How do they do it?

Showrunners and other creatives marvel that the quality of the work that the "Friday Night Lights" team pulls off on its modest episodic budget of about $2 million and change. On a day when showrunner/exec producer Jason Katims were celebrating the clinching of a two-season, 26-episode pickup, Katims took a moment to answer the "how" question.

Although everyone associated with the show raves non-stop about his talents as a showrunner, Katims (pictured left with "FNL" star Connie Britton) was humble in spreading the credit around.

It starts with the video verite 360-degree shooting style that Peter Berg (helmer of the 2004 "FNL" feature who also created and exec produces the series) established when the pilot was shot. Multiple cameras are going all of the time, and moving all around, in any given scene. Actors never know where they're next shot is coming from, so they just focus on the nailing the scene from any angle. (Katims didn't say so but you get the feeling there's a strict no-whining policy on"FNL" sets.) 

"The way Pete Berg directed the pilot allowed us to do the show in a very timely way," Katims says.

Then there's the "incredible team in Austin," says Katims, who supervises the writing from L.A.

Helmer-in-chief Jeff Reiner and producer Nan Bernstein plot out the shooting sked with a military precision. Katims notes that they often shoot footage for more than one football game at a time, to take advantage of the time and coin spent on elaborate setups.

"It saves a lot of money," Katins says, particularly when your show is blessed with a talented and dedicated crew.

Monday afternoon update: It's official! Deal's done!

Click here for the Variety story. More to come from my chat with Jason Katims later tonight once I'm (finally) off deadline.

One way or another, Monday should be a big day for "Friday Night Lights" fanatics. A final decision is expected to come from NBC and DirecTV on a two-season, 26-episode pickup of the acclaimed drama series.

Earlier this month, all signs were pointing to the Peacock and the satcaster were closing in on a deal to save the Imagine TV/Universal Media Studios series, but then early last week there was a hiccup over money -- what else? -- specifically the fee that DirecTV would pay for the right to air the episodes first, commercial-free, as the marquee offering on its 101 Network channel. That was the arrangement that kept the lights on for "FNL" this season, the show's third, and was hoped would continue for a fourth and fifth season of 13 segs each.

At one point it looked like the deal was off, but then clear eyes and full hearts prevailed and the talks resumed in the middle of last week. As of the weekend, the signs were again looking hopeful for the renewal, but insiders cautioned that the final fate of the Dillon Panthers et al would not be known until Monday.

As Slammin' Sammy Meade might say: Folks, this one's going down to the last kick.

Things are looking up for "Eastbound and Down" at HBO.

It's no secret that the lewd-and-crude comedy series starring Danny McBride as a washed-up former Major League Baseball pitcher was a hard sell for HBO -- especially among some of its top execs.

Even for a network that prides itself on doing shows that no other outlet would touch, "Eastbound" pushes the envelope. The central character is a crass, cocaine-snorting, foul-mouthed Southerner who spews political incorrectness and shockingly unfiltered snark every time he opens his mouth.

The show launched in February with little fanfare, particularly by HBO's marketing standards and considering the show's creative pedigree: "Eastbound" hails from the Will Ferrell-Adam McKay comedy hothouse, Gary Sanchez Prods., and its co-creators are all rising stars in the comedy world: McBride, Jody Hill and Ben Best (all pals from college).

The "Eastbound" producers were miffed when HBO quietly sent out only the first of the show's initial six episodes to crix for review -- most of which were not pretty, though the New Yorker, of all places, gave it a rave, as did a few others. (The show grew on me as a guilty pleasure. It's not going to replace "Cheers," "WKRP in Cincinnati" or "Fernwood 2-Night" on my list of all-time faves, but it did make me laugh, for reasons I can't quite explain.)

So who knows, maybe Kenny Powers is just the kind of underdog that HBO's affluent, well-educated viewers want to root for in these crazy times. The show, paired with "Flight of the Conchords" on HBO's Sunday sked, had undeniable momentum in its last few airings: The initial telecast of the March 22 finale delivered 904,000 viewers, up 34% from its Feb. 15 preem numbers, and it marked a 30% build from its "Conchords" lead-in.

Through all of the repeats and video-on-demand plays during the past two months, "Eastbound's" half-dozen segs have averaged a healthy 3.4 million viewers.

In any other circumstance, it's unlikely that "Eastbound" would still be awaiting a formal pickup announcement -- which is expected. It's just that some at HBO are still adjusting to the idea of keeping Kenny and Co. in the family. But those 158,796 fans who signed on to Kenny Powers' Facebook page in a matter of days will not be ignored.

By Shalini Dore

No secrets were spilled, but there was plenty for Losties to geek-out on during the WGA Foundation’s panel sesh with "Lost" scribes Thursday at the WGA Theater in Beverly Hills.

The “Inside the Writers Room With Lost” evening gave fans plenty to chew over as Damon Lindelof, Carlton Cuse, Liz Sarnoff, Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz talked about how they plot the ABC drama.

The process of writing each new season starts with a blue-sky meeting where scribes discuss what the season will accomplish. After that the writers break down the episodes and write them. Usually there are three storylines: on the island, off the island and one other.

What helps the writers? Rabid-fan discussions of reality shows like “Top Chef,” which Sarnoff took credit for introducing to the "Lost" writers room.

Hugs, back slaps and "this was the best show I ever worked on" testimonials were flowing Saturday night during the "ER" finale party at Social Hollywood.

You couldn't escape the emotion in the room for all of the cast and production staffers who have collectively labored so long and so lovingly on the Warner Bros. TV series. You also couldn't escape the feeling that the party, and next week's two-hour finale ("And In the End"), marks the curtain-drop on an era for primetime network television that will never be replicated, not in today's bazillion-channel, multiplatform universe.

Steven Spielberg, whose Amblin Television banner helped birth "ER" lo those many years ago was among those feeling it on Saturday. He was incredibly humble about his involvement with the show ("I wandered in every now and then") but evinced obvious pride his association with such a landmark of the smallscreen. (And BTW, if you don't think the 1994-95 television season was a long time ago check out those baby faces in pic posted below from March 1995.)

"There will never be a show as dominate as 'ER' was," said Spielberg, who greatly impressed the "ER" troops and partygoers by showing up unannounced and with no fanfare. "When 'ER' came on there was very little in the way of cable (competition.) Now I do all of my (TV) work for cable."

I already knew that -- Spielberg shepherded Showtime's "United States of Tara" (it was kick to spend 30 seconds gushing over the fantastic-ness of Toni Collette with him) and HBO's upcoming mini "The Pacific" -- but it was still eye-openingto hear it so matter-of-factly from the man himself.

The party drew a slew of current and former cast members (too many to count) and bunch of the writers and directors who've worked on the show over its 15 seasons -- Neal Baer, Carol Flint, Paris Barclay and Charles Haid, to name but a few. It brought out execs who were there at the beginning, including former NBC Entertainment chief Warren Littlefield and former Amblin TV head Tony Thomopoulos. The speechifying included a gracious thanks from current NBC boss Ben Silverman to the earlier regime of Littlefield and Don Ohlmeyer and even to Leslie Moonves and Nina Tassler for nurturing the show in their pre-CBS days at Warner Bros. TV. 

There was of course, no shortage of praise and standing ovations directed to "ER's" major domo, John Wells, who in turn was effusive in his thank-yous to cast and crew members for their dedication and long hours on their feet ("It's worked out well for me," he grinned). (Pictured right, Wells and "ER" vet Noah Wyle. More party pics after the jump.)

Wells also invoked the memory of Michael Crichton, who wrote the original script that would become "ER" many years later. Wells noted that in preparation for writing the finale seg ("And in the End"), he read "ER's" first seg and was struck at how even 15 years and 331 episodes later, the spirit of the show was encapsulated in the pilot that Crichton helped Wells write.

"The worldview was Michael's worldview," Wells said of the prolific scribe who died in November. "I wish he was here tonight."

The timing of "ER's" final bow is fortuitous, with the health care policy now much in the news again as it was when the show bowed in 1994. Warner Bros. chairman Barry Meyer praised the show's laser-like focus on "constantly reinforcing the point that quality medical care for all is a right, not a privilege."

After the speeches were done and the class picture was snapped and the giant cake was sliced up, Meyer, sounding like the studio mogul that he is, made a point of making the point to me that as much as Wells and the team deserved every tribute for delivering a world-class show week in and week out, there was something to be said too for the studio that made a home for "ER" at at time when other majors were backing away from the big-budget drama biz.

"There's something very Warner Bros. about all of this," Meyer said, wistfully. He's right.

-30-

Great television drama is all about emotion and storytelling, but in this case numbers tell quite a tale. As recounted by John Wells, "ER" in its 15 seasons has racked up:

331 episodes

2,664 shooting days

34,000 hours of shooting

180 shooting days in Chicago

34 writers

49 directors

5,453 actors

Aired in 196 countries

Translated into 22 languages

First-run NBC airings have amassed 27 billion views -- and that's not counting Thursday's two-hour finale.

MORE PARTY PICS AFTER THE JUMP

"A 12-year-old Benjamin Linus just brought me a chicken salad sandwich. How do you think I'm doing?"

Am I the only one who thought of "Five Easy Pieces" with all the talk of chicken salad sandwiches in this seg?

Tonight's installment of "Lost" was the weakest of the season to date, for this Dharma bum. I didn't gasp enough, which means I've been spoiled by the greatness of the previous nine installments. "He's Our You" had a bunch of good lines and the whoa factor certainly picked up in the last four minutes or so.

Generally speaking I love a good Sayid episode so this was kinda doubly disappointing. But let's think about what we've learned tonight about our favorite former member of the Iraqi Republican Guard.

Certainly this seg, written by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz and helmed by Greg Yaitanes, reinforced what we've already learned from Sayid's unfortunate dalliances with Femme Nikitas in past segs. At heart, he's a lover, not a killer. He has a healthy libido, for sure, but even more than that, he wants to be loved. He wants to be accepted as a good guy, not a monster who tortures and murders on demand (whether it's chickens or Russians or a golfing buddy of Charles Widmore).

Even in the childhood flashback scene to his boyhood in Tikrit, you get the idea that Sayid snapped the neck of the chicken for his brother (I presume?) to be a pal, rather out of a blood-lust for poultry. Interesting that the brother is unfailingly honest and admits that Sayid killed the bird without hesitation, to his own detriment. Which probably only raises Sayid's esteem for his brother.

Moreover, Sayid seeks a purpose to his life. For a while, it was the burning desire to reunite with his long-lost love Nadia. Then of course it was getting the Oceanic 815-ers off the island. And then it became avenging Nadia's death after their devastatingly short reunion, and protecting the friends he left behind on the island (that's some guilt trip, eh?).

But when Ben dumps him in the flashback scene in Moscow after Sayid takes out the Russian dude, he's crushed. Not only is he being abandoned but he's now lost his purpose, and he suspects there never was one to begin with, that Ben's talk about needing to protect his friends was horse manure.

"There's no one else in Widmore's organization we need you to go after," Ben tells him. "Mission Accomplished!"

Sayid sounds like anything but a warrior, whining in a Moscow back alley: "What do I do now?"

There's been a lot of chatter out there about the much-loved "Friday Night Lights" closing in on a two-season renewal from NBC and DirecTV.

The talks are ongoing between NBC, Universal Media Studios and DirecTV, but they hit a big pothole earlier this week. At one point it looked like the deal might crater. But fortunately for the show's loyal cadre of fans, the right phone call was made in the nick of time on Wednesday to hopefully get it all back on track.

It comes down to -- what else? -- money issues, and how much DirecTV will kick in to cover the cost of production on the show, which is estimated at a modest $2 million-$2.5 million per seg. They've been talking about doing 13 episodes per season, and giving DirecTV the exclusive first window, as the partners did for the show's third season, which bowed commercial-free on the satcaster in the fall and in January on NBC.

The biggest thing the Imagine TV production has in its favor is the desire for the deal to make on the part of the key players. Universal wants to keep the show going to amass enough episodes for a syndication sale down the road and to generally enhance the show's library value. NBC wants the prestige of supporting a show beloved by critics, even though it's never been able to draw a big aud. And most of the key cast members are on record as saying they're in if NBC and DirecTV are.

"FNL" exec producer and showrunner Jason Katims is busy now on a high-profile new pilot for NBC, U and Imagine, a new spin on the 1989 Imagine feature "Parenthood." Assuming "Parenthood" gets picked up, the network and studio would help him work out a sked to allow him to juggle both shows. By all accounts, Katims is a prolific writer and utterly devoted to "FNL."

So -- Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose -- and fingers crossed. The next few days should be pivotal for these negotiations.

OK, I confess. I'm enjoying "Desperate Housewives" in semi-regular doses this season.

The show lost me a few seasons ago with too many inane flights of fancy. Maybe I've mellowed, maybe in these turbulent times a guilty, soapy, silly pleasure is just what you need on a Sunday night. Or maybe the ABC sudser has simply gotten better after leaping five years into the future at the end of last season.

The storylines this season, from Lynette's son's affair with the soccer mom to Carlos' miracle blindness cure to the blossoming of Bree's Martha Stewart empire to Neal McDonough as Edie's hubby with the psycho-vendetta against Mike Delfino (who's now shacking up with Katherine, etc. etc.), have been fun and lightly addictive, kind of like M&Ms. Eva Longoria Parker has also been a standout this season, offering comic relief in all the right places. Felicity Huffman is unfailingly good at what she does, and earlier in the season Lily Tomlin was also a fun addition to the troupe.

I don't watch "Housewives" religiously every Sunday as I did in season one, but this season I've found myself checking in every other week or so to keep up with As Wisteria Lane Turns ...

Meanwhile, after all the fanfare and critical  hosannas showered on the series finale of "Battlestar Galactica" this past Friday, I'm feeling awful for never diving into the show.

It really makes no sense. By all rights, the remodeled "Battlestar" should be my kind of show -- smart fantasy drama with great characters, swell spaceships and scribes with a lot to say, Gene Roddenberry-style, about the state of our world by imagining the goings-on in distant galaxies. On top of all that, I'm a fan of Edward James Olmos.

Somehow, I missed Sci Fi Channel's initial boarding call for this mission when it began as a miniseries in 2003, and I just never caught up. I suppose that's what DVD box sets are for. If only spare time could be acquired as easily.

The showrunners just starting the prep for their last episode of the season when the official word came down from the network. "Life on Mars" would not see a second season.

As much as ABC execs from Stephen McPherson on down love the show, the math just didn't work. The long-gestating U.S. remake of the hit Brit series garnered mostly strong reviews (certainly from this space and from Variety's Brian Lowry) but it hasn't been able to draw a crowd, despite the benefit of landing ABC's two best drama lead-in slots, behind "Grey's Anatomy" in the fall and behind "Lost" for the past two months.

The "Mars" masterminds -- showrunners/exec producers Josh Appelbaum, Andre Nemec and Scott Rosenberg -- were just starting to get ready to shoot episode 17, the last of their order, in late February when the final call was made. There would be no second season of psychedelic adventures for Sam Tyler, the NYPD cop who mysteriously finds himself transported from Gotham 2008 to Gotham 1973 after getting hit by a car in the line of duty.

But the news was not all bad. In a sign of ABC's affection for the show, "Mars" was not yanked immediately. The show has been allowed to finish Tyler's journey through deep-seated emotional traumas that scarred 4-year-old Sam in '73 in ways that grown-up Sam has largely blotted out.

"It was a gift that Steve gave us, creatively to finish out the show and to have that closure for the audience," says Nemec.

It wasn't that hard to turn the script for the season finale to the series finale, set to air April 1. Because they were already building to a big revelation, they wound up rewriting the second half of the script to fully explain the "Mars" mythos and enlighten the loyalists on what's been going on and what becomes of Sam.

(Pictured above, "Life on Mars" stars Michael Imperioli and Jason O'Mara shooting on location in Gotham.)

I don't often get attached to reality show contestants -- because I rarely watch unscripted competish skeins -- but in this cycle of Fox's "Hell's Kitchen" I'm rooting for Robert, a 29-year-old sous chef from Quogue, N.Y.

You can understand why his co-workers (in the real world, not the "Hell's Kitchen" bunker on La Brea) nicknamed him "Cuddles," according to his bio on the "Hell's Kitchen" home page. He's nearly 400 pounds of cuddly joy, but he's also a fierce competitor. In last night's seg, as he once again did battle with lazy-bones Lacey, he declared (to the camera's delight) that if she won the competish he'd hang up his apron and "become a crack whore."

Yes, he has a way with words, and an unusual pronunciation style that is strangely endearing.  At one point he was carping at Lacey about how she's "not posed to do that" (translation: "not supposed to"). In another recent seg he tripped over the word "remember," which came out more like "menemember."

But more than anything else, I'm rooting for Robert because makes dishes that my husband and I would actually want to eat. He seems equal parts gourmet and gourmand. "Hell's Kitchen's" impossible-to-please boss Gordon Ramsay seems to respect Robert's skill and his obvious passion for great food -- it's real, as opposed to those contestants who jabber on about their passion without putting the goods on the plate.

Robert even got away with mooning the Big Cheese, albeit not to his face, in a confessional moment when Robert invited Gordo to "kiss my ass." Even with ample pixelation, the shot of Robert's wiggling his naked backside at the camera was a wide- screen moment not soon forgotten.

So here's to hoping that Robert rocks all the way to the grand prize, the head chef gig in Ramsay's Borgata restaurant in Atlantic City, N.J. As Robert has mentioned on air, he wants it so bad he postponed his wedding in order to take part in the show.

Hopefully, he'll win, get married and then take a little time off for a weight-reduction program. Because as fun-loving as he is, his weight situation is serious as a heart attack. I sense a father-son type "come to Gordon" confrontation for Ramsay and Robert coming soon.

The "Arrested Development" gang is getting back together again, kinda, for Fox's animated comedy "Sit Down, Shut Up," which bows April 19 in the plum post-"Simpsons" 8:30 p.m. slot. The Paley Center for Media hosts the skein's L.A. preem on March 26. The screening of the first seg and Q&A with voice cast members including

Henry Winkler (who plays Willard Deutschebog), Cheri Oteri, Tom Kenny and Nick Kroll, along with exec producers Mitchell Hurwitz, Eric and Kim Tannenbaum and Josh Weinstein. (Other "Sit Down" voicers include "Arrested" alums Will Arnett and Jason Bateman.)

I'm curious to see this show at long last. It's based on an Australian live-action series revolving students and teachers at a high school that wasn't particularly successful in its original run.

I bow to the wow of Jack Bender; this was a director's episode of "Lost."

The storyline wasn't quite as mind-blowing as "LaFleur" two weeks ago, but "Namaste" was a good workout for the frontal lobe nonetheless.

As if the two-week wait wasn't enough to build anticipation, our hearts were sent thumping by the fantastic opening sequence of the Ajira flight colliding with a time-travel flash, narrowly missing the mountainside and then skidding dramatically off the landing strip into the jungle. Chilling. I wish I knew enough about lensing techniques to know what the effect was that made those last few seconds when the nose of the plane plowed into the jungle so incredibly intense, but whatever d.p. John Bartley did, it worked. And just as my spine was tingling like a Blackberry set on vibrate, they pull back to a gnarly shot of the co-pilot impaled on some big piece of steel something that should definitely not be protruding from a man's chest. Extra chills, at no extra charge.

There are plenty of Sawyer acolytes out there who probably stood up and cheered at the scene toward the end with the square off between Jack and Sawyer. (I think we all owe an extra special thanks to writers Paul Zbyszewski and Brian K. Vaughan.) You get the feeling that Sawyer's been practicing that testy speech for a long time, no? Jack looks absolutely stunned by the whole crazy turn of events -- Matthew Fox did a very good job in that scene -- and nothing is throwing our woebegone Dr. more so than slowly realizing that Sawyer and Juliet have been playing house for the past few years. Jack really is Job -- he just can't get anything to go his way.

"I'm working on it," Sawyer fairly hisses at Jack when he's confronted with the WTF-do-we-do-now question from Jack. It's been a while but Sawyer still knows how to get to Jack, by questioning his performance as the as leader of the castaways way back in the future of 2004.

"I think. You pretty much just reacted," Sawyer says. "As I recall, a lot of people ended up dead." And just to twist the knife in further, Sawyer reminds Jack that he's now "back where you started" except that Sawyer's in charge now. (BTW, anyone catch what book Sawyer was reading?) "That's how I saved your ass today, and that's how I'm going to save Sayid tomorrow." Whoo-hoo.

Hulu is digging deeper into the indie film world with plans to launch a section on the Internet vid provider's home base dedicated to documentary pics.

The move comes after Hulu programmers were impressed by the success the streaming vid platform has had in had in  recent months with feature-length docus including "The Life and Times of Harvey Milk," the Bush-centric "Crawford" and "Hoop  Dreams."

As of this (Thursday) morning, about 100 docu pics will be added to Hulu's archive, including Morgan Spurlock's "Super Size Me"; and recent film fest faves "Kicking It," about a soccer competish for homeless people in South Africa; "Confessions of a Super Hero," about the costumed denizens of Hollywood Boulevard; and "DIG!," about the love-hate relationship between members of alterna-rock bands Brian Jonestown Massacre and Dandy Warhols. Hulu's trove of docu fare will also include a range of TV productions.

Hulu execs say they've been pleasantly surprised to see the viewership stats for docus climb as they've added more intriguing titles. Docs like "Crawford" and "Harvey Milk" have also generated a huge amount of chatter in Hulu's comments section. A Q&A with "Crawford" helmer David Modigliani also generated heavy traffic for Hulu, indicating that there's a clear opportunity for Hulu to serve as a forum for docu lovers to interact with filmmakers, according to Andy Forssell, senior veep of content acquisition and distribution.

"'Crawford'woke us up to an opportunity we have to highlight films that offer great content but don't always have the marketing budgets to make that connection with the audience," Forssell said. "We can play a great part in making those connections and offering filmmakers reach in a very cost-effective way."

OK, so I slept on it. I still hate the idea of Sci Fi Channel morphing into "SyFy" as of July 7. 

Makes no sense. What better moniker could the channel have than Sci Fi. It just sounds cool. I know that execs at Sci Fi have chafed a bit at what they feel are the constraints of the sci-fi genre in their programming thrust, but I've never understood it.

(Variety's Sam Thielman explains Sci Fi prexy Dave Howe's thinking in this report from the channel's upfront event in Gotham on Monday.) To my way of thinking, sci-fi is a pretty broad canvas, encompassing everything from fantasy fiction a la C.S. Lewis to schlocko horror to the intellectual pursuits of "Star Trek" and "Lost."

In the bazillion-channel universe, you gotta have a niche. Sci Fi Channel has a great one that they absolutely own. I can't understand the impetus to move away from it.

Goofy photo of the day. I'm guessing Michael Imperioli and his family got a free trip to Disney World out of this. Why else would he submit to this photo, snapped at Tony's Town Square at the Magic Kingdom park?

Cutline info provided by Disney notes that Imperioli's birthday is actually March 26 but he's celebrating it this week with the family -- no, not that family, his family.

Imperioli's also on the Disney payroll these days as a member of the ensemble on ABC's fine drama "Life on Mars," which unfortunately didn't catch enough fire to merit a second season, but fortunately will get the chance to go out in style with a mystery-solved finale next month....

... Josh Schwartz and Mary Tyler Moore are the latest biz names to join the speaker roster at the National Assn. of Broadcasters confab in Las Vegas from April 18-23. Schwartz will sit for a Q&A with Paley Center for Media's Joe Flint on April 22. Moore will receive the NAB's Distinguished Service kudo on April 20 for her TV legacy -- it doesn't get much better than "The Dick Van Dyke Show" and "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" -- and for her philanthropic work on behalf of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, among others.

The hits just keep on coming for "Lost."

ABC drama appears to lead the TV-on-Internet herd by a wide margin, drawing 2.5 million unique viewers in the month of February, according to the latest numbers from Nielsen Online. Those 2.5 million viewers initiated some 48 million streams of "Lost" episodes, clips and made-for-Web content a la the ultra-fun audio and video podcasts that showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse grace us with once a week (or thereabouts).

As much as I love writing "'Lost' is No. 1'," there's an important caveat to these numbers. Nielsen Online's monthly survey does not include numbers from Hulu, the NBC Universal-News Corp. joint venture. Hulu is on a tear these days, as readers of today's Daily Variety know from this page 1 story on Hulu climbing to No. 2 among online video providers behind only YouTube (which remains the equivalent of Wal-Mart, Microsoft, McDonalds and Toyota combined when it comes to online vid).

ABC.com ranks No. 6 among Internet vid providers for February with 187.1 million streams, up 14.5% from January. Hulu, on the back of its big marketing push, spiked 33% to 309 million streams. The average Hulu viewer spent 176.9 minutes watching its vid, compared to 104.8 minutes for ABC.com

So with that understanding, here's the rest of the top five online TV shows per Nielsen's report. They're mostly ABC shows, but that would likely change if only Hulu would cough up some show-specific numbers. Nielsen's report does include the individual websites of Hulu partners NBC and Fox, so there is some representation of their shows.

"Grey's Anatomy" -- 18.7 million streams/1.3 million unique viewers

"The Bachelor" -- 15.1 million streams/962,000 unique viewers

"The Office" -- 15 million streams

"Heroes" -- 11.7 million streams

Let the Emmy campaigning begin. The TV Acad is hosting a panel gabfest devoted to "The Office"at 7:30 p.m. on March 18 at its Leonard Goldenson Theater in North Hollywood. The show's first-string stars are all set to appear -- Steve Carell, John Krasinski, Rainn Wilson, Jenna Fischer and B.J. Novak -- but I gotta believe that a few others will be there too. How can you talk about "Office" without Angela, Andy, Kelly, Oscar or Kevin? ...

My money's on Elizabeth Perkins. The "Weeds" star will face off against thesp Aisha Tyler and "Dancing With the Stars"/"America's Funniest Home Videos" host Tom Bergeron in a  "Celebrity Jeopardy!"installment set to air Tuesday. It was taped in January at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas. The winner of the one-shot episode gets a $50,000 donation to their designated charity, while the other two players will receive $25K apiece for the charities of their choice. Perkins is playing for the New England Learning Center for Women in Transition; Tyler is playing for Doctors Without Borders and the International Rescue Committee; and Bergeron is in the game for the Muscular Dystrophy Assn...

More good works worth a shout-out: HBO entertainment prexy Sue Naegle was feted on Thursday by the Alliance for Children's Rights, a local org that does God's work on behalf of the neediest of the needy, foster kids in L.A. County. Sue is a most deserving honoree, and I'm told that her husband Dana Gould made a very sweet and short speech about his wife and their adventures in parenthood. (Sue is pictured far right with Ziffren Brittenham's Cliff Gilbert-Lurie, a longtime Alliance supporter, and Alliance chief Janice Spire) On hand for the event at the Beverly Hilton were Diane Keaton, Ted Danson, Jeff Probst, Angie Harmon, Nia Vardalos. LAPD boss William Bratton and his wife Rikki Klieman also got a laurel from the Alliance, presented by "Law & Order" chief Dick Wolf...

Something to watch for: Craig Fergusonis escaping from latenight for a little bit to host his first standup spec for Comedy Central, "A Wee Bit O' Revolution," set to bow March 22 at 10 p.m. He'll riff on his experiences in and out of rehab, among other topics. 

Can't get enough Alec Baldwin?

The "30 Rock" star has signed on to serve as co-host alongside Robert Osborne of TCM's Saturday night showcase slot "The Essentials." Baldwin's a movie buff who will undoubtedly have a lot to say -- in typically animated fashion -- about the featured pics. Upcoming titles getting the "Essentials" treatment include "Rocky" (March 14); "Cat Ballou" (March 21); "Ben Hur" (March 28); and "Take the Money and Run" (April 4). Also, John Lithgow has been tapped to host TCM's "The Essentials Jr." family film showcase, to run June-August.

Holy Horace Goodspeed, this is why I love this show.

Just when all of us smarty-pants obsessive "Lost" fans start to think that we have (some of) it figured out, by gum, along comes an episode like this to knock us back on our heels. I'm a little light-headed after absorbing everything that was presented to us in "LaFleur."

I think it felt particularly intense because a lot of it seemed to be pretty straightforward. I lost track of time after the second or third "Three Years Earlier/Later" slate and just tried to keep up with the ride as best I could. There were too many WTF and OMG moments to count. I was scribbling the whole hour; for once, I didn't mind the commercial breaks (except the Victoria's Secret spot with the skeletal model. That bugged the hell out of me. Enough with the emaciated look, already.)

One big question that popped into my mind right as I sat down to write: Where's Ben in the '70s Dharma groove that we've settled into?

By the end of this captivating seg, written by Elizabeth Sarnoff and Kyle Pennington and helmed by Mark Goldman, we learn that our ragged band of time-travelers -- Juliet, Sawyer, Miles, Jin and Faraday -- first integrate themselves with Dharma in 1974. And three years from that time would be, of course, 1977 (summer of "Star Wars" - I remember it well).

Ben, as we know from that great season three episode), was born by the roadside in Portland, Ore., sometime in the early 1960s (to the best of my recollection at this moment) and of course was delivered by good ol' Horace Goodspeed and his girlfriend/wife who were kind enough to help Ben's mom and dad in their moment of need, and then help Ben and his no-good dad come to the island when Ben was 10-11-ish. So doing the math, you gotta believe that Ben definitely arrives on the island somewhere between the 1974-1977 time frame, if not before. And, if memory serves, he's about 20-21-ish when he helps deliver the gas attack on the Dharmas, on his birthday no less.

During the episode, I kept thinking about how the presence of Sawyer et al for these years will turn out to have influenced the course of the Dharma story. As Faraday reminded us yet again tonight, "What happened happened." I'm sure our "Lost" leaders have answers for us, at some point.

Another thing that made this seg so engaging was the superb casting. The scene early on with the Dharma guards in the monitoring station who are afraid to go get "Mr. LaFleur" was a fantastic case of When TV Worlds Collide. Guard Jerry was the great Herc from "Friday Night Lights," played by Kevin Rankin. And Guard Phil was the unctuous, but somehow charming, Jimmy Barrett from "Mad Men," played by Patrick Fischler. Whoo hoo. Bonus points for TV junkies!

"Wire" creator David Simon is in the midst of working on a drama pilot for HBO, New Orleans-set "Treme," but that doesn't mean he's not a keen-eyed reader of his alma mater, The Baltimore Sun. Once a police reporter, always a police reporter, according to this account that Simon penned for Sunday's Washington Post. (Click here for the entire story.)

On Feb. 17, when a 29-year-old officer responded to a domestic dispute in East Baltimore, ended up fighting for her gun and ultimately shot an unarmed 61-year-old man named Joseph Alfonso Forrest, the Sun reported the incident, during which Forrest died, as a brief item. It did not name the officer, Traci McKissick, or a police sergeant who later arrived at the scene to aid her and who also shot the man.

It didn't identify the pair the next day, either, because the Sun ran no full story on the shooting, as if officers battling for their weapons and unarmed 61-year-old citizens dying by police gunfire are no longer the grist of city journalism. At which point, one old police reporter lost his mind and began making calls.