TVSquad

The networks have had a quiet summer, quietly introducing scripted bomb after scripted bomb, so they're certainly ready to jump into the new fall season. And It looks to be an interesting one. ABC is scheduling a two-hour block of new comedies on Wednesdays as the sitcom tries to make a comeback.

Even more risky is NBC handing 10:00 to Jay Leno every night of the week. Everyone's waiting to see how that one plays out. FOX is banking on huge positive buzz for Glee to make it a hit, while ABC is hoping FlashForward can pick up where Lost is leaving off when it wraps its run this season.

To help you with it all, TV Squad has put together a handy calendar of all the premieres so you can schedule responsibly in this busy time of TV watching. Some nights have as many as twelve premieres scheduled, so you might need to invest in a few more DVRs to catch all your favorites; Monday's still look grim. Bookmark this page and you'll have it handy to help see you through.

For those who don't know, DC Comics is more than superheroes and spandex. Under their Vertigo imprint, they've brought such sophisticated fare as The Sandman, Preacher and 100 Bullets to the masses. And by masses, of course, I mean the sixty-two people still reading comics.

This forthcoming season sees DC/Vertigo's Human Target make the leap to the small screen. And now a much lesser known property is following its lead as NBC has picked up Midnight, Mass. as a live-action drama. Over two series, Midnight, Mass. ran a total of fourteen issues from 2002-2004.

While it was a little odd that the "screener" of Glee we got was the exact same episode that FOX aired after American Idol in the spring, the rest of these shows were truly new. Dramatic offerings included FOX's loose adaptation of the DC Comics property Human Target and Past Life. On the comedy side they offered us screeners for The Cleveland Show, Brothers, Sons of Tucson and the aforementioned Glee.

After enduring the screener for Do Not Disturb last season on FOX, I could only hope that these offerings were at least better than that offense to the senses. And they were. Well, most of them. Unfortunately, it seems that FOX has at least one Do Not Disturb in them every season. Other than that, one of these shows was far better than I expected, another a bit worse, and a third one stands as one of the better pilots I've ever seen.

Well this is promising news indeed. Human Target is one of the most interesting concepts in the DC Universe and the Peter Milligan Vertigo series of the same name was one of the highlights of the early 2000s. The story centers on Christopher Chance, who takes on the identity of his clients to protect them from pending threats and help them eliminate them. He's a master of disguise in a way that Face/Off would envy. And now he has a name.

The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that Mark Valley has been cast as Christopher Chance in the Fox pilot for Human Target. Valley has been a staple on the screen for years, most prominently for three years on Boston Legal and currently recurring on Fringe, where he has mastered the creepy stare. The guy can go from comedic to heartfelt to bad-ass to, as I said, creepy, and diversity is what you need for this role. This is a great casting choice. He's not too young, he's big and he's got an intensity about him. Man, I hope Fox picks this up even more now! Maybe Valley can go in to FOX in disguise and vote to go to series.

Fox has inked a deal for a bunch of new pilots for next season. They include such titles as The Station, Walorsky, Two Dollar Beer, Sons of Tucson and Human Target.

Among them, Human Target is of the most interest to me. It's an adaptation from a DC Comics character. He's a bodyguard named Christopher Chance that assumes the identity of the person he is supposed to protect. Properly done, this could become a companion show or successor to 24 (particularly since Prison Break is ending).

This isn't even the first television adaption for The Human Target, as Rick Springfield starred in a brief series about the same character in 1990. However, things were different then. The environment is better for such a program now, assuming they take it seriously and don't make it too cartoon-like (although I could argue that 24 is cartoon-like in its presentation).

So which of the new Fox pilots do you find interesting?