geekent's Buy Nothing Year

I'm not a huge fan of the television. Oh, I love TV shows (as witnessed by my voluminous TV on DVD collection), but I'm not a lover of TV schedules and commercials. Commercial breaks are inefficient and time-wasting for the man who likes to consume as much story, information and entertainment as possible, as quickly as possible. Why watch a tv show in 1 hour at the rigidly scheduled period of 9 PM on Tuesdays when I can record it and watch it at my leisure, skipping past the commercials, in under 45 minutes (I miss TiVo), or, better yet, watching entire seasons in 5 days, like Aden and I just did with Heroes thanks to DVD.

But, at the same time, with my 1-year moratorium on new DVD purchases, I'm going to be a bit stuck for fresh entertainment, so I'll have to consume only what I have available to me. And even though the BNY doesn't start until January 1, 2008, I have to prepare for it now and invest in some programs, or else just watch nothing at all.

Aden and I devoured season one of Heroes quickly so that we might catch the second season premiere, which airs tonight. This of course will tear us away from any sort of movie (theatre) watching which I've been awfully neglectful of (we were planning on one of the nu-Western flicks).

Journeyman also starts tonight, and thanks to it's genre trappings, I'll give it a shot (it's a time-travel show, because, thanks to Heroes the big thing this fall is paranormal and/or super-powers). I don't think Aden will be into it (she doesn't like time travel or sci-fi much) but who knows. I'm not expecting much.

There's Carpoolers (October 2, ABC @ 8:30), from Kids in the Hall alum Bruce McCulloch, and a couple of Arrested Development producers. The previews I've seen are generally cute and or amusing, but not necessarily funny. McCulloch's post-Kids output (mainly sub-par Hollywood studio comedies) has been abysmal, and I can't say I expect much out of this either. Here's hoping. In general, network sit-coms aren't worth any sort of investment. Even The Office and My Name Is Earl find themselves played out after only their second seasons, and once smart comedies like Scrubs start to become routine, their humour expected. America loves Two and A Half Men, and I feel ill (previews for the new nerd comedy from the 21/2Men creators looks stomach churningly awful... I'm sure it'll be a hit). Carpoolers, if it's any good, should be a good occasional show, since I don't really feel like dedicating myself to a sitcom.

The Bionic Woman (Wed. Sept. 26 @ 9:00 on NBC) looks like it could be really good or yet more by-the-numbers "running-man" sci-fi. From the resurrectors of Battlestar Galactica, I'll give it a shot, since they did good things there, but, again, not expecting much.

Pushing Daisies (Wed Oct. 3 @ 8:00 on ABC) sounds intriguing but whether it has any legs or not, we'll find out after the first half dozen episodes. The conceit is a man discovers he can bring the dead back to life with one touch, but one touch again and their dead. A Private Investigator discovers his abilities and coaxes him to help him on his cases. On one case he discovers and resurrects his childhood sweetheart, they find themselves enchanted once again, only if they touch he'll lose her forever. It looks sweet and charming but I don't see a lot of potential for storylines. It's shows like this that make me wish the US made programming more like the BBC, shorter seasons with better quality episodes... and with creators who know when to quit and move on.

Battlestar Galactica and Lost don't begin again until January (sigh), which should fit into my schedule nicely, and by that point some of the above should be tanked, meaning my schedule should be freed up to actually do something productive for a change.

As it stands the start of the week is pretty top-heavy for me, with Mondays and Wednesdays being fairly busy days (and if Lost is back on Wednesdays at 10:00, that's three hours of TV plunkerdome to fill in the hole that having no New Comic Book Day will leave behind).