to come back. I hope this doesn't mean there are more problems on the set, like the one that shut down production for two weeks this summer. Regardless of the reason, we've seen countless times that long hiatuses on a new show can kill it.

However, if you think of the original V, it was a couple of mini-series followed by a regular series (best forgotten). So maybe these first four episodes will be written and set up like an epic mini-series with a bang-up ending that will sustain us through the break. I hope it's like that, otherwise they should just push back the entire series to 2010.

When I first started exploring this project, there were a few shows that I knew were going to be important to hit. This is the first of those. Firefly was Joss Whedon's sci-fi western series. The show mustered disappointing ratings in its short eleven-episode run on FOX.

Since then it's gone on to near mythic cult status. There was such an outcry of support from its loyalists, the Browncoats, over its cancellation that the producers made a feature film sequel. That movie, Serenity, answered a lot of questions about the future fate of the cast. Unfortunately, like the television series, it couldn't find quite enough people to show up and tune in to warrant a sequel. Nevertheless, the few morsels of Firefly we did get are enough to prove that this is one of the most innovative and enjoyable series ever to hit the airwaves.

Each year, as the new fall season approaches, I go through all the magazine and online sources talking about the various shows to try and figure out which ones I'm going to be excited about, and which I'm going to avoid like the plague.

Inevitably, I wind up sampling plenty of shows from which I should have steered clear. At the same time, a few shows will slip between the cracks, and then I'm bashing my head against the wall because I missed out on the beginning of something special. I hate coming into things late.

This year, I decided to share my top and bottom five selections. I'm sure the rest of the Squadders and you will have differing opinions than mine, but that's what makes America great, right? Chime in with your own lists in the comments.