The veracity of television network executives is not something to be taken at face value. Overall, they may be as unreliable as career politicians and used car salesmen.
It’s refreshing to find the occasional network honcho who may actually be telling the truth, even when his ambiguous phrasing of a pronouncement seems all too obviously questionable at best.
That was the case at last summer’s TV press tour for the FOX network when President of Entertainment Kevin Reilly proclaimed he would “look at” the return of “Breaking In” when the network revisits its “comedy block.”
When network chieftains tell you they will “look at” a particular program, you must resign yourself to the fact that it has as much chance of being resurrected as does the singing career of Vanilla Ice.
But then, Reilly did more than reconsider the future of Christian Slater in his role of the master of manipulation at an offbeat high-tech security firm.
As became clear at the winter TV press tour, “Breaking In” returns to the Tuesday night lineup, along with “Raising Hope” and “New Girl,” the latter starring the irrepressible Zooey Deschanel, recently nominated for a Golden Globe Award for her FOX series.
Network president Reilly may have been cagey with his answers to the gathering of the nation’s TV critics when he seemed less than forthcoming about the future prospects for the return next fall of “House” and “Fringe.”
If you love “Terra Nova” and think it is great family entertainment, Reilly offered some hope for a second season, but did say that there were “14 dramas on the network schedules this year” and most of them have “come and gone.”
Expensive production costs are an obvious factor for the fate of “Terra Nova,” and the handwriting is on the wall – kind of like a Washington stimulus package typically gone bad.
One of the most promising new shows of the mid-season is the one-hour crime drama “Alcatraz,” a bizarre supernatural thriller in which the most notorious criminals reappear 50 years after they vanished.
When San Francisco Police Department detective Rebecca Madsen (Sarah Jones) is assigned to a grisly homicide case, a fingerprint leads her to a seemingly impossible suspect – an Alcatraz inmate who died over 30 years ago.
Given that she had family members who worked at the prison, the detective’s interest is immediately piqued, and even more so, when a federal agent (Sam Neill) tries to impede her investigation.
Madsen gets partnered with an amateur Alcatraz expert and comic book enthusiast (Jorge Garcia), and they discover that the Alcatraz felon is still alive and has not aged a day since 1963.
The press notes indicate that the show investigates the shocking reappearance of 302 of Alcatraz’s inmates. Chasing one suspect a week could result in a decent run for this new series.
“The Finder” is a quirky, one-hour procedural centering on Iraq war veteran Walter Sherman (Geoff Stults), a remarkable man with the extraordinary ability to help people find what is irretrievably lost.
A severe injury during the war caused brain damage for Walter, but he acquired a strange power to find almost anything for just about anybody.
Because of his rare skills, Walter suffers occasional social ineptitude, general paranoia and case-related tunnel vision. That makes him a difficult person to work with, which of course is good enough reason for a TV series.
Kiefer Sutherland’s eight-season run on the Emmy Award winning series “24” made him one of the most definitive faces on the network.
Not surprisingly, Sutherland’s return to a TV series is eagerly anticipated in the uplifting drama “Touch,” the latest venture from “Heroes” creator Tim Kring.
Sutherland stars as a single father who discovers his mute 11-year-old autistic son possesses an extraordinary gift, the ability to see hidden patterns that connect people all over the world.
The severely autistic young boy shows little emotion, but he busies himself with cast-off cell phones, disassembling them and manipulating the parts, allowing him to see the world in his own special way.
Just as a social worker tries to intervene in the child’s life, Sutherland discovers his son has a gift of staggering genius but needs his father’s help to decipher the meaning of his discoveries.
Though FOX TV network is celebrating its 25th anniversary, it remains a relatively young network. “The Simpsons” has been on the FOX airwaves almost since day one.
Primetime animation has been an enormous part of the legacy, brand and identity of the FOX network. You can thank Bart Simpson for that.
Not surprisingly, FOX is the natural home for an animated series based on the hit film “Napoleon Dynamite,” the comic adventures of an awkward teenager and his offbeat family.
The original cast from the film lends their voices to their now-animated roles. John Heder is the voice of Napoleon, who faces down bullies and follows his own path while navigating small-town life in rural Idaho.
The teenager Napoleon, convinced he’s destined for greatness, spends his days practicing ninja moves, soul dancing and bragging about his girlfriend in Oklahoma whom nobody has ever seen.
Napoleon’s allies include Pedro (Efren Ramirez), his unflappable best friend who has recently been elected class president, and Deb (Tina Majorino), an incredibly sweet girl who sees the good in Napoleon and dreams of someday being his wife.
Oh yeah, you probably already know this: “American Idol” is back again for its eleventh season. Like it or not, we are stuck with host Ryan Seacrest for another run.
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
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