Grid Effect

A couple highly rated programs are on tap tonight, so we figured it convenient to preview this evenings network lineups. We didn’t watch any television beyond the OSU-PSU basketball game and rewatch the new Wire episode, so we are left with little material. Anyhow, though we aren’t exactly fans of anything airing, there is a variety of options to choose from so why not do an overview?

NBC

8pm: Deal or No Deal
Our feelings about this show have been made quite clear. But this week, we hear if you pick out a suitcase containing $100,000 or more, Howie Mandel douses you in that head slicker he liberally shines his dome with. Of course, that could always just be Mandel perspiration, in which case we wouldn’t wish that on anybody. See, if they actually did the former we might watch, but the show probably has to be moved to Nickelodeon for anyone to be doused with anything.

9-11pm: Law and Order
Two different episodes, probably a remarkably similar premise. We imagine a coed turns up dead and the main suspect is the boyfriend. In fact, they know it’s the boyfriend. Why? Because she was such an incorrigible bitch when they were dating (in TV Land, this qualifies as motive). But we are all stunned when it turns out to be her landlord or something. Who tearfully (yet comically) confesses while testifying that he didn’t mean to kill her…just scare her because she lead him on and he offered her a discounted rent as a result. This is surely how these episodes will go.

For those who don’t know, when Richard Belzer isn’t disparaging conservative politicians on Real Time, he plays a homicide detective on NBC.

ABC

8pm: Wife Swap
Oh My God! Two families with different lifestyles and different approaches to domestic duties switch matriarchs, and combative hilarity ensues, culminating with one of the husbands crying and one of the children cursing their TV mom.

9-11pm: Lost
Two hour season premiere, bitches. Gonna go home, get my beer on, get my Lost on. Actually, our enthusiasm is a farce, we can’t stand this show. Apparently they’re going to run notes across the screen telling you facts about each of the characters, which is about the laziest narrative structure imaginable. What good are these facts if they never materialize on screen? It could just be footnotes from past seasons for new viewers they’re anticipating (due to the writer’s strike), but either way it strikes us as tacky. Oh, and ABC is referring to this as an “enhanced version”. Meaning, if you were lucky ABC would always put into text what they can’t fit into plot.

FOX

8pm: American Idol
If you want to see a middle-aged British man cut seventeen year-olds down to size because they are unfit to compete on an elaborate talent show, no one does it better than American Idol. Its genius is its simplicity. Tonight they’re in Miami, so he’s bound to put some impoverished immigrants in their place to the amusement of the masses.

9pm: Moment of Truth
Unlike its lead-in, at least the people get paid for the national exploitation. Of course, after the divorce and other inevitable legal issues, that take-home prize will probably be swallowed up by lawyers. Still, the chance for a pay day is there.

CBS

8pm: The New Adventures of Old Christine
The show that supposedly broke the Seinfeld curse that nobody watches. If Julia Louis-Dreyfus hadn’t gotten an Emmy for her role on this after it was already canceled a couple years ago, this show would have been long forgotten. Instead, Elaine gets a bullshit Emmy on name recognition and it continues to haunt the airwaves for two more years. Anyways, there are two episodes on tonight.

9pm: Criminal Minds
If these shows even remotely resembled the country we lived in, one would assume that the U.S. had a Gaza Strip level of violence and you are lucky if you make it to work alive. Tonight’s episode details the investigation of home invasion murders, which will probably be treated like another day at the office. Christ, even The Wire treats a home invasion murder as something out of the ordinary, and it is set in fucking Baltimore.

10pm: CSI: NY
“Mac and the team find human blood on the crown of the Statue of Liberty, leading them on a race against time to save a famous musician from death at the hands of a vigilante.”

This is the episode description on CBS’ website. It sounds more like Treasure Hunters than a cop procedural. Of course, nothing about any CSI has ever resembled a realistic crime investigation.

Enjoy your bevy of options. While we’re not going to watch any of this, at least there is a wide variety of material, even if it’s all easily dismissed.