Dave on Demand: 'Jack and Jill' going further down the hill

There's despicable. And then there's television.

If there's a grubby way to make a buck, TV yearns to be friends with benefits.

For a few years now, American Idol has been taping contestants at screenings of Fox films that are about to open. It's been a halfhearted promotional scheme, a time-killer on the way to the next Ford commercial.

But there is nothing so bad that TV cannot make it worse.

Last week on Survivor: South Pacific, the tribe that won the challenge was taken to a brightly lit tropical theater for a screening of the DOA Adam Sandler comedy Jack and Jill. Would you like palm oil on that popcorn?

This week, The X Factor opened with a looooong segment that saw the semifinalists attending a red carpet event for - you guessed it - Jack and Jill.

Sure, this turkey of a film can use all the help it can get, but is it really fair to exploit the enthusiasm of these amateur singers without compensating them?

Why doesn't Jack and Jill just buy an ad, you ask. It does. Extended trailers that conveniently run adjacent to the make-believe events on the reality shows.

The upshot is that I'm now rooting against Simon Cowell's protege Drew. On the red carpet she squealed, "Oh my God, that was the funniest movie I've ever seen!"

I know she's only a kid, but even at 14, you have to have better taste than that.

Limited vision. What I like about NBC's Grimm: How much Hank (Russell Hornsby), Nick's detective partner, looks like producer Dr. Dre.

What I don't like about Grimm: How inconsistent the secret power of Nick (David Giuntoli) seems to be. How does a guy who can see the monsters beneath people's normal-looking facades not realize that the lieutenant he works with every day is the leader of the pack?

Nicely played. Legal shows love to drop eccentric attorneys into the plot. I wasn't too fond of what The Good Wife did with Michael J. Fox, but I loved the return of Carrie Preston this week as the kooky and canny Elsbeth Tascioni.

She's like a courtroom Columbo, unable to operate her office phone but a tactical genius. I'd say give this character her own series, but we'd miss Preston too much as anxious Arlene on True Blood.

Double dipping. You know you're hot when they preempt your show and you still have a big night in prime time.

Take Eric Stonestreet (Cameron on Modern Family). The sitcom skipped a turn this week, so Stonestreet popped up instead in the opener of the CMA Awards to harmonize with cohosts Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley on a little ditty about the blink-and-you-missed-it marriage of Kim Kardashian.

Later that night, Stonestreet guest starred on FX's American Horror Story as a patient of Dylan McDermott's who has abundant reason to be terrified of urban legends such as the Piggy Man.

Must have been a busman's holiday for Stonestreet.

Who's that girl? Best line of the week came on Glee when Kurt and Blaine, on a dare, go to a gay bar in West Lima.

The apathetic bouncer takes a look at their terrible McLovin-quality IDs and says, "It's drag queen night. Enjoy."

As they wade into the motley and rather grizzled crowd, Kurt says sarcastically, "Look at all the glamorous drag queens. Is that Lucy or Reba?"

"It's Ginger," says Blaine, "from Gilligan's Island."