When a show can have you rolling in the aisles one minute and welling with tears the next, you know you’re onto a winner. Tuesday’s episode of  Saving Grace amped up the tension, with Grace feeling the pressure as her family members were systematically targeted by an unrelenting assailant with a lethal grudge. With bombs and bullets raining down [...]

If you’re already preparing yourself for the departure of Lost in the spring of 2010, take heart. The series will go on a little longer than expected.
OK, it’s only one hour longer, but we’ll take what we can get.
An ABC rep confirmed Monday (June 29) that the final season of Lost will run 18 hours. [...]

Noah Wyle is jumping back into the TV pool, signing on to star in a sci-fi pilot for TNT that Steven Spielberg is executive producing.
The project will star Wyle as the leader of a group of soldiers and civilians who mount a resistance against an alien invasion force. Spielberg — who also executive produced ER, [...]

The fifth season of the Next Food Network Star started three weeks ago. Ten people who love to cook were all trying to be the next “star” on the Food Network and get their own show. The most well-known contestant of the competition is Guy Fieri (Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, Guy’s Big Bite, Guy Off [...]

NBC had already announced that The Jay Leno Show would premiere a week before the official start of the 2009-10 TV season. The network will take its time rolling out the rest of the fall schedule, though.
Leno’s prime-time show will premiere Monday, Sept. 14 and run every weeknight at 10 ET. Two other nights of [...]

CBS will take the concept of “premiere week” very seriously this fall, launching nearly its entire lineup the week of Sept. 21.
The only outliers on the Eye’s launch schedule are Survivor: Samoa, which will debut Thursday, Sept. 17, and the new medical drama Three Rivers, with star Alex O’Loughlin, which will premiere Sunday, Oct. 4. [...]

Jack Bauer is coming to Comic-Con — and he’s bringing Starbuck with him.
The stars of 24 — including Kiefer Sutherland and new cast member Katee Sackhoff, late of Battlestar Galactica — will be part of a panel at San Diego Comic-Con on Friday, July 24. They’ll be part of a pretty hefty presence from 20th [...]

The CSI: Miami team will welcome a new member this fall.
Former Third Watch and Invasion star Eddie Cibrian will be a regular on the show for its eighth season. He’ll play an officer from Hollywood, Fla., who joins the CSI team in Miami.
(Potential spoiler in the next paragraph.)
What he won’t be, at least according to [...]

AMC has given the go-ahead for a conspiracy thriller called Rubicon, bringing the number of original dramas on the cable channel to three.
Rubicon, which has been in development for more than a year, comes from writer Jason Horwitch (Medical Investigation, FX’s Pentagon Papers movie) and features a cast that includes James Badge Dale, Miranda Richardson [...]

Actress and former Deal or No Deal model Meghan Markle is joining the cast of Fringe next season.
Markle, who has guested on 90210 and a number of other shows, will have a recurring part on the FOX sci-fi series, according to The Hollywood Reporter. She’ll be playing a young FBI agent who’s described as “attractive, [...]

FOOD NETWORK OPENS CASTING FOR 2010 SEASON OF
THE NEXT FOOD NETWORK STAR
Conducting Open-Call Auditions in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Atlanta, Phoenix, San Diego and Austin
 
NEW YORK – June 23, 2009 – Food Network has greenlit a sixth season of its highest-rated reality series, The Next Food Network Star, the network announced today. [...]

FlashForward, having been teased during Lost, rightfully has its share of mysteries and a unique mythology growing.
And of course, that means spoilers.
Well, the showrunner-approved ones anyway. Journalists were threatened with having their press passes revoked, the silent treatment invoked and other menacing consequences if we were to reveal some of the pilot’s sixth-act surprises during [...]

The CW has amended the titles of a couple of its shows for next season. That in and of itself is not a big deal — new shows sometimes go through name changes between getting picked up and going on the air.
It’s how the titles were changed that is the reason for this post. As [...]

An Oscar winner is joining the NCIS: LA team.
Linda Hunt has signed on as a regular for CBS’ new drama NCIS: LA, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The diminutive actress will play the overseer for the “backroom” support staff that provides the Office of Special Projects (which brings down the criminals that threaten national security) with [...]

ABC has put another piece of its fall schedule in place, booking the season premiere of Private Practice for Thursday, Oct. 1.
The medical drama was one of a few shows ABC left hanging last week when it announced the bulk of its premiere dates for fall. Still waiting to hear about their debuts are Brothers [...]

The time-traveling Doctor Who’s next destination will be Comic-Con.
David Tennant, who’s wrapped playing the tenth incarnation of the Time Lord, and Doctor Who writer/executive producer Russell T. Davies will descend upon the fans in San Diego for the 40th annual Comic-Con on Sunday, July 26.
Joining them on the 10 a.m. panel will be executive producer [...]

The fifth season of the Next Food Network Star started two weeks ago. Ten people who love to cook were all trying to be the next “star” on the Food Network and get their own show. The most well-known contestant of the competition is Guy Fieri (Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, Guy’s Big Bite, Guy Off [...]

FOX will start rolling out its fall schedule just a little ahead of the official start of the 2009-10 season, giving shows like Bones, Fringe, Glee and Dollhouse at least one episode before the crush of premieres in late September.
The first-ever fall run of So You Think You Can Dance and Glee will kick off [...]

One of the surprise successes of the last TV season, CBS’ special I Get That a Lot, will get some more life on the network.
The hidden-camera special, in which celebrities work regular jobs and attempt to convince people they only look like the famous people they are, will be back three more times in 2009-10. [...]

Fire up your Diet Coke-and-Mentos cannons: The MythBusters are returning to Comic-Con. Joss Whedon and Dollhouse will be there too.
Discovery confirmed Friday that MythBusters Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage will make their second consecutive San Diego Comic-Con appearance. Savage and Hyneman will be the stars of a panel at 7:15 p.m. PT Saturday, July 25, [...]