Remember all that talk about Survivor moving to a colder climate, such as Canada? Never mind.

The long-running CBS show is actually going to China for its next season. The 15th season will feature the castaways in a non-island setting for the first time since the 11th season. Though I'm not sure if you can call them "castaways" if its not an island, but whatever. China is more open to other countries filming there now, and such a location may help Survivor catch on outside of the U.S. The new season starts in September.

I still want to see a cold climate Survivor though. Moving around to different warm parts of the globe (and I'm not sure exactly what the weather will be like in China, so maybe I'm off here) might be interesting on paper, but once you get into the game it's still the same old thing. Changing the climate would change the whole show.

• China's super-strict, guys-only version of American Idol debuts next month.
  
• Italy's new reality show has Italian mamma's picking brides for their sons, who are afflicted with too many girlfriends.
  
• American Idol's songwriting contest is back on, so the winner's first single might actually be good this time!
  

Sure, we all like sex, violence and cursing, but if you're like me, sometimes you like to pour yourself a nice cup of tea, settle into the couch, and watch something that's a bit more stimulating to the ol' gray matter. Therefore, here's a few shows coming up on PBS you might want to check out. Note that the first couple shows will air during the pledge period, so you'll have to check your listings for the exact date and time.

Kenny Rogers: The Journey (check local listings for date and time) - This combination concert and retrospective looks at forty years of Rogers' work, including interviews with the musician and singer.

PBS will air a four-part documentary on Wednesday, January 10 and Wednesday, January 17 at 9pm titled China from the Inside. The documentary will delve into both the history and current political landscape of China from all perspectives. It will also examine how women are treated in the country, problems with air and water pollution, religion, and the government's slow response to the AIDS epidemic. The four parts of the documentary are:

1. "Power and the People"

2. "Women of the Country"

3. "Shifting Nature"

4. "Freedom and Justice"

China is quickly becoming a major player on the world stage, but little is known about it. The creators of this documentary hope to shed some light on a country that still remains a mystery to many. I love the idea, and hopefully it will be as in-depth as they claim it to be.

On Thursdays episode of The View, a show I never watch because I spend that time celebrating the fact I'm not watching The View, Rosie O'Donnell cracked wise about Danny DeVito's drunken appearance on the show being national news, saying that even in China the newspaper read, "Ching chong, ching ching chong, Danny DeVito!"

(S01E10) Great to see that even an episode of a series about nuclear war and small town isolation can have a Thanksgiving episode! But it's not a "Very Special Episode" of Jericho, where everyone has a bake sale and learn a valuable lesson about...I don't know, bake sales or something, it's actually a rather fascinating episode about what the people of Jericho should do when boxes and boxes of food, medicine, fuel, and supplies are dropped from airplanes. Do you trust them? Are they poisoned? Is everything safe to touch? Confusing matters more is that the labels are in Chinese, and the planes were Russian.

At first I thought, yay, Chinese Food! That's what everyone eats when they're alone on the holidays, right? But then you have to think about who sent it (if they really did) and why.

It's official. Jack Bauer will return from his extended stay in China to save the world again on Sunday, January 14, 2007 at 8PM with a two hour premiere. As FOX has done with the past two seasons of 24, hours three and four of season six will air the very next night (Monday Jan. 15) at 8PM as well.

To give fans something to chew on in the meantime, on October 24 FOX will be releasing an extended "Day Six" trailer here. Click on it, there's a countdown and everything! There's a lot of buzz around this new season though. Besides finding out the ramifications of the Chinese kidnapping Jack, 24 will also be welcoming a boat-load (no pun intended) of new stars including Regina King, James Cromwell, and Peter MacNicol. Plus, Eric Balfour is back to reprise his season one role as Milo.

In conclusion? Tick tock... tick tock... tick tock.

[via ComingSoon.net]

It's not often that TV news executives are well-known, but Gordon Manning was one of those people.

Manning was with NBC and CBS news for several years, involved in many of the top news stories of the 20th century, including the student uprising in Tiananmen Square in 1989 for NBC, CBS' Watergate and Nixon's trip to China coverage in 1972, and even set up an interview between NBC's Tom Brokaw and Mikail Gorbachev in 1987, just before his meeting with President Reagan.

Manning was famous for something else we all see now: the color-coded election night map! NBC first did that in 1976.

Manning died Wednesday in Westport, CT of a heart attack.

(S02E02) This episode of Wonder Showzen began with Chauncey visited by himself from two minutes in the future. It turns out Chauncey's future self is a hundred times cooler than Chauncey, so Chauncey sets out to build a time machine and travel even further back in the future (four minutes) so he can be even hipper. But we'll get to all that in a moment.

I said in my last review that the "Beat Kids" segment wasn't my favorite, only because I don't think it always works in the execution. Of course, that was before last night when they had a kid put on zombie make-up, dress as the Pope, and interview people in front of a Catholic Church under the pseudonym "Little Dead Pope." Trey Parker has been quoted time and again saying Cartman was his way of creating a character who could say things that would get most real people burned at the stake. Wonder Showzen takes that concept one step further and actually uses real children, which adds a whole layer of apprehension when you hear them say things to unsuspecting adults like, "The Pope should go to Hell for promoting a corrupt system. High five!" Not many shows can make you almost fall of the couch laughing while at the same time fearing for a child's life. They should have some kind of award for that.