On shaky ground

The X-Files (Fox) We've been waiting for an explanation all these years and what do we get? Cancer Man telling Mulder, "I'm your father, Fox; come over to the dark side." What's next? A guest appearance by Jar Jar?

NYPD Blue (ABC) Can we please get through a season without Sipowicz losing another loved one? He's turning into that knight in "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" who keeps getting limbs lopped off in a sword battle but won't stop fighting. If I were the actor playing Andy's little boy, I'd be very, very worried. Not to rain on Dennis Franz's parade, but there are some other actors in the show. A few story lines for them might help.

ER (NBC) Alan Alda turned in a heroic guest stint this fall, but when he exited the show, you could hear whatever life was left in the old gal being sucked out the door with him. The rumor is that George Clooney has been coaxed back for Julianna Margulies' last episodes next spring, ending with a wedding for their characters, Doug Ross and Carol Hathaway. Um, could they maybe move that wedding up a few months?

The five worst shows of 1999

Greed (Fox) Fox puts its inimitable spin on the game show resurgence. Coming soon: "Sloth," "Gluttony" and "Lust."

Snoops (ABC) Proof that the prolific David E. Kelley can write them in his sleep. Alas, not even Gina Gershon and Paula Marshall in leather pants and half-buttoned blouses could save this charmless private eye show from a swift and just cancellation.

Time of Your Life (Fox) Adorable Jennifer Love Hewitt takes her adorable Sarah character from "Party of Five" to adorable New York City in this half-witted spinoff. All cute and twinkly and gushy, Hewitt is like the 25-year-old version of the Olsen twins. She must be stopped.

Family Guy (Fox) Seth MacFarlane's depressingly cruddy TV and movie-parody-laden cartoon about a beer-swilling doofus, his long-suffering wife and their kids, one of whom is a little sociopath. Why Matt Groening doesn't sue MacFarlane for plagiarism is a mystery. Then again, "Family Guy" is so relentlessly sucky, he probably doesn't want to acknowledge inspiring it.

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (NBC) In the criminal justice system, there are two separate but unequal dramas from Dick Wolf. One of them is a crisply plotted "just the facts, ma'am" series without melodramatic overacting or pointless excursions into characters' personal lives. The other is -- this.

R.I.P.

Madeline Kahn, George C. Scott, Mabel King ("What's Happening"), Gene Rayburn ("The Match Game"), Allen Funt ("Candid Camera"), David Strickland ("Suddenly Susan"), Gene Siskel, Richard Kiley, "Brady Bunch" theme composer Frank deVol, Dana Plato ("Diff'rent Strokes"), TV cook Jennifer Paterson ("Two Fat Ladies"), "South Park" voice actor Mary Kay Bergman, Harry Crane (co-creator of "The Honeymooners"), Buzz Kulik (director of "Brian's Song"), Sandra Gould ("Bewitched"), Gary Morton (Lucille Ball's second husband and vice president of Lucille Ball Productions), DeForest Kelley ("Star Trek"), "To Tell the Truth" panelist Peggy Cass, pioneering female TV comedy writer Lucille Kallen, Iron Eyes Cody, former "Letterman" announcer Bill Wendell, Jean Vander Pyl (the voice of Wilma Flintstone), Mary Jane Croft ("The Lucy Show"), Bobby Troup ("Emergency"), character actress Billye Ree Wallace (Jerry's nana on "Seinfeld"), Seqor Wences, TV newsman Martin Agronsky, wrestlers Gorilla Monsoon, Owen Hart and Rick Rude, BBC presenter Jill Dando, Ellen Corby ("The Waltons"), character actor Noam Pitlik (Mr. Gianelli on "The Bob Newhart Show"), "Fantasy Island" creator Gene Levitt, Clint Youle (TV's first weatherman), Shirley Hemphill ("What's Happening").

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