Thanks to original cast members Vin Diesel and Paul Walker, Universal's "Fast & Furious" drove off with a record-breaking $72.3 million at the box office over the weekend. Meanwhile, Seth Rogen and "Saturday Night Live's" Andy Samberg took the street-racing franchise to a whole different level. Enjoy...

On June 14th, HBO and creator Alan Ball's Southern vampire series, "True Blood," returns.                (Deborah Ann Woll and Stephen Moyer, above)

This is David Letterman and Joaquin Phoenix at their very best/worst, depending on how you look at it. Phoenix is in full rapper-reinvention (or meltdown ) mode and Letterman is exhibiting his very finest dry (or acid-tongued) wit. Softie that I am, I viewed it through my fingers; the discomfort this exchange inspires is reminiscent of Harvey Pekar's infamous appearances on the show more than a decade ago.

Letterman's position appears to be that this is his joint, it's an honor to be invited and if you don't bring your A game he'll assess exactly what you did bring and treat you accordingly. "Maybe sometime I'll come to your house and chew gum," he snarls. And: "Joaquin, I'm sorry you couldn't be here tonight." I think meant it, too.

Everyone's excited about the imminent (or not!) digital transition, that moment when the phrase "rabbit-ears antenna" will make the leap from quaint to truly arcane. However, Nielsen put out a press release to warn us that some population sectors aren't quite excited enough: A whopping 5.7% of Americans aren't ready!

Among the 56 local markets that Nielsen measures with electronic meters, the one that is least ready is Albuquerque-Santa Fe, with 12.4% of the households completely unready. The most prepared market is Hartford & New Haven, with only 1.8% of homes unready.

"It is imperative that we operate at an accelerated pace to educate those who are at the greatest risk of losing their television service -- low-income households, large numbers of senior, minority and disabled viewers. These viewers rely on traditional television the most and can least afford to lose their television lifelines. We have a responsibility to make sure that these groups whether in our families, churches or communities are equipped and ready for this transition," said Cynthia Perkins-Roberts, Nielsen African American Advisory Council (AAAC).

Of course, the alarmist tone of Nielsen's press release ignores that fact that their most valuable would-be consumers will achieve light speed once they realize a trip to Radio Shack is required if they want to continue watching "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" And it's kind to look out for those who might otherwise be overlooked or underserved. However, Nielsen's stake is to ensure that television-viewing habits can be preserved, and therefore measured, in the brave new world; you can't activate a people meter if the people can't watch television.

But who's watching TV, anyway? As Rick Kissell reported in regards to Pres. Obama's inauguration:

Preliminary Nielsen estimates show that 29.2% of U.S. households were watching the presidential inauguration -- easily the largest in decades but below the 37.4 household rating for Reagan. Obama's figures include viewership on roughly 15 broadcast and cable networks, while the Reagan ceremony was viewed only on ABC, CBS and NBC; also, they do not include the huge online viewing this time around, with CNN.com, FoxNews.com and MSNBC.com all reporting record streaming video traffic.

The Reagan inauguaration in 1981 ended up averaging a whopping 41.8 million viewers to stand as the most-watched on record. The previous low-water mark came in 2005 for the second inauguration of George W. Bush (15.5 million).

Someday, it won't matter how we watch as Nielsen Online or similar will have access to the wi-fi in our cerebral cortex. And someday, the future's Richest Person In the World will figure out how to make online make money. In the meantime, Nielsen's real panic threatens to surface as the value of TV viewers -- and in turn, their measurement -- is increasingly called into question. [BusinessWire]

I don't see much TV. (Neither a boast nor an admission of guilt. When I do watch, I prefer switching aimlessly between movies I've seen before.) However, I may have to start if only for producer Chuck Lorre's ("The Big Bang Theory," "Two and a Half Men") show-closing vanity cards, which are random and brilliant. (Scratch that; he has a whole site devoted to them. Problem solved!)

WARNING: If you like your Oscar fodder unspoiled, stop reading now. Even so, you might want to reconsider, as this is sort of genius.

Want to hear the stars of "The Yes Men" discuss post-nasal coke drip and sex with GILFs? Or see Rosario Dawson describe "Seven Pounds" as "superfuckingfabulicious?" Then you want No Good TV, a refreshingly fearless video site that doesn't know from the seven words you can't say on television. Although the site also includes interviews with more traditionally uncensored performers such as porn stars Belladonna and Kimberly Kane (age verification required), mainstream actors appear to appreciate the no-holds-barred schtick as a welcome break from the fatuous press-junket solemnity that dogs so much movie PR, especially when their sparring partner is comely blonde host Carrie Keagan. From an interchange with Will Smith re: "Seven Pounds": 

CARRIE: Fucking awesome movie!
WILL: Hey, you can't say that on TV!
CARRIE: Yes, I can!
WILL: You'll just bleep it?
CARRIE: Nmm... no.

(snip)

CARRIE: Did you bring your "Seven Pounds" of happiness?
WILL: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

I'll take that over Mary Hart any day. Apparently, so would Mark Burnett; he took a stake in the popular online video producer last month with plans to turn it into a TV series. I hope the web version will continue to thrive, since I don't know what channel would allow Dawson's description of preparing for a sex scene with Smith -- and that would be a pity. [NGTV]

Talk about losing the plot. With "Heroes" in a creative and ratings tailspin, executive producer Tim Kring fired co-exec producers Jesse Alexander and Jeph Loeb earlier this month. Loeb/Alexander said they would still attend a Nov. 17 panel at the Creative Screenwriting Expo in Los Angeles as planned, but Kring would not. Then everyone reversed themselves and it was Kring repping "Heroes" solo. OK, fine. Confusing and kooky world out there.

But what's really baffling is what appears to be Kring's strategy to bring back the fans. Before he went into some heavy-duty griping about how hard it is to write for the same characters, here's what Kring had to say on the panel:

(The serialized show) is a very flawed way of telling stories on network television right now, because of the advent of the DVR and online streaming. The engine that drove [serialized TV] was you had to be in front of the TV [when it aired]. Now you can watch it when you want, where you want, how you want to watch it, and almost all of those ways are superior to watching it on air. So [watching it] on air is related to the saps and the dipshits who can't figure out how to watch it in a superior way." (emphasis mine)

Whee! So for your show to be a hit, you need more saps and dipshits? That should make everyone feel great. [IGN, via Defamer]

Has real life made reality programming unpalatable? Scott Collins points out that an awful lot of nonscripted shows -- everything from "Deal or No Deal" to "Survivor" -- are struggling for, well, survival.  Meanwhile, "Gossip Girl," "30 Rock" and "Ghost Whisperer" show improvement in the ratings. Writes Collins, "Many of the reality shows currently on network schedules are, not to put too fine a point on it, old. 'Survivor' is in its 17th cycle... 'Dancing' is winding down its 7th season, the time when most series begin to show signs of wear." And he points out that "the deep recession of the early 1980s may have created a fertile environment for the success of nighttime soaps about the treacheries of the rich and infamous, such as 'Dynasty' and 'Dallas'... As the Dow continues to spiral down and jobs dry up, viewers may have decided that their everyday lives already contain more reality than they can bear." [Show Tracker] 

Snoop is Martha's Best. Guest. Ever. Don't believe me? Three words: Cognac mashed potatoes.

Today was the last TRL. Not that I ever watched, thank God. I'm too old and being home to watch it would have basically meant being unemployed. Anyway, here's MTV's 60-second obituary. It's worth putting up with the 30-seconds' worth of snowboard-videogame commercial that precedes it.

Is ABC erasing gay storylines? As Michael Ausiello reported, the character of Dr. Erica Hahn, a doctor who's recently come to terms with being gay, is being axed from "Grey's Anatomy." Said actress Brooke Smith, "I really hoped we were going to show what happens when two women fall in love and that they were going to treat it like any heterosexual couple on TV. And so I was surprised and disappointed when they just suddenly told me that they couldn't write for my character any more." However, Kristin Dos Santos says other gay-themed storylines and gay characters are disappearing. Melissa George, who a source says "came on ("Grey's") as a lesbian character but they changed the script and now she isn't." And Rebecca Romijn was a series regular on last season's "Ugly Betty" as transgender Alexis Meade; now she's not. [E! Online, EW]

RELATED

• Shonda Rhimes: "Brooke Smith was obviously not fired for playing a lesbian" [Ace Showbiz]

Are Lionsgate execs looking for a showrunner to replace "Mad Men" creator Matthew Weiner? With or without Weiner, Lionsgate has already made a deal with AMC for the third season of "Mad Men," which has a small audience, rabid fans and enough cultural zeitgeist for a small planet. However, Nikki Finke writes: "I hear CAA wants a multi-year deal that pays Weiner $10 million a year. Plus he wants control over promotion and advertising... it's way, way rich for Lionsgate, which is telling CAA it can't and won't pay that." [DHD]

RELATED:
"...absolutely 'not looking to replace him. He IS the show.' " [Defamer]

You might say, as Richard Siklos points out, that NBC Entertainment co-chairman Ben Silverman is "equal measures Ferris Bueller and Sean 'P. Diddy' Combs," "undisciplined" or even "the Paris Hilton of NBC." But he sure knows his way around a product placement! "For the first few weeks of the new TV season, NBC was stuck in third place and had no entertainment programs ranked in the top 20 most-watched shows," Siklos writes. "In the week ended Oct. 12, though, measured by shows with the most product placements, it had four of the top ten spots." However, "The Office" exec producer Greg Daniels says product placement bogged down the creative process and his show no longer does them; Marc Graboff, Silverman's fellow NBC Entertainment co-chairman, tells Siklos that "product placements may yet be back on the show." [Fortune]

Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, who won Oscars for their song "Falling Slowly" from the film "Once," will make an animated appearance on an upcoming episode of "The Simpsons" that mourns the decline of the Irish pub. Like the characters they portrayed in "Once," Hansard and Irglová will play local buskers. "Simpsons" executive producer James L. Brooks recently saw the duo perform at the Oscar Wilde Awards, held in August in Los Angeles. Kenneth Branagh will also provide a voice on the episode as the pub's landlord. Being translated into a yellow-skinned Simpsons character is an honor also shared by musicians such as U2, Paul McCartney, Metallica and Michael Jackson. [Irish Times]

I'd probably pimp this just for the opportunity to post the photo, but there's something in it for you: TV Season Pass, the blog edited by my colleague Kathy Lyford, is offering readers the opportunity to pose questions to "Mad Men" creator Matthew Weiner. It's part of an ongoing series that began with Marc Cherry and "Desperate Housewives and Silvio Horta of "Ugly Betty;" next up is Jason Katims of "Friday Night Lights." The deadline for Weiner's questions is 6 p.m. tonight; they'll be posted October 20. To submit, click here and leave your questions in the comments.

The season premiere of "South Park"? Ew. Or maybe I'm just old. Nah, just ew. Writes Erik Davis, "I tell you, just when you think those boys are starting to get a bit weak in their old age, you're shown a scene featuring Steven Spielberg and George Lucas physically raping Indiana Jones as the poor man cries out for help. Oh yeah ... and did we mention 'Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull' comes out on DVD this Tuesday?"

I'm all for culture jamming, especially when it comes to often-specious enterprises like poorly realized sequels or DVD releases with gummy and half-baked extras that leave all too much room for the super-deluxe version to come. But rape? Even Satan and Sadaam Hussein were supposed to be lovers in "South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut." [Cinematical]

Jimmy Kimmel tells Lynette Rice, ''ABC is a hellhole. My office is swarming with bees.... They pay me in Disney Dollars.... Every day my car gets keyed.... It's not so great over there.'' Funny stuff, unless you believe rumors that the network wants to push his show slot to 12:35 a.m. to make room for Jay Leno after he leaves "The Tonight Show" in May. And that Kimmel still has to renegotiate his contract every 12 months. And that he "wasn't seriously considered" as a host for the Emmys. This, for a host whose ratings are now on the heels of "Late Night With Conan O'Brien"? Coos a network rep, ''We remain committed to Jimmy. He's fantastic, and he's gaining momentum every night.'' [Entertainment Weekly]

Sarah Palin impressions are the new "Chocolate Rain." The Palin impersonators (or are they impersonating Tina Fey impersonating Palin?) clutter the web, writes Luchina Fisher. And while there's been talk of Palin trying to turn the tables with her own "Saturday Night Live" appearance spoofing Fey -- a move that would echo Richard Nixon uttering "Sock it to me?" on "Laugh-In" in September 1968, at the height of his successful presidential campaign -- that may not be a smart strategy. Says Syracuse University pop culture professor Bob Thompson, "It would be great if she could go on a snobby serious discussion show and blow everybody away. You ultimately want to distance her from Tina Fey, not point out how similar they are." [ABC News]

>> RELATED: Paris Hilton gets fake presidential advice [Cinematical]

Matthew Gentzkow and Jesse Shapiro, economists at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, have published a paper in the Quarterly Journal of Economics that suggests "the advent of television might actually have had a positive effect on children's cognitive ability," Justin Lahart reports. "Research suggests TV enabled an earlier generation of American children in non-English-speaking households to do better in school, helped rural Indian women to become more independent and contributed to lowering Brazil's fertility rate." That said, the 33-year-old Gentzkow doesn't own a TV set. [Wall Street Journal]

Game shows are the promised land for B-list actors who find themselves slipping down the alphabet. Joanne Kaufman points to Alfonso Ribeiro (sidekick, “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air”) and Richard Karn (sidekick, “Home Improvement”) and, of course, Howie Mandel, whose career had stalled as an actor, comedian and talk-show host before he found success as the (Emmy-nominated) host of "Deal or No Deal." Kevin Belinkoff, VP original programming at the Game Show Network, says he's deluged with resumes and calls from agents, but the work isn't easy. The first host of GSN's "Bingo America" was Patrick Duffy (“Dallas"); for the second season, it's Karn. Chirps a GSN rep: “Richard is a perfect fit for all the exciting changes viewers will see.” [New York Times]

Republican Vice Presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin may appear on SNL's Weekend Update to roast her own impersonator, Tina Fey, according to Bill Zwecker. The Alaskan Governor would portray Fey in an American Express commercial during this week's Thursday night premiere of "Weekend Update" (October 9, 9:30 pm PST). Palin and her reps are reportedly eager to return the late-night jests, especially in primetime. Fey, who has appeared on the NBC comedy three times in the past four weeks, most recently skewered Palin's debate with Sen. Joe Biden, with guest host Queen Latifah as PBS moderator Gwen Ifill. Watch below. [Chicago Sun-Times]

NBC's "Friday Night Lights" will start its third season tonight with a commercial-free 13-episode run on DirecTV. In exchange for the access, DirecTV helps subsidize the show's production costs. Scott Collins calls the move "a Hail Mary pass to save the low-rated but critically acclaimed fan favorite," adding that producers had to trim 5%-7% of last year's budget, which ran around $2 million per episode. [Channel Island]

Producer Mark Steven Johnson told Rob Allstetter that the project was the point of budgeting when "the new head of HBO felt it was just too dark and too violent and too controversial." Based on the Garth Ennis comic, "Preacher" is the story of a small-town preacher who's been possessed by a supernatural creature composed of equal parts pure good and evil. As a result, the preacher may have more power than God. HBO bought the property in November 2006; Johnson says he's "heard someone is in the process of getting the rights to turn it into a feature film. I hope that happens." [Comics Continuum]

If you can believe a text message leaked to In Touch, Heidi Montag and Spencer "I'm a" Pratt each make $1.25 million a year; Audrina gets $35,000 per episode and Brody $10,000. For those who can stomach it, there's more here. [PopCrunch]

"The partisan lines have never been drawn so neatly," writes Brian Stelter. Ratings for MSNBC's "Countdown" with Keith Olbermann have nearly doubled since August 2006, "when the host started delivering 'special comments' criticizing President George W. Bush." Outspoken commentator Rachel Maddow replaces legal analyst Dan Abrams on MSNBC Sept. 8, while Fox's Bill O'Reilly sees 2.25 million viewers nightly. CNN, meanwhile, "is positioning itself as the objective option for viewers... Greg D'Alba, chief operating officer for CNN advertising sales, said he pitched the reach of CNN's platforms rather than the opinions, or lack thereof, on the programs." [International Herald Tribune]

Fox will stream the premiere of "Fringe" and season opener of "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" online at the same time as they bow on TV, but only computer users on college campuses will be able to log in to watch. [Variety]

NBC's decision to "bottle the excitement" by showing time-delayed coverage may have cost the network dearly: According to research firm eMarketer, Emily Steel writes, NBC will see a paltry $5.75M in video-ad revenue. Compare that to CBS Sports, which made $23M by streaming NCAA March Madness games.

NBC limited its potential for ad revenue in a number of ways, industry analysts say. To provide a measure of exclusivity for its TV advertisers, it chose not to make available live video for some of the Games' highest-profile events. The network failed to distribute its videos widely on other sites, which would have boosted its audience.  [Wall Street Journal]

PBS programming like "Super WHY," "Between the Lions," "Word World" and "Word Girl" and the upcoming "Martha Speaks" are the result of a 2005 multimillion-dollar grant from the Dept. of Education. However, while they may encourage pre-reading skills, they may not encourage viewership: Only "Super WHY" cracks the top 10 of kids' shows. U of Michigan education professor Susan Neuman tells Elizabeth Blair that the shows focus "very much on phonological awareness, a key skill that is important to literacy development. But at same time, phonological awareness ... is not terribly fun for young children." [All Things Considered]

Intel Corp. and Yahoo are creating software that gives TVs the ability to display the internet (say, to check an actor's IMDb profile) without interfering with programming. TVs would need a set-top box to pull up online content. Comcast will begin testing services in the first half of next year. [Bloomberg]

Ben Affleck to star in Mike Judge's "Extract" [Variety]
Jennifer Lopez returns to UTA [Variety]
Jean Doumanian to develop "Blackbird" feature [Variety]
Joel Silver options "Fortune's Children" for HBO [Variety]
IFC Films buys "Where God Left His Shoes" [THR]

CNET blogger Chris Matyszczyk says he's heard several NBC online advertisers are looking to buy space elsewhere. NBC Universal CEO Jeff Zucker says the network's site has seen 30 million unique users; ComScore puts NBCOlympics.com at 6.7 million for the week ending August 10, with Yahoo's Olympic section getting 8 million uniques. Matyszczyk wonders whether viewers are rejecting Zucker's tape-delay strategies to "bottle" Olympic excitement. [Technically Incorrect]

Variety 
Lyle made his comments Thursday in response to a leaked ABC Studios memo, signed by ABC Studios executive VP Howard Davine, which asks producers to check with the studio before acquiring international formats. "If ABC and Disney refuse to repudiate the contents of the Davine memo, then producers in both the U.S. and around the world might note their silence and help themselves to the 'underlying premise' of 'Hannah Montana,'" Lyle said. The memo first surfaced in June on Deadline Hollywood Daily.
AND: A quarter of the 24 new shows debuting this fall are international adaptations, according to Christian Science Monitor’s Gloria Goodale.

Variety
The culprits include last-minute pilot reshoots, new series overhauls and the 100-day writers strike. Among the AWOL: NBC’s "My Own Worst Enemy," ABC’s "Life on Mars," the CW’s "90210" and CBS' "Eleventh Hour."
• Wired says the critics might try looking on file-sharing networks, where pilots began leaking in May.

Tuned In
Expect NielsenWire to provide regularly updated ratings and other stats on media and branding. Says Time magazine TV blogger James Poniewozik: "For media numbers junkies, it's a nice all-on-one-page general resource."