If there is any truth to the old adage that there is no such thing as bad publicity, it might behoove ABC to reconsider the name change they’re reportedly mulling over for Courteney Cox’s COUGAR TOWN. After-all, if there is one thing the ratings challenged show doesn’t need heading into its pivotal second season is audience confusion as it struggles to stand out in an increasingly crowded television marketplace. Sure, the name may not exactly be indicative of what the show has evolved to — which is far more of a ensemble laugher — but what’s in a name really…. we ask rhetorically as we present five shows whose name have very little to do with the show that they represent!

WILL & GRACE
While curious viewers may have first tuned in to enjoy the always platonic and often humorous friendship between a gay man (Will) and a straight woman (Grace), they stuck around for the hilarity that were the real stars of the show: An endless parade of guest stars Jack & Karen!

KATHY GRIFFIN: MY LIFE ON THE D-LIST
Suffice to say, after five seasons of her hit Emmy-winning Bravo reality TV show, an endless string of sold-out comedy dates spanning the globe, and a NY Times best-seller, there is absolutely nothing D-List about the artist formerly known as Brooke Shields second-banana on SUDDENLY SUSAN.

SMALLVILLE
Now correct us if we’re wrong, but have the last two seasons not primarily taken place in Metropolis? We’re just saying.

THE SECRET LIFE OF THE AMERICAN TEENAGER
Spoiler Alert: Once the entire school (not to mention millions of viewers) discover that you’re pregnant, the secret is kinda out.

PRIVATE PRACTICE
What started out as a show chronicling the inner-workings of Oceanside Wellness Center, a posh private Malibu medical facility home to a bunch of ridiculously good-looking doctors has quietly transformed itself into Addison’s Anatomy, with virtually every episode culminating in a trip to the hospital where a team of highly skilled physicians attempt to save multiple lives while struggling with a plethora of personal issues. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

If the sheer number of interview requests have have inundated our inbox over the past week or so is any indication, Emmy Nominations are a very serious business. Less serious, is the nature of the following post, which takes a tongue–firmly-planted-in-cheek approach by offering up five suggestions not for your consideration!

In the category of Outstanding Costume Design, the nominee will NOT be… TRUE BLOOD. Not so much due to lack of creativity or quality, but rather lack of screen time. Unfortunately for those hard working men and woman working behind the scenes at TRUE BLOOD, it’s somewhat hard to judge clothing design that spends 97% of the time on the floor!

In the category of Outstanding Direction for a Variety, Music or Comedy, the nominee will NOT be… the man manning the control room during this last season of AMERICAN IDOL. Yes, let this be a lesson for all current and future directors out there: If you’re not capable of ‘squeezing’ six contestants, four uninterested judges and a Ford commercial into an hour long show without running a good five or six minutes over… you are the weakest link.

In the category of Outstanding Casting For a Drama Series, the nominee will NOT be… the brains behind V. Who are under the mistaken impression that five aliens and five resistance fighters constitutes an epic struggle for earth’s survival.

In the category of Outstanding Writing For a Comedy Series, the nominee will NOT be… GLEE. Grammy maybe, but when you’re season finale’s song list outweigh your words per minute, we’ve got a big problem awarding Ryan Murphy an little statuette.

In the category Outstanding Host For A Reality Or Reality-Competition Program, the nominee will NOT be… Kelly Choi of TOP CHEF MASTERS. So personality-free is the former model-turned-hostess she actually knocks BIG BROTHER’s Julie Chen out of the top spot on our list of “People Most Likely To Suck The Fun Out Of A Guilty Pleasure.”

Taking a break from her always hilarious work as the most senior correspondent on THE DAILY SHOW, Samantha Bee was in her hometown of Toronto last week to publicize her new memoir, I know i am, but what are you? What follows are a few questions she was kind enough to answer to a group of adoring fans, including your very own TV Addict, during a Q&A at Indigo bookstore.

What made you want to write a book?
Samantha Bee: I don’t really know what I was thinking when I undertook this project because it was a very busy time. It was September of 2008 when I started the book so basically what I did was I made up my mind to half-ass certain very important parts of my life, compartmentalize them for a year and then I did this. I had just given birth to my second child, and the [US] Elections were coming us. I know I wrote it because I did, but I don’t remember the actual writing of the book except to say it was very pleasurable, I did it all in my spare time, and it took a long time.

When you do those prepared spots where you interview people, I’m always amazed that the people don’t see you coming, how come they don’t?
Well, I don’t know actually, that is a question for them. The people we interview have a lot of advance warning, interviews are usually set up about a week ahead of time, they know where we are from — THE DAILY SHOW WITH JON STEWART, on Comedy Central — and you would imagine that would provide enough clues for people to go home, look things up and do their due diligence. Yet it’s surprising how many people don’t do that, which I think is really crazy. But also, when we’re interviewing someone we’re usually interviewing them for a reason, because they feel passionate about something. So they usually have a point that they want to make and they believe in their hearts that they will be able to make that point. And say… their point of view intersects with something that we might find comedically useful… we all win!

Do you have any advice to aspiring DAILY SHOW correspondents?
I have good advice for aspiring DAILY SHOW correspondents. Which is to say first of all, you have to be active in writing your own material and being comfortable performing. But also you do have to apply for the job! It seems like such a mysterious and otherworldly process, but actually the truth is that anyone who wants the job basically has the job until they walk in the door. The show really wants people who are good and they’re always looking for people who fit what they’re looking for. It was not difficult for me to get the job in that sense. They came to town, they had regular auditions, I did a regular audition, I got a callback, I did the callback and then I got the job. It was a very boring process in a way that had huge stakes. I think people don’t think to send in a tape because they think it’s so out of reach, but actually it’s as out of reach as any acting job. It’s possible to get, I got the job and I don’t know how. I just think I looked “reporter-y.”

The show has cultivated a lot of great talent that has gone onto so many different things (See: Steve Carell, Ed Helms, Lewis Black and Stephen Colbert) Is anything like that in store for you?
I don’t know, that’s not precisely up to me. Jason [Samantha Bee's real-life husband is fellow DAILY SHOW correspondent Jason Jones]…. I wrote a book! What do you want! What more can I do to please you? Jason and I work as writing partners, we’ve written lots of projects together and we are of the opinion that we need to just throw a bunch of stuff on the wall and something eventually will stick. That kind of seems to me how the business works. Because we do realize that we’re not going to be at the show forever. God knows when the joy ride will come to an end, we don’t have any insight into that. But we can’t stay at doing the same show forever — I’m not going to be 82 at THE DAILY SHOW — although I might still be there, but the show probably won’t. i’ll just show up to work with a microphone trying to do “Man on the Streets” with no camera. That will be my dementia.

If you could sum up husband Jason Jones in one sentence.
Any opportunity to be in his underpants in national television is something he embraces with gusto.

Vanessa Williams joins DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES
Why? Given the performance she gave on UGLY BETTY, Williams should be anchoring her own series, not joining yet another ensemble, let alone on a show that lost its creative mojo several seasons ago.

Elisha Cuthbert, HAPPY ENDINGS
Really? You’re casting a woman millions of people despised so much on 24 that they wanted her alter ego to meet a grisly fate as a woman people would fight to stay friends with after she and her significant other break up? Yeah, good luck with that.

James Franco, GENERAL HOSPITAL
Looks like the big-screen actor will return to the soap for another stint this summer. In a twist any fan of the show will find shocking, his new storyline will reportedly unfold, at least in part in — gasp! — the hospital! (Trust us, if you’re a GH fan, that line is hysterical.)

Carter MacIntyre, UNDERCOVERS
Perhaps the funniest thing to come out of reading NBC’s press releases recently was to see the words AMERICAN HEIRESS listed as MacIntyre’s claim to fame. I will be stunned if anyone out there can tell me anything about HEIRESS, let alone MacIntyre’s role, without doing a Google search.

Kelli Giddish, CHASE
When the completely uninteresting in every single way Kiddish landed the lead role in the short-lived series PAST LIVE, we were stunned. The fact that she’s been given yet another lead — let alone as a “cowboy boot-wearing deupty whose sharp mind and unique Texas upbringing help her traack down violent criminals on the run” has us putting this show on our “blink-and-you’ll-miss-it” liste despite coming from Jerry Bruckheimer.

With Mother’s Day rapidly approaching, we’d like to take this opportunity to remind everyone to order flowers and candy for their moms. To that end, we point out that even if you have a few issues between you — and hey, who doesn’t? — it could be worse. At least these manipulative matriarchs aren’t pulling your strings!

Marilyn Tobin, DAMAGES
Although played by funny lady Lily Tomlin, Marilyn’s actions were no laughing matter! So greedy was this supposed lady that she kept her son in the dark about his secret offspring just to make sure he wouldn’t call off a hit on the girl and, by extension, prevent the family from retrieving ill-gotten gains!

Catalina Creel, CUNA DE LOBOS
Sure, your mom might nag, but we’re willing to bet she didn’t wear an eye patch for years and let you feel guilty for having poked out her peeper… only to later reveal that both her baby blues were perfectly fine. And frankly, that was probably the least evil thing the this infamous telenovela villainess did!

Lucille Bluth, ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT
The only thing Lucille loved more than her children? Alcohol, pills, interchangeable maids whose names she could neither pronounce nor remember, corporate chicanery and any thing else that can be spelled with letter ranging from A-Z.

Marie Barone, EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND
This mouthy mama proved that a boy’s best friend — and a wife’s worst enemy — is his mother. Especially when she lives across the street and thinks your home has an open-door policy.

Stephanie Forrester, THE BOLD & THE BEAUTIFUL
This lady comes very close to crossing the fine line between loving your children and looooving your children, especially where first-born son Ridge is concerned. (When it comes to his half-brother, Thorne, she takes an approach best summed up by a quote from GLEE’s Sue Sylvester: “Yeah, I don’t care so much about that.”)

SOAPnet
Over the past few years, this channel has been doing everything in its power to distance itself from daytime dramas. They’ve run and rerun episodes of ONE TREE HILL and GILMORE GIRLS into the ground, and Sunday nights — when they should be helping fans catch up with their soaps in preparation for Monday — the channel instead runs movies. And not just movies, but bad ones with little or no soap connection!

Fox News Channel
In a recent Forbes article, Glenn Beck — one of the most popular (and insane) personalities on the supposed news network admitted he didn’t give “a flying crap” about the political process he slams on a nightly basis and admitted he is part of “an entertainment company.” Throw in right-wingers Sarah Palin, Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity (because, let’s face it, nobody watches this network when these stars of the conservative/teabag movement aren’t on) and the network is many things, but one it is not is a “news” organization.

TLC
You’d probably never guess it based on their programming, but TLC is supposed to stand for The Learning Channel. But what, exactly, are we supposed to be learning from ADDICTED, which follows drug users, even showing them shooting up? (Oh, wait, guess I figured out what we’re supposed to learn…) The network’s other big hit is HOARDING, in which we learn there are two kinds of pack rats: Those who have a real problem, and those who just want someone to come in and clean up their crap. Both shows pretend to be about the healing process, yet they are clearly much more interested in the shock value. And what life-lessons do L.A. INK, FOUR WEDDINGS or LITTLE CHOCOLATIERS — about a married “little couple” who happen to run a chocolate shop — offer?

BRAVO
When I hear the word “bravo”, I think of a standing ovation. But would anybody really applaud the often-appalling actions of the “real” housewives from Orange County, New York, New Jersey and Atlanta who eat up a huge portion of this network’s slate? My problem with Bravo is that I have no idea what it’s supposed to be… aside from wildly appealing to gay men and people who like cat-fights.

MTV
Please, do we even have to explain this one? I suspect there’s an entire generation of viewers who couldn’t tell you what the “M” stands for.

THE PACIFIC [HBO]
From Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks comes a historically accurate, spectacularly shot and gut-wrenchingly horrific look at the sacrifices the greatest generation made so that we now have the freedom to sit comfortably on our couch and watch time slot competitor DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES in our boxers. We are so sorry.

BREAKING BAD [AMC]
Having originally been turned off by the show’s comedically dark conceit that saw high school chemistry teacher Walt White descend into a life of crime after finding himself on the wrong end of a cancer diagnosis, rest assured, it’s us who now feel bad as — three seasons and one Best Actor Emmy for Bryan Cranston later — we have yet to jump on board with this critically acclaimed series.

TREME [HBO]
And not just because we’re tired of seeing people’s exasperated expression of disbelief when we fess up to still not having caught up with THE WIRE. See, you’re doing it right now!

NURSE JACKIE [SHO]
Another critically acclaimed pay cabler gem that we know we should be watching — yet aren’t — having recently overdosed on television shows featuring strong female protagonists whose personal lives aren’t nearly as well organized as their professional ones. Thank-you-very-much TNT, Showtime and FX.

THE NIGHTLY NEWS
Are we embarrassed that we fall into the clichéd demographic of 18-34 year-olds who get the majority of their news from the likes of Comedy Central’s THE DAILY SHOW and THE COLBERT REPORT? We wouldn’t have to be if Katie Couric would — to borrow a line from Homer Simpson — be more funny!

Walker Landing
Who wouldn’t want to work for the BROTHERS & SISTERS vineyard? Given how much the Walker clan drinks, imagine if they had to actually pay for bottles of wine!

Dunder-Mifflin
Talk about a job with benefits? Just about everyone in the Scranton branch of THE OFFICE has hooked up with either someone at a nearby cubicle, someone related to someone in a nearby cubicle, or someone they met because of the job they supposedly do in their cubicle!

Forrester Creations
You know all those people who are hookin’ up at Dunder-Miflin? They look like neutered puppies compared to the horndogs at THE BOLD & THE BEAUTIFUL’s premiere fashion house. Plus, free clothes!

The Pawnee Parks Department
Let’s face it: The PARKS & RECREATION folks do less work than a Republican senator whose entire job revolves around uttering one word — “no” — repeatedly. As an added benefit, you get to spend plenty of time outside, working on your tan!

Veridian Dynamics
Yes, there’s always a chance you’ll wind up being turned into a sacrificial lamb for one of Lem and Phil’s experiments, but if ever a company is going to be the first to invent calorie-free French fries, it’s those crazy kids on BETTER OFF TED. Being on the ground floor of that particular development? Deliciously priceless.

“Let him blow both of the girls out of the water and I think that might be cool.”
That’s Fleiss’ take on the shocking moment in which season 11’s Brad Womack went into the finale knowing he was not going to choose either of the final two women. That’s right, ripping out the hearts of two women was “cool” to the show’s head honcho.

“We are very careful in our casting to develop characters that the audience is going to root for and root against.”
Fleiss admits that his show has less to do with “reality” than it does making good television. Which is all fine and good… if a few moments later he hadn’t claimed that the whole premise was romance and the search for love.

“There is sex. You know, there’s not a ton of it. I think the average is that the guy will wind up having sex with about three women during the course of the show.”
Explain to us again why season 14’s Rozlyn Papa was booted from the show for allegedly having “inappropriate relations” with a producer?

“Whether or not someone is there for the ‘right’ reasons, you really don’t know until they start crying.”
Fleiss made this claim only 15 minutes after admitting that producers knew from the start that crooner Wes was interested in landing a record deal as opposed to finding love with THE BACHELORETTE’s Jillian.

“To deprive [the audience] of that moment would have been unfair.”
Fleiss rationalizing the decision to let season 13′s Melissa Rycroft get dumped on camera without warning her in advance that Jason Mesnick had opted to replace her with runner-up Molly Malaney.