It used to be that nice guys finished last. And the old saying was never more true than on US TV, which in recent years has been all about embracing the anti-hero in the form of a mob boss, a corrupt police officer and a devious Wild West 'entrepreneur', to name but three.
Even if our heroes weren't as black as Tony Soprano, Vic Mackey and Al Swearengen they still tended towards the morally ambiguous.
The Wire's Jimmy McNulty might be good police but he's also a trainwreck of a human being; Rescue Me's Tommy Gavin has a drink problem twice the size of McNulty's, a head full of ghosts who just won't stay quiet and an attitude towards women somewhere between sadism and masochism.
Nip/Tuck's Christian Troy might have some redeeming features but you'd have to liposuction his vanity out to get close to them; while his partner Sean McNamara has made the journey from family man to self-deceiving fool with almost surgical precision.
As for Jack Bauer, he might still be saving the world but the methods he employs get a little darker as each long day ticks on.
But while the anti-hero has been all the rage, that's about to change. American TV's newest heroes include a laid-back slacker holding down a McJob, a gawky piemaker and an engineering geek who works as tech support in the 'nerd herd' of a local store.
Naturally that isn't all they do: Reaper's slacker Sam is in the unfortunate position of having to bounty hunt for the devil after his parents sold his soul. Pushing Daisies' Ned can bring dead people back to life and thus collects the rewards for murder victims in addition to baking pies. And the eponymous Chuck holds America's most valuable secrets in his head thanks to a former friend turned spy and is now trying to muddle through his workday without being kidnapped or killed by the CIA or the US army.
All of which sounds - and is - ridiculous and yet Reaper, Pushing Daisies and Chuck are also highly addictive. Why? Largely because of their heroes. These are guys you might actually want to hang out with.
Yes Chuck's a bit geeky and prone to talking about his ex. True Ned's phobia about touching, while reasonable - the people he brings back to life die if he touches them a second time - can verge on the obsessive compulsive. Certainly Sam lacks much in the way of get up and go.
Yet for all that there is something endearing about all three of them. They might have special powers but those powers have been thrust upon them, they're the guys that you pass in the street, or chat to in the pub. Normal looking, slightly awkward, prone to making references about unfairly cancelled sci-fi shows or an obscure graphic novel. For all their geekdom surprisingly, and attractively, comfortable in their own skins.
And their time is now - while Chuck, Reaper and Pushing Daisies are garnering great reviews, the favourite for early cancellation is Big Shots, a would-be male version of Sex and the City featuring four 'captains of industry' wittering about their metrosexual lives and how empty they feel despite their conspicuous consumption. It's all very 90s in feel and, as such, horribly out of touch.
So why is now the year of the geek? Partially because of last year's biggest hit, Heroes, and that programme's breakout character, Hiro Nakamura. Sure there are other heroes with interesting powers and better looks, but the Japanese worker drone with the ability to stop time and a goofy love of his ability to do so was easily the most endearing character on the show.
Then there's the unstoppable rise of Judd Apatow, a man whose comedies from 40 Year Old Virgin to Knocked Up and Superbad celebrate the glory of geekery. His heroes are gawky virgins, fast talking overweight nerds and stoned under-achievers. Yet they always seem as though they would be fun to hang out with and they always get the much better looking girl.
This then is perhaps the real secret of the return of the geek - it's wish-fulfilment at the highest level. When he created The OC, Josh Schwartz admitted that indie dork Seth Cohen was based on his own awkward teenage years, yet in this version of Schwartz's adolescent he was suddenly improbably cool and he got the girl.
This year's most endearing shows take that a step further, celebrating geekiness rather than disguising it. And when today's producers and directors are yesterday's Sams, Chucks and Neds then it should come as no surprise that the geeks have inherited the TV world.
