Happy day! The return of "Weeds" — clearly a favorite here — is finally upon us tonight, as is the premiere of the highly anticipated David Duchovny comedy, "Californication."

I've chosen to remain blissfully unspoiled about the goings-on in the season premiere of "Weeds." I finished season two on DVD recently enough that the crazy cliffhanger still looms large in my mind, and I wanted to wait and see the resolution when everyone else did. (Granted, "everyone else" has probably either watched it online or downloaded those leaked episodes by now, but hey. It's the principle of the thing.)

I did check out the premiere of "Californication," though, in which Duchovny plays a sex-crazed, self-destructive novelist in a writing rut. My hopes were high for the show, but I ended up feeling a little disappointed, mostly because I felt like I'd seen everything done better on another series before. It seemed a bit like a paint-by-numbers version of a pay-cable show — a dash of expletives here, a shot of bare breasts there. Two things will keep me hanging around for at least a couple of episodes, though: 1) Duchovny himself, whose aloofness is amusing here, and 2) Madeleine Martin, who gets all the funniest lines as Duchovny's potentially screwed-up daughter.

To watch previews for both "Californication" and "Weeds," read more

Photos courtesy of Showtime