REVIEW: "Help Me Help You"

Help me help you decide what to watch during the 8 o'clock hour tonight, which is sardine-can-packed full of good shows. Tonight's tip: Unless you can record four shows at once, don't bother with “Help Me Help You,” a mildly amusing sitcom that is promising -- including the sense that it promises to go nowhere fast.

Help me help you decide what to watch during the 8 o'clock hour tonight, which is sardine-can-packed full of good shows. Tonight's tip: Unless you can record four shows at once, don't bother with “Help Me Help You,” a mildly amusing sitcom that is promising -- including the sense that it promises to go nowhere fast.

It airs at 8:30 p.m. CT on ABC (KMBC-9).  

Ted Danson plays Dr. Bill, a world-famous shrink with issues. His marriage (to Jane Kaczmarek) is over. His daughter is dating a man old enough to be … him. But he's always got his practice, where he has just started holding group therapy with a new batch of social misfits.   One of the coincidences of this fall season is that we have two new shows with suicidal characters.

Unfortunately for “Help Me Help You,” the despondent guy in “The Class” is much more interesting than the despondent guy here (played by Charlie Finn). In fact, with the exception of Inger, the socially inept young millionaire played by Suzy Nakamura (who gets to deliver the night's funniest line), none of Dr. Bill's patients seems worth a second look.   I always enjoy watching Danson, even on the bad shows (anyone remember “Ink”?).

“Help Me Help You” is not a bad show, but the bar is set so high for comedies on a schedule where drama and reality shows rule. Sitcoms need an outrageously good premise and extreme but likable characters, such as were on Danson's last show “Becker,” or on two comedies that are on NBC tonight, “My Name Is Earl” and the Emmy winner, “The Office.”

Help Me Help You” isn't trying to be subtle, but it isn't trying hard enough to be outrageous either. And that's not going to help the show that will eventually join it on the schedule, “The Knights of Prosperity,” which passes my comedy test with flying colors but is, like “Help Me Help You,” stuck in this absurdly competitive hour of TV. (“Knights,” starring Donal Logue, signs on in three weeks at 8 p.m.)   Maybe Danson's new show will pick up steam. Maybe “Knights” will keep ABC's ratings from jumping off a bridge.

In any case, “Help Me Help You” will need serious help if it's to avoid an intervention by the network president.