OK, you owners of the Video Tape Recorder, I'm putting you on alert. NBC is 'super-sizing' some of its Thursday night shows during May sweeps. This, of course, will be putting your VCRs into a state of apoplexy.

On May 11th Will & Grace and the season finales of My Name is Earl and The Office will expand to 40-minutes apiece in a ratings-grabbing scheme that hasn't been seen on Thursday nights since Friends was on the air. The belief is, by adding an additional ten minutes to each show, viewers are less likely to surf to other networks.

This will be the next-to-last episode of Will & Grace and will feature a bit of baby drama for the two main characters. On Earl, the main character (Jason Lee) will encounter some problems as he tries to cross off the number one item on the list. The finale of The Office, written by star Steve Carell, will feature a charity casino night.

In a related story, ER will be ten minutes shorter that evening to see if anyone really notices. Heh. Heh.