After six months, though it felt like twelve, TruTV kicked Star Jones off the air, at least in her regular time slot. The network, nee Court TV, and Jones “mutually agreed” to end the show. Not because of ratings, of course (of which there were barely any), but because of the channel’s reshift in focus. Not that they signed Jones to her deal after they knew they were moving away from Court TV’s programming model or anything. Star will remain with the network as a legal analyst.

We’ve been following Star’s journey for quite some time now, from The View and the operating room to her big gay wedding and the East End, before she ended up at TruTV. And since Day One there, we’ve been monitoring her demise. And everyone agreed it was DOA.

TRU TO ITS WORD Since rebranding itself TruTV at the beginning of the year, the network formally known as CourtTV is up 17 percent in total viewers, 14 percent in households, and 15 percent among the 25-54 demo.

COURT TV GOES TRU After all the public service it did with the O.J. Simpson trial, Court TV is changing its name to truTV and becoming more action-adventure orientated. Um, things seemed pretty action packed on Law & Order. Anyway, our only opinion on this is official misspellings are never cute. [AP]

Choosing Isaiah Washington as her first guest isn’t going to make or break Star Jones’ new Court TV TruTV show, but it will set the tone. Already, the gays are lashing out — and once you lose the gays …

But as Star learned about her gastric bypass surgery, some talking points are just too choice to leave untouched, especially when you’ve got the little issue of “generating buzz” hanging over you. Isaiah knows it too: In just over a month, Bionic Woman premieres on NBC, and he’s written into the script for just five episodes.

So perhaps today’s live 3pm debut of Star Jones is the merger of two opportunistic equals. Or, as the race-baiters will undoubtedly conclude, they’re just protecting their own. Either way, we’re looking forward to hearing Isaiah apologize for the 451st time!

How does Time Warner go about rebranding one of its television properties that’s best known for The Smoking Gun’s website? That’s the dilemma they faced with Court TV, which they announced in March would lose its name and focus. (With all those Judge Judy shows, who has time for moderately less sensationalized courtrooms?) Out were courts and cops, in were real-life CSI rip-offs.

So after all that hemming and hawing, what’d we end up with?

CONTINUED »