In the fall of 2001, TV viewers were given the choice between two shows with difficult-to-distinguish race-around-the-world formats. One of them was Bertram van Munster's "The Amazing Race." The second, as I like to periodically mention, was NBC's "Lost."

 

At the time, it seemed as if you needed to choose between the two, to pick which format was most appealing to you. 

 

Naturally, I chose "Lost." 

 

And I'd do it again. 

 

In case you've forgotten, "Lost" felt like the edgier, least "produced" of the two shows. Two-member teams, previously unacquainted with each other, were dumped in the desert of an unidentified country, with only the most basic of provisions. Period. Their goal was not only to figure out where the heck they were, but then to find their way from that spot to the finish line at the Statue of Liberty. The story goes that "Lost" premiered on September 4, 2001. I don't need to tell you why the second episode was preempted, not that the ratings for the first episode were so superior.

 

There was something appealing about how desolate and amorphous "Lost" seemed to me. And, in contrast, there was something exhausting and over-programmed about "The Amazing Race." The two-member teams already know each other? Where's the fun in that? They get clues telling them where to go? Where's the challenge there? At each destination, they have to play games? Why does globetrotting have to be "Survivor"?

 

It turned out that "Lost" was on its way to a speedy cancellation, with the added ignominy of having its name usurped so totally that whenever I've mentioned "NBC's 'Lost'" in past articles, I've invariably had readers attack me for not knowing that "Lost" is on ABC, something any good TV critic ought to know.

 

And "The Amazing Race" went on to win all seven Emmys for Outstanding Reality-Competition Program. Thinking myself a "Lost" devotee, I skipped "The Amazing Race" for its first three seasons, but the 12 subsequent seasons that I've watched are enough to place the series at No. 28 on my list of TV's Best of the Decade.

 

[More on "The Amazing Race" after the break...]

The lyrics from that awful theme song to "Friends" told you everything you needed to know about the hit NBC comedy. "I'll be there for you/ Like I've been there before/ I'll be there for you/ 'Cuz you're there for me too."

 

All together now... "Awww..."

 

Ross, Rachel, Monica, Chandler and Phoebe (yes, I always forget Phoebe [NOTE: As a commenter notes, it was actually *Joey* I forgot. Sorry, Matt LeBlanc.]) *were* always there for each other, when they weren't sleeping with each other and dealing with the repercussions of sleeping with each other. "Friends" was a safe zone in which viewers could rely on the therapeutic powers of camaraderie to overcome any adversity and in which we could count on never hearing a single mention of *anything* related to the real world outside of this hermetically sealed bubble. [Oh and yes, at its best, "Friends" was a tremendously funny and effectively performed multi-camera comedy, one that would have made my Best of the '90s list.]

 

"Friends" ended its run in May of 2004. After a respectable mourning period, "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" premiered on FX in August of 2005 as almost the anti-"Friends."

 

Replace Central Perk with Paddy's Pub and you had a filthy petri dish that served as a breeding ground for the friendship between Mac, Dennis, Sweet Dee and Charlie, four chums united by the awareness that each one would throw the other under the bus given half the opportunity. Be there for each other? Perish the thought. The characters on "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" thrive on torturing, humiliating and denigrating each other. They find happiness in getting in the way of each other's happiness, which means that over the course of 50-plus episodes, they've never lacked for happiness.

 

I'm eventually going to have to split hairs over this. After all, I have at least five comedies (possibly two or three more depending on how open your definition of "comedy" is) ranked higher than "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia." But while some of the decade's comedies may be more consistent or more artful or brainier, it's very possible that no show makes me laugh harder than "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia."

 

[More on my choice as TV's No. 29 Best of the Decade after the break...]

I'd original set this spot aside for CBS' "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation." My argument, given that I can make up my own darned rules regarding what justifies a show's placement on this list, was going to center around the unquestionable proficiency of the original "CSI." The thesis was going to continue, noting that the formula established by Jerry Bruckheimer, Danny Cannon and company had taken CBS over and, in the process, made CBS TV's most watched network. Only only one or two shows of the decade were more empirically important and influential to the fate of a single network, because without "CSI," there'd be no "CSI: Miami," "CSI: NY," "Criminal Minds," "Without a Trace," "Cold Case" or "Numb3rs" and there probably wouldn't be an "NCIS" or an "NCIS: Los Angeles" either.

 

Oh yeah. I could have sold "CSI" at position No. 30. I could have made you believe.

 

Then Sepinwall says to me, "How often do you watch 'CSI' each season?"

 

Ah. There's the rub. Like several of CBS' procedurals, I really only watch once or twice per season, usually when there's a big-name guest star or the introduction of a new main character. I only watched the first two seasons of "CSI" in their entirety and even if I'm allowed to cheat this list as much as I see fit, that's more of a cheat than I could stomach, at least this early. I'll be cheating plenty down the road.

 

So I looked at my provisional list, with maybe 45 shows in no particular order, and "Grey's Anatomy" jumped out. Like "CSI," it isn't a snobby choice. It isn't one of those "I'm a Critic And I'm Going to Complain About a Show I Love That Sarah Palin's Real America Doesn't Know Exists" choices. It's also not a "cool" choice. In fact, "Grey's Anatomy" has been a punching bag for years, often self-inflicted.

 

"Grey's Anatomy" is a hit and it's also a hit that I watch every week, a hit that I feel emotionally invested in and a hit that I feel often achieves excellence, albeit sometimes dancing between excellence and infuriating within the space of a month.

 

[More after the break...]

Life is tough for washed up action movie stars.

 

If you're a "serious actor," a Chris O'Donnell or a Thomas Jane or a Joseph Fiennes, after a few failed movies, you can always come back to TV. Casting directors will always assume that just because you had no presence on the big screen, you might become a star in the "minor leagues." That's a retrograde kind of thinking, since it turns out that Joseph Fiennes is no better an actor on "FlashForward" than he was in the many motion picture duds he's done since "Shakespeare in Love." In fact, he may be worse, because "FlashForward" is asking us to spend 22 hours watching him this season, something even Andy Warhol wouldn't have been sadistic to ask in a movie.

 

Anyway, if you're a "serious actor" who can't cut it on the big screen, your next step is clear. But what do you do if you're Steven Seagal? What do you do if you were a huge star for a brief period, but none of your movies have been released in the States for a decade? Showtime isn't about to offer you a pilot and no matter how desperate Broadway promoters get, nobody's going to ask you to join the 1000th revolving cast of "Chicago," because no matter how low Ashlee Simpson's star wattage may be, she's credible on the Great White Way and you're not.

 

Fortunately, it seems that Steven Seagal has already had a secondary career in the works. For the past 20 years, Seagal has been a deputy in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in Louisiana. 

 

As the opening credits of A&E's new series "Steven Seagal: Lawman" tell us, this is "a job he's kept out of the limelight... until now."

 

Yes, starting on Wednesday (Dec. 2), Steven Seagal is a movie star (if you happen to have caught 2009's "Driven to Kill" or "The Keeper"), a lawman and a reality TV star. And, if the first two episodes of "Steven Seagal: Lawman" are any indication, he's also well on his way to becoming a comedy icon. 

 

"Steven Seagal: Lawman" may not give you any deep insight into Mr. Seagal and it certainly won't give you any deep insight into the workings of a small regional police force, but as an unintentional laugh-getter? It's off-the-charts.

 

[Full review of "Steve Seagal: Lawman" after the break...]

Vengeance is a real pain in the ass, isn't it?

 

That's probably the most important thing I got out of Tuesday (Dec. 1) night's second season finale of FX's "Sons of Anarchy."

 

Rarely has a season begun with a more clear imperative for bloody revenge. From the premiere, we had insidious white nationalists who didn't give a second's thought to using rape as a bullying tactic. TV may not have a Hays Code mandating punishment for all bad deeds, but not even the darkest and grittiest of cable dramas could deny that the combination of supremacists and sexual violence evade the most gruesome of retribution. 

 

But sometimes vengeance is hollow and sometimes vengeance is a catalyst for even greater catastrophes.

 

[More on "Na Triobloidi" after the break... I'm just gonna talk about the finale as if you've seen it, OK? That means I'm spoiling everything. You've been warned.]

 

Had UPN cancelled "Veronica Mars" after its first season, as bloodless ratings-driven network logic would have deemed reasonable, Rob Thomas' teenage gumshoe drama would have had a far higher place in the decade's pantheon, certainly in the Top 20 and maybe in the Top 15. I would have lamented the show's all-too-swift passing, but I would have celebrated the one exquisitely crafted season that viewers were lucky enough to get.

 

But "Veronica Mars" wasn't cancelled after one season. 

 

UPN (and then The CW) tried everything to thank the show's fans and to get the series a bigger audience, experimenting with different time slots and different programming strategies, attempting to finesse Thomas and company into different storytelling structures and themes. 

 

Somehow, "Veronica Mars" survived for two additional seasons and, in the process of those additional 42 episodes, much of what was so great about the first season got lost and diluted, many of the characters viewers fell in love with were compromised or marginalized. And my enjoyment declined. And declined.

 

But it's a tribute to the greatness of "Veronica Mars" Season One that the show comes in at No. 31 on my Best of the Decade list. 

 

[More after the break...]

I haven't really set out to do many long-term projects on this blog, seeing as how such ambitious long-term projects have often threatened to consume my colleague Drew's life. 

 

However, December 31 marks the end of what most of us are considering a decade and that means lists for The Best of the Aughts. My buddies over at The Onion have seemingly done 500 or 1000 lists already. 

 

In lieu of doing a straight-forward Top 10 or even Top 20 for The Aughts, I've decided to do a Top 31, my own personal Best of the Decade Advent Calendar, using the month of December to count down the decade's best. Doing one post/essay per day, starting on Dec. 1, I'm going to work my way through to No. 1 on New Year's Eve. 

 

If you know me, you already know what my No. 1 is going to be. It's the same No. 1 that most of my most trusted colleagues will also have chosen. There's a reason for that. That show is the best show of this decade or, very possibly, any decade. 

 

So even if the top spot isn't a surprise, I hope there will be one or two oddities and curios along the way. Maybe.

 

[More after the break...]

Left for dead more often than Chad Pennington and resurrected more often than Lazarus, "Scrubs" returns to ABC on Tuesday (Dec. 1) night with a two-episode premiere that sets the groundwork for the comedy's new structure.

 

While "Scrubs" has luckily survived "bubble" status each of the past four or five springs, even taking the extreme step of hopping networks last year, this is the first time that the series has come back in a markedly different form. Whether you choose to call the new incarnation "AfterScrubs" or  "Scrubs: The Paper Chase" or "Scrubs 2: Electric Scrubaloo" or "Scrubs: The New Class" or "Scrubs on Skates" or Bill Lawrence's preferred "Scrubs [Med School]," the series launching on Tuesday sounds exactly like "Scrubs," looks a little like "Scrubs" but also feels oddly different.

 

The result is a sometimes disorienting viewing experience. I'd almost compare it to watching those Robert Zemeckis motion capture movies he keeps insisting on putting out. Sometimes you think you're seeing something something recognizable and genuinely "Scrubs"-ian, but other times you're seeing something ersatz, an attempt to be "Scrubs"-ian without actually being "Scrubs." It may be the sitcom equivalent of the uncanny valley. Or maybe not.

 

[Full review of "Scrubs" after the break...]

 

In addition to an assortment of fresh faces in its cast, "Scrubs" returns with a new reworking of "I'm No Superman," a new version of the credits and a new collectivist ethos, represented in the show's new episode-title nomenclature, launching with "Our First Day Of School," a take-off on the pilot's "My First Day" and the the 160+ episode titles beginning with "My."

 

There's a transition in process as "Scrubs" turns its focus to a new crop of students at Sacred Heart's medical school. The new class includes insecure Lucy (Kerry Bishe), former med school burnout Drew (Michael Mosley) and cocky Cole (Dave Franco), who comes from a long line of wealthy Sacred Heart donors and, thus, is untouchable. Helping this new trio in their studies are all of the remaining "Scrubs" castmates who were available and whose new pilots weren't picked up this past spring. So that means that Turk (Donald Faison), Dr. Cox (John C. McGinley) and endearingly dyspeptic Denise (Eliza Coupe) are back in the fold in new mentor roles, as are Dr. Kelso and, at least in the early going, Zach Braff's J.D. 

 

Braff and J.D. had always been the series' primary voice and POV and a decision was made to use Braff at the start of the season to help ease the segue. In "Our First Day of School" and "Our Drunk Friend," JD splits voiceover duties with Lucy, who begins her studies with a very similar desperate desire to please, predilection toward errors or misjudgment and, presumably potential. As the season progresses and Braff is phased out, Bishe will take solo narration responsibilities.

 

Having a female equivalent to JD become the focal point of the show is just one example of his Bill Lawrence and company are pushing "Scrubs" into new territory without usually making it distinctive enough as a new entity. 

 

In early exposition, we're told that a year has passed since the last finale, which explains why, after that epic and tear-filled departure, JD is suddenly back at Sacred Heart, where the old hospital has been torn down and replaced with a new, slightly shinier, set. Sepinwall assures me that because Sacred Heart has always been a teaching hospital, Turk and Cox and JD had always been teaching classes in this manner, but we'd just never seen it before. It's like we'd been seeing the majority of their workdays previously and this is the sliver that had been cut out. It's strange and not completely satisfying as an explanation for the new framing of the show. 

 

Frankly, it would have been less distracting if the surviving castmembers had been airlifted to Jamaica and become resort doctors, still mentoring new trainees, but solving comical medical mysteries in Hawaiian shirts and cargo shorts. 

 

Or maybe it would have been less distracting if the writers had chosen a main character with markedly different personality traits from JD. I get the need to have a recognizably sympathetic character at the the center and I understand that having a sentimentalist as our hero gives the writers license for both the fantasy sequences -- Lucy's imagination is comparable to JD's -- and for other characters to be more arch and less cuddly. But if Braff often over-played JD's man-child innocence (intentionally), Bishe is also over-playing Lucy's wide-eyed aspect. Making the new lead a different "type" would have helped clarify how this "Scrubs" is a different series, rather than giving the sensation that the writers put JD in a dress (an unfair comparison, since Bishe is far cuter than Braff in drag).

 

While Braff really was the star of "Original Flavor Scrubs," with the other characters orbiting him at regular intervals, Bishe (one of my favorite parts of FOX's "Virtuality" pilot/telefilm) is just a first among equals here. While Coupe was a late addition to the old "Scrubs" she's a known quantity and her razor-edged sarcasm are still a strength, however in pushing Denise into more of a leading role, she's been much too quickly softened in a way that seems to sacrifice some of her core. Mosley is solid as well, responsible for bringing out one of the new season's truly fresh dynamics with Cox. And as much as I've enjoyed Franco in small roles on "Greek" and "Privileged," it's great to see him playing an out-and-out ass, rather than a goofy, slightly toasted sidekick. [A fourth new classmate is played by Nicky Whalen, but I'm not ready to acknowledge her as a regular until she gets to be part of a single punchline unrelated to her Aussie accent or her hotness.]

 

The old characters aren't as well deployed. McGinley's Cox-isms are so familiar by now that I'd actually hoped he was going to get a chance to do a new character on a different show this season. And the odds of Faison finding enough to do once Braff makes a permanent exit are low. More than anything, I immediately found myself missing Sarah Chalke, whose Elliot appears in the premiere's opening moments mostly to explain why we won't be seeing her again for a while. Oh and who'd have guessed that Neil Flynn would find a way to be otherwise occupied before Braff? The Janitor is sorely missed.

 

I could keep complaining about how "off" the new "Scrubs" feels, but that doesn't really extend to the writing or the overall tone of the show. "Scrubs" hasn't been *consistently* funny for years, but it's always been endearingly hit-and-miss, which has been enough. And that continues to be the case. There are still laughs to be hand and the series has built up a great reserve of warm over the years. I enjoyed watching the season's first two episodes as any over the past couple seasons and fans of the show aren't going to cease to be fans.

 

What the overhauls haven't done is noticeably reinvigorated the show. The presence of all of these old stars, largely on cruise control, keeps the infusion of new blood from taking hold completely. An entirely different group of doctors and mentors at an entirely different teaching hospital might have been liberating, but it probably wouldn't have let Lawrence keep using the "Scrubs" brand name, not that the "Scrubs" brand name brings a meaningful audience with it anymore. So fans will have to be happy to have "Scrubs" back at all, even in a version that isn't exactly the "Scrubs" they know and love.

 

What a not-so-long and not-so-strange journey it's been for ABC's "V," which ends the 2009 segment of its season on Tuesday (November 24). 

 

Worry not, alien invasion aficionados, the Visitors will return at some point in 2010 (after the show takes insignificant additional steps like writing and shooting new episodes).

 

It's a strange path to attempted success -- four episodes of diminishing weekly ratings followed by an hiatus of indeterminate length -- but "V" tells you how to approach the fall finale with its very title, "It's Only the Beginning." The episode is fast-paced and plot-heavy, but no matter what any over-excited critic tries telling you, it doesn't end with any sort of cliffhanger. It climaxes with one character uttering the episode's name before a shot that gives an indication of the scale that the second half of the season will aspire to. 

 

[More on the "V" fall finale, with only minor spoilers, after the break, including my reflection on the show's politics, which come out of hibernation in this week's episode.]

Because I've only been an occasional soap opera viewer in the past, I'd forgotten a key fact about the daytime genre: There's not really a narrative middle ground. Either what's happening is utterly bat guano ridiculous, or nothing is happening at all.

 

And unusually, you get both extremes in the same episode.

 

On Friday's (Nov. 20) "General Hospital," one plotline featured a protracted gunfight in a suburban residential neighborhood, think "Heat" on a soap opera budget and you'd have some sense of the amount of carnage and shellcasings littering the brownstone exterior.

 

Two other plotlines had people sitting on couches delivering exposition for the entire hour, without any movement or blocking at all, unless you count the occasional wild gesticulation as "business."

 

Those were the plotlines I didn't care about, of course. They made reference to a bunch of characters I'd never heard of before, though I gathered that there's a mobster who wants to go straight, a cop who's undercover as the mobster's henchman and so much talk about surveillance that I thought I was watching an extra installment of AMC's "The Prisoner."  One of the nice things about soap opera dialogue is the near absence of pronouns. Everybody is constantly referring to people by their first names so that the process of catching up on at least the basics ought to be swift, assuming one might care.

 

I watched Friday's "General Hospital" for one reason and one reason only: The odd spectacle of watching A-ish List Thespian James Franco strutting his stuff, Daytime-style.

 

How did the first appearance in James Franco's "General Hospital" run go? I'll talk a little bit about it after the break...