TVSquad

Did you miss the series premiere of V last week? If so, no need to despair, because it's on SlashControl and I've embedded it below. The show scored good ratings, and Jason had great things to say about the premiere, noting some similarities to Battlestar Galactica. He was also glad to see how the writers updated the storyline from the classic 1980s miniseries.

"I wasn't sure how they could modify the storylines from the series I remembered to accurately find parallels to our war on terrorism, and the terrorist movements themselves, but they did," writes Jason. "And they did it all while staying true to the struggles and fears that's kept the original series fresh in our minds for 26 years now."

Have the Visitors arrived on Earth with a message of peace? Time will tell, but not before they fully and irretrievably embed themselves into our society.

(S01E01) We were promised a modern re-imagining of the classic '80s V mini-series, and that's exactly what we got. Gone were the allusions to World War II Nazism and the treatment of Jews in Europe. Instead, we're offered allusions to the war we've been fighting for eight years now.

I wasn't sure how they could modify the storylines from the series I remembered to accurately find parallels to our war on terrorism, and the terrorist movements themselves, but they did. And they did it all while staying true to the struggles and fears that's kept the original series fresh in our minds for 26 years now.

Even better, I watched this with my 10-year old son who's never seen the original, and he was absolutely riveted. Everything I loved about V back then is here, and there's so much more to get excited about. I always thought V should be an ongoing series, and even though we eventually got one, I think this time they've finally got it right.

ABC's remake of V starts on November 3 (for four episodes, then it's going to take a break). Here are the first ten minutes of the pilot (even though the video says eight minutes, it's over 9 minutes long).

It's an effective opening, introducing all of the characters and showing us how the aliens come to our planet. If something happened like this in real life, would people really stand in the street and point and go to the top of buildings to get a better look or would we see a big ship and completely freak out and run out of town?

Remember when the networks hardly did anything with their TV shows online? Heck, remember when we didn't even have official web sites and fan sites for our favorite shows? If we wanted to talk about, say, Knot's Landing, we had to open our windows and yell to our neighbors, "Can you believe Val did that last night?!" Either that or send a letter via mail, and that took days.

But now we have web sites for every show, and fans of ABC's remake of V have already put up a bunch of sites for that show (which premieres November 3 ):

If you were bummed out by the death (?) of Juliet on the season finale of Lost (honestly, who the hell knows what's going to happen in the last season with that storyline), you'll get to see Elizabeth Mitchell on ABC's new version of V this fall. But is Juliet gone from Lost? In this interview with Michael Ausiello, she addresses that question and actually gives a shout out to fans of the show.

One of the best things about being the King of TV is that many times people will ask me questions about shows I have never heard of.

Last week, a young man contacted me through my MySpace page to ask me if I knew the name of a certain TV show. He described it thusly, "I believe it may have been British and/or on PBS. It was not narrated but had an eclectic cast (one of whom was deaf). The show was various vignettes, mostly science based from the ones I remember. The one I really remember is the guy who was making bubbles with cigarette smoke. The biggest clue I can give you was the logo. At the beginning of the show they would show the name, then turn it on its side and reflect it in a mirror. It looked like a cricket, then it bounced off..."

Well, I racked my brain and googled into the early morning but to no avail. I had to admit defeat. Now here is the great part.

ABC has announced casting for some of the networks upcoming pilots:

Scott Wolf will play the lead in a still-untitled comedy for ABC taking place in a law firm, despite only being twelve years old. Okay, he's actually pushing forty, but seriously, the dude looks like he never ages.

Charles Esten will star in another comedy pilot for ABC called American Family. Esten will play the patriarch of a middle class family. One assumes they'll do and say comedic things.

Beats me.

As I mentioned in my Five Canceled Shows post, this show was the most critically-acclaimed new show of the fall season and it had the nice time slot after Lost on Wednesday nights? It had a really strong cast and an intriguing pilot. So what the hell happened? The LA Times investigates, talking to the show's creator Hank Steinberg.

The whole thing was odd from the get-go, as The Nine's very first episode didn't even the numbers that ABC thought it would, and then the ratings fell from there. People who didn't like the show can say that the show didn't live up to the pre-season hype or the quality of the pilot, but that doesn't explain why the pilot wasn't watched by more people.

One thing the article says that I don't quite believe is that the show hasn't been officially canceled by the network. Yeah, if you want to get into semantics. The network says the show might be back in March or April, but at the same time it pulled the show because of low ratings and hasn't ordered anymore.

This doesn't look good.

ABCNews.com has posted a description of a special episode of 20/20 that's "Coming Up" this Wednesday, November 29 at 10pm. That's when the new drama The Nine usually airs, and I've checked three TV schedules online and they all say that The Nine is supposed to air as usual. And the episode last week had coming attractions of the November 29th episode, with no mention that it was going to be pre-empted for a week. There's been no official press release from ABC about it, and even the schedule at the network's site still lists The Nine as airing on that night, but the description of the 20/20 episode is on there too, so maybe they just haven't changed the grid yet.

This is not a good sign at all. Sometimes the networks pull low rated shows during sweeps, but this November sweeps period is about to end. Maybe ABC wasn't happy with last week's ratings of the show and have decided to shift gears and take it off the air for now? Or for good? I have a feeling this might be one of the "let's put the remaining episodes on the web" kind of deals, like Kidnapped. Or maybe this is a temporary thing and the show will be back in December.

(Thanks to Tom for the tip)

(S01E07) So we finally find out what Jeremy did in the bank to make Lizzie so upset and make him feel so guilty. One of the gunmen took the both of them to a hallway in the back of the bank, and while he was distracted, Jeremy ran for a back door! He actually wanted to get out, leaving Lizzie there, but felt really guilty about it. And now she's pregnant and they can't stay together and they have to tell his parents about it.

(S01E06) The people who don't like this show anymore (after the pilot) don't know what they're talking about. Are they expecting some sort of big conspiracy plotline? Something supernatural? A big mystery to be unveiled at the end? Do they expect something darker because of the bank robbery/flashback device the show is using? Do they expect the entire show to be set in the bank? They're watching the wrong show. This is a character-driven drama, period, and a damn good one.

They're into hour two of the hostage drama (in the flashbacks), and we get to see how they came to decide who should be the hostage released from the bank...

(S01E05) As you can tell from the episode title, tonight's episode focused exclusively on Jeremy. Ha! Just kidding. But it didn't really focus completely on Eva either. There was also plenty about the Lucas/Randall relationship, Franny, Kathryn and the baby, and the new Odd Couple, Nick and Egan.

"Can one divorced man and one soon to be divorced man share an apartment, without driving each other crazy?"

It used to be that getting a full season order was the best news a new show could get, but nowadays I think shows are just as happy to get a few additional episodes OK'd.

Four new shows have been given the green light for more scripts. Three of them are on ABC: The Nine, Men In Trees, and Help Me, Help You, and one NBC's Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (yeee-hah). Of course, this is no guarantee that the shows will be awarded with a full season, but it's certainly a sign of hope (and also cool to see the networks actually getting behind shows that are quality but are struggling).

For those keeping score, the shows that have gotten a full season already are Heroes, Jericho, Shark, Brothers & Sisters, and Ugly Betty.

(S01E04) It's interesting how this show is becoming something different than how it started. Oh, the set up is the same, a group of strangers coming together after a horrifying bank hostage situation. But the stage it's in now is intriguing. The group started out as complete strangers who just happened to find each other together at a bank. Then, they find themselves becoming great friends and even meeting on a regular basis for dinner to help each other through this. And now comes the inevitable third stage: still great friends, but little differences in opinion are starting to create little irritations and disagreements.

And we find out that one of the bank robbers had a chance to escape, but decided to go back into the bank...

(S01E03) Tonight was a great night for openings. First Jericho, and now The Nine. The opening scene wasn't just tension-filled, it was a great piece of filmmaking, showing the first hour of the bank robbery, where everyone was, and what happened. One of those well-done scenes that have a lot of characters and a lot of things happening, but you know exactly what's going on and what everyone is doing. And it clued us into how this show is going to operate in each episode. They're not just showing us what happened with a flashback, it's almost as if each episode is a new look at what happened, not just a flashback rehash of stuff we already know.