Barnhart's fall TV preview: The good die young

Remember when it seemed there were too many TV channels and not enough talented writers, actors and producers to go around? Well, forget that.

As the best and brightest from the film world migrate to television, the quality debate is settled. Spend some time with the new fall shows, as I have this summer, and you realize there’s no talent shortage in TV land.

Look over the new schedule, read the reviews, and you'll agree: Never has the American TV viewer had so many worthy choices on the five nights of the week, Sunday through Thursday, when we spend quality time with TV.

And wouldn’t you know, that’s a problem.

You see, some pretty good shows already air on those nights. Now pile on two dozen more shows. What do you get? A lot of tough choices for viewers and a lot of roadkill that doesn’t deserve to be.

In fact, one agency that buys buckets of commercial time on TV is already telling clients that new shows, including some of my favorites like “Jericho,” “The Knights of Prosperity” and “Justice,” won’t be able to win over enough viewers and will be gone, probably by Christmas.

Good shows in bad time periods is not a new story. But to have so many in one season — that’s new.

But wait. Are we not in an age where the Internet allows endless entertainment to be stored and viewed online? In other words, couldn’t ABC just move “The Knights of Prosperity” to its Web site and make it a hit there? Yes, if only ABC could overcome two little obstacles: The show is too long, and it costs too much.

The vast majority of video, even on mainstream TV Web sites, consists of cheaply made clips or promos of five minutes or less. The most downloaded video on the popular YouTube.com is a six-minute bootleg of an “inspirational comedian” named Judson Laipply performing dance moves on stage. What do you suppose the catering budget was for that production?

What the Web can do for the Class of 2006 is harness the Internet’s social-networking power to build buzz long before these shows hit the network. NBC, for instance, has created a site called NBCFirstLook.com, which allows viewers to watch short previews of series that are months away from their broadcast dates.

I used that site to watch a scene from “Andy Barker, P.I.,” the latest comedy starring former Conan O’Brien sidekick Andy Richter, which airs later in the season. The two-minute clip explained the premise of the show and gave me enough of a sense of Richter’s character to know I was going to like this show when it premieres.

But a video like that represents only the beginning. To produce that promotional clip, NBC was on the hook for scripts, casting and shooting that pilot … and developing the dozen or so pilots that were winnowed out because they weren’t as promising as “Andy Barker” was.

Although, who’s to say they weren’t as promising? NBC just gave an order for episodes of “Nobody’s Watching,” a goofy little sitcom that was developed for the WB network two years ago. The WB passed on the show and it went on the shelf, until somebody uploaded it to YouTube.com earlier this year. Alerted to its popularity, NBC soon picked up the show. But it will be seen only online.

That’s the Web acting as a farm league for network TV, much like the direct-to-video and print-on-demand markets help all those budding filmmakers and publishers who couldn’t get lunch with a big agent if they paid for it. Maybe someday the networks will do their development online, and viewers will vote for their favorite pilots. Some go to the network and some stay on the Web, are filmed on smaller budgets and make their smaller audiences very happy.

For now, though, don’t expect this fall schedule to hold together too long. With five excellent shows on Tuesday nights at 9 ET (six if you count “Eureka” on SciFi), the good will continue to die young for some time to come.

On the jump:

• a full rundown of the new shows;
• what's in cable's stable;
• shows you can stream.

ALL TIMES CENTRAL

The Class
7 p.m. Mondays on CBS (Sept. 18)
Nutshell: Third-grade class reunion leads to some new hookups.
Aaron’s take: The writing (overseen by “Friends” executive producer David Crane) is sharp, but the all-white cast seems slightly off-kilter, as though a bunch of 30-somethings were pretending to be 20-somethings. Needs fine-tuning and the emergence of a Barney (Neil Patrick Harris’ breakout character on “Mother”).
Verdict: Hey, it’s this or Howie Mandel on NBC.

Heroes
8 p.m. Mondays on NBC (Sept. 25)
Nutshell: Nine ordinary people around the world are discovering they have superpowers.
Aaron’s take: Liked this even more the second time I watched it. Two characters have so much appeal — Masi Oka as a goofy Tokyo cubicle worker who can stop time and Hayden Panettiere as an indestructible cheerleader — that they buy time for the others to grow on viewers.
Verdict: Record while you’re watching sitcoms on CBS.

Runaway
8 p.m. Mondays on CW (Sept. 25)
Nutshell: “Running on Empty” meets “The Fugitive” as a dad (Donnie Wahlberg) takes his wife (Leslie Hope) and kids on the lam to avoid a frame-up for murder.
Aaron’s take: I didn’t get a sense that these parents loved their kids. Without that, the show’s a non-starter. After all, he travels fastest who travels alone, so why would you take on a minivan of problems unless you couldn’t be away from them for one minute? That said, Hope could carry this show if it can overcome its shaky premise.
Verdict: Check back in a month.

Vanished
8 p.m. Mondays on Fox (debuted Aug. 21)
Nutshell: Two FBI agents (Ming-Na and Gale Harold) are on the hunt for a senator’s (John Allen Nelson) missing wife (Joanne Kelly) and stumble on what looks like a conspiracy.
Aaron’s take: Thriller has the requisite number of intrigues, but viewers’ circuits are going to overload awfully quickly trying to keep all the fall serial dramas straight. It doesn’t help that the FBI tandem got less screen time in the “Vanished” pilot than Rebecca Gayheart’s annoying TV reporter.
Verdict: Stream it online.

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
9 p.m. Mondays on NBC (Sept. 18)
Nutshell: New network boss (Amanda Peet) wants to revive venerable but unfunny late-night variety show, hires two troubled ex-writers (Matthew Perry and Bradley Whitford) and promises them creative freedom.
Aaron’s take: Talented ensemble (D.L. Hughley, Evan Handler, Sarah Paulson) should feast on whatever comes out of writer-producer Aaron Sorkin’s (“The West Wing”) computer. But America switched off Sorkin’s last TV-show-within-a-show, “Sports Night,” and if he’s serious about “weighing in on the culture wars,” as he promised critics this summer, he could drive a lot of potential viewers over to ESPN or “CSI: Miami.”
Verdict: Appointment TV.

Friday Night Lights
7 p.m. Tuesdays on NBC (Oct. 3)
Nutshell: Kyle Chandler faces the pressures of big time Texas high school football while trying to keep his family happy.
Aaron’s take: Much more than your typical sports drama, this show lacks the hard-edged social commentary of Buzz  Bissinger’s book of the same name. Still, the well-defined characters in “Friday Night Lights” show us that success in sports is fleeting and success in life elusive.
Verdict: Record while watching “House.”

Standoff
8 p.m. Tuesdays on Fox (debuted Sept. 5)
Nutshell: They’re hostage negotiators. They’re lovers, which is against policy.
Aaron’s take: Though the pilot was well-made, there’s nothing special about this show, which means it’s doomed. It sits in TV’s most brutal time period, against “The Unit” and “Law & Order: CI” (not to mention “Veronica Mars”).
Verdict: Delete.

The Knights of Prosperity
BEST NEW COMEDY
8 p.m. Tuesdays on ABC (Oct. 17)
Nutshell: Band of amiable losers led by Donal Logue decides  to improve its  fortunes by plotting and executing a robbery of Mick Jagger’s penthouse apartment in New York.
Aaron’s take: The creators of “Ed” have hatched another quirky comedy, aptly dubbed “Ocean’s Idiots” by its deep-throated confidence man (Kevin Michael Richardson). Perhaps the only criminal gang in history with its  own intern, “The Knights of Prosperity” will steal our hearts — if the Nielsen police don’t cart them off first.
Verdict: Appointment TV, at least until “House” moves against it in January.

Help Me Help You
8:30 p.m. Tuesdays on ABC (Sept. 26)
Nutshell: Ted Danson plays a shrink who conducts group therapy on a mixed-up bunch of individuals. Aaron’s take: Again with the time period — how does this show compete when audiences have made it clear they don’t like comedy that much?
Verdict: Something to tape on your fourth VCR.

Smith
9 p.m. Tuesdays on CBS (Sept. 19)
Nutshell: Ray Liotta leads a band of ruthless high-end thieves while trying to keep his wife (Virginia Madsen) in the dark.
Aaron’s take: The bandits, which include an unsettling hit man played by Simon Baker (he whistles while he works), don’t exactly radiate warmth. As the storyline plays out this season — yes, another serial drama — they may take on a certain dark allure. But will anyone be watching then?
Verdict: Worth taping, but not worth missing “SVU” or “Boston Legal.”

Jericho
BEST NEW DRAMA
7 p.m. Wednesdays on CBS (Sept. 20)
Nutshell: A small town in western Kansas is cut off from the outside world by what appears to be nuclear attack. Will the citizens of Jericho rally or turn on one another? Skeet Ulrich (pictured, with Ashley Scott) stars.
Aaron’s take: Of all the serial dramas airing this fall, none has a storyline of bigger consequence than “Jericho.” The pilot sent out mixed signals, but the second episode was stronger. At best, it could become something great — “Lost” meets Stephen King’s “The Stand” — but it could also dwindle into a soap opera that trivializes nuclear war. Given where this fictional burg is located, midway between Denver and KC, no way I won’t be watching.
Verdict: Appointment TV.

Twenty Good Years
7 p.m. Wednesdays on NBC (Oct. 4)
Nutshell: Jeffrey Tambor and John Lithgow are best friends, complete opposites, and suddenly determined not to live out their middle-aged years quietly.
Aaron’s take: What was NBC thinking? This show is amusing enough, but at a time when network comedy needs new life and young blood, “Twenty  Good Years” has little of either.
Verdict: Delete.

30 Rock
7:30 p.m. Wednesdays on NBC (Oct. 11)
Nutshell: Tina Fey is the head writer on a popular NBC variety show. Alec Baldwin plays the network boss sent in to make her life miserable.
Aaron’s take: Just missed being named my favorite new comedy. But it faces a lot of challenges: incompatible lead-in, behind-the-scenes turmoil (Rachel Dratch’s role apparently was slashed) and separating itself from “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip,” to name three.
Verdict: TiVo time.

Day Break
8 p.m. Wednesdays on ABC (but not until Nov. 15)
Nutshell: Taye Diggs would like to know why he’s being framed for murder. And he’d like to know why he keeps reliving the day of his arrest, “Groundhog Day”-style.
Aaron’s take: How you make a season out of this is anyone’s guess, but I recall saying that about “Lost,” too (“Day Break” takes over its time slot  when “Lost” goes on break). Great pilot, though.
Verdict: I like “Justice” better, and my TiVo can  hold only so much.

The Nine
9 p.m. Wednesdays on ABC (Oct. 4)
Nutshell: Nine people held hostage in a traumatic bank robbery try to resume their lives but find themselves facing that ordeal again and again.
Aaron’s take: A pilot does not a season make. That idea is exemplified by “The Nine,” which works its way backward from after the siege (I’m told that’s very “Rashomon,” but being the TV guy, I think “Seinfeld” wedding episode). Neat, but where from here? Still, I’m rooting for Tim Daly and Chi McBride,  sterling actors who deserved better than their last two network series.
Verdict: TiVo until I can decide whether  it’s better than “Kidnapped.”

Kidnapped
9 p.m. Wednesday on NBC (Sept. 20)
Nutshell: A hostage drama played out over one season.
Aaron’s take: Stylish and thrilling, with great casting decisions large (Dana Delany, Jeremy Sisto, Mykelti Williamson, Timothy Hutton) and small (Ricky Jay, Carmen Ejogo), “Kidnapped” could run off the tracks midway through. But so far, I like what I see.
Verdict: CSI who? Watch Gary Sinise in reruns and this live.

Ugly Betty
7 p.m. Thursday on ABC (Sept. 28)
Nutshell: Horatio Alger meets “The Devil Wears Prada” as a homely girl (America Ferrera) dreams of making it big in the fashion publishing world.
Aaron’s take: Based on a popular Spanish telenovela, this series is doomed to a quick demise in ABC’s least promising time slot, opposite “Survivor” and “Earl.” Ferrera is terrific, and Vanessa Williams is wonderful as the Botoxed Cruella De Vil.
Verdict: Catch it while you can.

Til Death
7 p.m. Thursdays on Fox (Sept. 7)
Nutshell: Brad Garrett plays a guy in a long and seemingly loveless marriage to Joely Fisher, a fact that is brought into comic relief when an insanely happy pair of honeymooners (Eddie Kaye Thomas and Kat Foster) move in next door.
Aaron’s take: Garrett’s hangdog reactions and beaten-down baritone still serve him well here. But “’Til Death” seems a pretty thin concept. Won’t it be the same show every week? Or will anyone even be watching once the other networks’ shows come back?
Verdict: Good to save on your third VCR.

Happy Hour
7:30 p.m. Thursdays on Fox (Sept. 7)
Nutshell: Henry (John Sloan) gets dumped by girlfriend, finds new friends.
Aaron’s take: A total 18- to 34-year-old male fantasy: a bachelor pal with a bar better stocked than many hotel lounges, hot women available at a moment’s notice and a good-looking boss who hits on her employees, even goofy-looking ones like Henry. His swingin’ roommate Larry (Lex Medlin) sets the mood with Sinatra music throughout the show, but I don’t get a kick out of you, “Happy Hour.”
Verdict: Delete.

Six Degrees
9 p.m. Thursdays on ABC (Sept. 21)
Nutshell: Happenstance connects six New Yorkers in the latest relationship show from J.J. Abrams, the producer behind “Felicity” and “Lost.”
Aaron’s take: Good writing, great casting (who doesn’t love Sarah Vowell?). Those are two reasons to be high on “Six Degrees.” Here are two more: It’s on after “Grey’s Anatomy,” and Abrams is a big shot. Gee, I guess the only downside is that it’s up against “ER” and CBS on a Thursday night and that ABC hasn’t had a scripted hit in this time slot since “The Streets of San Francisco.” Oh, and Abrams is a big shot, which means he has movies to make and has probably already lost interest in this show.
Verdict: With luck, ABC will move it to another time and it will be worth a TiVo.

Shark
9 p.m. Thursdays on CBS (Sept. 21)
Nutshell: James Woods plays a hotshot defense attorney who gets burned by a client and decides to switch sides and work for his rival, the D.A. (Jeri Ryan).
Aaron’s take: A total prosecutorial fantasy from start to finish, much of “Shark” seems laughably contrived, and yet Woods’ brazenness sells the concept. But he’s no “House,” and my gut tells me that his act will wear thin with viewers, though I’d  like to be proved wrong.
Verdict: Record this while watching “ER.” If it’s still good in three weeks, tape “ER” instead. \

Men in Trees
8 p.m. Fridays on ABC (Sept. 15 but previews Sept. 12)
Nutshell: Famous relationship advice-giver (Anne Heche) realizes her life is a lie when her fiance dumps her. So she moves to a quirky outpost in Alaska.
Aaron’s take: Heche jokes aside, she strikes a fine mix between self-confidence and self-doubt. That’s why they call it acting, right? But this isn’t “Northern Exposure” so much as “A Connecticut Yankee in King Salmon’s Court.” Alaska stereotypes abound, including the motto about males, “The odds are good, but the goods are odd.” Still, it grew on me by the hour. Maybe ABC will like it enough to promote, something “Men in Trees” desperately needs in this suddenly competitive time slot.
Verdict: I’d watch in a minute over “Close to Home” or “Las Vegas.” But I’m odd, too.

Celebrity Duets
8 p.m. Thursdays with results show 8 p.m. Fridays on Fox (Sept. 7 and 8)
Nutshell: Eight celebs, running the gamut from pro wrestler Chris Jericho to venerable bongmeister Cheech Marin, are paired with actual singers and slowly voted off, one by one.
Aaron’s take: Can’t they all be voted off at once? Actually, this makes a lot of sense for Fox: It’s produced by Simon Cowell, who will make appearances on the show; and Fox can’t make anything else stick on Fridays anyway.
Verdict: If you ever wondered what happened to Lea Thompson, Lucy Lawless or Wayne Brady, do not miss this show!

Sunday Night Football
6 p.m. Sundays on NBC
Nutshell: Taking over for ABC’s “Monday Night Football” as the premiere NFL matchup of the week, this version features Bob Costas in the studio, Al Michaels and John Madden on play-by-play and dynamic scheduling that means NBC won’t get stuck with lousy matchups in November and December the way ABC did.
Aaron’s take: The best gets better.
Verdict: Good thing HBO’s got video-on-demand.

The Game
7:30 p.m. Sundays on the CW (Oct. 1)
Nutshell: This “Girlfriends” spin-off focuses on the relationship struggles between football players and the women in their lives.
Aaron’s take: This show has one of everything: happy, hungry young couple that’s banking on his becoming an NFL star (Tia Mowry and Pooch Hall); the domineering mother-manager of another player (Wendy Raquel Robinson); the interracial trophy wife (Brittany Daniel). Another smartly done urban comedy from our town’s Mara Brock Akil.
Verdict: This one’s for the ladies while the men are in the other room watching football.

Brothers and Sisters
9 p.m. Sundays on ABC (Sept. 24)
Nutshell: Sally Field, Tom Skerritt, Rachel Griffiths and Calista Flockhart star in this high-profile drama about a family that’s about to go through some big changes, professionally and personally.
Aaron’s take: The reworked pilot didn’t arrive until Labor Day — usually a bad sign. But I found it absorbing and intelligent, even in its take on GOP politics. (Flockhart plays a right-leaning talk show host.) Still, it was a very talky hour, quite a change from thrill-a-minute “Grey’s Anatomy” that was in this time period. I’m afraid the audience will lose patience and switch to CBS.
Verdict: Tempo needs to pick up in episode two or this show’s going to disappear “Without a Trace.”

What's in cable's stable

The best show airing anywhere on television this fall is “The Wire,” which just returned to HBO for its fourth season.

Creator David Simon has created an amazing dystopia in inner-city urban Baltimore, but it could be any place in America where the people have been given up for dead by society, by a system that’s too broken to break the city’s cycle of violence, drugs and decay.

No, it doesn’t leave you feeling good. And yet, you won’t feel right with yourself until the next hour is on. The season premiere airs at 8 tonight on HBO, but episodes are available six days ahead of the telecast with HBO On Demand (which is now free for all Time Warner Cable customers).

Other cable highlights this fall:

“Koppel on Discovery: The Price of Security,” 7 tonight on Discovery. The first installment of a signature line of specials featuring the former ABC newsman will focus on the erosion of personal rights since the 9/11 attacks. It will be followed by a “Nightline”-styled town meeting moderated by Koppel.

“Dexter,” Oct. 1 on Showtime. Michael C. Hall, who carved cadavers in the basement of the family home on his last show, “Six Feet Under,” has managed to find an even creepier role. here. He plays a forensic pathologist by day who and hunts down murderers at night and kills them.

“Atlas,” Oct. 1 on Discovery, is a showcase of what promises to be dazzling high-definition films about the geography and society of the world’s leading nations. The first four films, airing weekly, will cover China, Italy, Brazil and Australia.

“The Street,” Oct. 3 on BBC America. From the writer of “Cracker” comes this gritty drama about a working-class neighborhood in England. Each episode focuses on a different house on the street. Jim Broadbent heads the cast.

“Dan Rather Reports,” Tuesdays beginning in October on HDNet. The former CBS newsman will get his own weekly showcase, in high definition. The channel, owned by Mark Cuban, promises Rather will be “completely uncensored” and that the show “will reflect the signature qualities of its host with a focus on accuracy, fairness and guts.”

“I Pity the Fool,” Oct. 11 on TV Land. Former TV action hero Mr. T travels the country dispensing advice. “Mr. T is a straight-shooting guy,” the “A Team” star says. “I pull no punches.” That said, this is the hip-to-be-square cable channel, so expect Mr. T to get an irony supplement.

“Desperate Crossing: The Untold Story of the Mayflower,” November on the History Channel. Re-enactments bring to life surprising facts about the people who helped colonize America.

“One Punk Under God,” Dec. 13 on Sundance. Short-run documentary series follows Jay Bakker, son of the once highflying TV evangelist, as he leads an urban anti-church that operates out of a coffeehouse in Atlanta.

“Tsunami: The Aftermath,” airing late this year on HBO, is a two-part miniseries that dramatizes the events during and after the Dec. 26, 2004, tsunami that killed thousands of people.

Where to see them online

Networks are still experimenting with different ways to offer their shows online. Here’s the rundown:

NBC made “Studio 60” and “Kidnapped” available to Netflix members last month to raise interest in these shows. The pilot of “Heroes” will be a free download from iTunes, where other NBC shows, present and past, are available for sale. In addition, the NBCFirstLook.com site lets you preview upcoming series on the network, even midseason shows like “Andy Barker, P.I.”

CBS will stream the first four episodes of “Shark,” “The Class” and “Smith” and make each episode of “How I Met Your Mother” and “The Unit” available for a week following their broadcast on the Innertube site at CBS.com.

Every episode of the three “CSI” series, “NCIS,” “Old Christine” and “Numb3rs” “Numbers,” will be on Innertube for four weeks after their broadcast, but “Jericho” and “Survivor” will be streamable all season. Some of these shows are also on iTunes for sale. Also, “CBS Evening News With Katie Couric” will stream live on CBS.com nightly.

Fox is airing several new and returning series at Fox.com, IGN.com and other sites free, with some promos embedded. Currently only “Prison Break” and “Vanished” are streaming, but Fox will add more. Episodes of “Bones” and “24” are selling on iTunes, as are classic shows “Hill Street Blues” and “Murder One,” produced by Fox’s TV studio arm.

ABC will also stream shows this season at ABC.com. It is selling shows from several of its series at iTunes.

In addition, many cable networks including Sci Fi, ABC Family, Comedy Central and Adult Swim Cartoon Network offer streaming of part or all of their original series.