NBC (Wednesdays, 8 p.m. ET)
To say that something is a good thing is not to say that all is right as rain. Martha Stewart, post-prison, is making her way back with two shows, both problematic. The syndicated Martha is an enjoyable-enough daytime hour, a playful mix of studio audience, star guests and domestic tips (put nutmeg in the spinach). But her talent is the exquisite, meticulous gilding of small pleasures. A daily show on this Reality scale probably would benefit from something grander than her focused, measured energy. She's not a born performer. You wish she could just come out swinging like Oprah Winfrey.
Stewart's Apprentice is much more entertaining than Martha, if not in the way she or producer Mark Burnett intended. This duplicate of Donald Trump's Apprentice (now in its fourth season) is a showcase for Martha the businesswoman, a visionary who nudges along presumably zillions of projects in a calculatedly soothing corporate environment. (Good light, soft colors, tidy work stations—it's not an office, it's a biosphere.) But a reality show requires a performance too. Stewart lacks the eager ham of Trump, capitalism's William Shatner. She speaks with a hemmed-in flatness, even when raving over sushi: "That looks like fresh wasabi. It grows under running water, and it's so beautiful to go to a wasabi farm." Take me! Take me!
What made the premiere intriguing was the striking disconnect between Martha's composed and cool good taste and the contestants' idiotic squabbles. How can she stand these people? After Stewart dismissed the first contestant with an uncomfortable "You just don't fit in," she sat down and wrote him a farewell note. She read it in voice-over, sounding like an archangel graciously but firmly slamming Eden's gates behind Adam's retreating back. The suspense here won't be picking the winner—it'll be how soon Martha can rid paradise of these tacky interlopers.
COMEDY
CBS (Mondays, 8:30 p.m. ET)
How I Met Your Mother is a compound of Friends and Seinfeld—adorable young singles hopping in and out of cabs, in and out of bars, in and out of beds in Manhattan, that island playground of hearts—only it comes with a narrative gimmick. It's recounted as one big sitcom romance flashback, as told by a father to his two children in the year 2030.
The kickoff: In 2005, Future Dad is a guy named Ted (Josh Radnor, an actor who could best be described as Jimmy Fallonian). Ted realizes it's time to settle down after his best friend proposes to their roommate, Lily (the always appealing Alyson Hannigan). He immediately falls in love with a local TV broadcaster (Cobie Smulders)—but at this point the two kids hearing the story in 2030 are brought up short. That isn't the woman who became their mother. So the mystery will be teased out. Or maybe someday Dad is going to explode with laughter and tell the kids, "You're clones, you clowns!"
The main point of interest here is Neil Patrick Harris as Ted's bizarre sidekick, a self-styled ladies' man who dresses up in natty suits even at local dives. He's all snappy, ridiculous banter and posturing. What's this character doing here? The better gimmick would be if he turned out to have some sort of sick Fight Club deal with Ted. That's not going to happen, any more than the clones.
Extras (HBO, Oct. 2, 10:30 p.m. ET) Ben Stiller plays himself—a monstrous parody of himself—in this new comedy series about desperate actors starring Ricky Gervais (The Office).
Boston Legal (ABC, Oct. 4, 10 p.m. ET) Fresh from two big Emmy wins, including best actor for James Spader. Heather Locklear makes a second appearance as a sort of Hitchcock blonde.
So You Think You Can Dance (FOX, Oct. 5, 8 p.m. ET) The finale: The winner wins a chunk of change and moves to Manhattan to start a dance career. It's all so Tony Manero!
Making the Band 3 (MTV, Oct. 6, 10 p.m. ET) Rap impresario Diddy continues his search for girl singers—last season ended with three finalists and still no winners.
Threshold vs. Invasion
Both shows:
Steven Spielberg's summer movie War of the Worlds was a powerful fantasy of alien invasion, so pressingly intense it sucked the breath out of the audience. But sci-fi is even more unsettling when the invaders infiltrate us, infect us, become us. Is our breath even our own? Does our own hand reach for that Altoid—or is it an alien that knows we suffer from halitosis?
Both Threshold (CBS) and Invasion (ABC) explore this idea of mutable identity. One's high tech, the other (at least at the start) small-town gothic. In Threshold, an alien presence announces itself as something that looks like a Christmas ornament twinkling in the night sky. It sends out a virus that alters human DNA, making the double helix a triple one. After that comes freakish change: One poor man's face expands as if pencils were thrusting through the skin and then...well, this is about mutations, not makeovers. It's a complicated, dark mystery with good, unsettling special effects. If you hear people discussing "fractal patterns," they've been watching Threshold.
Invasion, at least in its opening, is a simpler story: The aliens arrive in a shower of stars as a hurricane howls through a Florida community. Afterward phantom lights are seen burbling in the waters of the Everglades, and at least one survivor gives off a peculiar vibe: A physician (Kari Matchett), found naked in marshland, returns to her old life, only something has changed. But what? Matchett, who has the blonde hair and patrician nose of a Hilton, quietly conveys a creepy unease. An ill wind still blows, only for now as a whisper.
Nicholas Brendon: For seven seasons Nicholas Brendon hunted demons on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Now he's cooking things up as chef Seth Richman on FOX's Kitchen Confidential. Is it a four-star life?
FROM HORROR TO STOVE TOP
In 2003, during the last season of Buffy, I joked that I should just call Darren Star [creator of Sex and the City] and tell him what we really needed on television was a male Sex and the City. And now, well, here I am working for Darren on a show that is pretty close to that. I get down on my knees every day with gratitude. I do tend to pick edgy, cool shows—or maybe they tend to pick me.
BONDING WHILE COOKING There's an instant camaraderie with all the guys on the set. These guys are already good friends of mine. But even that is kinda different for me. I went from an all-girls show, on Buffy, to an all-guys show. There is definitely a lot of male bonding going on. There's a lot of butt-grabbing in the kitchen.... It's a male thing.
CAR SERVED IN A PAPIER CRUST We toilet-papered [series star] Bradley Cooper's car one day. Then he threatened me and said he was going to TP my car. He hasn't yet.
ON THE HEAT OF BEING IN A NEW SERIES We don't know how it will be received—[nice reviews, actually, but ratings haven't been great]—but honestly? I think we have, uh, the recipe for a hit. You, knew I was gonna say that, didn't you?
- Contributors:
- Tom Gliatto,
- Pamela Warrick.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
