Tonight's TV: Monday September 17

For the next couple weeks, I'm going to lay out the new shows that are premiering and the returning series. Big night tonight on Fox...Prison Break is back, and K-Ville makes it's debut.

** Indicates new or returning show premiere

ABC
8:00 Wife Swap (R)
9:00 Wife Swap (R)
10:00 Supernanny (R)


CBS
8:00 How I Met Your Mother (R)
8:30 New Adventures of Old Christine (R)
9:00 Two and a Half Men (R)
9:30 Rules of Engagement (R)
10:00 CSI: Miami (R)

CW
8:00 Everybody Hates Chris (R)
8:30 Everybody Hates Chris (R)
9:00 Girlfriends (R)
9:30 The Game (R)

Fox
8:00 Prison Break **
9:00 K-Ville **

NBC
8:00 Deal or No Deal **
9:00 The Singing Bee
10:00 Heroes (R)

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Full List of Season Premiere Dates

To make sure you don't miss the return of your favorite show, or the debut of your favorite new one, here is a full list of season premiere dates.

9/9
Tell Me You Love Me, HBO
Curb Your Enthusiasm, HBO

9/11
The Biggest Loser, NBC

9/13
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, FX

9/14
Nashville, Fox

9/17
Prison Break, Fox
K-Ville, Fox
Deal or No Deal, NBC

9/18
Beauty and the Geek, the CW

9/19
America’s Next Top Model, the CW
Gossip Girl, the CW
Back to You, Fox
'Til Death, Fox
Kitchen Nightmares, Fox
Kid Nation, CBS

9/20
Survivor: China, CBS

9/23
Cold Case, CBS
Shark, CBS
The Simpsons, Fox
King of the Hill, Fox
Family Guy, Fox

9/24
Chuck, NBC
Journeyman, NBC
Heroes, NBC
The Bachelor, ABC
Dancing with the Stars, ABC
How I Met Your Mother, CBS
Two and a Half Men, CBS
Rules of Engagement , CBS
The Big Bang Theory, CBS
CSI: Miami, CBS

9/25
Reaper, the CW
Bones, Fox
House, Fox
Law & Order: SVU, NBC
NCIS, CBS
The Unit, CBS
Cane, CBS
Boston Legal, ABC

9/26
Private Practice, ABC
Dirty Sexy Money, ABC
Criminal Minds, CBS
CSI: NY, CBS
Deal or No Deal, NBC
Bionic Woman, NBC
Life, NBC

9/27
Ugly Betty, ABC
Grey’s Anatomy, ABC
Big Shots, ABC
Smallville, the CW
My Name Is Earl, NBC
The Office, NBC
ER, NBC
CSI, CBS
Without a Trace, CBS

9/28
Las Vegas, NBC
Ghost Whisperer, CBS
Numb3rs, CBS
Moonlight, CBS

9/30
American Dad, Fox
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, ABC
Desperate Housewives, ABC
Brothers & Sisters, ABC
Dexter, Showtime
Brotherhood, Showtime

10/1
Everybody Hates Chris, the CW
The Game, the CW
Girlfriends, the CW
Aliens in America, the CW

10/2
Cavemen, ABC
Carpoolers, ABC

10/3
Pushing Daisies, ABC

10/4
30 Rock, NBC
Supernatural, the CW
Law & Order: Criminal Intent, USA

10/5
Friday Night Lights, NBC

10/7
Life Is Wild, the CW

10/12
Men in Trees, ABC
Women’s Murder Club, ABC

10/15
Samantha Who?, ABC

10/18
Viva Laughlin, CBS

10/25
Scrubs, NBC

10/30
Nip/Tuck, FX

11/27
Cashmere Mafia, ABC

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Fall TV Preview: Mondays at 9PM

Is there a more exciting time than the beginning of the fall TV season? To get ready for the return of favorite series, and the debut of new ones, I will be taking a look over the next couple of weeks at each hour of programming. I'll be giving my thoughts on the many pilots that I've seen, and identifying which shows I will be watching and recording. Fall TV, here we come!

Mondays at 9PM

ABC
8-9:30PM Dancing with the Stars (premieres September 24)
Idol Thoughts readers know I love this show -- click here for a full list of postings on Dancing, including the list of this year's participants.

9:30PM Samantha Who? (premieres October 15) NEW SERIES
ABC Says: Christina Applegate returns to network television in a comedy that offers a do-over in life. What if you had the chance to start over, to do it all again? For Samantha Newly (Ms. Applegate), this fantasy becomes a reality after a hit-and-run accident leaves her in an eight-day coma. When she awakens in the hospital, she is surrounded by family and friends. The only problem is that she has no idea who they are or who she is. As she sets out to rediscover herself, Sam is forced to rely on the only people who can help her -- an eclectic bunch of friends and family.

I love Christina Applegate -- always have, always will. Loved her on Married...with Children, loved her on Broadway in Sweet Charity, heck I even loved her on Jesse. This looks to be the perfect vehicle, allowing Applegate the opportunity to use her humor and romantic comedy chops to their fullest extent. Add to that a stellar supporting cast, including 24's Jean Smart, Gilmore Girls' Melissa McCarthy, What About Brian's Barry Watson and Rescue Me's Jennifer Esposito, and this could be the best new sitcom of the season.

CBS
9:00 Two and a Half Men (premieres September 24)
Just not my thing.

9:30 Rules of Engagement (premieres September 24)
I didn't watched it last year, and I'm not going to start now!

Fox
K-Ville (premieres September 17)
Fox Says: A heroic police drama set – and filmed – in New Orleans. Two years after Katrina, parts of the city are still in chaos, but hope has emerged. Battling an upsurge of violence, understaffing of police forces and a lack of crime labs and other facilities, the cops who remain in the New Orleans Police Department have courage to burn and a passion to reclaim and rebuild their city. Through its no-holds-barred crime stories and dramatic personal stories, this intriguing series will take viewers from the Victorian mansions of the Garden District to the rubble of the Lower 9th Ward.

While some have said the timing of this show is in poor taste, I actually tend to disagree -- why not use the immediacy of the recent past to tell good stories, as long as they are done with respect? Anthony Anderson (who shone on The Shield a few seasons back) and Cole Hauser are excellent as the two leads, although the pilot screener Fox sent me was a little tonally uneven. Still, I'm willing to give this one a chance.

NBC
Heroes (premieres September 24)
It took me until about halfway through the season to figure out what all the hype was about, but once I gave in to the power of Heroes, I never looked back. I'm a little concerned that all of the new ensemble members may dilute the show's engaging storytelling techniques, but I'm more than willing to go along for the ride.

The CW
9:00 Girlfriends (premieres October 1)
Nope.

9:30 The Game (premieres October 1)
Um...nope.

Click for more of the Fall TV Preview

Next up: Mondays at 10PM

Click for This Fall at Idol Thoughts

Fall TV Preview: Mondays at 8PM

Is there a more exciting time than the beginning of the fall TV season? To get ready for the return of favorite series, and the debut of new ones, I will be taking a look over the next couple of weeks at each hour of programming. I'll be giving my thoughts on the many pilots that I've seen, and identifying which shows I will be watching and recording. Fall TV, here we come!

Mondays at 8PM

ABC
Dancing with the Stars (premieres September 24)
Idol Thoughts readers know I love this show -- click here for a full list of postings on Dancing, including the list of this year's participants.

CBS
8:00 How I Met Your Mother (premieres September 24)
I'm not a big sitcom person, and I don't watch this show every week, but when I do happen to catch it, I generally find myself pretty amused. How could I not, with top-shelf talent like Allison Hannigan, Jason Segal and they hysterical Neil Patrick Harris on board? Mandy Moore joins the cast for a few episodes this fall.

8:30 Big Bang Theory (premieres September 24) NEW SERIES
CBS Says: Leonard and Sheldon are brilliant physicists, the kind of "beautiful minds" that understand how the universe works. But none of that genius helps them interact with people, especially women. All this begins to change when a free-spirited beauty named Penny moves in next door. Sheldon, Leonard's roommate, is quite content spending his nights playing Klingon Boggle with their socially dysfunctional friends, fellow CalTech scientists Wolowitz and Koothrappali. However, Leonard sees in Penny a whole new universe of possibilities... including love.

This is one of the fall's stronger sitcom entries, with Johnny Galecki and Jim Parsons make an amusingly dorky pair, and 8 Simple Rules' Kaley Cuoco well cast as their much hipper foil. It was announced this week that Galecki's former Roseanne costar Sara Gilbert would be joining the cast for an unspecified number of episodes, which only gives the show more cachet.

Fox
Prison Break
I just received the pre-screener of the third season's first two episodes, so look for a review soon. Until then, know that I love Wentworth Miller, and that alone is enough to help me overlook some of the more implausible plot turns this show tends to take. Since 24 doesn't return until mid-season, Prison Break is sure to be my edge-of-my-seat fix for the fall.

NBC
Chuck (premieres September 24) NEW SERIES
NBC Says: From executive producer, Josh Schwartz ("The O.C.") and executive producer-director McG ("Charlie's Angels," "We Are Marshall") comes a one-hour, comedic spy thriller about Chuck Bartowski (Zachary Levi, "Less Than Perfect") - a computer geek who is catapulted into a new career as the government's most vital secret agent. When Chuck opens an e-mail subliminally encoded with government secrets, he unwittingly downloads an entire server of sensitive data into his brain. Now, the fate of the world lies in the unlikely hands of a guy who works at Buy More.

This pilot shows some promise, and Levi is an endearingly dorky lead (not to mention a dead ringer for Adam Brody's Seth Cohen character on The OC), but at the end of the 44 minutes I couldn't quite determine if this series was an action show, a comedy, or a relationship drama. If they can smooth out some of the tonal inconsistencies, it may wind up being a charming underdog for the fall season.

The CW
8:00 Everybody Hates Chris
I watched a few episodes of this series back in Season 1, but to be honest, I haven't made much of an effort to tune back in since.

8:30 Aliens in America NEW SERIES
The CW Says: Justin Tolchuck (Dan Byrd, "The Hills Have Eyes") is a sensitive, lanky 16-year old just trying to make it through the social nightmare of high school in Medora, Wisconsin, with the help of his well-meaning mom Franny (Amy Pietz, "Caroline in the City"), aspiring-entrepreneur dad Gary (Scott Patterson, "Gilmore Girls") and his beautiful and popular younger sister Claire (Lindsey Shaw, "Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide"). Franny is the kind of take-charge mom who micro-manages her family, and she's come up with a plan to help Justin: she signs up for the school's international exchange student program. Picturing an athletic, brilliant Nordic teen, Franny is sure this new friendship will bestow instant coolness on her outsider son. However, when the Tolchuck's exchange student arrives, he turns out to be Raja Musharaff (Adhir Kalyan, "Fair City"), a 16-year-old Muslim from a small village in Pakistan. Despite the cultural chasm between them, Justin and Raja develop an unlikely bond that just might allow them to navigate the minefield that is contemporary high school.

What could easily be a one-joke stereotype is mined for real laughs and genuine emotion in what I think is the best new sitcom of the year. Although the pilot I saw didn't have Gilmore alum Patterson, I'm already sold on this one.

Next up: Mondays at 9PM

Click for This Fall at Idol Thoughts

Fall TV Preview

Full List of Season Premiere Dates

Fall TV Preview: Mondays at 9PM

Fall TV Preview: Mondays at 8PM