June 2000 Archives

Football is Easy -- Comedy is Hard

By Philip Michaels on June 30, 2000 12:00 AM

Well... at least it wasn't O.J.

That's always a risk when Don Ohlmeyer -- friend to the downtrodden, defender of the legally liable -- is doing the hiring. Factor in that Ohlmeyer signed on with ABC to bring some spice back to the venerable Monday Night Football franchise, and it's especially fortunate Ohlmeyer didn't turn to his good pal O.J. for a favor. Honestly, what better way to goose the ratings than giving a prime-time platform to O.J. Simpson, gridiron star, one-time MNF commentator, and all-around lady-killer? After all, it worked for Court TV.

But Ohlmeyer resisted, O.J. didn't get the gig, and Al Michaels won't have to keep one eye on the exit while he's trying to do play-by-play. Instead, Ohlmeyer went a different route to restore Monday Night Football to its former glory, to rekindle the good ol' days when a nation watched transfixed as Howard Cosell and Dandy Don Meredith locked horns and Frank Gifford prattled on about pro-set sweep formations, blissfully unaware of the cruel Kathie Lee-tinted card that fate would one day deal him. Now our deliverance from the tedium of meaningless Monday mismatches between the Falcons and the 49ers will take a new -- and completely unexpected -- form. Ladies and Gentlemen, joining our man Al in the booth this fall will be Dennis Miller, the noted funnyman with the heretofore untapped expertise in the intricacies of pro football.

Like I said, at least it wasn't O.J. Though it might as well have been.

I don't mean that as any shot at Dennis Miller. Oh, I worry that in the third quarter of a Seahawks-Raiders blowout, he'll start riffing about how he hasn't seen an end-run like that in Seattle since Bill Gates was served with a federal consent decree. And poor Al Michaels will have no idea how to shut him up, save for vainly signaling the producer to turn off Miller's microphone. Or, even worse, Miller tones down his act for prime time and becomes a dull "football-is-a-kind-of-war" cliche-spouting drone. After all, that's the role of MNF's other new hire, the oatmeal-bland, almost lifelike Dan Fouts.

But, aside from the risk of obscure references to Garo Ypremian anytime someone lines up for a field goal, I think Miller will be a fine addition to the Monday Night Football booth. He's bright, he's articulate, he's quick-witted. And unlike his predecessor, Boomer Esiason, he's able to put together a complex sentence without dislocating his tongue.

No, you'll have to surf elsewhere for righteous indignation about Dennis Miller's new adventure in broadcasting. And if you do, you won't have to listen too hard to hear the hue and cry of media critics who've decided that hiring Miller -- a common wiseacre! -- to fill the commentator role handled so ably by the likes of Alex Karras, Joe Namath, and Dan Dierdorf constitutes an affront to the hallowed temple of sports journalism.

Yeah. Whatever happened to standards and dignity, for chrissake? Call me old-fashioned, but why couldn't ABC have followed the fine examples and time-honored traditions of broadcasters past? Like letting an ex-beauty queen and Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder co-host The NFL Today. Or having Howard Cosell leer at Randi Oakes during the dunk tank competition on Battle of the Network Stars. Or, at the very least, use Fox's glowing hockey puck technology in some way or another. Or... or...

I'm sorry. I lost my train of thought. Where was I?

Oh, yes... standards! Dignity!

If adding Dennis Miller to the Monday Night Football mix causes this much grumbling, imagine the wailing and rending of garments that would have transpired had ABC gone with another leading contender, Rush Limbaugh. Even the news that ABC had merely considered Limbaugh was enough to send TV critics into paroxysms of outrage normally reserved for paroled child molesters, particularly bloodthirsty dictators, and Fox reality specials.

Salon.com took a break from its normal routine -- running stories that work the word "penis" into the headline and watching its stock price plummet to Marianas Trench-like depths -- to bewail the evils of the radio talk show host. Al Franken -- last funny and relevant during the Ford administration -- vowed that if Limbaugh were hired, he'd never watch Monday Night Football again, no doubt putting the fear of God in ABC executives worried about erosion in the valuable hack comic demographic. And TV critics across the land flexed their analytical muscles by scouring their thesauri for different ways to call Limbaugh "fat."

The kind of mass hysteria generated by a simple job interview would be comical -- if it came from the plot of a 1950s B-Movie. "Attack of the Conservative Football Announcer!" or some such nonsense. Sadly, the hysteria comes from reporters, a group of people who should be able to look at things critically rather than produce articles based on groupthink. But apparently newsrooms are such tolerant, open-minded places, that to merely suggest something as neutral as "Rush Limbaugh is a competent broadcaster who would be an intriguing addition to Monday Night Football" is to invite untold guff from your hippie-trippy colleagues. Either that, or TV critics are so devoid of original ideas that they've taken to parroting each other's works. Which explains the widespread and inexplicable acclaim enjoyed by David Kelley, come to think of it.

And so Limbaugh gets the ol' raspberry from the fair-minded fourth estate. Which is a shame, actually. Because just as Miller will bring a new and welcome voice to MNF, Limbaugh would have added a distinct -- and interesting -- personality of his own. If nothing else, any show where the play-by-play announcer and color commentator could come to blows at any moment is a show worth watching. Dandy Don and Howard proved that time and again, lo those many years ago.

At the root of the Sturm und Drang surrounding Miller and Limbaugh is the belief that hiring either one renders Monday Night Football's credibility as wobbly as a Ryan Leaf spiral, that sports coverage is treated by TV networks with the same care they give a news event. Well, it doesn't, and it isn't. Sportscasts divorced themselves from the bonds of journalism long ago. Or haven't you been watching?

Take the halftime show on NBC during the NBA playoffs -- Net.Zero at the Half, for those of you who pay attention to such things. Most of the feature stories and interviews during halftime were thinly disguised promos for upcoming games, all broadcast on NBC of course. Then, there's the fine interview work of Ahmad Rashad, a man whose withering line of inquiry usually falls along the lines of "Shaq, that was some basketball game," and "Were you feeling as good as you played out there, Penny?" It says a lot about Rashad the journalist that the most informative piece work he's ever done is his voice-over on the current ad campaign for Coors.

Yes, beer commercials. Just like Edward Murrow used to do, I believe.

Or consider the upcoming Summer Olympics. Last month, about the same time that pundits were frothing at the mouth about the odd couple of Rush Limbaugh and pro football, NBC announced that its Olympic coverage would be live for a grand total of zero hours. The network plans to tape-delay the whole enchilada, a curious decision since the Olympics are ostensibly news and news is ideally reported in a timely fashion.

But to NBC and Don Ohlmeyer's evil disciple, Dick Ebersol, the Olympics are not news. Rather, they are a dramatic event. And there's no better way to heighten the drama then by editing out the dead spots and adding a few inspiring profiles about the swimmer who overcame rickets and the gymnast who's battling a Pop Rocks addiction.

The folks who worked themselves into a dither about Monday Night Football, they haven't had too much to say about NBC's Olympics shell game. Perhaps they're still too busy coming up with clever ways to ridicule Rush Limbaugh's weight.

Well, not me. Give me Dennis Miller on Monday Night Football. Hell, give me Rush Limbaugh and Regis Philbin and Soupy Sales while you're at it. Because in a world where the Olympics get turned into a pre-packaged highlight show, where Jim Gray asks Pete Rose a legitimate question about his gambling habit and gets pilloried for it, where Ahmad Rashad can still draw a paycheck, trying to make Monday Night Football more entertaining by adding Dennis Miller is the least of my worries.

Just keep the references to the Marianas Trench and Garo Ypremian to a bare minimum. OK, Dennis?

Tooth Decay

By Bill Frost on June 28, 2000 12:00 AM

This piece is not suitable for residents of Utah. If you happen to be from Utah, please click away and go do something productive: Work in the garden, search for the turn-signal indicator on your mini-van (it's there, really), breed, anything. Just don't read on any further, OK? Thanks.

Now that they're gone, we can get down to the business of TV--specifically, the cancellation of Utah's absolute favorite daytime gabfest, Donny & Marie. [Blood-curdling scream]

Oh, crap! Uncharacteristically, one Utah resident has failed to blindly follow orders, learned of D&M's demise, and just committed suicide.

As you can see, Donny & Marie, hosted by toothy Mormon siblings Donny and Marie Osmond, is much loved in the Beehive State. When news of the syndicated talk show's axing by distributor Columbia TriStar finally leaks out, the ensuing carnage could rival Jonestown, Heaven's Gate, or even Woodstock '99.

"We are not moving toward a third season," Columbia TriStar TV Distribution president Barry Thurston announced two weeks ago. "We had to make an evaluation based on the overall ratings." Since "overall ratings" are inclusive of markets other than Utah -- like the all-important New York -- D&M was doomed, despite somehow improving ratings during its two seasons (Latest ranking: No. 102). "The marketplace is difficult and the show itself is expensive," Thurston continued. "We were not prepared to reduce the quality of the series." When asked during which season they had planned to introduce quality into the series, Thurston declined to comment.

To be fair, Donny & Marie isn't the worst daytime talk show in syndication -- not as long as Jenny Jones and Rosie O'Donnell can still haul their shameless asses out in front of a camera. Lacking Jenny Jones' soulless exploitive edge, and never quite rising to the dizzying heights of fawning phoniness of The Rosie O'Donnell Show, Donny and Marie were forced to do the unthinkable: be themselves. Since being an Osmond only plays in Utah, Branson and certain suburbs of Phoenix, it's amazing Donny & Marie has lasted this long.

The show's biggest problem? Donny. Having survived his debilitating "social anxiety disorder" years (as documented in the dullest VH1 Behind the Music ever), Donny now seems determined to make up for lost time by reinventing himself as a cocky, creepy extrovert. Since this makes the average viewer want to reinvent his face with a tire iron -- citizens of Utah excluded, as we've established -- the channel flips. Not to Ainsley Harriett, fergawdsakes, but it flips.

Then again, Donny may have a perfectly good excuse for being such a tightly-wound freak: During an infamous 1998 appearance on The Howard Stern Show, Donny stated proudly that Debbie, his wife of 20 years, had never, ever, performed oral sex on him. Keep in mind, this is a guy who admits to frequenting Internet chat rooms using the screen name "Captain Purple." Seriously. Contacted numerous times by Stern, Debbie refused to confirm or deny Donny's heady pronouncement. Marie, nearly achieving a facial expression, simply said the story was tough to swallow, and that the whole situation left a bad taste in her mouth. [Bulletin: Eight more Utah citizens have just killed themselves.]

Having mentally checked out of the show sometime during the first season, Marie can't share in the blame for the plug being pulled on Donny & Marie -- she's in such a medicated haze, even the guests barely seem to notice her. Marie's finest hour of the show's run happened when psycho-magicians Penn & Teller poured an entire plate of live maggots down her blouse, and she actually made a noise and blinked. Industry buzz had it that Marie was planning to base her new one-woman Branson show around the incident, until People for the Ethical Treatment of Maggots protested and shut her down.

While D&M's cancellation is bad news for its stars and producer Dick Clark (who reportedly has been feeding off the souls of Osmond offspring to maintain his youthful vigor), it's a downright tragedy for Salt Lake City Fox affiliate KSTU 13. Imagine being the local station that loses Utah TV royalty like the Osmonds -- when Donny & Marie reruns disappear from the tube this September, it ain't going to be pretty. Think Los Angeles' NBA Finals victory riot/party, only catered by the Olive Garden.

Perhaps it's just as well, though. After all, talk shows are old hat now -- people want courtroom TV shows, and plenty of 'em. Thus, joining Judge Judy, Judge Mills Lane, Judge Joe Brown, Judge Hatchett and the rest in the daytime fray next season will be Judge Martin Short, Judge Richard Simmons, Judge Magic Johnson, Judge Roseanne, Judge Howie Mandel and -- wait for it -- Judges Donny & Marie!

Citizens of Utah, you may now return to your homes.

My TV, She is Like a Woman...

By Chris Rywalt on June 26, 2000 12:00 AM

Men really have no idea what kind of women they're really attracted to. Try this experiment: Ask a man for the list of things he'd like in a woman. Be sure to do this when the man's girlfriend or wife or interminable companion isn't around. Take notes. The next time you see this man's girlfriend or wife or interminable companion, use your notes as a checklist. I guarantee -- guarantee! -- you will check off fewer than three items. Men are like car shoppers who collect brochures for sporty red imports but end up buying the green station wagon with plenty of room in the back.

I have discovered that I, at least, was the same way about television viewing.

Like a few of the other Vidiots, I recently bought a TiVo. I won't go into a lot of detail on what it is -- you can get that elsewhere -- but here's a quick summary: It's a digital VCR. You tell TiVo what you want to record and it records it. When you sit down to watch TV, TiVo shows you a menu of shows it's recorded with the name of the show and the date, like "18 Wheels of Justice 6/21". You choose what show you want to watch and you watch it. If in the middle of this nail-biting Lucky Vanous vehicle something more important comes up -- say you forgot to taste-test the glue in that new box of envelopes you bought -- you hit the Pause button, lick yourself silly, and come back. It's a lot like a VCR without the hassle of figuring out what time a show is on, what tape has room on it, and what tape you saved that show you wanted to watch on. Come to think of it, it's nothing like a VCR at all.

Owning a TiVo has brought to light one fact in my little world: The shows I thought I watched because I liked them I in fact only watched because they were on when my TV was on. Given the freedom to watch whatever show I want whenever I want has changed not only how I watch but, more importantly, what I watch.

It's like going into the showroom and finding nothing but sporty red imports. And all within my price range.

My TiVo is hooked up to my DirecTV, but the way TiVo works you have to use their onscreen programming guide, not DirecTV's. I was a little depressed about this -- the Hughes DirecTV unit I have has an amazingly wonderful onscreen guide -- until I found that I almost never use any onscreen guide at all. I tell TiVo what to record, it records it, and so I always watch whatever TiVo's got on tap. Hot and cold running Good Eats? You betcha.

Gone is Howard Stern's E! show. Gone, in fact, is the entire E! Entertainment Network. If Steve Kmetko exploded on air leaving only a pink mist hanging next to Jules Asner, I would not know it. I have not frolicked on any beach with E!'s Wild on the... series in months. I am not shedding tears over Talk Soup. E! is off my dial. Come to think of it, my dial is off my dial -- I haven't owned a TV with a dial in eons.

A friend passes me this gag:

From Futurama this weekend: Gary Gygax: I'm <rolls dice> very pleased to meet you.

A Gary Gygax joke? On prime time TV? Futurama is on TiVo now once a week. What a great show!

I can't remember the last time I tuned to MTV or VH1. Behind the what? Before They Were who? TRY? I haven't heard any pop music in ages. You mean everyone isn't listening to Miles Davis' "Bitches Brew"?

But people have been talking about this Malcolm in the Middle series. Now playing on TiVo. What a great show!

Emeril Live is now dead in my house, alas. But Good Eats -- ah, there will always be Good Eats.

I'd seen an episode or two of good vs. evil and I kind of liked it. Let's throw it on TiVo! What a great show! Oh, they cancelled it. Again. Oh well. What about Space Ghost: Coast to Coast? Still running? There it is!

My TV viewing hasn't completely changed, of course. Law & Order is still a staple of my week, and, you know, I even watch it in its regular time slot. But now, if the kids get uppity -- Pause. And, if need be, we can always switch over to one of the many children's shows we now have on hand twenty-four-seven: Blue's Clues, Kipper, Maggie and the Ferocious Beast. Kiddie cartoons are not just for Saturday morning any more.

So, yes, I still watch Law & Order. Which goes to show that while I may think I like tall, brown-haired, shapely women with smoky looks and kissable lips, what I really like is short, blonde, chubby, with non-smoking looks -- and kissable lips.

Real Reality Television

By Lisa Schmeiser on June 22, 2000 12:00 AM

It's easier to ask forgiveness than permission.

Television is a confessional medium: we watch shows because we like watching other people commit and repent for their misdeeds. There's nothing American audiences love more than watching someone else own up to their mistakes on TV. Given that our country was founded by religious sects that loved making public examples of penitent people, it's understandable that we have a weird fascination with anyone who's willing to go on television to grovel for the American goodwill.

Save some of that fascination for New York 1, WPIX, WWOR, WCBS and WNYW, five television stations in New York City. Lord knows they deserve it. These stations -- citing competitive pressures and cat-out-of-the-bag reasoning -- all aired explicit videotaped coverage of last Sunday's Central Park attacks. In this case, "explicit" is synonymous with "showing several near-nude victims' faces post-attack."

It is a well-established policy in most news organizations¹ -- print, broadcast and online -- not to reveal the identities of victims of sexual abuse. Typically, faces are blurred and names and addresses are not released to the public, thus affording the victims a modicum of privacy even as their assault leads the 6 p.m. news.

Several of the women who were attacked in Central Park on Sunday were, in addition to being surrounded, stripped, beaten or robbed by a roving gang of men, treated to a replay of the event courtesy of five channels broadcasting an unedited amateur videotape of the assaults. WNYW played a clip where one victim, stripped of her shirt by the gang, crouched behind a wall, screaming. Although the channel blurred her breasts -- so as not to offend the delicate sensibilities of viewers -- it couldn't be bothered to extend the treatment to her face.

We live in a hell of a world when it's okay to show a traumatized woman cowering from her attackers -- as long as it's a PG-13 show.

WNYW isn't the only guilty party: WCBS, WWOR, WPIX and New York 1 played the unedited tape -- which includes a close-up of two recently-assaulted women's tear-streaked faces -- for two days. New York 1, which received the tape ten hours after it was broadcast on the other stations, ran the thing without bothering to editing it because, as news director Peter Landis said, "We wanted to be competitive with the other guys."

Yeah, they had a fighting chance, what with being only ten hours behind the rest of the news programs.

The channel pulled the tape after three more showings, altering it and issuing a hasty mea culpa later in the day. The other stations which had elected to run the unedited tape pulled their broadcasts by Wednesday afternoon -- apparently all disgusted by the New York Post, which had printed stills from the videotape in the morning edition. Post editor Xana Antunes, displaying the type of reasoning that demonstrates why the Post is not going to be giving the New York Times a run for its money any time in the foreseeable future, said, "since these images were played many times on television, we felt there was little to be gained by altering them."

After all, why bother with taking the ethical high road when you can wallow with your WNYW brethren? That's a negligible gain -- or loss -- for the Post. For the television stations, there's little to lose -- they got to broadcast everything and stay competitive, and all they have to do now is explain that their better instincts were trumped by the heat of competition and oh, gosh, they're so sorry.

Lord knows if my screaming face had been plastered on every channel in New York, hearing a bunch of still-employed news directors carry on about the cut-throat world of broadcast journalism would make everything all better. Uh-huh.

The sad truth is that nobody's going to learn from this. It's not as if New York television viewers rose up en masse and demanded that the footage be removed: so far as most of them were concerned, it was reality TV and they had a right to see it. So long as it's not them on the receiving end of a rampaging mob, show the tape and damn the consequences.

By the time this sorry spectacle is over, broadcasting news directors will have learned one important lesson about their job: they don't have to ask permission, and they don't need our forgiveness.

[1] It's worth noting that WNBC was the exception to this. News director Paula Madison saw the tape and decided to withhold broadcast until it was edited. She explained that competition couldn't drive decisions because it would compromise the public's confidence in WNBC's ability to broadcast news responsibly.

Rock the Cybervote

By Bill Frost on June 20, 2000 12:00 AM

So I'm channel surfing on a Monday night--as opposed to what I do every other night of the week, surfing channels--and I run across this music show called Farmclub.com on USA. Former MTV veejay Matt Pinfield (the portly bald dude who resembles Spider-Man villain The Kingpin and has far too much musical knowledge to work for MTV) is introducing this "hot new band" from Atlanta called Stereomud. Never heard of 'em.

Then it hits me that I'd seen Farmclub.com before. Pinfield was introducing another "hot new band," but they were some gawdawful grunge-punk outfit from Ft. Lauderdale called Monster Zero. They could barely play the half-baked "song" they'd written and, even worse, they just didn't look good on the tube. How did these fat nobodies wind up on a national TV show playing alongside skinny somebodies like Beck and Jay-Z?

Thank Al Gore: It's the Internet.

Mankind's technological tool for great knowledge and greater porn has now surpassed the old "big in Belgium" joke in music-biz circles, and Monster Zero apparently has a "big" Internet following. The band put down the Twinkies long enough to upload one of their stellar compositions to Farmclub.com, the Netizens voted heartily, and winners Monster Zero got to rock out on basic cable. Stereomud -- who at least can play, albeit exactly like Korn, the Deftones, et al -- were the most recent inductees. The Next Net Thing looks to be Macon, Georgia's Hank & the Hardknox (a redneck Bon Jovi), currently in the Farmclub.com lead with over 7,000 cybervotes. Power to the people, y'all.

This may or may not be good news for Net-savvy bands looking for record deals -- they promote as though contracts will be passed out like skate stickers, but Farmclub.com has signed a only a small handful of uploaded artists to their own Interscope-distributed label. But does it make for good TV? Do you really want to see Pinfield introducing every unsigned act voted onto Farmclub.com as a "hot new band," even though you and he both know full well that 90 percent of them sound like an unbalanced load of Rottweilers in a Maytag? "From Lactose, Wisconsin, give it up for DevilDump!" (Guitars: "Gronkety gronk-gronk, shtwang! Gronkety gronk-gronk, shtwang!" Singer with asparagus hair and $200 Adidas sneaks: "Daddy didn't love meee! My life suuucks! Arrrggg!")

Of course you do; it's funny as hell.

See, nearly every musical act featured on Farmclub.com is either Korn-fed goon metal or hardcore hip-hop, and the studio audience is made up almost entirely of Caucasian frat-rats--except for the gaggle of nubile females obviously shoved up to the front by the camera crew. Farmclub.com -- which, not coincidentally, follows WWF RAW Is WAR on Monday nights -- is a dude's show all the way, just not in the upfront fashion of fellow cable male-fests like Comedy Central's The Man Show, FX's The X Show or the Food Network's Iron Chef (like pro rassling -- with recipes!)

Only this explains the presence of Farmclub.com co-hostess Ali Landry, the T&A balance to Pinfield. For the most part, Landry just shimmies next to the bald wonder and looks hot -- not a difficult task, even for a hat rack like her. Occasionally, however, they let Landry speak, introduce a band or, heaven forbid, conduct an interview. As evidenced in her infamous Doritos commercial, the former Miss USA knows how to catch flying chips in her mouth. Dogs can be trained to do this with Frisbees, but you don't ask Fido to interview Third Eye Blind. You assign someone slightly smarter than Third Eye Blind -- like a cat, or a ham sandwich.

The real work of Farmclub.com falls on Pinfield's rounded shoulders, and work it he does: There are no "bad" bands in his world, just varying degrees of "cool" ones. Whether he's rapping with legit artists like Beck, or rushing breathlessly to the post-performance stage to chat with talentless mooks like Papa Roach before they fade into obscurity in front of your very eyes, it's all good.

"Upload your music and join our portfolio of new and unique talent," goes the mini-manifesto on the Farmclub.com website, "or visit our Listen section to check out featured artists and hear great music." The original idea is a good one: helping new artists and bands get their music out to the world through brand-name recognition -- just being on the Net alone isn't enough; Farmclub.com is a recognized destination point. Now, if more of that unique talent and great music could make it onto the TV version, they'd really have something.

Until then, you've got The Kingpin, Landry shaking her moneymaker and a whole lotta "Gronkety gronk-gronk, shtwang! Gronkety gronk-gronk, shtwang!"

Survivor: Youth Must Be Served

By Philip Michaels on June 16, 2000 12:00 AM

They're fat and happy over at CBS right now. Times are flush. Life is good. The reality game show Survivor has become an instant hit, the biggest thing to hit TV since Regis Philbin started pestering flustered trivia buffs for their final answer. Survivor is huge -- it's bolstered CBS's ratings, given the network a high-profile platform to promote its fall lineup and provided a shot in the arm during the normally humdrum months of summer.

Not coincidentally, Survivor is also shooting CBS right in the demographics foot.

It probably doesn't seem like that on the surface. Indeed, things could hardly be better for CBS and its hardy castaways. The show has trounced all comers, including the NBA Finals. Even Regis is giving Survivor a wide berth. What seems to be the problem?

Only this: the first person voted off the island was a 65-year-old California woman. Next to go was a 64-year-old Kansas City man. And in last week's third episode, Rudy, a 72-year-old former Navy SEAL, came within a hair's breadth of getting the boot. Once he's gone -- and really, it's only a matter of time -- the oldest person on the island will be 38.

Waxing the old people one by one is all well and good if your core audience falls squarely in the ages 18-to-45 demographic. But on CBS -- which makes its bones catering to the dentures-and-Metamucil crowd -- sending senior citizens out to the woodshed is tantamount to broadcast suicide.

Which is a shame really, because Survivor is excellent television. Not "excellent" in that I, Claudius-PBS pledge break kind of way, but rather, "excellent" in the sense that it's 152 degrees in the San Francisco Bay Area right now and if I have to do anything more mentally challenging than watching TV, my melting brain is going to seep out my ear. And... Hey! Those people are eating rats!

In case you've missed it -- and those aforementioned boffo ratings suggest that's highly unlikely -- Survivor takes 16 people and strands them on a deserted tropical island, in which "deserted" is defined as "populated by camera crews." The 16 strangers must set aside their differences and work together to build shelter, forage for food and battle the harsh, unyielding elements. In this sense, Survivor is sort of like "The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan's Island," only without the basketball-playing robots.

If that was all there was to Survivor -- participants vying against the arbitrary whims of their angry gods -- it would still be a hell of a show. But Survivor adds another, more diabolical element. The 16 contestants are split into two groups that compete against each other in survival-of-the-fittest-style games. Win, and you're King Shit: supplies, rations, fruity tropical drinks are yours for the asking. Lose, and one of the members of your tribe gets to take a long walk off a short plank. And you're the one giving that final push. Think "Lord of the Flies" meets Battle of the Network Stars. Well, Ken. The Pagong tribe seems to have managed to erect a crude shelter out of bark shavings and palm fronds, and just before the thunderstorm hits, too. And now, let's cut over to the dunk tank and see how Piggy and his teammates are making out.

It's all a sham, of course. The participants on Survivor aren't exactly roughing it. Besides those ubiquitous camera crews, doctors are standing by with canisters of antivenin, just in case the snakes decide to retaliate against the Man for moving in on their rodent action. Those folks voted off the island? It's not like they have to fashion a crude raft in under an hour or else their former comrades hunt them for sport. The losers are airlifted off to a hotel room on an adjoining isle. Nobody's had to don conch shells or weave grass skirts to stay clothed; Reebok has generously offered to supply the Survivor participants with t-shirts and other jungle garb. So I guess the key to surviving any stint on an uncharted desert isle is to make sure you've lined up a good sponsorship deal.

In other words, the Survivor cast gets in trouble, the producers will no doubt swoop in and avert disaster. CBS isn't about to leave 16 people out on an abandoned atoll to die. MTV, yes. CBS, no. Well... probably not, anyhow.

Still, even with the safety net in place, Survivor is engrossing television. There are few things more compelling than watching a half-dozen strangers try to function together as a cohesive unit, only to turn on each other like hopped-up pro wrestlers when it comes time to send someone packing. One minute you and your comrades are learning you have a heretofore undiscovered taste for grilled rat, the next you're lowering the boom on some poor sap whose only mistake was trusting in you.

The knowledge that betrayal lurks around every corner adds a sense of urgency to the proceedings, an air of noticeable desperation and politicking. Sure, you caught and gutted all those fish, Steve, and we sure are thankful... but maybe I just don't like your face. Give my regards to the hotel bellhop.

How much better would television be if this conceit were added to every show. I'm sorry, Urkel. But the rest of us want you to leave.

Forget TV -- let's add Survivor's ever-present Sword of Damocles to every aspect of life: our jobs, our relationships, our penny-ante Web sites. Tribal vote tonight, Boychuk. Wouldn't get too comfortable if I was you.

Of course, that's where CBS has gotten in to trouble with Survivor. Stick three older folks on the same island with 13 young cusses, and what do you think will happen? That the old timers will be revered for their knowledge and life experiences? That they'll be treated with the respect that our elders deserve? Or will they be cast out to sea clinging to driftwood, lest those detestable fogies consume any more of the kids' precious oxygen?

If you answered yes to the first two choices, you obviously don't watch a lot of TV.

Sonja was the first to go. She came across as a delightful woman -- turns out she's a cancer survivor who visits Alzheimer's patients in her spare time. Which would be all well and good had she not tripped during one of Survivor's weekly contests, costing her tribe the match.

Needless to say, that put Sonja in real good with Survivor's young turks. Yeah, congratulations on beating back cancer, Sonja, they may as well have said. Now, why don't you take your shit and get out?

Following Sonja out the door was B.B., a retired contractor and a bit of a grump. B.B. worked hard, helped his tribe tremendously and seemed to be the exact sort of fellow you'd want to be stuck on an island with -- provided that Tina Louise and Dawn Wells weren't options. But B.B. was also a bit bossy, and that turned out to be his fatal flaw. Young people will tolerate many things, but we will not stand for some fossil telling us what to do. We've got dot-com stock options, you know.

B.B.'s departure left only Rudy. Poor, gruff, aged Rudy.

"Once Rudy's gone, I think we'll have a very strong team," sneered Stacey, a San Francisco attorney.

As it turns out, Stacey -- not Rudy -- got the boot. Seems her teammates decided she was the weak link in the chain, what with her constant whining, lack of physical prowess and a skill set that doesn't come in too handy on an unpopulated tropical islet. Filing writs and citing precedent don't bring home the bacon. Or the rat, as it were. Still, the breeze of tribal sentiment is clearly blowing against Rudy, and unless he figures out a way to MacGyver up a satellite dish from bamboo, a few mangoes and a stick of chewing gum, I don't think he'll be around to collect the winner's prize money.

What this says about our attitudes toward older folks is fascinating... or chilling for Baby Boomers who more and more find themselves on the north side of 50. Because what gave B.B. and Sonja the shaft off the coast of Borneo didn't just materialize out of the thin tropical air.

What's that, Gran'ma? You want to ensure you get what you deserve from Social Security? That's nice. But the rest of us voted to spend the budget surplus on pizza and beer. The tribe has spoken.

While that may be all well and good from the twin standpoints of entertainment and public policy, imagine you're squarely in CBS's aging, gray-haired target audience. All you want when you turn on the TV is a little JAG, maybe some Nash Bridges. Instead, what you get is a show where everyone in your age group is systematically rooted out and humiliated. You ask CBS for an evening of harmless diversions, and the network turns around and shows you a bunch of whippersnappers showing up members of your peer group. That's not going to go down too well over at the VFW, that's for sure.

What kind of network flips a figurative bird at the very people who make up the core of its audience? Would the WB air a show that paints teen-aged girls as the devil's own horde? Can you picture a UPN show calling for the slow and unyielding eradication of young males? And ABC... would it air a show that demonizes... um... well... heh.

Just who exactly watches ABC, anyhow?

The point is, CBS runs the risk of cheesing off its best customers. Lose the older crowd, and you've lost your reason to keep broadcasting. Unless you're counting on college fraternities around the country to start hosting Diagnosis Murder drinking parties.

For CBS, then, the course of action is clear. It must let Rudy be the sole Survivor, no matter how much it has to rig the game. Give Rudy a head start on all competitions. Surreptitiously drug all of his rivals with lewd, mind-altering barbiturates. Hell, dust off those basketball-playing robots from "The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan's Island" and reprogram them to kick some young-people ass. Either way, Rudy has to win, even if Survivor winds up more crooked than an East German swim meet.

The future of Nash Bridges depends on it.

Daytime TV: It's The Putts

By Gregg Wrenn on June 14, 2000 12:00 AM

As a grade schooler, it was a dream come true: A week at home, unable to go to school or do anything but lie motionless in front of the TV. Of course, when I was a grade schooler, The Jerry Springer Show was just a gleam in Satan's eye.

Nowadays, the possibility of a week in bed with nothing to do but stare at daytime television is as good a vaccine as anything Jonas Salk could ever dream up. "I Married My Sister!" on Springer or a day at work coughing up blood and swatting at the fever-induced leprechauns dancing through my hair?

I'll be there 10 minutes early, boss.

This is not a story about daytime talk shows, however. This is a story about a television event far more shocking: miniature golf. As in, miniature golf on television. More specifically, the 1999 Putt-Putt World Championships. Did I mention it was on TV?

OK, world. It's nice to see you've settled into the handbasket. This should be a short trip. Hell's just down the block.

It's not like miniature golf is a great affront to the lofty morals of our forefathers. There are very few people marrying their sisters on tattered blue Astroturf with a eight-foot windmill behind them, so Springer's got the Lowest Common Denominator Emmy sewed up once again.

Yet miniature golf is an affront to broadcasting morals. I mean, if you're going to showcase Putt-Putt on television, what won't you show? It was bad enough when ESPN2 featured the Magic: The Gathering World Championships. At the time I thought there was nothing less athletic on TV. I was wrong.

And it's not like the 1999 Putt-Putt World Championships was even real miniature golf. Real miniature golf is hot pink Astroturf so mangled it looks like it's straight off the field at Veterans' Stadium. Real miniature golf is the two guys behind you in black Poison muscle shirts, shouting back and forth about new Trans Am carbs. Real miniature golf is their girlfriends in powder blue tube tops and hair big enough to be seen from space with the naked eye, smacking gum and gauging your manhood solely on the basis of your ability to thread a 12-foot putt through three concrete obstacles and into the small tube that means an automatic hole-in-one.

Real miniature golf is the windmill. God, how I hate the windmill. A silent sentinel standing guard over the 12th hole, mocking my every attempt at miniature golfing immortality. One day, windmill. One day you too shall be judged and found lacking...

(Editor's note: The author has been slapped across the face and given another dose of medication. He shall return shortly.)

So the 1999 Putt-Putt World Championships has none of the elements that make for true miniature golf. What it does have is professional miniature golfers. Yes, you read that right: 'professional.' There is a pro Putt-Putt tour, and I say it's about damned time. After all, what red-blooded American child hasn't dreamed of one day barnstorming the country, making their living with a junior putter and pastel-colored golf ball?

The tournament consisted of three guys trudging through 18 windmill-less holes carpeted with the nicest turf this side of a hillbilly's El Camino. Each competitor gets only one shot to sink the putt, so if you don't get a hole-in-one, you're roadkill. The money is awarded like a Skins game: each hole is worth a certain amount of money, if two players both get an ace, the jackpot carries over to the next hole.

As easy as it is to make fun of these guys -- and it is very, very easy -- they were playing for a substantial amount of dough. The winner took home $6,750, which isn't bad considering how excited I get just by sinking the 19th hole that gives you a free game.

Despite the money, mini golf just isn't a made-for-TV sport. For one thing, there's the gallery. About a dozen shirtless fat guys holding giant novelty cups of beer actually followed the players from hole to hole. It's like the cheap-seat ticketholders at Lambeau or Soldier Field spend their off season following the professional miniature golf tour.

Then there are the commentators. Believe it or not, miniature golf requires both a play-by-play and a color man. I think this is mostly to drown out the incoherent obscenities of the gallery rather than imparting actual information. Seriously, what do you need to hear in order to follow a miniature golf tournament? Distance to the hole? Well, you can see it. Club selection? Rare was the hole that these guys needed to pull out the driver. Hell, there are signs at every tee telling you which number hole this is. Strategy? Well, you could either hit it straight at the hole or, if it was around the corner, try a bank shot. It's not like Jack Nicklaus designed the course.

My main problem with miniature golf on TV is that I don't consider it a real sport if I can do what the supposed athletes are doing. I can't even lay down a proper bunt, let alone jack a curveball into the bleachers. I can't evade an oncoming blitz and fire a frozen rope to Jerry Rice fifty yards down the field. I can't float a nine-iron 165 yards to within 18 inches of the pin.

What I can do is make hole-in-ones on a miniature golf course. Not as many as the professionals did, but then again, they had no windmill, no water and none of those four-foot tall volcano holes. They also didn't have to deal with tube tops and the overpowering aroma of hair spray. Then again, there are usually only two or three fat shirtless guys following me around the course.

Daytime TV is certainly not the wonderland of Scooby-Doo and breakfast cereal commercials that it once was. Where you once had to choose between 3-2-1 Contact and Star Blazers, now your choices involve sub-sports like putt-putt and the sub-humans on Springer. Of course, we could combine the two: "I Married My Sister on a Miniature Golf Course!" just might work.

Red, Red Whine

By Philip Michaels on June 9, 2000 12:00 AM

Paying attention to TV commercials is like paying attention to office gossip. Neither one is something you want to get yourself worked up in too fine a lather over. To fret obsessively is to court disaster. One minute, you're a happy employee. The next, you've begun a blood feud with Ed in accounting because of that crass remark he made about you and the girl from HR last week at the water cooler.

But every now and again, there comes a TV commercial that requires obsessive fretting, that demands fretting be ratcheted up to DefCon-1 levels. Such a commercial not only insults the intelligence of even the dimmest viewer, but so violates the basic tenets of human decency that it must be stopped, lest it tear away at the delicate fabric separating our society from anarchy.

And so you must raise your voice. You must bitch like there's no tomorrow. You must gripe and grouse and grumble until the last frame of the last videotape is sealed off in the coke oven. To do otherwise is to sit idly by as society slouches ever further toward Gomorrah. Silence equals complicity.

And when it comes to the TV commercial hawking the sale of raspberry-flavored wine, I can stay silent no more.

I do not remember the name of the product -- always the sign of an effective ad campaign. I do not care ever to know the name of the product. All I know is that someone is selling raspberry-flavored wine to gullible rummies and that I must put a stop to it before our society becomes irrevocably torn asunder.

It's not the product itself. Though, really -- raspberry-flavored wine?

I'm the furthest thing from a wine snob. Like any fine American of good Lutheran stock, I enjoy a good Merlot; who doesn't? But it's not like I go into paroxysms of rage whenever someone tries to have cabernet sauvignon with chicken or gushes about a petit syrah's rich, smoky flavor when any idiot knows that petit syrahs are tart, fruity wines. For all I know, cabernet sauvignon goes great with chicken and petit syrah tastes like battery acid.

But I do know one thing about the ol' vino. Pour enough food coloring into fermented grape juice to make it look like stage blood, slap a "Raspberry Wine" label on the bottle, and you have probably not created the next "Wine Spectator" cover story. You've created a cheap high for teenagers, winos, and lightweight drinkers who've never been able to handle the harsh aftertaste of peach schnapps.

Raspberry-flavored wine. It sounds like something Prince would sing about drinking right before he got his freak on.

All that would be horrifying enough. It's the commercial itself that moves raspberry-flavored wine out of the realm of mere annoyance and into the rarefied air of possible violation of the Geneva Accords.

The commercial features three couples made up entirely of -- and I apologize that there is no politically sensitive way of saying this -- filthy, horrible yuppies. These six sacks of human filth have converged on a lovely, rustic cabin on the shores of a scenic lake, even though it's obvious that their idea of "roughing it" entails a weekend when the cable TV goes out. The couples bid each other hello, mutter about the hectic pace of their workaday lives and break out the bottle of raspberry-flavored wine.

And that's when the trouble begins.

Someone's cell phone rings. And one of the horrible, yuppie filth -- she looks like a discount version of Andie MacDowell -- gets a wild look in her eye. "Maybe this is just the raspberry-flavored wine talking," her eyes seem to say, "but I'm about to do something wicked and naughty."

She grabs the cell phone and throws it into the lake.

This causes quite the giddy stir among her compatriots. Soon, everyone is following suit. Pagers, handheld organizers, wristwatches that tell the time in Budapest -- all go flying into the lake. By the commercial's end, one particularly carefree person has tossed a laptop computer into the drink. The rules are out the window. Chaos reigns. And, presumably, as the camera fades out, the raspberry wine-induced partner-swapping orgy can commence.

Hor-ri-ble.

I get the point the commercial is trying to make: Our raspberry-flavored wine is so outstanding that you'll forget all your troubles with just one sip. Of course, that could be because the fumes from the wine are melting your brain and -- Oh Christ, my eyes!

But at the risk of making a value judgment on the lives of these saps, I'm guessing that people who buy wine for its raspberry flavors are not the kind folks who can afford to toss hundreds of dollars' worth of technical gadgets into a lake, just because some low-rent Andie MacDowell clone went a little bit crazy on the booze. I'm just speculating here, but I'd wager that when the buzz clears and the six bozos shave the raspberry-flavored hair off their tongues, they're going to cry the tears of regret for their rash decision. And then they're going to tie Andie MacDowell's doppelgänger to the nearest anthill and leave her to die.

Put another way, I am not a violent man. But let's say that Andie MacDowell and the gang, their minds clouded by raspberry-flavored vapors, espy me working busily on my laptop -- a bit of machinery I paid a pretty penny to own. You want to know what happens if they try to toss my laptop into a watery grave? Their weekend in the woods winds up making "Deliverance" look like high tea at Windsor Castle.

That's why the raspberry-flavored wine advertisement is a big ol' hunk of Evil; it's feeding lies to the American people. It's telling them that not only is there a demand for raspberry-flavored wine, it's the drink of choice for upscale adults. It's telling them that they'll never be truly free until they grab the aforementioned wine and start doing Jell-O shots with it. But most tragically, it's telling them that if they hurl someone's personal electronic devices into a lake that they won't wind up with the heart cut out and served as an entrée to the local fauna.

Still, I bet that heart would taste great with a good cabernet sauvignon.

You'll Pay For This, Nielsenman!

By Lisa Schmeiser on June 7, 2000 12:00 AM

I never wanted to become network television's nemesis. I blame the Nielsen ratings, the people who provide them, and whomever decided the 1999-2000 ratings should come out immediately after the networks had debuted their fall lineup. They drove me to it, inculcated within my unbalanced brain the fervid desire to dish out sweet, cold revenge.

It goes without saying all of them are fools. Fools, I say! The Nielsens should have been measured and tallied after the networks announced their forthcoming shows, thus permitting me to coordinate boycotts in protest of boneheaded scheduling decisions.

I'm dreaming -- nay, hallucinating wildly, as is the wont of all nemeses. The networks don't give a hoot what I think, which is why I need to invent a death ray as leverage. Don't think the networks are the only targets of my wrath; I'm after their viewers too. Judging by the numbers, the average viewer loves Judging Amy and Providence; I can't sit through five minutes of either without running to get the scissors, then debating whether they'd be put to better use on the heroines' hairdos or plunged into my own eyeballs. A well-aimed death ray would prevent me from having such a debate. After I get the death ray up and running, the only debate I'll have is deciding who gets fried first.

Unfortunately, I don't even have a working prototype, which reduces my effectiveness as the network nemesis. And until I can scrape together the legions of smartly-uniformed lackeys and a mad scientist or two, I'm still stuck in Phase I of nemesishood, which seems to be the phase in which I accumulate the necessary data to justify my raging hatred. Fortunately, the networks have made that easy for me by cancelling every show I liked.

I loved Now and Again. It had a novel premise, fantastic chemistry between the lead actors and great writing. Glenn Gordon Caron had put together a great television show, something poised to fill the X-File's spooky-government-meets-unrequited-love-story shoes.

Unfortunately, instead of seeing the chance to nurture a cult audience, then break out in another season or two, CBS decided to refocus their schedule on the senile.

I loved Action. Jay Mohr's vaguely reptilian persona dovetailed nicely with the banal and demoralizing business of producing entertainment. I also liked Harsh Realm because it created a great yarn and gave viewers the chance to start thinking about how we create our own worlds. Both of these Fox shows pushed the envelope.

Of course, "pushing the envelope" might as well be synonymous with "please, cancel me." How else can one explain why soggy, self-absorbed yuppie drama Once and Again got renewed while poignant and realistic Freaks and Geeks got the shaft before, during, and after cancellation? Or how can you justify living in a world where the wretched Daddio is permitted to draw breath while the one half-hour comedy to give its viewers credit for having half a brain, SportsNight, got taken out back and shot?

I could get tiresome and start reciting all the great shows that got off to shaky ratings starts and then became the pillar around which networks built first-place schedules. That's a waste of time: neither network executives nor Average Viewers comprehend arguments that appeal to delayed gratification or the principle of rewarding a show for its persistent excellence.

So I'm just going to take my scissors and my remote control and go retreat to my secret volcano lair (you get one when you become a nemesis). I'm going to go work on my death ray, with the greater goal of using it to scare up the necessary billions I'll need to start my own television network. Lord knows until I do that, the forces of Nielsen and the average viewer will be working against me, foiling me in my attempt to watch novel network television shows. Curse you all!

Everybody Loves Reruns

By Monty Ashley on June 5, 2000 12:00 AM

Now that the season finales have finally made their way off the grand stage of network television, it's time for the best part of television: the reruns.

I'm not talking about the syndicated Friends reruns they show in the afternoons. I mean, I have nothing against them, except that the fifth time around, I'm pretty sure Ross and Rachel aren't going to patch things up in this episode. I'm talking about the reruns that are about to be showing up opposite Who Wants To Be A... actually, you know what? I think I'm going to do this without talking about that particular show. There's plenty of television to mock without trotting out Regis for a quick laugh.

Back to my subject: it's my theory that even the worst show on television can put out one good episode. And even the best show will put out a stinker. The trick, of course, is to watch only the good episodes.

At this point, you're thinking I wait until the rerun season to watch the good episodes from the bad shows. Nope. The bad shows don't live this long. If I waited until now to watch Secret Agent Man, I'd be fresh out of luck, wouldn't I? Oh, your plan sounded good at first, but it was grievously flawed. Because the clever part about rerun season is that this is when the shows that survived are all over the place.

And that means that natural selection has done my work for me. As long as I can steer clear of the wreackage that is Diagnosis Murder, whatever I run across will probably have some merit. This is where I benefit from a country full of viewers doing my market research for me. And meanwhile, I got to spend the regular season searching for hidden gems. Not that I found any this time around, but in a couple of years, who's going to be able to contradict me when I claim that The Beat was a great show? After all, I've been raving for years about Jason Bateman's brilliant It's Your Move (September, 1984), and no one's called me a liar yet.

And now that I can turn my attention to Buffy and The West Wing and whatever other shows are supposed to be good, I can rely on other people to have done my market research for me. I'm not just talking about places like this very website alerting me to the fact that "This Friday, the best-ever episode of Steve Harvey airs!" I'm talking about the buffoons I work with. They've been talking for months about this episode of Malcolm in the Middle or that episode of Angel, or the very special episode of The King of where Jerry Stiller gets his first period. Now I can watch the high spots of each of these shows without having to endure the chaff.

Not only that, this is where the networks trot out the extra episodes. Let's say you've got a mysterious attachment to Eddie Murphy's claymation extravanganza The PJs. Well, hey there, cowboy! Somebody paid good money for several hours of unseen PJs, and the network is danged if it won't put 'em on somewhere.

And the summer replacements! Whoo! For those of you that rolled your eyes when I mentioned Secret Agent Man, wait'll you see the short-term shows that clutter up the schedules in the coming weeks. Oh boy! And not only "series"; the rejected pilots will be shown. I remember getting to see the pilot of Tag Team several years ago. This was a show starring "Rowdy" Roddy Piper and Jesse "The Body" Ventura as wrestlers-turned-cops. And if it weren't for the summer replacements, I would never have had the chance to bore everyone I know to death with that story over and over again.

So, friends, do not bewail the summer reruns! Do not give in to the temptation to give your valuable television-watching time over to watching those Japanese porn videos! And whatever you do, do not turn off your set! I repeat, do not start reading Finnegans Wake instead! There is nothing James Joyce can give you that the rerun season cannot provide! Embrace the reruns! Search out the hidden gems!

Of course, having said all that, I should admit that while writing this, I was watching "Happy Gilmore" instead of a series show.

Be Careful What You Wish For

By Steve Lutz on June 2, 2000 12:00 AM

I've been reading the recent analyses of the upcoming fall network lineups with considerable bemusement. The common criticism seems to be that the shows of the "new" fall season look an awful lot like the refried pablum that made up the old fall season. Evidently, the programming powers-that-be believe that their brain-damaged audiences are incapable of concentrating long enough to follow an original premise. I think the articles also mentioned something about Regis Philbin. I don't know, I wasn't paying that much attention.

Well, count your blessings, gang, because I've come to remind you that it could be worse. And I can make that statement with authority, because it has been worse. The kind of worse that makes you want to claw your eyeballs out, then stuff them in your ears to drown out the miserable dialogue.

For there was once a time when original premises were a dime a dozen. And oh, God and baby Jesus, did they ever fucking suck.

Mind you, I don't blame Philip Michaels or the rest of the Vidiots for forgetting how bad things once were. The human brain has a remarkable capability for blocking out traumatic events. The intervening years that Phil spent concentrating and inhaling 3M Scotchgard probably didn't help, either.

In fact, I had forgotten those terrible days myself until a few weeks ago. I was thumbing through my friend Dave's extensive library of Porkin' Porkers magazine (from the esteemed publishers of Stuck Pig and All-Anal Adipose) when I ran across his dirty little secret: a cache of old TV Guide Special Fall Preview issues. Against my better judgment, I picked one up and began to skim through it.

And then it suddenly came rushing back to me. The absurd premises. The hateful, mismatched ensemble casts. The monkey crap. I'm not making some sort of ham-fisted analogy to bad programming here, either. I'm talking about real monkey crap!

It is said that those who forget history are doomed to watch repeats of it. Therefore, in order to prevent such evils from befalling us again, I consider it my solemn, painful duty to remind you of the horror that was. So brace yourself. Make little Billy leave the room. This is going to hurt.

I present to you. The New Fall Season. Of 1983.

The curtain opens on the surviving programs of '82. Prime time is awash with tired sitcoms that have worn out their welcomes, Dallas and its innumerable bastard children, and more cop shows than you can shake a nightstick at.

Representing the sitcoms, Diff'rent Strokes, Happy Days, Three's Company, Alice, The Jeffersons, and One Day at a Time all limp along as gimpy shadows of their former glory. Square Pegs and Too Close For Comfort have been axed, and Joanie evidently no longer Loves Chachi, yet Mama's damnable Family inexplicably still resides at NBC's 8:30 time slot.

The two lone bright spots are Family Ties and Cheers, which will be joined a year from now by The Cosby Show and Night Court. These four shows will soon become known as the Best Thursday Night Lineup in Television History. Until then, though, we're stuck watching Nell Carter waddle around the set of Gimme a Break! Sometimes she sings, causing at least one impressionable eleven year old Southern California boy to crumple into the fetal position and weep bitterly.

Meanwhile, you can't throw a rock without hitting a Carrington, or a Ewing, or a Channing, or a Colby. And, given that sleazy primetime soaps will continue to stink up the airwaves for over another decade, somebody should be throwing lots and lots of rocks.

On the adventure and cop show front, T.J. Hooker's William Shatner and The Fall Guy's Lee Majors are locked in an epic battle for the title of Most Washed Up. Pube-headed detectives Matt Houston and Magnum P.I., on the other hand, just look like they need to wash up. And thinking back on the number of hours I wasted on tripe like The Dukes of Hazzard, Fantasy Island, and The Love Boat makes me feel like washing up. Sadly, some stains just never come out.

Then, just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, here come the new shows! We'll start with those programs that dare to rise above total mediocrity. This should take about thirty seconds.

Hardcastle and McCormick has a cool theme song and a main character with the nickname "Skidmark."

I pity da foo' that don't watch The A-Team, since aforementioned foo' will miss out on a great cast, fun and snappy dialogue, and ridiculously contrived yet hugely entertaining plotlines.

Scarecrow and Mrs. King benefits from great chemistry between its two stars, and the chicks sure seem to dig that dude from "Tron."

Finally, Hotel, which is Swedish for "Love Boat on land," is a show about stuff that happens in a hotel. It comes on after my bedtime and it sounds kind of boring, so I will never watch an episode, but it will stick around for several seasons, so I'm guessing it has some redeeming qualities.

So in a year when The Good consists primarily of a large black man with a Mohawk and 400 pounds of gold around his neck shouting, "You ain't gettin' me on no plane, Hannibal," what do The Bad and The Ugly look like?

Well, I think they look a lot like The Rousters, "an action-adventure comedy about a carnival based in Los Angeles." If that scenario doesn't thrill you to your very core, maybe the wacky cast of characters, headed up by the likes of Hoyt Axton and Jim Varney, will. More likely, though, this show will just remind you of why people usually walk through the freak show very, very quickly.

While we're on the subject of freaks, I would be amiss not to mention Webster, which brings us the wholly original tale of a teeny-tiny black boy who is adopted by an upscale white family. See, it's different from that other tiny-black-adoptee show, because this little guy has a squeaky little voice instead of talent. I don't think there's a doubt in anybody's mind that Gary Coleman could eat Emmanuel Lewis alive. He couldn't convert him into urine, but he could eat him alive.

Too bad he never did. Webster, Ma'am, and George will continue to plague us with their cloying, family-approved storylines for the next four years.

New to Tuesday is NBC's Bay City Blues, Steven Bochco's next gig after Hill Street Blues ("Look, this one has "Blues" in the title, too! It must be good!"). It follows the misadventures of a rag-tag minor league baseball team, the Bay City Bluebirds, whose players include Bernie Casey, Dennis Franz, and Ken Olin.

Despite the fact that the Bay City Blues promo picture in the TV Guide Preview Edition features a gal with huge hooters, this turkey will last a marathon four episodes, and Bochco will later use this debacle as a source of comfort when Cop Rock folds after six. Hey, at least we didn't have to see Franz's acne-pitted ass-cheeks this time 'round.

Many viewers probably feel as if last year's departure of the long-running favorite, M*A*S*H, left a little hole in their heart. If you're one of these viewers, perhaps CBS's Monday night offering, After M*A*S*H will help to fill that void. I strongly doubt it, though, since the only thing the two shows have in common are Klinger, Colonel Potter, and Father Mulcahy, the three least appealing characters in the show's history. Within half a season, they will produce something that they managed to avoid through eleven years of the three-year Korean War: a massive bomb.

Moving from bombs to bombshells (insert rim shot here), We've Got it Made could easily be called Two Guys and a Blonde with Big Titties. As you may have guessed, it's about two guys that hire a blonde with big titties to clean their house. It's all very modern.

Perhaps the show could be forgiven its misogyny if it weren't for the fact that one of the two guys is Tom Villard. In case you're not familiar with his work, Villard is a Howie Mandel-alike (as if the world really needed two) whom you've seen in numerous small movie roles. And, trust me on this, you've hated him in every damn one.

At least he's not in Just Our Luck, a tepidly offensive sitcom about an unsuccessful TV weatherman who inherits a genie named Shabu, in the form of T.K. Carter. The show itself is not nearly as interesting as what the pre-PC TV Guide has to say about it: "What's more, Shabu is black. That's just what Keith needs in 1983 -- a slave." I suppose we can be glad the show disappeared from the face of the planet before Shabu got a chance to whip up a batch of magical genie-style collard greens 'n' chitlins.

Coming Fridays to NBC is Mr. Smith, a show about a super-intelligent talking orangutan who works as a special consultant to the U.S. government. Sort of like if Janet Reno had her own sitcom. Fortunately for those of us with multiple functioning synapses, Mr. Smith will be axed after less than half a season. I attribute its death to the fact that none of the early episodes included a scene in which Mr. Smith chucks a steaming handful of poo at Ted Kennedy.

The loss of Mr. Smith will leave many of us asking, "Can a primate carry a prime time television show?" We will have to wait until next season's introduction of Who's the Boss? to find out the answer. Which is, in fact, "Good God, no!" Lucky for Tony Danza his young co-star Alyssa Milano will begin developing breasts midway through season one, causing toilet paper usage to nearly triple over the next four years in homes containing teenage boys.

Okay, this doesn't really fall under the heading of prime time, but I have to bring up this new show that comes on right after the news at 11:30. It stars seven vertical bars of varying colors. They stand side by side without moving for five and a half hours. The soundtrack is an incredibly grating high-pitched tone that plays on and on until you want to jam two sharpened pencils through your eardrums. It's not a great show, but it beats the other option, which is a painfully unfunny comedy talk show called Thicke of the Night. I mean, I've got my standards.

There are many more aborted programming fetuses I could mention, but I think you've suffered just about enough. Still, lest you continue to harbor the idea that an original premise is the answer to all of today's TV woes, allow me to remind you of one final program. It's about this guy. He fights crime. He turns into animals. He's called Manimal. He will survive for eight episodes, then go down in history as possibly the worst show ever to grace the airwaves.

And you guys have the gall to bitch about a season full of half-assed Friends rehashes?

You should be ashamed.

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