King of Queens courtesy Sony Pictures
The King of Queens: The Complete Series, a 26-disc collection featuring 207 episodes from nine seasons (but apparently no coffee-table book) streets Nov. 6, for $232.95.... Also debuting on that date: Monty Python's Life of Brian: The Immaculate Edition, touting an all-new documentary and a newly discovered first cast reading.... Battlestar Galactica: Razor — Unrated Extended Edition comes out Dec. 4.... Saturday Night Live's The Best of '06/'07 compilation is available today, but only at Starbucks. After all, sometimes only an espresso can keep you awake during those final 30 minutes.... Amazon is now taking pre-orders for Seinfeld Season 9 and The Complete Series, as well as High School Musical 2.... Reminder: Heroes Season 1 is now out. Order through TVGuide.com for an additional 5 percent discount.
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Britney Spears by John Sciulli/WireImage.com
Some of the findings of a "pop culture" poll conducted of nearly 5,000 people by Parade.com:• Britney Spears is your nightmare babysitter, with 77 percent dreading the thought of the pop tart minding their own tots. Conversely, Katie Holmes and Reese Witherspoon are deemed supermoms.• Britney's rep is the most tarnished (says 40 percent of respondents), with Lindsay, Rosie and Paris tying for second.• Jennifer Aniston (yeah?) and Jessica Alba (oh yeah!) boast the best bikini bodies, while Matthew McConaughey wields the washboardiest abs.• Alec Baldwin's voice-mail to his daughter is deemed the most shocking caught-on-tape moment. David Hasselhoff's hamburger humiliation placed second.• McConaughey and George Clooney are the most eligible bachelors, while Aniston tops the list of single-and-looking femmes.• King of Queens is the most-missed show to recently exit the airwaves (say 26 percent of you), with The Sopranos very close behind. Gilmore Girls was ...
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Drew Carey by Craig Blankenhorn/CBS
According to the New York Daily News and as of today, Drew Carey is the front-runner to take over The Price Is Right — pending the success of his Power of 10, premiering next month.... What fall series has you counting the minutes until its return? Choose from our list and vote here (bottom right).... Scrubs and Without a Trace have each been granted two-year syndication renewals.... Maury and Jerry Springer have been picked up through September 2010. Unemployed and paroled potential studio audience members cheer.... The King of Queens' Season 9 DVD set streets Sept. 25.
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Question: What is your take on why sitcoms have disappeared from the television landscape? I get that they don't win awards and don't get a lot of watercooler talk for the most part, but a show like The King of Queens was at times last year the top-rated comedy on any network, and House of Payne opened to huge numbers on TBS. As much as I love The Office, 30 Rock, How I Met Your Mother and others, why have the networks abandoned a genre that doesn't appear lost in terms of viewer numbers?
Answer: That's a much bigger question than I can easily address in this column, but it boils down to the cyclical and cynical nature of the industry. It hasn't been that long since Friends was a phenom, not to mention Raymond keeping CBS afloat in its quieter way. But it has been a while since a new sitcom was both a critical and popular smash, feeding a perception that the old-fashioned sitcom (live audience, laugh track) was no longer in vogue and the quirkier, single-camera comedy was the way to go,
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King of Queens courtesy of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Amazon has another amazing sale going on, but this one is just for today (Tuesday, June 12). You can buy 8 seasons of King of Queens for $115.99, a savings of $175.96! This isn't the entire series, just seasons 1-8 (194 episodes!). That'll get you up to speed once the final season is released, though we don't have a date for that yet.Save 60% off King of Queens at Amazon.com - today only!Gord
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Leah Remini and Kevin James, The King of Queens
CBS' The King of Queens — which presents its series finale tonight at 9 pm/ET — ruled as long as Seinfeld and Everybody Loves Raymond. Abdicating after nine seasons, Kevin James will match Jerry's and Ray's marks for longevity, even if King never achieved the same critical or ratings success. "We were TV's bitch," says cocreator David Litt. Still, flying under the radar had its benefits. "It helped us because the network let us do our own thing," James says. "We were the litt
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Dinosaurs DVD courtesy Michael Jacobs Productions
Whoops! I was buried in other work yesterday and I forgot to do my weekly "Pick of the Week," so I apologize to anyone who came here looking for the story yesterday.May 1 has a number of decent releases, but no single "Wow, this is going to be the #1 set" release, which makes my job a bit harder to do. I looked at the sets that people on TVShowsonDVD.com want, and there were two that stood out: the second season of Beverly Hills, 90210, and the third and fourth seasons of Dinosaurs. I'm going to go with Dinosaurs for next week; the set contains seven unaired episodes (out of the 36 in the set), a behind-the-scenes featurette, commentary tracks, a music video and more. Sounds like a winner to me. While 90210 will be a decent set, it'll also contain a lot of music substitutions.Warner Bros. is also releasing the first season of What I Like About You, though it'll have a different theme song on the DVD set (check out the previous blog entry regarding theme songs); Fox has the second se...
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Question: Any spoilers for the King of Queens finale?
Answer: Only what I told you in my vodcast last week: Leah Remini is not going to be happy with the ending.
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Leah Remini, The King of Queens
Funny lady Leah Remini speaks candidly about her friends Tom and Katie, her diet tips, and moving on from CBS' The King of Queens (Mondays at 9:30 pm/ET).
TV Guide: After playing Carrie Heffernan on The King of Queens for nine seasons, you're coming down to the wire with next month's series finale. How does it feel? Remini: Awful. It's a cliché, but you just don't know what you have until it's gone. Kevin [James] and I have both had babies on the show. We've lost weight. We've gained weight. Just look at everything we've gone through. Nine years is a big chunk of your life. It's been my first real success, and you can't
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This Monday's ratings highlights:• Dancing with the Stars averaged 18.7 million total viewers over its 90-minute run, up 800K from last week.• How I Met Your Mother and Old Christine, each with an audience of 7.73 million, were up 200K and 900K, respectively.• Two and a Half Men and The King of Queens each drew about 13.4 mil, giving the latter its best numbers since November 2003.• 24 (11.38 mil) was up 530 thou, while the 9 pm debut of Thank God You're Here was watched by 9.54 mil. A 90-minute Bachelor (9.23 mil) was down 830,000.• Trailing CSI: Miami (15.94 mil) and The Bach, a second hour of Thank God (7.08 mil) did 1.6 mil better than the final Black Donnellys and gave NBC its best 18-49 delivery in the time slot since the Golden Globes on Jan. 15.
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