A "Prime Suspect" remake? Terminate with extreme prejudice!

It's probably good for my fairly under control blood pressure that as I'm first hearing about this idiocy, it also comes with word that NBC has - for now at least - shelved this monstrosity, and for the best possible reason.

Yes, the network whose last big brilliant idea was putting Jay Leno in prime time five nights a week (how'd that work out, guys?) was actually considering a remake of the sublime BBC police procedural "Prime Suspect."

And I can certainly understand the temptation. For sheer intensity matched with characters you actually care about, only "The Wire" and - at its best - "NYPD Blue" have even come close to matching "Prime Suspect" on this side of the pond, and almost all of the credit for that has to go Dame Helen Mirren.

Of all the characters of the last 20 years or so, on big screen or small, very few have been taken over as completely as Helen Mirren dived directly into the role of Jane Tennyson and made it entirely her own. And it's apparently their belated realization of just how impossible it would be to replace her that finally led NBC to abandon this madness.

Unable to find the right actress for this, NBC has now shelved it until at least June, and here's hoping forever. If I had to name one actress who could pull this off, the only name that even comes to mind is Anjelica Huston, but as great as she is, I can't even see that working, if God forbid she'd even be interested.

And if you've somehow never seen "Prime Suspect," I can't recommend it highly enough. If you want to get started, the beginning would be best, but if you only want to watch one, No. 3, with David Thewlis and Ciaran Hinds in a truly tawdry tale about child murder and serious police corruption, is the best of all in my book.

Here's hoping that this NBC "idea" gets aborted for good, and from now on today it's all about a trio of clips that at least managed to catch my eye this morning.

First up comes a clip from the upcoming flick "Date Night" featuring Tina Fey, Steve Carell and, in this clip, a shirtless Marky Mark. Even though NBC's current king and queen of comedy would seem to make a dream team on the big screen, I somehow just can't get all that excited about this. I just get the sinking feeling it's gonna lack any of the truly manic appeal of "After Hours" in chronicling a supposedly "wild" night in NYC. Anyways, enjoy the clip.

Next up comes a TV spot for something I'm much more excited about, "The Runaways." On paper, the idea of Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning playing rockers Joan Jett and Cherie Currie just sounds dreadful, but the buzz about this out of Sundance was mostly positive, and it really does seem music video director Floria Sigismondi has come up with something that will rock when this finally comes out March 19. Enjoy.



And finally today comes a surprise that made me genuinely laugh out loud. I've never found Jimmy Kimmel all that funny at all, but Tracy Morgan can really do no wrong in my book (yes, I'm really gonna go see "Cop Out" just to see how funny he can manage to be in it, even though the reviews are dreadful.) In this clip I have to assume appeared on Kimmel's show sometime this week (after my school-night bed time, of course), he and Morgan make a rap video, and it's absolutely as silly as you might imagine. Here's hoping that Kimmel's turn as Lil' Jim puts the final nail in autotune. Enjoy, and have a perfectly bearable Thursday. Peace out.