DON'T CALL IT A COMEBACK:  Not only did LL Cool J (star of the number 2 drama on television) knock out a guy who had broken into his home, the robber was hospitalized after Cool J took him out.

YOU KNOW, THERE'S TWO KINDS OF DOCTORS. THERE'S THE KIND THAT GET RID OF THEIR FEELINGS, AND THE KIND THAT HOLD ON TO THEM. IF YOU HOLD ON TO YOUR FEELINGS YOU'RE GOING TO GET SICK EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE. IT'S PART OF IT:  As part of its series heralding shows which hit at least 100 episodes, the AV Club selects ten episodes representing ER at its best. (None of them feature Dr. Dave Malucci.)

Matt re-reviewed "Love's Labor Lost" as part of our 2009 retrospective.

THIS MAN HAS MY FULL SUPPORT:  That's what Odell Watkins scribbled on the back of his business card handed to Marla Watkins for use in expediting Cutty's bureaucratic needs with the new gym, and I'm sure both Robert Caro and the Institute for Justice could have a field day with the Cutty scenes ... but we're not here to talk about that.

Because at the heart of The Wire's season three episode, "Slapstick," are a series of consequential, if very human mistakes which seem bound to doom characters who had it all on the right path. We'll start, as we must, with Prez.

BECAUSE NBC DOESN'T HAVE ENOUGH PROBLEMS AS IT IS: Two big TV stories folks are likely to want to discuss:

• Starting next January, ABC is flip-flopping Nightline and Jimmy Kimmel Live, with Kimmel going head to head with Letterman and Leno.  I'm not a huge Kimmel fan, but will be interesting to see how folks respond to a younger option in the timeslot.  As compensation, Nightline in Primetime replaces What Would You Do? as a Friday night news magazine.
• Perhaps 2 years later than it should, Greg Daniels has confirmed that the 2012-2013 season will be the last one for The Office.  Do you think we need to see Michael Scott one more time before the show wraps (if only so Steve Carell can win an Emmy for guest actor)?  Any other threads that need to be wrapped up?  Do we care about Schrute Farms, which is apparently going to make its first appearance as a backdoor pilot during this season?

QUEEN OF THE CACKLE:  Phyllis Diller wasn't the first female standup comedian, explained Gerald Nachman in Seriously Funny: The Rebel Comedians of the 1950s and 1960s, but she was the first to make it respectable, "to drag female comedy out of the gay bars, back rooms, and low end resorts and go toe-to-toe with her male counterparts in prime clubs." As to her pissed-off, self-deprecating housewife shtick, she once said that "I was saying all the things women were thinking but not saying," and her 50,000+ index cards of jokes are part of the Smithsonian collection.

She passed away today at the age of 95, and they don't make legends quite like that anymore.  Here she is on The Ed Sullivan Show, 1969.

TONY SCOTT, 1944-2012:  Unlike his brother Ridley, Tony Scott's films were not typically critical favorites, but were nonetheless successful--often extremely so.  He helped Tom Cruise become a movie star, directing Top Gun and Days of Thunder, was a staple director for Denzel Washington in action hero mode (Deja Vu, Crimson Tide, Man On Fire, Taking of Pelham 123, Unstoppable), and helped establish Will Smith as a big action star with Enemy of the State.  But despite all the success, Scott apparently took his own life yesterday afternoon.

UGLY CHICKENS DESERVE TO DIE:  Zap2It lists the forty-five weirdest reality shows of all time, though they left out both  of 2002's competing torture/quiz shows.