For everyone that loves TV, there is nothing more simultaneously terrifying and awe-inspiring than pilot season.
As usual, network and cable providers have whipped up a horrifying batch of new programs with a sprinkling of potentially watchable new shows.
No one should enter the season of cultural swamp unprepared, so Voice has decided to gear all potential viewers up for the new season of hits and misses.
Mercy (NBC)
A brand new hospital drama focusing around a group of three nurses, played by Michelle Trachtenberg, Jamie Lee Kirchner and Taylor Schilling, “Mercy” is going a different route than the typical hospital show by focusing on the friendship between the three coworkers. Still, it is a hospital show. “Mercy” is going to have to work hard to stand out in the already crowded genre of medical dramas, but it appears so rigidly formulaic that it is almost guaranteed to last a couple of seasons.
Glee (Fox)
Fox has had some ridiculous ideas, but the super high concept “Glee” managed to attract quite a following when the pilot aired this summer.
The story of a renewed high school glee club and the challenges that the group and its participants face will form the crux of the show, but it is bolstered by its twisting of modern pop songs into musical numbers.
In an already musical saturated entertainment industry, I am sure that “Glee” will be able to last.
Cougar Town (ABC)
ABC has been betting on over-sexualized garbage since “Desperate Housewives,” and “Cougar Town” does not plan on trying to break the mold.
Starring Courtney Cox as a divorced and depressed mother, the show follows her relationships with those of a slightly younger age set. Bill Lawrence of “Scrubs” fame is the creator, which gives it some potential, but the trailer is almost unimaginably bad. I’ll give it five episodes.
The Cleveland Show (Fox)
The first “Family Guy” spin-off, “The Cleveland Show” centers around the titular African American character as he moves to a new town and starts a new family. I, for one, have been under Seth McFarlane overload since the fifth season of “Family Guy,” but there is enough of a rabid following of the former to support “The Cleveland Show.”
Accidentally on Purpose (CBS)
Jenna Elfman of “Dharma and Greg” infamy is getting a shot at TV redemption with “Accidentally on Purpose,” the story of an older woman who has a one night stand with a slacker and finds herself pregnant. It seems like the writers might have seen the trailer for “Knocked Up” and thought “Hey, we could do that!”
Avoid this show at all costs.
Save yourself, and then save the children.
Flashforward (ABC)
ABC gained a rabid cult following with the complex mysteries of “Lost,” and it appears that it hopes to do it again with “Flashforward.”
The intriguing premise is a global event that allows every human to see a flash of his or her lives six months in the future.
The show gives itself plenty of openings for drama with many of the complex and open-ended questions it asks in the pilot.
“Flashforward” appears to be the new show to bet on, and with a set end point and an intriguing philosophical question about the nature of fate.
