Get ready for a new face or two when Jericho (a.k.a -- The Little Show That Could) returns to the CBS primetime schedule early next year. One of those faces will be Esai Morales'.

The former NYPD Blue and Vanished star will appear in a recurring role for six of the seven episodes that have been ordered for the new season. Hmm, in the real world that would seem like a regular rather than occurring role. Semantics aside, Morales will play Colonel Hoffman, a career military officer and Iraq War veteran who has not seen or heard from his wife since the day of the attacks.

Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson finally made it legal . . . their divorce, that is. Papers filed in Los Angeles Superior Court last Friday make the singer/actors legally single once again. Officially, they now retain the status of "single, unmarried persons," according to the documents.

Nick and Jessica's fifteen minutes of fame began when they starred in the MTV reality show Newlyweds: Nick & Jessica. That newlywed feeling ended around Thanksgiving 2005, when the couple announced their separation. One month later Simpson filed for divorce after three years of marriage with Lachey and thousands of pages of tabloid speculation.

Since then, Simpson has appeared with Miss Piggy in a series of Pizza Hut commercials and jumped on the infomercial bandwagon to promote Proactiv skin cream. Meanwhile, Lachey released a CD back in May entitled What's Left of Me, in which he sings about the couple's painful breakup.