The Battle For Sunday

Networks are waging war on Sunday evenings and my poor DVR is caught in the middle. I expect this sort of thing in the Fall premiere season, but not summer. Unless you've got multiple DVR's or one of the good cable systems that provide 4 way DVR tuners, you, like me, see certain nights like a crazy frustrating puzzle.

So, we can record two things at once and cable networks tend to broadcast their shows at multiple times. Keeping in mind there's certain shows we are completely obsessed with and want to watch live (or as close to live as possible to avoid commercials) and trying to juggle all the back up knowledge ala "well, Food Network always runs a minute over but HBO shows end 7 or so minutes early" and blah blah blah.

So here's what's on this Sunday evening and how I'm planning to fill my two tuners. Numbers in BOLD are the showings I'll set my DVR for:

Army Wives - Lifetime 10pm, 11pm, 12am
Expedition Africa - History 10pm, 2am
In Plain Sight - USA 10pm, 1am
Law & Order: Criminal Intent - USA 9pm, 12am
Merlin (2 episodes) - NBC 8pm, 9pm
The Next Food Network Star - Food Network 9pm, 12am
True Blood - HBO 9pm, 11pm
The Best Thing I Ever Ate - Food Network 10pm, 1am

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Mad Men Confirmed For August 16th

While announcing they had worked out a way to squeeze more ad time from Mad Men, AMC confirmed the series will be returning for it's third season on Sunday August 16th. It's slated to run in the 10pm time slot, which is famously HBO territory when it comes to high quality scripted programming in the cable world.

In years past HBO had become known for the 9pm-11pm Sunday evening slots with the success of Sex And The City and The Sopranos. After Sex and Sopranos ended, other cablers like USA moved in with In Plain Sight and then AMC dipped it's toe into the water with Breaking Bad and then season two of Mad Men.

It must have worked because they're sticking with it.

Regular networks had always been hit heavy with Sundays, especially ABC who airs their Desperate Housewives/Brothers & Sisters duo then. And of course football is always a big winner for the night.

The big hoopla with more time for advertising has been worked out, apparently. AMC wanted to add two more minutes of ads during the hit show in order to make up for the higher licensing fees the third season was demanding. Since the beginning it had been noted that AMC wasn't even paying producers enough to cover their entire budget.

The studio and producers were so sure they had a hit on their hands that they were willing to wait for DVD sales and whatnot to make up for it. Now that the show has proved itself as a huge hit and won numerous awards the network, I assume, has probably reached the point were they have no choice and have to pay enough fees for the entire budget.

The deal struck between the creatives and suits means that each episode will still run 47-48 minutes, about 5-6 minutes longer than network fare and 3-4 minutes longer than most cable shows, but will air from 10pm-11:02pm. They've also worked out the kinks, assuring all that the technical side of things are being handled so that DVR's will not cut off at 11pm sharp.

I wish all networks, cable or not, would wake up and follow AMC's lead. Cable network FX is already really good about this while sister broadcast network Fox is terrible.

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The West Wing Invades USA

I will proudly make it known to any and all anywhere at anytime that The West Wing was one of my favorite series of all time. From the first five minutes of the pilot to final second of the season seven finale, I enjoyed every damn second of that show. That's one of the reasons I was pretty excited by last night's USA lineup.

The other, of course, is that I really like "In Plain Sight" and "Law & Order:CI", so I would have been watching anyway, but the big draw for last night was a special one in my book. In those two short hours we were treated to four West Wing alum spread through two shows. A good night indeed.

First up was "Law & Order:CI" with special guest Janel Maloney, affectionately known as simply Donna in my house. Both I and my room mate, who is more of a casual "West Wing" fan than I, became completely entranced by Maloney's WW character, Donna Moss, and her guest appearances everywhere from Showtime's (amazing) "Brotherhood" (especially her nude scene - yikes!) to "30 Rock" are celebrated heartily.

Her turn as a manipulative, adulterous wife of an equally adulterous pastor was a bit beyond what we're used to seeing her play, but it was, as always, a treat.

Hour two is always WW alum territory with Mary McCormack starring as Deputy Mary Shannon of the U.S. Marshall Service in "In Plain Sight". She's seemingly tough-shelled with a fast mouth and brute atmosphere, until you see a bit deeper when she's bogged down in family problems and guilt after shooting and killing an attacker in the season one finale.

McCormack was a late-comer to The West Wing, starring as a U.S. Naval Commander turned Deputy National Security Advisor Kate Harper in seasons 5-7. McCormack presented Harper much like Shannon, tough-shelled, good at keeping secrets, able to commit bodily injury easily. As with her new characters familial problems and sense of remorse, Kate Harper slowly falling into a romance with a West Wing co-worker showed that she's not all vinegar and nails.

That WW romance took place with Deputy Speech Writer, Will Bailey, the oft-geeky wordsmith played by Joshua Malina. In a pleasing story line of "In Plain Sight", Malina becomes an acquaintance of Mary Shannon's goofy sister via an AA meeting the last few weeks. Malina's appearance this week debuted a bit of character background: he's filthy rich and interested in her sister enough to ask her to the Governor's Ball.

It was nice to see both McCormack and Malina sharing a scene together, though the episode was nearly over before that happened. Atleast when the time came it was with a short quip, "It's better if you breathe", from Shannon to Peter (his character: Peter Alpert) upon viewing Shannon's sister, Brandi, all dolled up for the ball, slightly remniscent of a WW quip.

Thankfully, it seems like Peter will be around a bit this season.

Finally, West Wing alum number four, Richard Schiff, a favorite of mine who has a new show premiering on Fox in next year's mid-season, graced "In Plain Sight" with a one off appearance as a slick Jewish P.I. of sorts. The unnamed character had surprising wit that baffled McCormack's Shannon, and her tough but caring demeanor worked him over, leading from annoyance on her part to a shared admiration.

Schiff, who's character Toby Ziegler over played his Jewishness at times of frustration, which was often - Ziegler was a tightly wound wordsmith and, coincidentally, Will Bailey's boss, played an old-school rabbi known for being able to track down anyone anywhere and being able to talk them into near anything with a patience that's unbelievable to Marshall Shannon.

Their final scene together ended with the unnamed rabbi handing Marshall Shannon a business card and alluding to being able to find her long lost father, so here's hoping for a repeat performance by Shiff.

Too bad USA's Friday night buddy P.I. comedy "Psych" is between seasons or we could have had a whole week of The West Wing on USA as Dule Hill, who played personal aid to the President Charlie Young on West Wing, is now Gus, one half of the Psych Detective Agency. I'm thinking about starting a petition asking Elisabeth Moss, who played young Zoey Bartlett, first daughter and on again off again love of Charlie Young, to take time out from "Mad Men" and her engagement to Saturday Night Live's Fred Armissen to play a damsel in distress on Psych.

It was nice to have a night of The West Wing stars on my DVR, even if it wasn't The West Wing I was watching.

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In Coming! What's On This Weekend

Most people's DVR's will betting quite a rest this weekend. Believe it or not, the only new drama for Friday night is Fox's doomed Prison Break. NBC has that new episode of Kings I mentioned Saturday at 8pm and The Best of Amy Poehler should be good for some laughs at 11:30. Sunday sees the return of Law & Order: Criminal Intent and In Plain Sight on USA, Desperate Housewives and Brothers & Sisters return to ABC after a small break and AMC has a new Breaking Bad.

When we last saw Desperate Housewives, Gabrielle was horny, Lynette was overworked but got some revenge, Orson was on the run, Bree refused to give up her company, Dave got found out and Edie was shocked to learn the truth and then shocked again.

Jesse hit the jackpot and Walt's money excuse was cut off of Breaking Bad.

Brothers & Sisters left off with Ryan being a jerk, Tommy still on the run, though not aware that Holly has gotten him off the hook. Rebecca and Justin are still on the outs, Sarah has returned to Ojai and Kitty and Robert are having some big marital problems.

And of course, don't forget the pay cablers: HBO airs Grey Gardens on Saturday. It's a movie adaptation of the 1975 documentary following the black sheep of the Kennedy family. On Sunday HBO has new In Treatment and Number 1 Ladies Detective Agency while Showtime has new The Tudors.

Catch up at The iTunes TV store..

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