[Televisionary]

Welcome to your Friday morning television briefing. ABC Family has canceled quirky dramedy The Middleman , with the cabler confirming that it has "decided not to renew the series for a second season." Fans looking for closure can keep their eyes open for a Season One DVD, slated to be released this summer, and a comic book written by creator Javier Grillo-Marxuach that will tell the story of the original season finale, which was scrapped for budgetary reasons. ( New York Post ) Jason Clarke ( Brotherhood ) has been cast as the lead in CBS' untitled US attorney drama pilot from writer/executive producer Frank Military. Clarke will play "the powerful, charismatic section chief who oversees four lawyers and a handful of paralegals in their overlapping cases." Elsewhere, Jonathan Sadowski, Kevin Simpson, Noureen Dewulf, and Ricky Mabe been cast in FOX comedy pilot Two Dollar Beer and Nick Bishop, Kelli Giddish and Ravi Patel have all been cast in FOX's untitled

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing. Cabler FX is developing a series adaptation of Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming's comic series Powers , about two police detectives in the homicide division assigned to cases involving super-powers. “ Powers is in active development as a pilot at FX,” Bendis told MTV. “I just handed in a draft to the network and we’re getting our notes from the network as soon as this thing is over. So next week I’ll get the notes, and as long as they don’t involve sock puppets and some sort of orgy scene that I’m not interested in, then hopefully it will go in the right direction.” ( MTV's Splash Page ) More discussion about Tom Zarek's motivations during the recent two-episode arc on Sci Fi's Battlestar Galactica , this time from Richard Hatch himself, who eloquently commented on Maureen Ryan's thread about the most recent episode ("Blood on the Scales") over at the Chicago Tribune 's site. "First

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing. The CW has unveiled a scheduling shakeup that will feature the launch of Season Two of Reaper earlier than expected. Reaper will take over the Tuesdays at 8 pm timeslot--currently inhabited by 90210 --on March 3rd and will air 13 episodes without interruption. 90210 will then move to 9 pm on Tuesdays, taking over Privileged 's timeslot. So what happens to Privileged ? That series will wrap its run February 14th, much earlier than originally planned after it aired fewer repeats. No decision has been made yet about a second season of Privileged . ( Hollywood Reporter ) Torchwood fans should keep their eyes on the internet on Thursday as the 60-second trailer for the series' five-episode Season Three, entitled "Children of Earth," will be released... simultaneously around the world at 4 pm ET. Season Three is set to air later this year on BBC One and BBC America over five consecutive nights. (via press release) Mi

Welcome to your Monday morning television briefing. I hope everyone's now well rested from Super Bowl weekend and a slew of first-run series programming. Let's dive into the headlines. Bad news for the belly button-less: ABC Family has canceled teen sci-fi drama Kyle XY . The cabler did however renew Greek , Lincoln Heights , and The Secret Life of the American Teenager for additional seasons and handed out ten episode orders for new series Ruby and the Rockits , Perfect 10 , and 10 Things I Hate About You . ( Variety ) NBC announced that it will stream both the 3D and 3D versions of tonight's episode of Chuck live at NBC.com starting at 5 am PT tomorrow. Viewers will also be able to choose between watching the 3D installment in either HD or standard definition, with or without closed caption subtitles, and stream while chatting using NBC.com's Viewing Party function. (via press release) The New York Times profiles Chuck 's Adam Baldwin, who returns to the airwav

Welcome to your Wednesday morning television briefing. Still no word on when--if ever--ABC will air the three remaining installments of Pushing Daisies . "They are not scheduled to air right now," creator Bryan Fuller told Entertainment Weekly 's Michael Ausiello, "and that's all we know." Rest assured, I'm also trying to get to the bottom of this. ( Entertainment Weekly 's Ausiello Files ) The Futon Critic's Brian Ford Sullivan has a new interview with Joss Whedon about his upcoming FOX drama Dollhouse and Dr. Horrible , in which Whedon discusses the lure of television, the genesis of Dollhouse (over lunch with Eliza Dushku), and ditching the original pilot. "This won't be the second episode because this isn't what the network wants, this isn't the kind of show they want," says Whedon. "This is something you could do two years in when everybody's familiar with it and you don't have to explain it. I always hol

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing. Hope you weren't too attached to CBS' The Ex List . The Eye has pulled the low-performing drama off of its schedule, effective immediately, and will fill the Friday night timeslot with repeats of NCIS for now. Decision comes on the heels of yet another batch of low ratings for the drama (5.3 million viewers and 1.5/5) and the departure of showrunner Diane Ruggiero. No word on whether production will continue (series is currently shooting its eleventh episode) or whether CBS will air the produced episodes later down the line. My thought is that they won't be going to prom any time soon. ( Variety ) Barack Obama's presidential campaign has decided not to enlist a full broadcast regime on Wednesday night, opting not to purchase the 8 pm air time on ABC, which will instead air an original episode of Pushing Daisies instead. I'm hoping that the fact that Daisies is one of the few series that will air original episod

Welcome to your Thursday morning television briefing. Once again, I am feeling burnt out after an overstuffed night of TV viewing that included new episodes of Pushing Daisies, Top Model, Old Christine, Project Runway , and Dirty Sexy Money . Whew. Jason Priestley has signed on to direct an upcoming episode of the CW's 90210 but don't expect to see him in front of the camera any time soon. Priestley will direct the series' 18th episode, slated to air in the spring. While Priestley's Brandon Walsh won't be turning up in that hallowed zip code, Shannen Doherty is said to be returning for two episodes later this season (though executive producer Gabe Sachs wouldn't comment officially) and producers are also said to have locked Jennie Garth for six additional segments. (All that hubbub about Garth not coming back? Allegedly just a "misunderstanding.") ( Entertainment Weekly 's Ausiello Files ) On the eve of the premieres of US versions of Life on Mars

Fans of BBC's Hyperdrive or Channel 4's Black Books might just want to make their way down to the ABC Family booth at Comic Con. Cabler ABC Family will be on hand at the convention later this week to promote several of its series, including upcoming animated series Slacker Cats , about the misadventures of two ne'er-do-well cats. Voice talent includes Alex Borstein, Stephen Root, Dave Foley, Harland Williams, Sinbad, Emo Philips, and Nicole Sullivan. So what does this series have to do with Black Books and Hyperdrive ? I'm glad you asked. Creators Kevin Cecil and Andy Riley, who created the BBC2 comedy Hyperdrive (starring Sean of the Dead and Hot Fuzz 's Nick Frost) and wrote several episodes of the hysterically surreal Black Books --including one of my personal favorite episodes "Manny Come Home," which guest starred Simon Pegg--just happen to be the creators of Slacker Cats , which launches August 13th on ABC Family. They'll be at the ABC Famil