Three looks at QT's "Inglourious Basterds," and what have they done with "Friday Night Lights"?

You know, I suppose the "Chuck" fiasco has been settled about as well as we could have possibly expected, with the show returning to its same time slot for the winter midseason - and maybe getting a bit of a bump from following the Winter Olympics.

But buried in NBC's upfronts (or infronts, who knows?) was a surprising note regarding "Friday Night Lights." This year, TV's best drama (by far, in my book) returned to NBC's Friday lineup in January for those of who don't have DirecTV (Jeremy, always a friend to this blog, was kind enough to send me some episodes before they hit NBC - most grateful.)

Now, however, it's been pushed back to summer, so that NBC can air f-in "Southland" instead. I suppose I should be happy that's it's somehow already guaranteed to come back for two more 13-episode seasons, but the wait is just gonna truly be a bitch. In the meantime, the third season - easily the best yet - hits DVD this week, so if you haven't caught on, it's well worth a rental (which I've already put in my queue.)

This grownass man will freely admit that the show would make me almost cry at some point in just about each episode, and I would submit that the episode in which they bid goodbye to Smash (Gaius Charles) is the finest hour of television broadcast in the past year. What else can I say? It's the best thing on TV since "The Wire," so watch it already.

Here today, however, before I got distracted, it was supposed to be all about Quentin Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds," which it seems he has not only actually finished but apparently also cut to just more than two hours. As I'm writing this, I believe it's already premiered at Cannes, so I suppose we'll get a lot of reaction in the coming days. Some goofball at the Hollywood Reporter (yes, I suppose that's just jealousy) panned it as just a "standard action movie," but you can still count me rather severely psyched to see this when it comes out for the rest of the world in August.

In the meantime, here are a couple of great time-wasters to give you a little taste. The first comes courtesy of CHUD, and for those who like the music QT puts in his movies (of which you can certainly count me one), the site has put together a listing of the songs that will appear on the "Inglourious Basterds" (I seem to spell that differently each time I type it, so maybe I should just stop correcting it) soundtrack, with many of the entries linking to YouTube or Quicktime clips that let you hear the songs. Instead of the usual feast of pop nuggets, this time it's a lot of Ennio Morricone and other film music, but there's still a few fun surprises thrown in. Click here to give it a listen.

Second, and even better, are three short clips courtesy of Trailer Addict. The only real problem I have with any of these is that the more I see of Brad Pitt, the more he just seems to have the most ridiculous accent. I think that's gonna only be a minor distraction, though. Anyways, enjoy the clips and have a perfectly passable Thursday. Peace out.