New York City may be all the way across the country, but if Rupert Murdoch gets his way there you can bet he will cast his gaze upon all other major metropolitan areas: the New York Times reports that Murdoch wants to obtain a permanent FCC waiver to acquire two TV NYC stations in addition to his three newspapers and radio assets. Will this be a last hurrah while the friendly Bush Administration still controls......

Before playing William Adama in Battlestar Galactica, Edward James Olmos was mostly known for his portrayal of Jaime Escalante in Stand and Deliver. Based on real life events, the movie follows Escalante as he enters James Garfield High in Los Angeles and makes a difference on the young tough kids through his teachings of mathematics. Kinda like Dangerous Minds but with no Coolio. Right next to MacArthur Park on Wilshire Blvd. you'll find "Los Angeles......

With Lost sent off to Hiatusland for the next month, Thursday's have suddenly deflated to an extraordinarily flaccid state - makes me hunger for the return of Thursday regulars like "My Name Is Earl" (check out NBC's CEO Jeff Zucker season rehash promo). After scouring the listings I can only come up with Jim Jarmusch's Mystery Train(1989) on IFC at 8:15pm and then Don Rickles on Jimmy Kimmel for late night watching. In news......

The 10:00pm slot is hot again tonight but I'm going to have to go with Lewis Black again, that's a great show, maybe Comedy Central has finally figured out what to do with him. In other items, the Nielsen Company, whom I've occasionally reported on/castigated in this column, is inviting LAist to submit some TV Trivia questions for an "Ultimate Pop Culture Trivia Challenge" contest and I'd to invite YOU, our readers, to submit some......

Van Hunt plays the Temple Bar tonight, the third and last in a series of LA shows | Photo via his MySpace page The Guide to March Rock Music Residencies has been updated with a few more listings -- it seems as if residencies are catching on, which is a good thing. Meanwhile, Howlin Rain plays their last LA concert before a tour promoting their new album, Magnificent Fiend, that was released yesterday. Nicole......

Test Your Reflex plays this month at Hotel Cafe on Wednesdays | Photo by Luke Wooden via their MySpace Despite SXSW starting up this week with 100+ Los Angeles based bands heading over there, residencies are growing stronger and more venue-diverse across the line, especially on Monday nights where the volume makes it hard to choose from. Here's to a great month of residencies, rock on. Mondays The Chapin Sisters @ The Echo (Free),......

Thursday night I almost invariably turn to NBC - what's gonna happen if we run out of new episodes of our fave shows? I might have to get creative, perish the thought. I apologize for writing the word "fashionistas" yesterday, I also apologize for saying that Kenny vs. Spenny was premiering - what we got last night was a sneak preview, not a premiere, the premiere happens on Sunday. 8:00pm Ugly Betty ABC - Betty......

Two of the four big summer three-quels hit DVD shelves today. Neither is worth your money. Better to spend it on La Vie en Rose, featuring one of the best performances in years by the amazing Marion Cotillard. Better yet, make it a French double-feature and pick up Paris Je T'Aime, too. If you haven't yet, invest a weekend watching Berlin Alexanderplatz. And, yes, it will take the whole weekend. Christmas and South Park......

Before the Kroger corporation absorbed the grocery chain, making it just a small portion of the empire that also includes Cala Foods, Food 4 Less, and Foods Co., among others, Ralphs was owned by a local named George. George Albert Ralphs had been a bricklayer, but a hunting injury forced him into being an apprentice in the grocery biz. Two years into it he founded the now legendary grocery chain in downtown LA with......

The LA Times is reporting today that the city has a near $77.5 million unspent in Quimby fees that it has been collected from developers for park space and improvements. The fees, from the California 1975 Quimby Act (not that quimby folks), require developers to help mitigate the impacts of property improvements and new development by paying a fee that goes into a city parks department fund or set aside land on the development.The......

Yeah, yeah, I know. Serenity is not exactly "new" to DVD this week, but I don't care. This just-released collector's edition is the best DVD available today so do yourself a favor and check out Joss Whedon's underrated sci-fi flick (and marvel at the wonder that is Summer Glau). The tenth season of South Park is one of the best in years. Chef, how could you join the Super Adventure Club? I never thought......

In a couple of weeks I will be joining 40,000 artists, misfits, deviants, hippies, vampires, musicians, furries, and nudists to participate in the 21st Burning Man Festival in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada. So if you happen to be strolling through Venice Beach during the week of Aug. 27- Sept. 3 and wonder where all the freaks are at don’t be alarmed, we’re all just taking a much needed vacation from the default......

Although South Park is shocking and The Family Guy delivers more jokes per minute than ever thought possible, neither show would be around without The Simpsons, the longest-running animated television series of all time. Part of the show's universal charm and unparalleled stamina is its rich tapestry of lovable characters -- many of whom are criminals and deeply flawed. Somehow LAist got our hands on two movie passes (each pass admits two people), and......

South Park aired "Night of the Living Homeless" a couple weeks ago. The last episode of the first half of season 11 (translation: they're taking a break until October) paid tribute to some famous SoCal icons ... namely Tupac, Tony Hawk, and, well, the homeless. Enjoy Cartman and Co's music video.......

Don Imus is an old man. Maybe back in the day he was funny, but he hasn't been funny for as long as I've been aware of him. But he does live in America, and here we have the freedom of speech. Now that Right doesn't mean that people cant call you out on what you say, but it should mean that you shouldn't have to get fired or jailed or killed for saying......

A Word Or 45 (or so): Fox has got it down, the top 5 most viewed programs on TV were on Fox, 3 were episodes of American Idol and the other 2 were Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader? Someone at Fox is smart enough to know that most American adult's aren't. Tonight - Wednesday - March 7th, 2007 Lakers @ Bucks (KCAL, 5:00 p.m.) Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon (TCM, 5:00......

An Iraqi national named Fadhel Maliki was detained this morning while trying to board a plane at Los Angeles International Airport. He is suspected of trying to smuggle metal objects hidden in his rectum. The hole truth is unknown at this time, but some details are starting to leak out. Airport officials reacted swiftly, and there were no reports of any major backup for other travelers still at the airport. Passengers on the plane......

Brian Doherty of Reason just wrote a big honkin book about Libertarianism. He will be signing "Radicals For Capitalism" tonight at 7pm at Book Soup (8818 Sunset Blvd., W. Hollywood), talking about, reading from, and answering questions about all things Libertarian. We were lucky enough to get all the dumb questions out of the way for you. LAist: The Dems are the Left, the Repubs are the Right, what are Libertarians? Brian Doherty: Libertarians......

Need a little boost after the President's State of the Union speech this week? Looking to combine an evening of nuanced political satire, slapstick humor, Gilbert & Sullivan, and..well, what else do you want? The Beastly Bombing, billed as "A Terrible Tale of Terrorists Tamed by the Tangles of True Love", commenced its second run at the Steve Allen Theater last weekend. Kitchen sinks aside, writer/director Julien Nitzberg and composer Roger Neill have concocted......

While checking up on SFist, we found they've been posting a lot of Christmas videos. One of them shows the epic battle between Santa and Jesus on the original South Park (above), while another shows the pair's complicated love triangle. Other people on the internet take a more commercial approach to this rivalry, while the extremists are trying to kick Santa out of their country. Some just think it would be a good fight,......

Wednesday Night "NBA Basketball" (ESPN, 6:00 p.m.) Grizzlies @ Kings "NHL Hockey" (Fox Sports, 7:00 p.m.) Flyers @ Ducks "Office Space" (IFC, 7:00 p.m.) Unwind from humpday with the unedited neo-classic. "College Basketball" (Prime 42, 7:30 p.m.) BYU @ UCLA "Dancing With the Stars" (ABC, 8 p.m.) The moment of truth. Season finale. "Jericho" (CBS, 8:00 p.m.) The town comes up with a plan to repel "intruders" (use President Bush pronounciation on that word)......

Because it took The Simpsons so long to make a movie might mean that it will actually be really great. However, the fact that the show has been on the air for so long might mean that it has run out of edgy ideas. It already gets way less hype than shows that it opened the door for like "South Park", "Family Guy", "Futurama", and our favorite, "Drawn Together", but we're keeping our fingers......

Couldn't help but notice the mascot for KCAL 9's Yule Log Fun Run looks disturbingly like South Park's venerable Mr. Hanky the Christmas Poo. Squeeze out your own feces-themed joke and insert ______HERE______.......

Let's take a look back at a week that raised this Zen koan: if Kevin Federline got into a wrestling ring with a wrestler, who would you root for? Austinist was in an entertainment state of mind as they covered the dickens out of the Austin Film Festival, depicted all the Big 12 football coaches as South Park characters, and interviewed Jose Gonzalez. Chicagoist talked about the passion as they bid adieu to Bell's......

There used to be a time when MTV would go crazy for the latest Beck video, and they should've, his music and his visuals were always cutting edge. But then something happened a few years back and the golden boy decided he was going to follow in the moonwalk of Gordon Lightfoot and Don Henley and "keep it real" with the sad tunes. LAist liked the early experimental jet trash shit when he has......

This week a memo was leaked, or found, or stolen from South Park co-creator Matt Stone to the MPAA (the people who hand out the ratings for movies). The film in question was South Park: The Movie. There are always tales about filmmakers arguing with the MPAA and the studios about what to cut so as to get a tamer rating, and therefore increase the chances of a bigger box office because the lower......

L to R: Jordan Savage as Poona and Michael Lanahan as The Handsome Prince Welcome to the magical kingdom of Do, where no one does - a magical land that bears some resemblance to America and some to South Park, Colorado. A talking television, a little girl who learns to kill people over the Internet, a giant foam penis and a dismembered rabbit are among the residents of this double-edged land. Their stories are......

Fri 5/5 - Islands @ The El Rey ($12) – Montreal’s Islands are an eccentric indie pop band that formed out of the ashes of the Unicorns. Don’t hold that against them, they’re much better than the Unicorns. The band can still be too cutesy at times (the song “Don’t Call Me Whitney, Bobby” doesn’t seem to have anything to do with Whitney, Bobby or Curtis Mayfield) but the arrangements are more fleshed out......

Concerned commenter valleyist asks: Why are you guys showing so many clips from YouTube? Do they pay you for these plugs? If I wanted to see clips from youtube, I'd go to there [sic] website. Is that what you want? Let's start by saying yes, that's what we want. We want you to enjoy surfing around on the internet (particularly while you're at work), we want you to watch funny videos, read your favorite......

LAist has a feeling that Tom Cruise, Scientology's patron saint, must be in the midst of the promotion campaign for Mission: Impossible III. How else can we explain the recent spate of TC and/or TomKat articles popping up, like everywhere, lately? Let's scan the headlines and find out what our boy's been up to in the past week or so, shall we? - With Isaac "Chef" Hayes quitting South Park, the Scientology episode scandal......