Using scores from Metacritic, Miller-McCune weighted the critical scores of actors' movies with the relative size of their roles in those movies. The final list shows that everyone who was in Lord of the Rings is an awesome actor with great taste in projects, with Elijah Wood topping the list and Viggo Mortenson and Ian Holm (the British geezer who played Bilbo Baggins) making the top four, too. Philip Seymour Hoffman is as serious an actor as you think he is, and Jessica Alba is as big a hack. Bottoming out the list was Freddie Prinze, Jr., followed by someone named Eddie Griffin and a tragic Matthew Lillard who had so much potential, once. Here's an abridged sampler:

Equally interesting was scatterplot showing the relative niceness and consistency of America's 25 most prolific movie critics. We discover that the Chicago Tribune's Michael Wilmington drinks the kool-aid more than any other critic, followed by the Chicago Sun-Times' Roger Ebert's perennially upraised thumbs. The meanest critic in America is the Austin Chronicle's Marc Savlov, who gives low scores but deviates regularly. On the other hand, TV Guide's Maitland McDonagh gives low scores and has a relatively low standard deviation from her mean score, meaning she's always stone cold.

[Miller-McCune]

How mad are they? Mad enough to totally drop the CW and MTV from their channel lineup for no real reason! The Philadelphia Inquirer's David Hiltbrand noticed the weird omission and checked in with Scott Crystal, TV Guide's CEO and president. "There are now hundreds of channels on television and we can only accommodate approximately 70 in our primetime grids," he e-mailed. "In the past few weeks, the following networks have not appeared in the grids: MTV, CW, DIY and TV Guide Network." Damn, even TV Guide Network! Must have been an awkward office Christmas party.

But why would TV Guide drop those high-profile networks from its scheduling grids while retaining, say, QVC? According to Variety, it's because the home shopping network is a major advertiser—which might also explain why the extra room in the grid has been filled by an expanded listing for MyNetwork, broadcast networks' laughable baby cousin who no one talks about. Also, Variety speculates, maybe the magazine is now read exclusively by old people who can't figure out why their set-top box remotes are not emitting money when they try to stick their ATM cards in. If that's the case, will any of them notice that there are no upcoming times listed for The Hills and Privileged? They will not, preferring instead to use the magazine as a TV dinner coaster and an occasional reminder of when The Bonnie Hunt Show is on.

• TV Guide drops CW, MTV listings [Variety]

Sheen's bump was the sharpest by far, according to the report, which also noted a measly 10% jump for Simon Cowell, whose American Idol duties now nab him an even $50 million per year. CSI star Petersen went up $100,000 per episode since 2007, while Law & Order: SVU's Mariska Hargitay ($400,000) and Closer star Kyra Sedgwick ($275,000) were the top earners among women on network and cable TV respectively. Congrats to them. Meanwhile, Charlie Sheen makes $800,000 per episode of Two and a Half Men.

Oprah still made more money than God, with her production company as a whole generating $385 million in revenue in 2007 (up from $260 million in '06) and Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane bringing up the rear among moguls with a $100 million deal guaranteed through 2012. And did you hear about Charlie Sheen? $800,000 per episode? For Two and a Half Men? Is this the same Two and a Half Men with Jon Cryer and that kid? The cringeworthy one? Also in syndication? Just making sure.

$800,000. Is that, like, in pesos?

• TV STARS' SALARIES: WHO EARNS WHAT? [TV Guide]