Bad news for fans of dramas about female cops. It's been announced that Lifetime has pulled the plug on newbie series 'The Protector.'

According to Deadline, the network declined to order a second series after the drama failed to catch fire with audiences.

Originally airing on Sunday nights, 'The Protector' attracted only 1.9 million viewers for its June 12 premiere. It later moved to Mondays after failing to hang onto around 50 percent of its lead-in audience.

(S01E02) - "You're just one boy. What good can you do here against all that?"

Kings is a show about a lot of things: love, money, greed, power, guys in suits that cost more than one year of college tuition. Mostly it's about action and consequences. So if the show's premiere episode was about war as a consequence, then naturally the next episode should be about its root cause: politics.

We finally get a taste of the aristocracy from the inside in the second episode. All the scheming and conniving that makes the greatest primetime soap operas and dramas like The Shield and The West Wing so great to watch. The fun comes from figuring how people like Vic Mackey and President Bartlet are going to get themselves out one bear trap without chewing their own foot off and choking on the marrow.

In Kings' case, however, the plot seems to have found its way out of one bear trap and inadvertently stepped right into another.

You see this picture? That's Christopher Egan in NBC's new midseason drama Kings. He'll be playing a David-like character -- as in David versus Goliath -- when the series debuts later this year or in early 2009. And in an interesting casting coup reported by EW's Michael Ausiello, Macaulay Culkin has been cast on Kings as King Silas' nephew. The king, by the way, is the formidable Ian McShane. Joel reported just how formidable McShane is at last summer's TCA.

Culkin is a long way from the adorable Kevin McAllister in the Home Alone movies, but he's still got that charismatic appeal.

Since Kings is all about power, as McShane's nephew who has been exiled from the kingdom and returns after David's success defeating the Goliath of the show -- a killer tank -- I can see him perhaps as a Mordred character. In other words, an antagonist with issues.

Culkin isn't the only name to join Kings in some capacity: Brian Cox, Miguel Ferrer, Leslie Bibb and Michael Stahl-David are also on board for guest arcs.

(S04E15) "All right, one more time for the slow kid." - Lee Scanlon

When I was in grade school, sixth grade to be precise, everyone brought their lunch to school in a small brown paper bag, sometimes, girls used a cute version (white bag with hearts, pink bag with kitties) but other than that, there were no exceptions. If anyone was foolish enough to bring their mid day meal to school in a lunchbox of any kind, they would pay dearly. For example, my friend Lance who quickly earned the nickname "Lunchbox Lance" all because of his love for the rock band Kiss. Thankfully, it never occurred to Lance to fight back like the young man in Allison's dream. However, now that I am an adult and I collect vintage metal lunchboxes, I would pay a hefty price for the lunchbox that young man used to bludgeon his tormentor.

(S01E02)"God you're a douche." - Jaime, to Jonas

Last week I mentioned that Bionic Woman had a lot of Alias in it, and the opening scenes of this second episode solidifies that viewpoint a little bit more, with Jaime's fiancee dead and her friends moving on with their lives ("I'm gonna to be a scumbag lawyer, you guys!") and Jaime stuck at a bartending job and feeling a little lost, a little unfulfilled.

Time to save the world!

He hasn't even made his debut on the show yet (he starts tonight at 8 on NBC), but Isaiah Washington says that NBC has already said they might want to spinoff his Bionic Woman character because "there's been some relative excitement about my presence."

First of all, who the hell talks like that about themselves? There's been excitement about his presence? Um, OK. Second, Washington is only slated to do five episodes so far, and I think that if NBC really thought he was great then they would want to sign him to a full-time contract on Bionic Woman before taking the chance of spinning him off on his own show.

(S01E01)"I guess that makes me your landlord." - Jonas Bledsoe, explaining to Jamie Sommers who he is and all the money he spent on her

Sometimes I really hate first episodes of TV shows. They have to have so much exposition and explain everything and set everything up so fast. In the first 15 minutes of Bionic Woman, the following occurs: we meet the evil killer bionic woman, who is killed by one of her cohorts after a rampage; we're introduced to Jamie and her job as a bartender; we meet her kid sister and see them argue about their absent father; we meet her boyfriend the professor/scientist; and we find out that Jamie is pregnant.

OK, so the networks have given their upfronts and they've sent out the screener DVDs. These are the pilot episodes of the new fall shows, in not-quite-completed form. Things could still change before they hit the networks this fall, but they give a good general sense of what the shows are about and what they're like.

Today Joel and I start with previews of some new NBC shows: Bionic Woman, Life, Chuck, and Journeyman. More networks and other shows coming soon!

(Photos courtesy NBC.com)