Fall TV Friday – 2005
Fall TV Friday – 2005
Starting tomorrow I’m debuting a new segment here on Change The Channel. As you’ve probably gathered I love that time of year known as the new Fall TV season. There’s so much promise and possibility in the air. It’s like getting thirty television length Christmas presents scattered throughout the month of September. Of course all it takes are a few bad Hank’s and a couple of Eastwick’s and all that promise and possibility go out the window, but that doesn’t stop me from looking forward to the new Fall TV season like some kind of deranged eight year desperate that this year will be the year they finally get that pony made of candy and rollercoasters they’ve always wanted.
So to fulfil my absurd desire to watch every television show ever created, and to relive the Fall TV experience every month of the year I’ve decided to create a segment I like to call ‘Fall TV Friday’. I’m going to pick a year and then take a look at all of the shows that debuted in that year. This will be a lengthy project as each Fall TV season has some thirty shows debut. Some of those shows are still on the air, some barely made it through their first five episodes, but all of them are worthy of my time and analysis.
You see, the argument can be made that television is more about failure that it is about success. There have been hundreds of shows that can be called failures but only a select few can be called hits. For every CSI there are a half dozen Robbery Homicide Division’s. For every Seinfeld there are seven Help Me Help You’s. The first year I’m going to tackle is 2005 and of the 31 new shows that debuted only 10 of them survived to the second season, and only 5 of them are still on the air today.
I hope that part of this look back at the Fall TV seasons of the past delves into the world of failure and to see if we can make any sense of it… while watching a crap ton of television along the way, of course. I’m going to treat these old seasons the same way I’d treat a new Fall TV season. I’m going to watch the pilot and then review the pilot. Obviously I can’t time travel back to the actual fall of 2005 (despite many failed attempts) so I’m going throw a little ‘future perspective’ into the mix as well. If you are able to travel back to 2005 maybe take this guide along with you and you can blow the minds of television executives, critics and everybody else with even a vague interest in this little box called TV. They’ll be all like “My Name Is Earl sure is funny isn’t it?” and you can be all “Yeah well I bet it gets cancelled on a cliffhanger!” They’ll declare that “Invasion is the new Lost!” and you can shut them down with “If by that you mean Invasion is not the new Lost at all and instead just another show that’s going to get cancelled before the first season even ends BAM!”
My first impressions will be aided by hindsight, hopefully knowing the fate of some of these shows will allow me to delve a bit more into ‘what makes a good pilot’. Can you tell from a pilot whether a show will be a hit? Can you even tell from a pilot whether a show will become your favourite show of all time? Can you really tell anything from a pilot at all?
Each Friday, starting with tomorrow, I’ll try to post one or two reviews of shows that debuted during the Fall of 2005. This is bound to be a messy project but one I’ve often talked about taking on. I don’t know where this curiosity to look back at old TV seasons comes from but I think it’s the possibility of finding an otherwise uncovered gem.
Just in case you want to play along at home and analyse these forgotten gems, or buried failures, along with me here’s a list of the shows that debuted during Fall 2005. The shows marked with an asterisk are the ones I’ve been unable to get a copy of.
FOX
The War At Home
Kitchen Confidential
Prison Break
Bones
Head Cases*
Reunion
Killer Instinct
CBS
Out Of Practice
Close To Home
Criminal Minds
Ghost Whisperer
Threshold
How I Met Your Mother
WB
Just Legal
Supernatural
Related
Twins
NBC
Surface
My Name Is Earl
E-Ring
The Apprentice: Martha Stewart
Three Wishes*
Inconceivable*
ABC
Invasion
Commander In Chief
Freddie
Night Stalker
Hot Properties
