'Austin Powers' star Mindy Sterling has been tapped to star in the FX pilot 'Alabama.

The project, from 'Reno 911!' stars and creators Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon, is set 1,000 years in the future on a United Nations peacekeeping ship. According to Deadline Hollywood, 'Last Comic Standing' judge Natasha Legerro has also been cast in the project.

The show picks up six years into the crew's seven year peace-keeping mission. If the show heads to series, it will follow the crew as they visit hostile planets, hang out with aliens and interact on the tiny ship.

In other TV news ...

• Malcolm Gladwell is developing a Cold War era spy series for HBO. The project, from Gladwell and screenwriter Charles Randolph, follows a missionary in Berlin who becomes involved with the CIA. Gladwell would serve as a nonwriting executive producer. [Live Feed]

• Get ready for more nudity on reality TV: producers are seeking nudists to appear on 'The Nak'd Truth.' The reality series would follow contestants as they worked at a Florida nudist resort for a month. [NY Post]

• Larry King has landed the first interview with former Jet Blue flight attendant Steven Slater. The former flight attendant -- who quit his job after going on a tirade over an airplane's intercom system, grabbing beers and deploying the plane's emergency slide -- will break his silence on Oct. 26. [Hollywood Reporter]

(S04E1/S04E02) "Kenny, I'll get you a Wet-Nap. Your people love those." - Earl Hickey

Well, they wasted no time getting Earl back on track this season.

I must admit that while I enjoyed some of Earl's coma dreams and most of his stay in prison, even I was relieved to see the list back in play.

It's been so long since I've seen Seth Green be funny in anything, I forgot how funny he actually is. Seeing how Green spends a good part of his career making short films and animation that mercilessly mock the current state of cinema, he was the perfect choice for his role.

(S07E08) When I was watching the cold open to this episode, one thought came to my mind, "Oy, I don't know how I'm going to put up with another season." Usually on Scrubs, the cold open is a good indication of how the episode is going to go, comedy-wise.This cold open was not only not particularly funny, but it seemed oddly paced, as well. The only funny part about it was the gag about Ted being The Janitorial's investigative reporter because no one ever knows he's there.

But then something happened: the episode got funny. Not peak-level Scrubs funny, not even peak-level season seven funny. But it at least gave me hope that Bill Lawrence and his gang have enough in the tank to give us another twenty or so episodes (between what's left this season and what they'll likely shoot for ABC next year) and not make me want to stick a fork in my eye or, worse yet, turn the show off altogether.