JPTV: What I'm Watching Tonight--And Not

Tonight Tuned In hopscotches the NBC Must-See Comedy lineup: The Office and 30 Rock si, Scrubs no, My Name Is Earl... mmmmmmaybe. To fill the gaps I may watch another episode or two of the very promising midseason Andy Richter sitcom NBC sent. Ugly Betty goes into the TiVo freezer for later, as does Letterman's 25th anniversary on-air. (I'm an old, tired man.)

What I won't be watching is E.R. Nor did I watch last week. Nor--and I realize I probably should be embarrassed as a professional TV critic but am not--have I watched the show for a good couple of years. E.R. has been on since 1994, has been coasting since, oh, somewhere around the end of the Clooney era. I know what it is; I get it; I'm not interested. There are probably no further ways someone can get a gun into the O.R. nor further stunt-casting coups--Paris Hilton, Helen Mirren, the exhumed corpse of Lionel Barrymore--that can re-interest me.

TV criticism is a merciless business, there are only so many hours in the day, and there comes a point when I decide that, say, Crossing Jordan is just not going to get any better, and it and I must part ways. E.R., likewise, is on my personal Stephen Colbert "dead to me" list. Anyone care to make the case for it?