For Better or Werts : TV Worth Watching

NEWS FLASH: 'Damages' moves to DirecTV

Channel worth watching? That's what DIrecTV seems to be creating in its original programming channel The 101. Not content with grabbing the first run of Friday Night Lights from NBC, they're now adding Damages, after FX balked at continuing Glenn Close's costly legal thriller when ratings lagged.

DirecTV and producing studio Sony announced late Monday that they've agreed to debut 20 new episodes of Damages exclusively on satellite for the next two seasons, with production starting early next year. They'll also be encoring previously produced Seasons 1-3.

The 101 started making noise a few years ago by picking up the final season of NBC's canceled soap Passions. Then DirecTV took over the original run of Friday Night Lights in its third season, with episodes subsequently being broadcast on NBC (currently Friday at 8 p.m. ET).

The channel does imports, too, offering the American debut of the Australian crime drama Underbelly (Wednesday at 10 p.m. ET).

They've made viewers without premium cable happy by offering encores of acclaimed series like HBO's Baltimore urban drama The Wire (currently Sunday at 9 p.m. ET) and Showtime's Boston politics/crime family tale Brotherhood (Wednesday at 9 p.m. ET). Other goodies have included Showtime's much lauded terrorist saga Sleeper Cell and HBO's gritty western Deadwood and prison drama Oz.

And they're dug deep to premiere unaired episodes of gone-too-soon network series like ABC's mental hospital drama Wonderland and sleuth saga Eyes, along with CBS' crime hour Smith.

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Diane Werts has been glued to the tube since she can remember, growing up in a household where the TV came on first thing in the morning and stayed on till bedtime and beyond. She worked for the USA Film Festival, then for The Dallas Morning News writing about everything from Shakespeare to macrame art to rock music (and has the hearing loss to prove it). She moved to New York's Newsday to edit their glossy TV magazine, then returned to writing about television, specializing in its stranger permutations. She's a past president of the Television Critics Association.

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