Current mood:	hopeful
Current music:	Coldplay's "Violet Hill"

When in doubt, steal from the Brits …
I haven’t yet had a chance to catch the new “Indy” film, though my daughter reports from the beach (where she’s on holiday with a classmate’s family) that it’s well worth seeing. Hopefully I’ll get to it soon.

In the meantime, there’s a bunch of stuff I’d like to catch up on, starting with the much scaled-down new fall network prime time TV season recently announced.

The most notable thing about the new fall shows is that there are so few of them — because the writers strike basically wiped out pilot season for the networks. The new shows picked up for the coming season were mostly signed on the basis of outlines rather than pilot episodes.

Because of this, several of the networks opted for Americanized versions of previously produced imports. Included in this group are ABC’s remake of the BBC’s acclaimed “Life on Mars,” about a current day police detective who gets hit by a car and somehow wakes up back in the politically incorrect 1970s; superproducer Jerry Bruckheimer’s CBS remake of “Eleventh Hour,” about a team that investigates dangerous science (with Brit Rufus Sewell taking over from Patrick Stewart, who starred in the 2006 original for Britain’s ITV); and CBS’ “Worst Week,” a reworking of the 2004-2006 BBC comedy “The Worst Week of My Life,” which starred Ben Miller and was seen over here on BBC America. In the new version, Kyle Bornheimer stars as the guy who can’t do anything right in trying to impress his impending in-laws. Also, NBC has bought “Crusoe,” a new British-produced 13-part series based on the classic “Robinson Crusoe.” Philip Winchester stars as the castaway and Sean Bean is seen as his father (presumably in flashbacks). No word on who will play his man Friday. NBC is reworking the noisy Australian battling-mother-daughter sitcom “Kath & Kim,” this time starring Selma Blair and Molly Shannon.

Another upshot of the writers strike is that some of last year’s new shows that never really got established before the strike cut them off are getting another chance this fall, including ABC’s “Pushing Daisies,” “Private Practice” and “Dirty Sexy Money,” none of which I ever got into watching. Plus ABC picked up a midseason run of NBC leftover “Scrubs” for some unfathomable reason. And, like a cockroach, “According to Jim” just won’t go away.

The only new show really generating any advance buzz is season ratings champ Fox’s “Fringe,” a sci-fi series from “Lost” creator J.J. Abrams about a sort of “X-Files” type team. And the buzz is mostly because it’s from J.J. Abrams, since very little is known about the show itself, in typical Abrams fashion, except that it involves a female FBI agent, a scientist and a bad-boy genius who investigate unexplained phenomena.

ABC’s version of “Life on Mars,” starring Irish actor Jason O’Mara (playing an American), already has run into turbulence before it’s even been shot, with executive producer David E. Kelley bowing out to concentrate on the final season of “Boston Legal.” I’m skeptical about this one, mainly because most Americanizations of quirky British hits in recent years have been completely botched (“The Office” being the notable exception, and it got off to a very rough start). Part of what made the original “Mars” so compelling (besides stars John Simm and Philip Glenister) was the typical British attention to minute period detail (usually absent in U.S. period pieces). Also, the show’s ambiguity (again, not a hallmark of most prime time fare in the U.S.) about whether the misplaced cop actually had traveled back in time or was simply in a coma. You can hardly imagine the U.S. version following through with how the British version wrapped up the second and final series with an ending that may have included the lead character’s suicide. And since it’s been given the plum slot after “Grey’s Anatomy” on Thursdays (“Lost” won’t begin its season until January), the new “Mars” is going to have to try to hold on to as much of its lead-in audience as it can — which makes ambiguity something likely to get tossed in favor of concentrating on weren’t-the-seventies-tacky culture clash moments.

By the way, I wrote about the original British version back in July 2006. You read about it here:
http://billking.livejournal.com/24623.html

Other new shows that might merit at least a look: Simon Baker as a celebrity “psychic” who helps the cops while searching for the serial killer who murdered his family in “The Mentalist.” … “Harper’s Island,” a CBS murder mystery set on an island off Seattle where a group has assembled for a wedding (likely due in midseason). It’s been described as a cross between “10 Little Indians” and “Scream.” Plus it’s on an island, so throw “Lost” into that mix, too. … “Dollhouse,” a Fox adventure from “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” producer Joss Whedon about a mercenary team that has personalities “imprinted” on them for missions and then wiped clean. Eliza Dushku is in the cast.

I’m not sure what to make of “My Own Worst Enemy,” a new NBC series starring Christian Slater as a suburban efficiency expert who has a double life as some sort of secret agent/trained killer. But not being much of a fan of smarmy Jay Mohr, I doubt I’ll check out “Project Gary” (wanna bet that title changes?), in which he plays a recently divorced painter returning to dating. “The Inn,” a Jerry O’Connell Fox sitcom about the staff at a hip New York hotel, doesn’t sound very promising, either. And talk about your unlikely concepts: CBS’ “The Ex List” stars Elizabeth Reaser (“Grey’s Anatomy”) as a woman who is told by a fortune teller that she must marry within a year or be forever single, and that she’s already met the man she’ll marry but just doesn’t know it yet. Or something like that.

Keifer Sutherland’s Jack Bauer and “24” won’t return for the season-that-wasn’t until after the first of the year, Fox says, but instead the network will have a two-hour stand-alone “24” movie in the fall to set up the new season, which has been completely written in advance to hopefully avoid those mid-run plot lurches that have plagued the show.

The rest? Mostly a mishmash of bad (but cheap) reality and game shows (the mainstay of fourth-place NBC’s schedule now) and retreads, such as NBC’s revival of “Knight Rider” and the CW’s desperate stab at a new “90210.”

It’s enough to make you wish they’d bring back the good old made-for-TV movie of the week!

AT THE MOVIES: I went with my daughter to see “The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian,” which she found even more enjoyable than the first “Narnia” film. I thought it was well done, moved briskly, had an engaging cast of young Brits, and the special effects were quite good. I did find the Aslan-the-godlike-lion-to-the-rescue ending a bit predictable, though. For more of my daughter’s thoughts on summer movies (including “Indiana Jones”), check out her new Live Journal blog:
http://ojpking.livejournal.com/

QUICKIES: I was sorry to see that Dick Martin of “Laugh-In” fame had died at age 86. There was so much always going on in “Laugh-In” and so many cast members and guest stars that I think the marvelous interplay between Martin and the late Dan Rowan often went unnoticed or at least underestimated. Martin went on to direct, including episodes of the classic “Bob Newhart Show.” By the way, does anyone besides me recall Rowan & Martin’s first prime-time variety hour? It was the 1966 summer replacement for the “Dean Martin Show.” … The Chairman of the Board hit No. 2 on the album chart last week with the release of a remastered version of his “Nothing But the Best” hits collection. I know my pals Al Sussman and Brad Hundt have already groused over on Al’s blog about the fact that “Nothing But the Best” isn’t the quintessential single-disc Sinatra collection, but as they concede, there really isn’t a single-disc Sinatra hits collection that has everything you’d want. And this one does have a lot of great stuff, so if you don’t want to shell out for a box set but want to enjoy classic Frank, this very nice-sounding set is a good choice. … It’s good news that USA has ordered an eighth season of “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” (though only 16 episodes instead of 22), but I’m not pleased that Julianne Nicholson’s partner for Chris Noth’s detective is returning, replacing Alicia Witt, whom I found much more appealing. Hopefully, the pattern this season of splitting the series equally between the superior Vicent D’Onofrio episodes and the lower-rated Noth ones won’t hold. We need more Goren and Eames! … If you haven’t caught the trailer for the upcoming “X-Files” movie, here it is:
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/36716


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