Tue, September 8, 2009

Regular readers are probably aware that it's just about time for this year's ATGoNFP. They've probably been marking their calendars and lying awake nights in anticipation. For the rest of you (youse?), that's the Annual TiVo Gauntlet of New Fall Programming – a soul-sapping exercise in pop-culture immersion therapy devised a few years ago to avoid missing the awesome debut of a hypothetical "sleeper" show – one that looked to be a dud but turned out to be good. I figured I'd watch one of each show before deciding whether or not I'd become a viewer – that way if some rare gem should come along, I wouldn't be left unaware of whatever revelations were doled out by the premiere episode. (Nowadays, we have iTunes to solve that problem – or BitTorrent if we're willing to walk on the dark side – so it's more of a tradition than anything else.)

Normally, you'd get a few snarky paragraphs in this section about what to expect from the new shows and which ones seem particularly worth checking out. That's because I would pore over the Entertainment Weekly fall TV preview and check out clips of all the new shows off their networks' respective web sites. But this year I didn't have time for that, and once again EW delayed its fall TV preview past the point at which it would do any good, so I'm going mainly on gut instinct. (As a result, most shows have zero or one stars; not even Michelle Trachtenberg was enough to earn a pity star for NBC's Mercy, though Neil Flynn did pull one out for ABC's The Middle.) I couldn't summon the energy to hunt down clips of all these shows on the Internet, and I have only watched USA and TNT this summer, so I haven't even seen ads for most of them. I adore ABC's Wipeout, however, so I've seen a few clips of the ABC sitcoms, including promos for Hank which proffer "Kelsey Grammer as you've never seen him before!" followed by footage of Grammer exactly as we've seen him before, except with slightly worse material. God bless the guy, he did fine work with Frasier Crane, but if he can't do anything else, is it so bad to simply hang up one's hat? (Also, we need a new word to replace "sitcom" when referring to shows that obviously have no comedy about them. I'd like five suggestions for a replacement term on my desk by 5:00pm. Five by five, I say!)

As for shows that seem worth watching, for me it begins and ends with NBC's Community, featuring Joel McHale, Chevy Chase, and a ragtag bunch of community college students attempting a study group. The early clips of this show were riotously funny, and it's great to see McHale in an environment that allows him to stretch his well honed sarcasm but hems him into reality just a little bit. It's also fantastic to see Chevy Chase in something resembling a comedy. I have huge hopes for this, because at some point Chevy Chase will be dead and I see this as his last chance to be remembered for the kind of comedy work he was doing at the top of his game instead of the kind of comedy work he's been doing for the last 15 years.

Some out there are equally excited about Fox's Glee (let's face it – much, much more excited), but I'm not convinced yet. The musical numbers are fun (though if a person could put aside his or her ironic detachment, the musical numbers in High School Musical are just as fun), but the rest of the show feels not-quite-there. The glee teacher is a little too earnest, the dialogue is a little too on-the-nose, and the main girl isn't just stilted, she drifts into downright unlikable. ("These days it's worse to be anonymous than poor. Fame is the only thing that means anything in today's culture." We're supposed to pity her limited world view, but instead I just find her grating – until she's singing.) Jane Lynch, who would normally elevate such a mishmash, is doing fine work, but she's playing a character she's played so many times, it's hard to get too excited about it. I'm hoping for the best, but I worry I'll spend most of my time gritting my teeth at the acting choices or mourning the loss of Lynch from Party Down.

So that's one and a half shows to get excited about and that's about it. NBC is starting very little else, since they've handed five of their precious prime time hours over to Jay Leno in an experiment that could go very right or very wrong but is unlikely to be very funny. They're launching Mercy and Trauma in the same season, both about good-hearted hospital folk? Are they suffering from John Wells withdrawal? Are they unfamiliar with the tired cliché about how every third show is a cop show, lawyer show, or doctor show? (They should read more ATGoNFP, because I mention it a lot.) (Then again, CBS is reaping a high yield from its non-stop cop crop, so maybe I don't know anything.) (Okay, I'll shut up now.)

When the CW network isn't busy raiding the late-'90s Fox lineup, they're ripping off their own Gossip Girl or cashing in late to the Twilight mania; CBS has apparently interpreted a letter-writing campaign by some bored housewives too stupid to realize that Moonlight was very poorly written to mean there's pent-up demand for Alex O'Laughlin in any role, even as an organ transplant doctor; ABC thinks there's still humor to be mined from putting a stodgy old white dude next to a gay guy and watching them roll their eyes at each other. (They even think it's "modern." Not that there's anything wrong with gay characters on TV, especially when they are portrayed by Jesse Tyler Ferguson, but it pains me that they are always used as the butt of these jokes, if only because it's making Will & Grace look sensitive and well-made by comparison.) Not a lot to choose from there, folks.

But here's what you really came for: the paperwork. One thing no publication has ever been able to get right is a time slot grid of all the new shows, with their premiere dates attached so you know what starts when. Thus, every year, I tirelessly build one from scratch. Also (mainly for my own use), a chronological list of premieres – new and returning shows, but just the returning shows I watch – to expedite the weekly TiVo time slot juggle and make sure I have fresh dreck to review for you each week. Both are linked below in case you find them useful. (Shows are rated for quality – anticipated quality in the case of new shows.) Share and enjoy!

2009 Guide to Fall TV Premieres [113k PDF]
2009 Schedule of Fall TV Premieres [104k PDF]

Premiering This Week

Hey, guess what! If you slipped into a coma sometime in the late 1990s and just reawakened, CW Tuesday is the place to be!

Melrose Place: CW, Tuesday at 9:00
Glee: Fox, Wednesday at 9:00
The Vampire Diaries: CW, Thursday at 8:00

Returning This Week

What follows is the weirdest time slot ever for a network to dump the remaining episodes of a show it hates, but it happens to be a show I love, so I'll take it. (Besides, this is the TiVo era. We're post-time slot.)

Sit Down, Shut Up: Fox, Saturday night at 12:00
King of the Hill: Fox, Sunday at 8:00 (series finale)

© onebee · all rights reserved