From my childhood and well into adult life, I bought one issue of TV Guide a year: the Fall Preview. I genuinely looked forward to it. I’d carefully read every summary and look over each cast photo. Then I felt well prepared for the slate of new shows—which to sample, and which to skip.
So what changed? Me? TV? Both? With more and more channels, it’s certainly become harder to sift through and care about the new shows. The staggered schedules on cable, with shows debuting in random months, only confuse matters more.
As a public service, I want to help you navigate the new fall offerings. I have not seen any of these shows. I am basing my opinions solely on the descriptions in the TV Guide 2012 Fall Preview. It may seem like slim pickings, but fear not; we’ve always got the new Michael J. Fox show in fall 2013.
666 Park Avenue (ABC) — I already feel like enough of a jackass watching American Horror Story.
Animal Practice (NBC) — In the ’90s, I watched half of one episode of Friends. A monkey was turning on a stereo. That was it for me and monkey shows in this lifetime. Unless they remake Lancelot Link.
Arrow (CW) — CW is still a channel? Really? Um, this appears to be about the superhero the Green Arrow. Never read the comic, and I’m not watching the show. And that Green Lantern movie sucked also.
Beauty and the Beast (CW) — How dare they try to remake my beloved old series that… oh wait, I never watched that one either.
Ben and Kate (FOX) — Back in 2005, I revealed the star of this show, Nat Faxon, to be a fraud!!! Now they want me to believe he wrote The Descendants with that bald guy from the ridiculously overrated Community? I seriously doubt “Nat Faxon” is an actual name. Nat Faxon? Not watchin’.
Chicago Fire (NBC) — Sorry to douse your Chicago Hopes, but if I watched junk like this, I’d be saying “Rescue me.”
Elementary (CBS) — It’s Sherlock Holmes with Lucy Liu as Watson, which sounds like the worst idea of all time. I’ll watch this right after I watch those Robert Downey Jr. movies, which is never.
Emily Owens, M.D. (CW) — It’s Meryl Streep’s daughter, Mamie Gummer! That name may be even stupider than Nat Faxon. I’ll stick with Trapper John, M.D.
Go On (NBC) — Whoops, I lied, I saw the preview episode of this one during the Olympics. If you like completely generic sitcoms with random bits of sappy drama uncomfortably shoehorned in, this is the show for you. They should’ve put Matthew Perry in that monkey thing. Go On? No go.
Guys With Kids (NBC) — Is this a sequel to that shitty summer movie that no one saw, about the guys who were going to be dads? If this is only half as bad as the incessant Olympics commercials made it seem, it would still be six times worse than a show I would watch.
Last Resort (ABC) — Andre Braugher should’ve retired after Homicide. This time he leads a “renegade submarine crew” and… eh fuck this.
Made in Jersey (TNT) — Ay! Oh! She’s an attorney! This looks like shit!
Major Crimes (TNT) — Sorry, I only know where TNT is on my cable box during basketball season.
Malibu Country (ABC) — Just when they finally stopped showing Reba on every freaking airline flight, she had to go and make another goddamn show.
The Mindy Project (FOX) — I’m guessing this was called The Mindy Project while they were developing the show, and then some network moron said, “Hey! Wouldn’t it be cute if we actually called it that?” After the failure of this series, the world can stop pretending that Mindy Kaling is talented.
The Mob Doctor (FOX) — We’ve run out of ideas for mafia therapists, so this one is about a surgeon. I’m imagining a lot of “But it goes against the Hippocratic Oath.” “Yo, we take an oath too—a blood oath.” How do you say “I will not watch this” in Sicilian?
Nashville (ABC) — I wonder if that old Robert Altman movie Nashville is ever on TV? I could record it using the DVR space on which I won’t record this.
The Neighbors (ABC) — Hey! It’s Squatch from The Knights of Prosperity. He went to see a friend’s band. Seemed like a decent guy. I’ll watch one episode.
The New Normal (NBC) — With Modern Family, I was tricked into watching, and totally loved the first episode, but have been disappointed ever since. At least this complete ripoff has the decency to look sucky from the get-go.
Partners (CBS) — I like David Krumholtz. I don’t watch TV shows that he stars in. But I like David Krumholtz.
Revolution (NBC) — Post-apocalyptic horseshit.
Stars Earn Stripes (NBC) — They pre-tape all this reality nonsense, right? So, we would’ve heard if Todd Palin got run over by a tank or something?
Vegas (CBS) — Sorry, I only watch shows called Vegas when the S is a dollar sign.
Yesterday I read a nice obituary of sorts by Al Franken.
That started off funny and got funnier and funnier. I love the last line. Ah, ’70s TV was pretty bad too, but since we were like 10 years old or younger, it seemed great at the time.
Miclusick, I missed that, but just watched a video of him helping with a Habitat for Humanity house.
Thank you, CM! In fairness, most every creative endeavor is crap, and one of the nice things about society is how occasionally, quality is rewarded and rises above the dross. A couple of people on Facebook said “jeez you don’t like anything” but if I had said that these all looked wonderful, wouldn’t that be the deluded viewpoint?
I look forward to watching the first episode of Revolution and then giving up on it like I did with Flash Forward, The Event, etc.
I would agree this season seems pretty weak for new series. Rather, I’m looking forward to a couple return shows like The Big Bang Theory and Suburgatory. Nothing of the new shows looks strictly original. My coworkers at Dish and I were trying to figure out what might be worth watching. It’s not going to be easy to find anything worthy of watching in the new season. My coworker reminded me about a couple of the cool features in the Hopper I just got from Dish. One, it automatically records all the primetime shows on ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox with the new Primetime Anytime feature. I will have all these pilots available and with the Auto Hop feature I can watch them with or without the commercials.
Good plan, Carli! And Joey “Comment Spa”M, my aunt signed up for Dish Network last month, but when she plugged it in, it set her house on fire. She switched to DirecTV and won the lottery.