This newsmagazine amazes me with its longevity, its continual quality, and its unflagging ability to present stories that hook you just from the promos. Tonight’s installments, for example, include a report by Morley Safer on the Roman Colosseum – breaking the story that the age-old accepted story of Christians being sacrificed there, forced to stand against lions and such, has absolutely no basis in archaeological fact. (This just in…) It’s a great story, full of amazing images of the Colosseum – so be sure to tune in, if you Wannaseum.

How time crawls. It’s that time of year – the time when Halloween approaches, and The Simpsons presents its annual Treehouse of Horror anthology. And to celebrate its silver anniversary, Treehouse presents one of the best installments ever, including a parody of A Clockwork Orange that is real horrorshow, and a parody of another film that allows The Simpsons to be haunted by their own past selves – the ones from The Tracey Ullman Show, when Homer Simpson sounded like Walter Matthau, and when all of the Simpsons were drawn as, let’s say, less well-rounded.

After last year’s stunningly strong season, The Good Wife was in danger of falling into a slump. No such bad luck. This season has been another absolute delight, serving up one entertaining and unexpected conflict after another. And tonight, here comes another one: Alicia (Julianna Margulies) heads into court and finds an unexpected adversary as the opposing counsel: the quirky but very effective Elsbeth (played by Carrie Preston). Now that Preston’s run on HBO’s True Blood is over, maybe The Good Wife can find even more for her to do.

Last week’s season opener was so intense, I was watching nervously, truly worried about the fate of some of my favorite characters. Well, they made it through last week’s gauntlet – but today is another day, and Rick and company are back where they started in Season 1: wandering the outskirts of the city, exposed and very, very vulnerable.

Last week’s series premiere was the only episode Showtime sent to critics for advance review – so I’m as anxious as you are to see what happens next, and whether this show can maintain the high standards, and fascinating subtexts, of the opener. Dominic West stars.

SEASON FINALE: This series has been renewed for a Season 2, but tonight’s season finale is being described by the network as “explosive.” And since the show is all about the development of the atomic bomb, perhaps we shouldn’t take that description too lightly.