Early fall is a time of new beginnings, of fresh faces and new seasons, and not just for screaming sports fans and armchair quarterbacks. This is the time when network executives unleash new programming on hungry television viewers, with freshman series battling for ratings supremacy against veteran Nielsen champs, all trying to make it to one more season and perhaps ultimately that entertainment Valhalla known as syndication.
FOX
Fox is the first network to draw ratings blood this fall, with most of its new and returning series already running new episodes. The second season of “Prison Break” finds its convict brothers on the lam and on the hunt for D.B. Cooper’s fabled loot, while the third season of “House” shows its crotchety title doctor as sour and troubled as ever, having illegally prescribed himself Vicodin in last week’s episode. Also returning are animated favorites “The Simpsons” and “Family Guy,” as well as a slew of reality shows covering everything from unruly children to amateur dancers to Lucy Lawless singing.
New additions to Fox’s lineup include “Justice,” a Jerry Bruckheimer produced legal drama, and “Standoff,” which centers on the dicey world of crisis negotiation. “Justice” revolves around a team of hotshot Los Angeles defense attorneys that rips through cases with a lust for headlines and financial remuneration instead of a need to see justice served. Every episode ends with the same gimmick, a flashback to the scene and moment of each week’s crime that lets the viewer see definitively what lawyers and judges can only speculate. “Standoff” is about two top negotiators who can defuse almost any hostage situation but struggle to overcome the pitfalls of their own burgeoning romantic relationship.
“Til Death” hopes to score laughs by filling a slot left open by cancelled comedies “Arrested Development” and “Malcolm in the Middle.” The new show stars “Everybody Loves Raymond” exile Brad Garrett, groaning and deadpanning as a long-married schlub whose outward cynicism can’t mask his deep love for the wife with whom he constantly spars.
CBS
CBS takes a stab at the funny bone, too, with its upcoming show “The Class.” This half-hour comedy follows a motley crew of disparate twenty-somethings with little in common but a wealth of shared experience – they were all in the same third grade class.
Known of late for its endless stable of hour-log procedurals, including the returning “Cold Case,” “Criminal Minds,” “The Unit,” “Without a Trace” and now-countless incarnations of the beast that has become “CSI,” CBS trots out a few more examinations of law and order with the monosyllabically titled “Shark” and “Smith.”
The former rests on the considerable charisma of James Woods, who will no doubt chew every shred of scenery in view as a shady defense lawyer undergoing an unexpected crisis of conscience. Ray Liotta headlines the latter as a career criminal with his eye on high-stakes robberies of all kinds. Virginia Madsen stars as his in-the-dark wife, and if that combined star power isn’t enough for you, the supporting cast includes up-and-comer Simon Baker, Amy Smart and former Oscar nominee Shoreh Aghdashloo.
For those tired of legalese, there’s “Jericho,” a what-if examination of how a small Kansas town reacts to being cut off from the outside world when a large mushroom cloud suddenly appears in the distance. Starring late-90s heartthrob Skeet Ulrich and career-rebounding Gerald McRaney, “Jericho” seems like a paranoid marriage of disaster film and politically slanted science fiction, something aimed squarely at the same set that worships “Lost” and “The X-Files.”
ABC
Speaking of “Lost,” the ABC castaway epic returns in October with more loose ends to tie up than can possibly be managed in the third season opener. If your head has stopped spinning after the mind-bending finale of the second season, you’re ready to dive even further into the mythology of the Dharma Initiative and the mysterious world of the Others.
ABC also brings back ratings powerhouses “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Desperate Housewives.” “Grey’s” was last season’s most popular show on any network, and it looks to reclaim that title again with its offbeat soundtrack and hospital ward full of bittersweet medical drama and McDreamy love triangles. Coming off a shaky sophomore year, the producers of “Housewives” assure their show is back up to form as well, promising that this season of lust and backstabbing on Wisteria Lane is more shocking and funny than any that has come before.
Among the network’s new drama hopefuls are “Ugly Betty,” a “Devil Wears Prada” clone about a frumpy young lass infiltrating the snobby world of high fashion; “Day Break,” in which detective Taye Diggs has to piece together the clues of his own murder-mystery variation on “Groundhog Day;” and “Brothers and Sisters,” a dysfunctional family weeper along the same lines as “Six Feet Under” with a heavy-hitting cast of TV royalty like Calista Flockhart, Rachel Griffiths, Sally Field and Ron Rifkin.
Fans of high-concepts can hitch their stars to “The Nine” and the J.J. Abrams-produced “Six Degrees.” The nine of “The Nine” are survivors of a bank heist that ended in bloodshed whose lives have become inextricably linked after the crisis. Each episode offers a small piece to a larger puzzle, with the first ten minutes of each show devoted to a flashback that explains more about the robbery and the people involved. “Degrees,” meanwhile, is about a handful of strangers in New York City, whose separate lives begin to merge through coincidental meetings and turns of fate. With Abrams involved, as well as wonderful performers like Hope Davis and Campbell Scott, there has to be more to these coincidences than first meets the eye.
The network’s new comedies look less inviting, though one’s bizarre premise warrants a smile and an initial viewing. Donal Logue stars in “The Knights of Prosperity” as a cut-up who wants to finance his lifelong dream of owning a bar … by robbing legendary rocker Mick Jagger. Sounds fun, but it might’ve captured even more viewers with its original title, “Let’s Rob Mick Jagger!”
NBC
That leaves only the Peacock unaccounted for. NBC, struggling so badly in last year’s ratings wars that Emmy emcee Conan O’Brien sang about it, looks to overcome the loss of flagships “Will and Grace” and “The West Wing” with its most promising and diverse lineup of newcomers in half a decade.
For comedy fans, there’s “30 Rock,” the brainchild of writer and star Tina Fey. It’s about the backstage madness at a popular TV show, something Fey should know from experience, and Alec Baldwin in support as a network exec guarantees solid laughs in every episode. Amanda Peet is also playing a network honcho in Aaron Sorkin’s critically adored new dramedy “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip,” co-starring Matthew Perry and Bradley Whitford as writers for (what else?) a late night sketch comedy program. Also debuting is “Twenty Good Years,” featuring the combined midlife antics of buttoned-down Jeffrey Tambor and madcap John Lithgow.
“My Name Is Earl” is back, and so is “Scrubs” for star Zach Braff’s, and likely the show’s, final season. And don’t forget Steve Carell’s “The Office,” continuing the Jim and Pam romance that so sweetly ended the show’s Emmy-winning second season.
Drama lovers get a star-studded hostage caper (“Kidnapped”), an adaptation of a popular high school sports film (“Friday Night Lights”), and an ambitious glimpse at what would happen if normal people suddenly began to realize they had superhuman powers and abilities (“Heroes”), and all these shows look better than anything the network put out last year.
Others
The newly formed CW brings back WB and UPN favorites like “Everybody Hates Chris” and “Gilmore Girls,” and HBO has the fourth season of Baltimore-based crime saga “The Wire,” easily the grittiest and most complex drama on any network, perhaps the best now that “Deadwood” is dead, and “The Sopranos” is on hiatus.
Pick your horses, TV fans, and see where the ride takes you.