New on the tube: 'Moonlight,' 'Brothers & Sisters'

  Just one network TV show premieres tonight, but most of your weekend favorites will be returning.

New on the tube: "Dirty Sexy Money," "Private Practice"

Four new shows, only one of which got my attention out of the gate, debut on the networks tonight.

"House": Season four reboot

I think I've diagnosed an ailment in the new season of TV's top medical drama. Hopefully it's a temporary condition. Watch the video.

Also, I reviewed tonight's debuts of "Reaper," my favorite new fall network show, and "Cane," not my favorite. Read the reviews.

New on the tube: "Reaper," "Cane"

The best new show of the fall is on tonight. Hope you know where the CW network is.  

“Reaper”  
8 p.m., CW (KCWE)  

It would be easy to say that “Reaper” is an attempt to revive the old “Oh, God!” movie franchise with a millennial twist -- this time, with Satan come down to Earth (in the form of Ray Wise, much more nattily dressed than George Burns) to give oracles to a humble store clerk.  

It would also be a no-brainer to say that “Reaper” is some kind of network-safe stoner comedy, with its premise of college-age dropouts sleepwalking through their day jobs at the local big-box store when one day Sam (Bret Harrison) turns 21 and then it's all, “Dude! The devil just showed up in my car!!”  

No, no, no. Critics have generally been as thrilled about “Reaper” as I am, but they keep wanting to hang a label on it -- slacker comedy, post-Buffy horror show, “Touched By a Devil” … the truth is, “Reaper” is all that and more. That's why it's so good. That's why it zoomed to the top of my list of the 27 new shows premiering this fall.  

The work of two young women writers of the post-Buffy generation and produced by a team that includes Kevin Smith (“Clerks”), “Reaper” is remarkably well-paced and hilariously well-written. Neither the CW, its predecessor the WB or its parent company, the CBS, has a show anywhere near as clever as this. Scratch the surface and you'll discover something else. “Reaper” might be the most faith-based show to come along since “Touched by an Angel” … and not nearly as mawkish.  

Consider. In the first episode “Reaper” establishes (a) that there is perdition and that irredeemably bad people go there, though some managed to escape in a jailbreak reminiscent of the old Fox show “Brimstone”; (b) that preserving the order of the Judeo-Christian-Muslim worldview demands they be sent back; (c) that Satan is a wily trickster who will say anything to get you to do as he tells you (pay careful attention to his facial expression when he tells Sam he knows how history will end and that “God wins”); and (d) that there really is something to this whole purpose-driven life business, even if the inspiration, in this case, is the worst person in the underworld.  

“Cane”   9 p.m., CBS (KCTV-5)   A year ago, CBS filled this time slot with “Smith,” a drama about a guy in a bad marriage who pretends to go off to his humdrum job but in reality, robs banks with a pack of psychos. CBS executives promised “Smith” would risky, adventurous, edgy … and that it was. Also, completely inappropriate for network TV. It drove away audiences in droves, and the network cancelled “Smith” after three weeks.   Well, the dangerous show is back, only it's been given a couple of tweaks to make it more palatable to a mainstream audience. “Cane” is about a large sugar-cane growing family, with Hector Elizondo as the patriarch and Jimmy Smits as the heir-designate, which is in one of those classic struggles for survival with a predatory rival.

There's feuding inside and outside the family, as you might expect. Also, somebody is going to get killed in tonight's episode, and it's going to be the responsibility of one of the ostensible good guys -- pretty much how “Smith's” first hour ended last year. The difference, other than the heavily Latino makeup of the cast, and that Smits seems to be happily married, is that the killing will be seen as a good thing.   It might even work, but the first hour's writing, pacing and storylines were too pedestrian for me to recommend “Cane.”

Aaron reviews the new season of “House” at videos.kansascity.com.

Sober, apparently, is not the new green

Fox threw an "Eco-Casino Party" last night in Hollywood, "sponsored by Cisco and benefiting Habitat for Humanity, The Nature Conservancy and Earth Share." And here is Kiefer Sutherland, not yet showing the effects of being overserved which would result in his getting pulled over early this morning for a DUI. Look, I realize Kiefer is a man's man, a hockey Player and all, but can't he pay a goon to drive him to and from these events?

What's up with thumbs up

I talked with the co-host of 'Ebert & Roeper' about his new Starz film hosting gig, his take on the Jesse James film the "thumbs down" controversy and Roger Ebert's absence from the show. Watch the video.

Also I wrote a preview of "Dancing with the Stars," "Chuck" and other network premieres tonight. Read the reviews

WBAL: Taking your call or calls

If you were listening live to this broadcast instead of this podcast, you could've called in with your question about the new TV season! While we waited for the switchboard to light up, WBAL's Bruce Elliott and I yakked about "Back To You," "Chuck," "Reaper," "Bionic Woman" and more.

• Download the podcast

New on the tube: “Dancing,” “Chuck,” “Journeyman,” “Big Bang”

  The fall television season begins tonight, both with a “Bang” and a cha-cha-cha. In addition to the biggest “Dancing with the Stars” yet, two new shows will be sandwiching “Heroes” on NBC and yet another sitcom will joining the CBS Monday lineup.

Local cafe gets mother of all promos

What a night Mike Riggs had. The Garnett, Kansas, restaurant owner and midlife graduate student had just walked out of a grueling evening class in research methodology, feeling great because his three-person team — which just happened to include Mrs. TV Barn, herself a midlife grad student — had given a boffo class presentation they'd spent all week toiling over.

But Mike's night was just getting started. On picking up his messages, he learned that Conan O'Brien was going to pimp his eatery on television that very night.

Would I make this up? See for yourself:

(There's a sharper version of the video at NBC.com.)

Now, you would think watching that clip that the proprietor of the Sherwood Inn lacked a certain, what do you say, sophistication? Well, now you're going to hear .... the RRRRREST of the STOR-y.

It all starts Sunday

  If the fall TV season were a movie, we would say it's getting a slow rollout. This week the Fox network jumped the gun on everyone else, using the Emmys to rush out its new shows. The executives at Fox couldn't bear to keep us waiting another week on the debuts of “K-Ville” and “Back to You,” I guess.

  To continue our movie analogy, the fall season opens wide starting Sunday. Here are some of the returning shows to look forward to in the coming week.

'Kid Nation,' the review (finally)

Because CBS wouldn't send TV critics advance copies of its most talked-about new show, "Kid Nation," I couldn't review it until now. (I did, however, rave about another reality show with the initials "KN." Read my review.)

Watch my video review.

'The War,' Pt. 4

The changes Ken Burns was forced to make to his World War II epic only made it better. Watch the video

My critical review of "The War" appeared in Sunday's Kansas City Star. Read the piece. And you can also watch Part 1 , Part 2 and Part 3.

'The War,' Pt. 3

Here we look at the blind spot of the new Ken Burns World War II epic: its complete oversight of Latinos who fought in the war, and how it was partially corrected. Watch the video. My critical review of "The War"
appeared in Sunday's Kansas City Star. Read the piece. And you can also watch Part 1 and Part 2.

New tonight: "Kitchen Nation," "Kid Nightmares" ... oh, wait

All times Central:

  “Kitchen Nightmares”

  8 p.m., Fox 4

  An utterly compelling reality show on Wednesday nights this fall with the initials “KN” -- but it's not the one you've been hearing about.

  We'll get to “Kid Nation” in a moment, but first consider this brilliant concept: Take British chef and TV personality Gordon Ramsay out from “Hell's Kitchen” and throw him into the kitchens from Hell. Call it “Extreme Makeover: Café Edition.” Every week, Ramsay enters a restaurant carefully chosen for its dwindling customer base and dysfunctional staff. By the time he walks out seven days later, he expects to have worked a turnaround. If not -- hey, it still makes for great TV.

  Then there's that mouth. Ramsay swears even when he's happy. But he seems to speak the language of the kitchen, and he gets results in his first two episodes. Tonight, he hits the jackpot with a Long Island restaurant run by a family that exudes Italian stereotypes, including a super-macho brother who is driving the business off a cliff, to the despair of his co-owner sister. It's a recipe for gripping TV, and Ramsay and his producers cook it to perfection. In the second episode, he confronts the owner with his self-esteem issues. He's not above pep talks and hugs. He's like a foul-mouthed Dr. Phil of the culinary circuit.

  Since CBS doesn't want us to see “Kid Nation” in advance, I guess I'll just have to declare “Kitchen Nightmares” the best new reality show of the fall.

  “Kid Nation”

  7 p.m., CBS (KCTV-5)

  Forty kids ages 8 to 15 spent 40 days in a ghost town turned movie ranch in New Mexico, with no adult help, forming their own experimental society. That part you probably know. That's the message the CBS publicity machine has been putting out all summer. Perhaps, too, you read the story about the kid who accidentally scalded herself on the set, or about the children who accidentally drank bleach. Maybe you checked out the Web site with the 23-page release the parents of “Kid Nation” had to sign. Maybe you heard that the state of New Mexico was investigating whether child labor laws were broken after some kids complained of being put through 18-hour work days. (In their defense, the show's producers said they were running a “summer camp,” and unhappy campers could leave at any time.)

  I was hoping I could provide a better idea of what “Kid Nation” will actually be like by now. But CBS decided to withhold the preview screeners that are traditionally mailed to TV critics prior to broadcast of every new fall show. Maybe they're just having a bad summer over at Television City (I don't have the screener for the CBS vampire drama “Moonlight,” either). Maybe they think the show can sell itself with that five-minute trailer currently running on the Web.

  Or maybe it's even worse than the critics thought.

  I've been of two minds about this show. And I still am. Just like you, I'll have to wait until tonight's episode to decide whether “Kid Nation” is brilliant, edgy reality programming, or an exploitative show that makes me shield my eyes and is bound to leave its young stars scarred for life.

  “Gossip Girl”

  8 p.m., CW (KCWE, Channel 29 over the air, Channel 7 cable)

  Unlike “Kid Nation,” I have no ambiguity about this show -- I hate it. Mostly, I hate what it stands for: the idea that teenagers reenacting episodes of “Dynasty” in New York City's posh Upper East Side could be considered entertaining; the addition of one more show about filthy people to a mediascape that has all but forgotten the working class and poor; the idea that teenagers only read trashy novels (like the “Gossip Girl” series); and the fact that minority actors only get second-class parts on a show set in America's biggest melting pot.

  That said, it's going to be a success, in all likelihood, because of the books and the sweet time period (right after “America's Next Top Model”).

  “Back to You”

  7 p.m., Fox 4

  Kelsey Grammer and Patricia Heaton play dueling news anchors in Pittsburgh, with an assist from Fred Willard and a whole crew of sitcom veterans working behind the scenes. Workplace comedies just bore me. I'd rather watch “America's Next Top Model,” because at least I haven't been watching TV like that all my life. Fox is hoping that putting two former “Everybody Loves Raymond” co-stars side by side on its schedule will draw enough viewers to this tough time slot (Brad Garrett, fresh off embarrassing himself at the Emmys, returns for a new season of “Til Death” at 7:30). Secretly, I'm hoping they both crater and Fox's reality king, Mike Darnell, plugs the hole with another hour of Gordon Ramsay, who's much funnier than “Back to You.”

'The War,' part 2

My weeklong video preview of Ken Burns' 15-hour documentary about World War II continues with a look at the role of race in the war and "The War." View the video here. My critical review of "The War" appeared in Sunday's Kansas City Star. Read it here.

Forced to make changes, Burns makes "War" better

If you own a Macintosh computer, you may know about the Ken Burns Effect. That’s what they named the Mac feature that allows the user to zoom in and pan slowly across a still picture — a fitting tribute to the man who popularized that technique on the way to becoming America’s best known documentary filmmaker.

There’s another Ken Burns Effect, one that is cultural rather than technological. It’s unfolding now, in the days leading up to next weekend’s world premiere of “The War,” his latest multi-part PBS epic.

Three hundred public television stations have spent weeks trumpeting the arrival of Burns’ World War II project. With groups like the Veterans of Foreign Wars promoting it, the telecast may draw record audiences for PBS, rivaling the record 17 million who watched Burns’ breakthrough film, “The Civil War,” in 1990.Afterward, copies of the film will be sold to thousands of schools and libraries across the land. Families will plan pilgrimages to the World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C., after seeing “The War.”

Each Burns film is a tide that lifts all boats. Kansas Citians, in particular, know this.

After all, it was Burns’ massive “Baseball” project that introduced America to a sweet-talking old Negro Leaguer named Buck O’Neil and made him a national hero.

But Burns, who’s virtually a one-man division of PBS, learned that the Ken Burns Effect has its limits. It was during a long standoff earlier this year with Latino and Native American groups who were outraged that he did not find a single veteran of either descent to interview for “The War.”

Rather than acknowledge these glaring oversights in his 14  1/2 -hour project, Burns claimed that the film was “locked” (more than a year before its broadcast date) and that making any changes to please an interest group would “destroy the film.”

He agreed to shoot new footage only after 21 members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus met with Burns’ corporate sponsors to tell them they supported the protest and to suggest a boycott might result if amends were not made.

As someone who has watched about half of “The War,” let me address Burns’ most serious concern: Not only has the added material featuring Native American and Latino war stories not “destroyed” his handiwork, it has unexpectedly strengthened and enhanced it.

To tell the story of World War II, Burns and co-producer Lynn Novick chose four archetypal towns and cities: Sacramento; Mobile, Ala.; Luverne, in southwest Minnesota; and Waterbury, Conn.

Many of the film’s talking heads either entered the armed forces from one of these towns or stayed behind in them while loved ones went off to war. The four-town construct gives “The War” a distinctively American perspective, though it also gets the film off to a sluggish start.

There is far too much scene-setting in the first hour, too much foreshadowing. Only as 1942 arrives does “The War” find its rhythm. If Burns has learned one thing over his long television career, it’s that you can show or tell anything to your audience. You can tell how the armed forces were segregated down to the blood supply. You can show a gruesome photo of a beheaded American soldier. You can tell them what SNAFU and FUBAR stand for (though your PBS station might bleep it).

The only thing the audience asks is that you release the pressure at decent intervals, and this Burns does with a jazzman’s timing.

Perhaps better than at any time since “The Civil War,” Burns demonstrates his ear for the felicitous description. He quotes liberally from the wartime writings of Al McIntosh, the longtime editor of Luverne’s daily paper, the Rock County Star Herald. McIntosh’s home-front columns (read here by Tom Hanks) are revered in Minnesota and will soon be cherished elsewhere.

Whether making readers smile by telling about the local woman who sold $56,000 in war bonds in minutes or breaking their hearts with the story of the father who greeted the telegram delivery person with the words, “Which one?” — for he had two sons — McIntosh had an ability, uncanny even among journalists, to paint memorable scenes with few words.

And then there is the signature Burns pairing of image and sound. In the fifth episode, which covers the dark days of late 1944, he uses big-band music to accompany the newsreel of paratroopers landing behind enemy lines, then switches to a doleful Western duet as other paratroopers are spotted by German forces and shot out of the sky.

After watching a dozen of Burns’ films  over the years, I still find juxtapositions like these surprising and strangely moving.

Many times in “The War,” when Burns is searching for an emotional crescendo, he departs from his four-town rule and brings in oracles from elsewhere. The historian Paul Fussell has poignant recollections about his experiences in the infantry. Sam Hynes, a Marine pilot with a gift for words, supplies the first night with its most memorable quote: “I don’t think there is such a thing as a good war. There are sometimes necessary wars.”

Burns is very mindful of some ethnicity — specifically of Japanese-Americans who were rounded up in mid-1942 and shipped off to camps, then later given a chance to prove their valor in combat; and of African-Americans who served bravely despite ongoing racism in uniform.

Willie Rushton, a Marine from Mobile, supplies wonderful plain-spoken commentary about his tour of duty, which included fierce fighting at Peleliu Beach in late 1944. The Japanese, he observed, “didn’t make no difference if you was black or white, they didn’t care.” In the next scene, Rushton is wounded and taken to a hospital ship where, as the only black man aboard, he is refused a haircut by the ship’s barber.

These, of course, are indispensable stories. Burns is right to highlight them. But at times I think he forgets that history is not just for people who lived America’s past. It’s for those who live in America’s present.

And at a time when Latinos are fighting and dying in large numbers in an unpopular war that many people have grown indifferent toward, it’s unconscionable that they should also be invisible during this seven-night broadcast event.

In the end, Burns had to agree. Stubbornly, though, he kept the original film intact. So, tacked onto the end of three nights’ episodes are a total of 29 minutes of material featuring 94-year-old Joe Medicine Crow, a Crow Indian from Montana; and two Latino Marines, Bill Lansford and Pete Arias, interviewed with the help of Hector Galan, a Los Angeles filmmaker.

Burns’ decision means that we meet Lansford and Arias after the opening episode seems to be over. Norah Jones sings a ballad, “American Anthem” (commissioned for “The War”), over a slow-moving montage of images while the screen fades to black … and then suddenly this text appears: “More than sixteen million American men and women would serve in uniform during the War. They came from everywhere and each had a story to tell.”

Arias and Lansford served with Carlson’s Raiders, an elite force that carried on a bold campaign of harassment behind Japanese lines. “It was like a mini United States,” Lansford says. “You got Jews, you got Italians, you got Indians — and they all learned to live together.”

And of course, they died together. When the two men are done with their grim tale, and the credits begin, this time without the salve of Jones’ music, the emptiness is palpable. And you’re reminded that whether a war is later judged to be necessary or a pointless expenditure of human life, there is no good war.

The Emmys 2007: Many surprises, not all of them pleasant

  “The Sopranos” won the top honor at Sunday night's Primetime Emmy Awards, but little else was preordained -- or, apparently, rehearsed -- during a sloppy three-hour-plus Emmycast on Fox.

  Despite taking three Emmys for best drama, writing and directing, “The Sopranos” was overshadowed by free-network shows in the individual acting awards.

  “30 Rock,” the little-watched but critically adored sitcom about life at NBC, won best comedy, leading its star, writer and creator Tina Fey to offer her thanks to the show's “dozens and dozens of viewers.”

  America Ferrera took home an Emmy for acting in a comedy. “Wonderful things happen when your dreams come true,” said Ferrera, who could've been talking about her character in ABC's “Ugly Betty.”

  Inexplicably, James Spader won another Emmy for best actor in a drama on ABC's “Boston Legal,” which some observers have argued should be entered as a comedy. Looking over in the general direction of “Sopranos” star James Gandolfini, whom he bested, Spader said, “I feel like I just stole a pile of money from the mob.”

  Robert Duvall, who didn't win an Emmy when the miniseries was riding high -- he was in “Lonesome Dove” -- accepted two Emmys Sunday night for “Broken Trail,” which dominated a diminished miniseries category. In the slightly stronger movie category, HBO's remake of “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” won. Helen Mirren added to her trophy case with another Emmy in her swansong for “Prime Suspect” on PBS.

  The coronation for “The Sopranos,” which signed off in June after seven seasons on HBO, began in the Emmys' second hour, with back-to-back wins for directing (Alan Taylor) and writing (the show's creator, David Chase), a tribute by the cast of the Broadway musical “Jersey Boys” and a perp walk by the show's many character actors to center stage.

  The show itself got off to an embarrassingly bad start and only improved marginally, plagued by production goofs and at least two presenters who forgot they were on live television. Ryan Seacrest, as ill-suited to the role of Emmys host as people thought he'd be, actually looked good compared to a lot of other stuff Fox threw against the screen.

  Apparently bored with the standard proscenium design of an awards stage, Fox put the stage in the middle of the Shrine Auditorium, with audience on all sides, including several staring right out at the home audience. It made the Emmys seem like “American Idol,” or a baseball game (Fox, of course, airs both).

  Seacrest's monologue, which mostly poked fun at his selection as host, was unsurprisingly weak. And he should've used what creative clout he supposedly has at Fox to prevent the opening sketch, which featured two cartoon characters from “Family Guy” trashing other TV shows in a musical number. It was the kind of thing that probably sounded good in a meeting -- but once underway it was obvious someone had made a mistake.

  I think “Family Guy” is hilarious, but Stewie, the British-accented toddler, is not somebody you just drag out in front of America and have him sing a number filled with more industry references than the front page of Variety. The first show mentioned in the song was “Scrubs,” a low-rated comedy on NBC. When Stewie sang that “Scrubs” is proof “that a sitcom doesn't have to make us laugh,” the camera cut to Jeremy Piven of “Entourage” in the audience -- who didn't laugh. Ouch. A few minutes later, Seacrest told a joke and the camera cut again to Piven, who laughed heartily. Double ouch.

  Even the much-hyped tribute to “The Sopranos” fell well short of its potential. The stars of “Jersey Boys” sounded great covering the hits by the Four Seasons, but the camera dwelled too much on them and not enough on the “Sopranos” clips showing in the background. Then came a long perp walk by the cast of the show, who stood in the circle and turned in circles, acknowledging the audience in 360-degree turns.

  The first glimmer of hope came when “Lost's” Terry O'Quinn, a wonderful role player who seemed destined to being passed over by better hyped nominees, especially Masi Oka of “Heroes” and T.R. Knight of “Grey's Anatomy,” won supporting actor in drama. The 6,000 audience members seemed stunned, but O'Quinn won them over with a charming improvised acceptance speech.

  Ellen DeGeneres brightened her corner of the Emmys with just a little nothing about TV shows and caller ID. An hour before the Fox broadcast she was on E! with her partner Portia de Rossi, joking about the designers of their outfits. Even then, she had me wishing she was the host instead of Seacrest. Also acquitting themselves were current and former stars of “The Daily Show,” including Steve Carell, Stephen Colbert and Lewis Black, who delivered a hilarious rant against on-screen clutter and cable news channels (“The only thing we get from you is attention deficit disorder!”).

And in a little-noticed but wonderful development, the writers of "Late Night with Conan O'Brien" finally hoisted the show's first Emmy Award after 14 years on NBC.

  There were other problems that made you wonder if Fox was up to the challenge of putting on four straight hours of TV. There was a 6-second cutaway shot and silence during Romano's segment; according to wire reports, he dropped an F-bomb on the air. The show's announcer mispronounced the name of presenter Katherine Heigl (who later won an Emmy, and also cursed on live TV). And the was a poorly edited clip reel of late-night comedians' jokes with a too-short tribute to the late Tom Snyder tacked on at the end.

  With Gandolfini and co-star Edie Falco denied their moments of glory, the brightest star power from these Emmys belonged to Tony Bennett, who duetted with Christina Aguilera and later picked up two Emmys for his NBC special (which won a total of seven, counting last week's Creative Emmys ceremony); Al Gore, who followed up his two-minute plug for the environment at the Oscars with a two-minute plug for his cable channel, Current TV, which won an Emmy for interactive TV. And in the night's other infomercial, Kanye West gamely lost a round of “Don't Forget the Lyrics” to Rainn Wilson of “The Office” by mispronouncing a word in his own song.

The Emmys: What the bleep was THAT?

Ricky Gervais — played here by Steve Carell — took the Emmy for best actor in a comedy. Carell's substitution for the missing Gervais was one of the few genuinely hilarious moments in a three-plus-hour telecast that was one of the sloppiest I can remember, as you'll read in my review. The only saving grace: So many deserving people and shows won, including "30 Rock," Terry O'Quinn for "Lost," and (finally!) the writers of "Late Night with Conan O'Brien."

Here's a full list of winners. I'll be discussing the Emmys today with Chip Franklin and Paul Harris  (see below for times).

Ken Burns' "The War," part 1

All week long I'll be looking at aspects of the PBS filmmaker's 15-hour documentary in a series of videos. Here's part one. In addition, I wrote a long critical piece on "The War" in the Kansas City Star.

• View Part 2

• View Part 3

• View Part 4

Emmy predictions

Also, my first video. But not my last.