Slow News Day: Professor Jables, Weeklong Swim, No-Name Nowhere Director

ITEM: Jack Black and the Acceptable TV crew have added more hilarious amateur filmmaking tutorials to their website, concluding with a depressing guide to rejection, complete with Heat Vision and Jack reference. By the way, if you haven't been watching Acceptable TV, you should really get started.

ITEM: Adult Swim is expanding to a full week of 11-6 programming, which will make room for more new shows like the previously reported Fat Guy Stuck in Internet (formerly known as Gemberling), a full season of Lucy, Daughter of the Devil, and the long-developing Superjail. Meanwhile, the second seasons of The Boondocks and Metalocalypse are coming this summer, and new episodes of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Squidbillies, and (if finished in time) Venture Bros. this fall.

ITEM: Karey Kirkpatrick has signed on to direct Eddie Murphy in the promising-without-Eddie-Murphy Ed Solomon/Chris Matheson script NowhereLand. Kirkpatrick is probably best known for butchering the script to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but he also penned the super-affable Chicken Run, and his offbeat cereal-themed directorial debut Flakes is getting pretty good notices in its current festival run, so let's say his involvement pushes NowhereLand further towards the "yes" end of "maybe."

Slow News Day: Would You Believe Alan Arkin?, Venture III, Andy's Bar, Animania Strikes Again

ITEM: Fresh off his Oscar win, Alan Arkin has signed on to play the Chief in the film update of Get Smart with Steve Carell. He'll be joining Anne Hathaway, the Rock, and Terence Stamp in the 2008 release, which is unfortunately brought to you by the writers of Failure to Launch and the director of Anger Management.

ITEM: Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer have announced that The Venture Bros. has been greenlit for a third season, and a fourth is almost definite. (Hell yeh!) But...the third season probably won't begin until next spring, due to the enormous amount of time the show takes to animate. (Hell naw...)

ITEM: The usually reliable Andy Ackerman (Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm) is working with the usually shitty Scott Silveri (Friends, Joey) on an untitled new sitcom for CBS, about a group of late-night bar regulars. Meh...

ITEM: The third volumes of the beloved Saturday morning relics Animaniacs and Pinky and the Brain will hit DVD on June 19, which will finally complete your Pinky collection and push you over the halfway mark on the other.

The V in DVD

Creator and co-writer Jackson Publick has announced on his blog that the second season of Adult Swim's The Venture Bros. is tentatively scheduled to hit stores on April 17. The set will feature full episode commentary, exclusive live action material, and in the neighborhood of 30 (!) deleted scenes.

There has yet to be any official announcement from Cartoon Network on either this DVD or whether or not a third season will be greenlit, but fans can probably take it easy since the first season hit #1 on Amazon's sales chart when it was released earlier this year.

If you haven't been watching this show, then get the hell on the ball: The Venture Bros. - Season One