Laurel’s TV Picks

Best Bets

New How I Met Your Mother (CBS, 7pm)
New Heroes (NBC, 8pm)
New Two and a Half Men (CBS, 8pm)
New Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (NBC, 9pm)
NewWeeds (Showtime, 9pm, 9:30pm, 11pm)

Primetime Grid

News & Notes

NBC has picked up Heroes for a full season of 22 episodes. CBS has picked up The Unit and The New Adventures of Old Christine for full seasons.

Smith has been pulled from the CBS schedule. Can’t say I’m upset about that as I didn’t care for the show. No word yet on when/if the episodes that were already filmed will air, I’m guessing they’ll air at some point though.

Last week, CBS announced that they’re moving How I Met Your Mother to 7pm on Mondays and The Class will air at 7:30pm on Mondays.

And then late last week the CW announced that they’re moving Seventh Heaven and Runaway from Mondays to Sundays and their Sunday block (including Everybody Hates Chris) to Mondays. Confused yet? I liked having Everybody Hates Chris on Sundays at 6pm because it was good for families and meant it had little competition. Now, unfortunately, it’s up against How I Met Your Mother– I’m wishing CBS hadn’t made that move as having Chris and Mother back to back (albeit on different networks) would’ve been excellent given I’m not wild about either The Class or All Of Us. Oh, well.

Times listed are for the Central timezone, please adjust accordingly if you’re in a different timezone.

Featured Pick

Season premiere of What About Brian (ABC, 9pm).

Most people don’t seem to have heard of this show and certainly didn’t watch it last season so I was surprised it made the schedule this year (and predict it may not last long). Barry Watson (the oldest son on 7th Heaven) stars as Brian. All of Brian’s friends seem to be married or engaged or otherwise partnered up and he’s ready to get married, but hasn’t found the right woman yet. Or has he? Last season it was established that he’s in love with a woman– the catch is, she’s engaged to his best friend. D’oh! The woman in question is played by Sarah Lancaster (who was “Madison” on Everwood and was also in dr. vegas).

Six months have passed since the end of last season so we get a nice long “previously on” to fill folks in (if you’re new to the show, you should have no trouble jumping in). Rosanne Arquette plays Brian’s older (and now rather pregnant) sister; her husband is off filming a movie somewhere and is notably absent from the first two episodes of this season. Brian’s married friends who experimented with an open marriage last season are having major problems now. And Brian’s best friend is set to get married in just four days. Of course Brian does return and of course things get very messy.

J.J. Abrams (of Lost, Felicity, Alias, et al) is one of the producers of this show. The excellent Amanda Foreman (“Meghan” on Felicity and “Carrie” on Alias) will have a recurring role this season as will Jason George who plays her husband.

I just watched the first two episodes of this season and I enjoyed them, but was also already frustrated with the poor choices some characters made. I understand that people need to screw up for there to be good drama, but it’s hard to pull for characters when they don’t even seem all that conflicted about morally questionable things they do. I guess the characters feel bad, but they don’t seem very good at resisting making these poor choices.

It’s also so much about the one love triangle that it gets a little tedious; I only watched a couple of episodes last year and was already a bit weary of it then. There’s a good cast here and some decent bits of writing– the show certainly has potential. But it’s not something I’d recommend given how many better shows there are out there, unless you don’t feel you have enough things to watch and would like a simple drama about the complicated lives of a bunch of people (as opposed to the many crime dramas and intense serials that air everywhere these days).

Anyway. The season premiere airs tonight. If you watched last year and cared at all about these characters, you’ll probably want to check out these new episodes just to see what happens.

Primetime

Marshall and Ted go bar hopping on How I Met Your Mother (CBS, 7pm). I’m sure Barney tags along, too.

Not only did the CW relocate their Sunday block of comedies to Mondays, they’ve also decided to rebroadcast all of the season premieres in case anyone didn’t actually watch them then. It’s really basically like a “do over” for these shows and the CW on this night.

Whoopi Goldberg guest stars in a rerun of the season premiere of Everybody Hates Chris (CW, 7pm). This is a great show that anyone can watch (my great aunt watches, my parents love it, I know kids who dig it as well as folks my age). Goldberg plays a neighbor who wants to be in charge of the neighborhood watch.

Agent Mahone (“Bill” Fichtner) gets very interested in the D.B. Cooper case just as Michael and Lincoln search for Cooper’s money on a rerun of Prison Break (FOX, 7pm). Coincidence? I think not. No new episodes ’til October 23rd, just in case you were wondering.

Series premiere of Off The Leash (Lifetime, 7pm; second episode at 7:30pm). It’s a search for the next canine superstar. The show follows a pet talent agency. Now that’s a reality show show I might enjoy! Especially if there are Scotties or other cute terriers involved.

Nicole’s husband and her ex-boyfriend (who she recently slept with again) are becoming friends on The Class (CBS, 7:30pm). Needless to say, she doesn’t like this development. Sara Gilbert (of Roseanne) guest stars.

Hiro takes a good look at that comic book (wouldn’t you?) and wants his friend to accompany him to America on a new Heroes (NBC, 8pm). I love Hiro. And, well, there are more developments for all of these characters. I’ve seen this episode and it’s pretty darn cool– I take it as a good sign that episodes two and three are better than the first episode (and hope folks who weren’t impressed by the first episode stuck around for a little more before giving up). And if you thought the first couple episodes had a bit too much gross stuff– well, be ready to close your eyes quick for some scenes in this one.

Alan wants custody of the dog he shared with Kandi on Two and a Half Men (CBS, 8pm). Just in case you enjoy playing “spot the quote which is the title of the episode”– tonight’s title is “A Pot-Smoking Monkey” and I’d also like to apologize for my own mess of a sentence.

Amanda Seyfriend (“Lily Kane” on Veronica Mars) guest stars on a rerun of Justice (FOX, 8pm) as a young woman who claims she killed a famous producer in self-defense.

Ritchie wants to attend church on The New Adventures of Old Christine (CBS, 8:30pm).

Season premiere of What About Brian (ABC, 9pm). Featured above.

Whoops– it turns out that they’ve inadvertently plagiarized another comedian on Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (NBC, 9pm) so they try to make a change (or “break into”) the west coast feed to prevent further embarassment. I want to like this show, but it’s too heavy-handed at times and the show within the show is so very bad that it hasn’t won me over. I’ll keep watching, but think there is a good reason the ratings are declining for this. It sure as heck isn’t as good as either Sports Night or The West Wing which is a shame given the interesting premise and strong cast.

Doug heckles Celia at a city council meeting, Nancy’s husband pressures her to quit her job or at least scale back (you knew that was coming, didn’t you?), and the boys celebrate their late father’s birthday on a new episode of Weeds (Showtime, 9pm, 9:30pm, 11pm). I’m completely hooked on this show.

Male models are murdered on CSI: Miami (CBS, 9pm). And it sounds like somebody is getting stalked too. Rob Estes (of The Evidence, Melrose Place), Kari Wuhrer (of Sliders), and Robin Atkin Downes (“Byron” from Babylon 5) are among the guest stars.

Late Night

Some good talk show guests tonight, check out Sue Trowbridge’s page for listings. (There’s always a link on the main TV Picks page).