So: What's So New
About New Fall TV?

Hole In The Wall: Is this the best new offering of Fall 2008?
Fox

 

The fall season's new TV shows are starting to make their debuts: this week brought 90210 (unfortunately), and there are more premieres to come. This weekend, Alan Ball (of Six Feet Under and American Beauty) brings his vampire drama, True Blood, to HBO's traditional Sunday-night "good show" slot. (For more about that, check out David Bianculli's review, or hear from Alan Ball himself, about both this project and his upcoming film, Towelhead.)

But if you stick with the networks, there aren't as many new shows as you might expect. While it was easy to focus on the immediate effects of last year's writers' strike — the seasons interrupted at midpoint; the seasons not completed at all — there are perhaps even more pronounced effects just showing up now.

There are only four new network comedies this fall — two on CBS, one on Fox, and one on NBC. That's consistent with the general disappearance of half-hour prime-time comedies, of course.

But there were more than 50 such comedies on the fall schedule five years ago, on what were then six prime-time broadcast networks (before the WB and UPN merged to form the CW). The five surviving networks will air fewer than 20 this fall.

There are maybe 10 new dramas (numbers depend somewhat on how you count, and somewhat on how far into the season you consider "fall"). And there's basically nothing new happening in reality programming (though there are a couple of game shows coming down the pike) — so America's symphony orchestras and major museums had better buckle up for the coming flood of patrons who stayed home only because The Mole was on.

With so few new shows, it gets easier to look closely at the approach each individual network is taking to rounding out its fall lineup. So let's take the quick tour, and then as things premiere in coming weeks, we'll take a few closer looks. (We'll also get to cable, don't worry.)

Networks at a glance, plus what that incredibly awesome guy is doing in that picture, after the jump ...

CBS

Believe it or not, there are even more police procedurals coming on CBS, which continues its march toward the still-hypothetical (but surely inevitable) Safe Crossing, about a team of investigators getting to the bottom of jaywalking tickets.

• On Sept. 23, the network rolls out The Mentalist, a show about a guy who is not a psychic, but seems like a psychic because he pays attention. (Cue "ooooooh" reaction.) This is CBS's third shot with Simon Baker, who starred in The Guardian and was part of the sprawling cast of the Ray Liotta bomb Smith, which got excellent reviews in the fall of 2006 and stayed on the air for all of three episodes.

• The Eleventh Hour has a guy using science to solve crimes. On CBS! I know! If there's not a heartbreaking montage in the first three episodes where someone stares at a dead body as if waiting for it to answer all of life's questions, I'll eat my fingerprint kit.

• CBS also brings you The Ex List, a gimmicky high-concept pile of romantic goo scheduled to allow people who are genuinely frightened by The Ghost Whisperer to settle down and fall asleep on Friday nights. The story, about a woman who goes back to rediscover old boyfriends on the advice of a psychic, sounds sort of like a book one would only read on a plane.

• As for those two comedies, CBS has on tap Worst Week, a horribly titled show that sets up the headlines for the many terrible reviews it is receiving. Also: Gary Unmarried. If that sounds to you like it will involve a guy spending a lot of time in a ratty T-shirt, I'm going to say I agree.

NBC

With most new shows, you can understand what leads the network to believe the show will be a success. For instance, NBC's new Thursday-night comedy Kath & Kim, is based on a successful Australian show and stars Molly Shannon, a durable if uneven presence in American comedy since her days on Saturday Night Live, and Selma Blair, who's a fairly well-known movie actress. You can see what they're thinking. However:

• With Crusoe, I have no idea what they're thinking. How a Friday night show about Robinson Crusoe that features unfamiliar actors is expected to flourish is a mystery. That it's like Lost, maybe?

• If you don't already know that NBC is bringing back Knight Rider, I don't really have the heart to break it to you.

• Finally, NBC brings you the thriller My Own Worst Enemy, in which Christian Slater plays a Jekyll & Hyde-style guy who receives secret transmissions from the evil side of himself. (Perhaps that's the side that decided to star in Gleaming The Cube.)

Fox

The good news for Fox is that it has the closest thing to a buzzed-about network show in Fringe, a moderately supernatural spy thriller in the X-Files tradition, created by J.J. Abrams of Alias and Lost. (And Felicity, but nobody ever says that.)

The bad news: Fox's one new comedy is Do Not Disturb, which couldn't even find funny jokes for the previews, so draw your own conclusions.

Still, Fox is also offering the show that I, personally, am happiest about this fall, and that's Hole In The Wall. Among the many strange game shows on Japanese television is a game where ... well, you really have to see it.

Fox, bless them, is bringing us an American version. Hole In The Wall! Wooooo!

ABC

There are only two new shows at ABC:

• One of them is Opportunity Knocks, a game show where families win prizes. So if you like that, there it is.

• The other, however, is Life On Mars, based on a respected British original in which a police officer accidentally time-travels to the early '70s. The cast boasts some power (Harvey Keitel, Gretchen Mol, Michael Imperioli), but the whole project has been plagued by reports of endless backstage tinkering, which is almost never a good sign.

CW

In addition to 90210, the CW will kick off Privileged, another drama about rich kids; Stylista, a reality show about aspiring to work at Elle magazine, and a set of Sunday shows it outsourced to a separate production company. Those include In Harm's Way, a reality show about dangerous jobs (not enough of those around!); Valentine, about Greek gods set loose in L.A.; and Easy Money, about loan sharks.

You can see why I'm most looking forward to Hole In The Wall.

--Linda Holmes