The underutilized actress has much to offer, but is not offered much. Also today: the continued employment of Courtney Thorne-Smith, AMC has a bad idea, and Showtime is getting into the Stephen King business.

  • Poor Judy Greer. She's one of America's most likable and funny and talented actresses, and yet she is still not the big star she deserves to be. Her great, weird turn on Arrested Development went mostly overlooked, her supposed-to-be breakout movie roles have largely been in crappy, soon-forgotten films (Elizabethtown, e.g.), and the TV shows she's starred in (Miss Guided, Mad Love) have been early-canceled duds. It breaks your heart! And now this news: she's been cast as Ashton Kutcher's wife on the ninth, Sheen-less season of Two and a Half Man. Sigh. I know that she could, like, be working in a coal mine or homeless on the street or, worst of all, be stuck working in theater, so she is rather lucky when you consider many of her fellow actors and most humans in the world, but c'mon! Two and a Half Men? That's just mean, Hollywood. Someone get this lady a show on HBO or something, a show where she can showcase her oddball charms. Two and Half Men is not that show. The poor thing. Poor, poor Judy Greer. [TV Guide]
  • Hey, let's keep talking about Two and a Half Men! Courtney Thorne-Smith has been hired back to the show to once again play Jon Cryer's love interest, Lyndsey. So, good for her. You won't hear any Judy Greerian cries of dismay on this one. I mean, we're talking about Allison Parker here. (Though, it should be noted that when looking at Courtney Thorne-Smith's television career, it's pretty likely that she has become very, very rich over the years. 181 episodes of According to Jim! Jeez louise, lady. Well done.) [EW]
  • From the Department of Terrible Ideas comes this tidbit: AMC is considering doing a Watch What Happens Live-esque show about The Walking Dead, hosted by Singled Out's Chris Hardwicke. Haha, what? The whole reason that Gay Uncle Andy's Gay Basement Program works (and I use the term "works" loosely) is that the shows he's talking about are deeply, deeply silly. The Walking Dead is not that. It's not Shakespeare, but it's not Real Stinkfish of Hell Island either. I just do not like this idea! You're supposed to be classy, AMC. Classy people don't host their own recap shows. Classy people let the bearded Brooklyn bastards of the blogging world do that terrible, shameful work for them. [Vulture]
  • It seems that MTV's salute to the rotting corpse of the art of music (which MTV killed), the annual Video Music Awards, earned its highest ratings ever on Sunday night. Nearly 9 million giggle-eyed weirdos tuned into the festivities, yours truly among them, and were given the pleasure of seeing Beyoncé do five key changes in one song, and the surreal horrors of Jessie J's mangled leg and Katy Perry's general existence. Then we all put rocks in our pockets and walked into the sea. [Deadline]
  • This is exciting! Stephen King is teaming up with Showtime to make a TV series based on his recent novel Under the Dome, about a town that exists, well, under a dome. King is producing along with the DreamWorks TV team. This could be a very interesting show! Though why no one thought to just do this fifteen years ago when Bio-Dome came out, I will never know. [THR]

[Photo via Getty]