Education by Television

I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book.
~ Groucho Marx

I think Groucho would have become very educated if he had to look at the 2009 fall TV line up. I'm looking the network choices over, and finding very few shows to get excited about.

That means more time for writing and reading though! My silver lining.

So what am I looking forward to? It's a short list. First, a few returning shows.
- Castle on Monday - and I admit I watch it for Nathan Fillion more than the writing. He'll always be Captain to me. Unfortunately this show isn't Firefly, so I'll probably only remember to turn it on a few times during the season.
- I'll TiVo NCIS on Tuesday and watch it later in the week with hubby. It's about the only show we both watch.
- The Mentalist on Thursday. Ok, so there are two shows hubby and I both watch. This one we'll also TiVo to watch together later.
- Dollhouse on Friday! I'm having an "ugh" moment seeing Fox is leading into it with a pair of sitcoms. Hopefully Summer Glau can chase my fears of imminent cancellation away.

Wow. One show I'll actually plan to watch, one I'm Eh about, and two that are on there to be 'date shows' with the hubby.

Maybe there's something more exciting in the new shows? Don't get too excited.
- V (ABC) Premieres: Tuesday, Nov. 3 at 8/7c. Notice that the new show I'm most excited about won't be here until November. From TV Guide :

Lost's Elizabeth Mitchell stars in this reimagining of the 1980s sci-fi miniseries and series as FBI counter terrorism agent Erica Evans. She is the first to discover that, beneath the skin of a presumed friendly visiting alien race, they're more sinister than anyone imagined. Evans' son, Tyler (Logan Huffman), sees the Vs as an opportunity to make mankind unite with a common goal while news anchor Chad Decker (Scott Wolf) wants to advance his career by getting an exclusive interview with the aliens' leader, Anna (Morena Baccarin).

Am I letting nostalgia get in the way of judgment? I loved the original miniseries. Even bought the novelization, and held onto it until college. The diretoor and cast have a lot of geek cred, so I'm hanging onto my high hopes for this one.

- Eastwick (ABC) Premieres: Wednesdays, Sept. 23 at 10/9c From TV Guide :

The producers of this fantasy series about suburban witches, which stars Rebecca Romijn and Lindsay Price, hope the third attempt to bring John Updike's novel to the small screen will be the charm. The big-screen version, The Witches of Eastwick, was a major success in 1987.

I liked the movie ok, but always thought there was more potential here than a 2 hour movie could catch. So I'm going to give this one a shot. And, witches. Fun times.

- FlashForward (ABC) Premieres: Thursday, Sept. 24 at 8/7c From TV Guide :

ABC has high hopes for this series, centered around a bizarre event that allows millions of people to briefly see flashes of the future. What do they see? What does it mean? And should people be worried if they don't have a future? Watch to find out, we don't know, and yes.

The hype around this one reminds me a bit of the hype around Heroes. And Heroes was fun for one season. Ok, for most of one season, they actually lost me about 2 episodes from the end. Maybe ABC has found a similiar spark with this one?

- The Vampire Diaries (The CW) Premieres: Thursday, Sept. 10 at 8/7c From TV Guide :

Brooding high school newcomer Stefan (Paul Wesley) can't get his mind off classmate Elena (Nina Dobrev) — perhaps because the two of them were deeply in love 130 years years ago. Yeah, Stefan is a vampire, and so is his reckless bad-boy brother, Damon (Lost's Ian Somerhalder). This one also features a special guest appearance by massive amounts of fog.

Vamps. They're hot, they're now, and they may be getting close to being overdone. Unlike HBO's True Blood (which you'd think would be marketed to adults only with all that blood and sex) this show is aiming for the high school crowd; think Twilight fans here. Will the show have any appeal outside the 15-18 demographic the network usually aims for? I'll tune in once or twice and give it a shot.

And that's it for me. One new show I've got as a don't-miss, and a few I'll give a shot. There's a few more on cable that look interesting (Stargate Universe being the big one), but again - a lot of yawns across the listings.

Have I missed something? Is there a show out there that you're especially excited about and think I should give a try?

I'm looking at one bright spot out of this. Maybe I'll be able to find time to get to a lot of great books that have been waiting on my TBR pile for far too long.