Fall TV

My sense of time has gone all wonky, and I can't believe it's already mid-September. The summer seemed to drag on, and I thought we'd never see the end of it, and yet it's almost come as a shock to realize it's on its way out. For instance, the fall TV season has totally caught me off-guard.

Not that I'm too excited about it. My favorite shows, the ones I analyze and discuss and really care about, are summer shows, and some of them still have a few episodes left, so I'm more fired up about those season finales than I am about the new season that's starting. At level of highest intensity there's Doctor Who and Haven, and then Warehouse 13 is right behind them. I also like some of the USA summer series, but not really on the analyze/discuss level.

Just about all of those come above most of the regular season shows for me. I'll be happy to have Parks and Recreation back again, but since I spent the summer getting caught up on the earlier seasons on DVD, it doesn't feel like it's been gone. I'm curious as to how The Office will go with James Spader in the cast. I'm also curious about what the cliffhanger in NCIS will mean going forward and it will be interesting to see how all the changes made in the season finale of Chuck will affect the show.

I may watch the season premieres of House and Supernatural just to see where they're going with things, but their season finales turned me off in ways I'm not sure they can overcome. Just about everything else falls into the "watch it OnDemand when I get a chance" category.

Of the new shows for the fall, the only ones I think I'm going to bother trying are the two fairy tale shows, Grimm and Once Upon a Time, mostly just to see what they do with the premise. They were doing some sneak peeks of Once Upon a Time at movie theaters in those pre-show ads during the summer, and it looked like it could be a really fun fantasy series, but then I also remember The Charmings. This one could go either way.

What I'm mostly excited about is the Masterpiece Theatre lineup for next year, with a new season of Downton Abbey and Sherlock. I believe Downton Abbey actually starts in England this week, but I think I'll resist the temptation to find it by alternative means and wait to watch the US broadcast -- mostly because I'm really busy right now and need to rewatch the first season, so by the time I'd have time to catch up, we'd almost be at the US broadcast anyway.

I haven't seen anything about anything new coming up for the fall/winter season on the channel formerly known as SciFi. I'd heard there would be another Battlestar Galactica prequel, but now I'm hearing that they're going to do that as a web-only series. Their site doesn't really mention anything new for the fall other than the Neverland miniseries. I never got into Sanctuary, but I may have to try, just for the lack of anything else to watch. I wonder if not having seen the previous seasons will be a problem in following it.

All this means I should have a lot more reading and writing time, I guess. And fall is my favorite outdoor time, so I'll be able to spend my days outside if I can write in the evenings.