The Week in Gay TV: Memorial Day Marathons, More Drama at "Childrens Hospital," and Bravo is Seeking a "Platinum Hit"

It's time to take a look at The Week in Gay TV, looking at the shows that will be battling for space on your DVR in the days ahead. It's a holiday weekend, and one right after the regular season has wrapped, so we've got a quiet week ahead. Then again, with the last True Blood season hitting DVD store shelves next week, I'm going to need some free time.

Friday's pretty lacking in terms of new programming, but NBC does have a new episode of Friday Night Lights as the Lions are embarrassed when some of the team's secrets are revealed by a website, and Coach Taylor ends up in a power struggle with Vince's dad. This is the midpoint of FNL's final chapters and, while I'm not watching, I'm wondering if the FNL fans out there are seeing a build-up to a satisfying conclusion. What do you think?

Meanwhile, might I suggest that Friday Night Lights fans check out Current TV's 4th and Forever? The docu-series follows the football team at Long Beach Poly, a Southern California school trying to recover from their worst season. In a community struggling with a wide variety of problems, the team is a rare source of pride. It sounds like 4th and Forever aims to be a documentary version of Friday Night Lights, and considering the quality of Current's programming, chances are good it will live up to that goal.

Following 4th and Forever, Current takes a look at the week in media when infoMania debuts on its new night. This week sees the debut of Bryan Safi's newest character, Jesse Martinez-Coffee. As part of "Live Too Late," Jesse is a local news reporter who usually shows up to a story after the story has passed. That sounds a bit specific for a new segment, but I guess time will tell if "Live Too Late" manages to avoid becoming repetitive.

Finally, Syfy is celebrating Memorial Day weekend with a series of movie marathons. Most of the weekend will feature the gay-free Star Trek movies, but Friday will feature the campy Syfy original movies with aquatic monsters. That means another chance to watch the silliness of Dinoshark and Malibu Shark Attack along with two Syfy films with 80's pop stars — Tiffany bicycle kicking carnivorous fish on Mega Piranha and Deborah Gibson in Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus.

There's not a lot happening on Saturday, either (you probably should be figuring out what you're going to be making for that Memorial Day picnic, anyway) but Logo has a new Pretty Hurts. When Rand and Curt get a chance to sell their skin care products on a home shopping channel, Rand has to deal with his issues with speaking on camera, and hires a media coach so that he can represent his product well. Of course, all this drama focused on Rand's products on reality TV is another chance to promote them on national TV.

Meanwhile, if you were a fan of CBS' short-lived espionage comedy CHAOS, CBS is burning off two episodes on Saturday. Considering the many absurdities of our current intelligence community and the adorable nature of star Freddy Rodriguez, I had high hopes for CHAOS. Unfortunately it failed to live up to those expectations, but with Saturday being so quiet, I might give it another chance.

Since the TV schedule is pretty slow, I thought I'd point out that one of the few anime series I've liked is getting a fresh run starting this week. Saturday, Adult Swim is airing the first two episodes of Cowboy Bebop with two more episodes coming on following Sundays.

Following the adventures of two space-faring bounty hunters who struggle to make enough money to keep their ship working, it mixes gritty sci-fi with a visual style that frequently borders on being deliciously campy. Basically, imagine Firefly if re-imagined by Quentin Tarantino.

Saturday also has a few marathons you might want to check out. Starting at 1 PM, Logo is airing the entire second season of Noah's Arc followed by the movie Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom (for some reason, Logo is running the first season on Monday).

BBC America has the entire Matt Smith run (so far) of Doctor Who starting at 6 AM. Maybe if I re-watch those episodes, I'll figure out why Amy Pond fails to grab my interest the way Rose, Martha and Donna  did. Meanwhile, Music channel FUSE is dedicating half of the day to Beyonce, starting at 6 AM. MTV2 has seven hours of the Jackass boys' humanitarian attack against homophobia starting at 11 AM.

In the 80's, TV hadn't heard of gay men who exist to help straight women with their style choices, much to Jerica's regret.

Finally, kids network HUB has the 80s cartoon that became a classic among gay boys who grew up at the time (no, not Robotech, unfortunately). Four hours of Jem and the Holograms will be airing starting at 2 PM, starting with the tale of how the Holograms got together. Try not to lose your voice singing along to all the bad music.