The US terrestrial TV networks have this week been unveiling their autumn schedules at the upfronts, the annual presentations to advertisers that take place in New York each May. It's also a first chance for us Brits to get a first good look at the new US TV shows that will be heading our way later this year or early in 2007.
For extensive upfronts coverage, check out the Futon Critic, or see what the TV critics from the New York Times and the Kansas City Star thought of it all.
Hollywood Reporter's Cynthia Littleton had this to say about the network's fall 2006 programming: "Get set for another season of disasters, kidnappings, homicides, fugitives on the lam, conspiracies and conversations with the dead... Laughs are few and far between compared with the primetime lineups of 10 or 20 years ago."
One of the buzziest shows at the upfronts seems to have been West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin's new NBC drama, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip - you can see the promo the network played for it here - at least until YouTube is forced to remove it.
Another of the most talked about upfronts moments was ABC's spoof Grey's Anatomy clip - well it was available here, until Disney told YouTube to cease and desist - featuring three of the male leads together in the shower.
Judging by the Studio 60 promo, Sorkin's new show shares a love of dingy lighting with the West Wing. It also features West Wing's Josh and Danny Concannon, Chandler from Friends and, er... Alex from Taxi. Oh, and the pilot for Studio 60, which is about the behind the scenes shenanigans at a Saturday Night Live-style TV comedy, features a fictional sketch set in the Oval office - wonder what that might be a reference to?
However, Studio 60 could risk being strangled at birth, as no sooner had NBC announced that it would be scheduled at 9pm on Thursdays - against CBS' CSI, one of the top rating TV shows in the US - then ABC promptly announced that it was moving another popular drama, Grey's Anatomy, to from Sunday to the same Thursday slot. There is already speculation that NBC may be forced to rethink its scheduling of Studio 60 to avoid it being squeezed between CSI and Grey's.
Elsewhere, the US networks seem to have got over last year's post Lost obsession with sci fi/fantasy dramas - of the glut of such shows launched in the autumn of 2005, Threshold, Invasion and Surface have all been axed.
CBS has extended its wily tactic of casting well known character actors William Petersen, David Caruso and Gary Sinise as the leads in its three CSI shows to virtually all its new dramas this year, signing up James Woods, Ray Liotta, Joe Pantoliano and Stanley Tucci. Medialoper is not very impressed with the results.
A final thought - Jeff Jarvis, the blogger, MediaGuardian columnist, and former TV critic, suggests that with the proliferation of digital media, the upfronts are no longer the biggest show in town. He quotes a New York Times article analysing how TV is becoming more like the movie business: "Many new series are seeking to emulate theatrical films, with higher production costs, more complex plot lines and larger casts filled with more complicated characters." Variety made broadly the same point.
