Here’s a brief rundown of what we know so far about the shows that are coming back next season. As Josh alerted last night, “Community” is back for 13 episodes, though more have not been ruled out. “30 Rock” has also been renewed for a FINAL season of 13 episodes. “The Office” will be back, as well. There has been no official renewal, but Ed Helms, John Krasinski, and Jenna Fischer all re-upped for next year yesterday. They wouldn’t do that unless there was a reason for them to return.

Moreover, while it’s not official, everyone and their dog knows that “Parks and Recreation” will be renewed, as will “Up all Night.” The question is when will they be renewed, and for how many episodes? So, fans of NBC’s Thursday night line-up, the only thing you REALLY need to worry about is whether “Community” will continue with the stubbornly inaccessible episodes next season, like last night’s and the “Inspector Spacetime” episode.

I should also note that “Parenthood” was renewed for another 15 episode season, which is great. They are also poised to renew “Celebrity Apprentice” for TWO MORE YEARS WHAT THE F— IS WRONG WITH YOU, NBC? Oh, and “Fashion Star” has been picked up for another year, too.

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1. Reset Dunder Mifflin Under the Old Management — The one great thing about last week’s episode is that this appears to be the end-game: The old CEO of Dunder Mifflin, David Wallace, is set to buy out the company, using Andy’s poached client as leverage. This will effectively give David Wallace his old job back, and dispose of the misguided Robert California experiment.

2. Get Rid of Nellie — The amount of damage that Nellie has done to “The Office” this season is immeasurable. It’s not enough that she’s simply written out of the show; she needs to suffer a horrible, hilarious work-place related harm, the lawsuit of which will bankrupt Robert California, making it even easier for David Wallace to take over Dunder Mifflin again.

3. Write Out Andy and Erin — They’ve had a few moments, but their character arcs have been exhausted to the point of tedium. There was never enough lead-character appeal in either of them to make them the romantic centerpiece of the show, so there was little suspense in their will they/won’t they relationship. A happy send off is fine, just as long as they’re sent off for good.

Renewal season is right around the corner. By the end of April through the first of May, final decisions will be made on the fate of most network televisions shows. It’s a nervous, jittery time, but it really shouldn’t be. Not anymore. For all the hand-wringing we do about cancelation fears, the reality is: Good shows that have been around for at least a season are rarely canceled anymore. Networks are no longer in the driver’s seat. New shows are increasingly difficult to launch. How many new big hits were there in the 2011-2012 season? Zero. How many moderately-sized hits were there? Four: “New Girl,” “Once Upon a Time,” “Revenge” and — so far — “Don’t Trust the B—- in Apt. 23.” With the increased competition from cable, it’s harder and harder to land a new show, so the networks tend to stick with what they know, even if it’s low-rated. This explains five seasons of “Chuck” and four seasons of “Fringe,” and the yearly renewal of “Community” and “Parks and Rec” despite anemic ratings. You know they’re doing gangbusters on the back-end with those shows on DVD and online licensing, though. They just have to be.

Ultimately, I wouldn’t worry too much about losing a favorite show, except for one:

ABC

On ABC, the only major bummer is the likely cancelation of “Cougar Town.” In an ideal world, it could be paired with “Happy Endings” and “Apt. 23″ in perhaps the best comedy block on network television. That’s still a possibility, and Tuesday nights would be ideal, though it woud leave the higher-rated “Last Man Standing” without a suitable pairing. More likely, only two of the three will be renewed, and “Apt. 23″ and “Happy Endings” have the better ratings. The one leg “Cougar Town” has up on the other two is two more seasons, which makes it closer to syndication money. The strike against it, however, is that Bill Lawrence is off working on a new show for another network.

Meanwhile, it’s not official yet, but “Modern Family,” “Suburgatory,” and “The Middle” will all be renewed as well, and “The Middle” may be better paired with “Last Man Standing” next season. If anyone is interested, “The Missing” will probably be canceled, however.

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Complaining about the quality of “The Office” is old hat. Complaints began soon after the marriage of Jim and Pam, and it’s only gotten worse over the last two seasons. I thought it couldn’t get worse than last season, though. There were a lot of times during the previous two seasons which I had hoped that the show could stop focusing so much on Michael Scott’s character, who I thought had been completely played out, having become a caricature of a parody of himself.

But, man: I miss Steve Carell. For all the problems endemic to his character, it’s clear now that he was holding that show together with spit and gauze. The first half of the first season without Steve Carell wasn’t good. The last half — since the Florida trip — has been awful. And I don’t mean “awful” in terms of “The Office.” I mean awful relative to the rest of television. At this point, there are probably a lot of CBS sitcoms that are better than “The Office.”

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Idris Elba is a great actor who, in my opinion, doesn’t get as many roles as he deserves. I was one of the lazy people who took forever to watch “The Wire” and to put it simply, I really enjoyed the character of Stringer Bell. As a regular viewer of “The Office,” I also liked Elba as Charles Miner for his small arc of episodes, even though his character was just a really big jackass to everyone. In both of these shows, a certain facial expression Elba made stuck with me, because he uses it a lot. When someone says something dumb, Elba normally dishes this face out. It’s like saying “you stupid motherf*cker” without saying it at all. To avoid complexity, I call this phenomenon the Idris Elba Face, and of course, I have brought examples to help you learn what I’m talking about.

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