ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, September 15, 1996 TAG: 9609160082
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 2 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Tom Shales
SOURCE: TOM SHALES
Choosing the first ``worst'' shows of any new fall TV season is never very hard. Choosing five ``best'' shows gets harder every year.
From here, the new TV season, which starts officially on Monday looks like it'll be no picnic, no walk in the park, no day at the beach. But those are summer things anyway.
To start out on a positive note, though, here are the five best new shows on the four major networks, in no particular order:
``Spin City.'' Michael J. Fox comes crawling back to television after a collapsed movie career, but he crawls with style. He plays the deputy mayor of New York, the brains behind the throne, in a sitcom that's comparatively smart, snappy and sardonic without being cynical. Produced by Gary David Goldberg, Fox's old boss on ``Family Ties.'' A zippy pip. (ABC, Tuesdays at 9:30 p.m. Eastern time, premieres Sept. 17).
``Cosby.'' Another old reliable TV star, Bill Cosby, returns in a vehicle that's by no means as fresh or merry as ``The Cosby Show'' of the 1980s but still shows plenty of promise and features plenty of Cosby. This time he plays a middle-aged man suddenly laid off at the factory and not sure what to do with his time. The producers and writers aren't sure, either, but Cosby's charm is still a formidable force. Phylicia Rashad, as his wife, isn't so lah-de-dah as she was on ``The Cosby Show'' and Madeline Kahn contributes nifty nuttiness as a zany neighbor. (CBS, Mondays at 8, Sept. 16).
``Relativity.'' A new drama from producers Ed Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz, who did ``thirtysomething'' and ``My So-Called Life,'' this is the continuing saga of a relationship from boy-meets-girl in the premiere through courtship to, who knows? The situation is complicated by the fact that the young woman is already engaged. For the young man, it was love at first sight, which is what the show may be for many viewers. (ABC, Saturdays at 10, Sept. 28).
``Party Girl.'' Christine Taylor, who was Marcia in the ``Brady Bunch'' movies, makes a big splash in her first starring role as a lovably loopy single woman trying to make something serious of herself in New York with the help of her librarian-godmother, beautifully played by that doozy, Swoosie Kurtz. (Fox, Mondays at 9, premiered Sept. 9).
``Pearl.'' Rhea Perlman and Malcolm McDowell make unlikely but highly watchable sparring partners as a widow who returns to college and the snooty professor who likes to berate students in this deftly written sitcom. Says the professor: ``Like most self-made men, I am in awe of my creator.'' (CBS, Mondays at 8:30, Sept. 16).
And now for the five worst:
``Millennium.'' One of the new season's many imitations of ``The X-Files,'' this one actually comes from Chris Carter, creator of that show. It's a gruesome ordeal about a moody ex-FBI agent who solves ghastly murders by putting himself in the killer's mind. Gory and depressing. (Fox, Fridays at 9, Oct. 25).
``Dark Skies.'' Yet another would-be ``X-Files,'' this fantasy about aliens who infiltrated America in the '60s and never went away is ridiculous drivel replete with wiggly worms imbedded in humans' brains. You'd need a wiggly worm in your brain to tolerate such slush. (NBC, Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sept. 21).
``Men Behaving Badly.'' A lame attempt to do a flesh-and-blood version of MTV's ``Beavis and Butt-head,'' although the two cloddish louts in question are a bit older and, imagine this, much less witty. (NBC, Wednesdays at 9:30 p.m., Sept. 18).
``Lush Life.'' An ugly imitation of the British series ``Absolutely Fabulous,'' this sitcom about two promiscuous women who slobber around town, boozing and giggling, is absolutely meretricious. (Fox, Mondays at 9:30 p.m., premiered Sept. 9).
``Mr. Rhodes.'' He's, like, a cool dude of a teacher who wanders into a snobbish prep school and wins the students over with lectures that are stand-up routines. ``I'll bust my butt to be cool,'' he tells them, ``if you'll bust yours to receive said coolness.'' Oh, shut up! A good candidate for first new show to be canceled. (NBC, Mondays at 8:30 p.m., Sept. 23).
There's the lowdown, down to the lowest. Happy viewing!
- Washington Post Writers Group
LENGTH: Medium: 78 linesby CNB