Mystery Channel

NBC Universal has launched its new cable channel that features nothing but recyclings of old detective and action TV shows and a few movies in the same genres. It's called Sleuth and it's not available yet on DirecTV or from most cable services around the country. If you'd like to see what you're missing — a lot of Simon and Simon reruns, mostly — here's a link to the Sleuth website.

Sleuth starts with, the website says, entry into 5 million American homes. Trio, the channel which NBC Uni terminated when they launched Sleuth, was in 8 million homes when pundits, including Yours Truly, first began predicting its demise. That was down from the 20 million they had when Trio was included in the DirecTV lineup. Obviously, they must have some strategy to get Sleuth into more households soon.