Is 'Southland' going to do it again? Well, you'll have to watch TNT to find out

SILENCED: The 20-something stars of "Glee" won't perform at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, but Ballou High's band will. (Michael Yarish/fox)

Originally, MacFarlane and Alex Borstein ( who voices Lois on MacFarlane's "Family Guy") were going to pause between comedy bits to plug Microsoft's Windows 7 operating system.

Which, the Reporters Who Love Seth MacFarlane insisted, was revolutionary television and a throwback to the golden age of television when show hosts would suddenly erupt into praise for some dog food or cigarette brand mid-show. No, it's not easy to reconcile "revolutionary" and "retro" but The Reporters Who Love Seth MacFarlane are nothing if not contrary.

Now, even the most rabid MacFarlane fanboy has had to admit, the half-hour special is just another commercial-free episode of some show covered by a single sponsor. Nothing "revolutionary" there.

Microsoft, which was looking to court MacFarlane's elusive geek-guy audience, decided it didn't have the stomach to get into bed with the "Family Guy"/"American Dad"/"Cleveland Show" creator after some of its suits attended the show taping last month and realized that in these troubled times, Holocaust and feminine hygiene jokes are best delivered by darling, precocious cartoon characters -- not actual people.

Talkin' turkey day

Despite aggressive lobbying by their producers, the 20-somethings pretending to be high-schoolers in the cast of "Glee" ultimately did not get an official invite to perform at this year's Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

On the other hand, some actual high-schoolers will be performing in the parade, including students in the marching band from Ballou Senior High School in Southeast Washington, parade network NBC announced Monday.

Also performing will be the Towson University band.

And, of course, the Macy's Great American Marching Band featuring students from all 50 states will be back.

The creators of "Glee" had been in talks with the parade reps at Macy's about performing during the parade, which is broadcast nationally on NBC. But NBC ixnayed the eeglay because "Glee" is a prime-time series that airs on a competing broadcast network -- and, of course, NBC, being the weakling among broadcast networks in the ratings, would look just silly promoting a show that airs on Fox -- this season's BMOC.

Sadly, "Glee" creator Ryan Murphy was mistaken when he said at the time he "completely" understood NBC's decision to nix the "Glee" idea in order to make room in the parade broadcast for a Jay Leno float.

There is no Jay Leno float in this year's parade, according to the list NBC and Macy's issued Monday. We double-checked.

On the bright side, there is a Jimmy Fallon float and it will feature not only the NBC late-night host but also his show's band, The Roots.