Fall 2009 Roundup

EARLIER THIS SPRING, I vowed that I would try to change my viewing habits a bit come fall. I was growing concerned that the only network drama I watched with any regularity was House, and How I Met Your Mother was pretty much the only comedy. The rest of my viewing menu was taken up by cable and pay shows -- which made for some great viewing, but also some great skewing. When you call yourself a professional TV writer, having tastes that narrow is not a plus. It's kind of elitist.

Flash ahead to Fall 2009, and it's been more than easy to correct that balance. I was all set to do a post to respond to a friend's querulous email asking, "Is FlashForward really your favourite new show?" and maybe a roundup of my feelings about the fall.

And then I went and read Heather Havrilesky in Salon, and I can honestly say, "what she said."

The life of the party this fall is ABC's "Modern Family." In a sea of attractive and witty guests, spewing quips and tossing back drinks, "Modern Family" (9 p.m. Wednesdays on ABC) is that unnervingly funny guy in the corner whose jokes keep making your mojito blast out of your nose. I've been waiting for this show to falter or underwhelm for weeks now, and each episode has been better than the last. Ty Burrell is consistently hysterical as hapless, pandering dad Phil.

Along with Burrell, Manny (Rico Rodriguez) -- that's Jay's (Ed O'Neill) kid -- is an unexpectedly hilarious character (loved the scene where he stroked his fake goatee when considering avenging the kids that drew it on his face), and every episode ends on just the right note. Yes, we saw it coming when Phil's teenage daughter's boyfriend, Dylan (Reid Ewing), sang a sweet love song that turned raunchy. But how great was that song? And then ending with the whole family, humming "I just wanna do you, do you" to themselves as they brushed their teeth or got ready for school? Brilliant. I love the dramatic choices by the excellent writers of this show, I love the little touches thrown in by this incredible cast (Eric Stonestreet as chubby, earnest Cameron makes me laugh out loud every single time he's on-screen), and really, I'm just in awe of "Modern Family." If you're not watching this show, you're nuts.

All of which stands in sharp contrast with another ABC show that I chose as one of the best new shows of the fall. If only I'd had a "FlashForward" to how mediocre this serial drama would become, I would've stopped watching weeks ago. From the lead character, Mark Benford (Joseph Fiennes), to his doctor wife Olivia (Sonja Walger) to his partner Demetri Noh (John Cho), this show is crowded with flat characters, and the story transformed from an eerie big bang of a pilot into a big sopping mess of nothingness in a few short (but seemingly endless) episodes.

It's astonishing to me that ABC could compare this show to "Lost" and then do so little to develop its characters over the first few weeks. What stands in for real character traits, back story and nuanced flaws on "FlashForward" (8 p.m. Thursdays) are cartoonish details like "He has a drinking problem" (Mark) and "She's a dedicated doctor, mother and wife" (Olivia). My favorite, though, is Demetri, who is somehow interesting because he's in love with his fiancée and he's going to die soon. He and his lady Zoey (Gabrielle Union) spend their time smiling sweetly at each other, which tells us zero about them, while Demetri tries not to harsh Zoey's premarital bliss with the nasty omens that he'll soon be dead.

Oh, and by the way? "He'll soon be dead!" isn't character development either, nor is it a hefty foreshadowing element when you don't know who Demetri is in the first place. Aaron (Brian F. O'Byrne) is still gloomily worrying about his daughter (whom we also know nothing about), Olivia's doctor friend Bryce (Zachary Knighton) has a new lease on life, but we don't completely understand why he was suicidal in the first place, and Nicole (Peyton List) is depressed about her vision of being drowned, but secretly, we can't wait until she's attacked because all she does now is wander around like a sullen model badly in need of a psychotropic intervention.

Wow. Um...yeah. What she said!

Read the rest of Heather's "I Like To Watch" column on Salon.com --

Best new TV: "Modern Family"

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