Relaunch

I can't wait to see tomorrow's ratings... will ABC be able to successfully relaunch its semi-successful Wednesday night lineup from last season?

I suspect mixed results, and potentially disastrous ones.

Private Practice will be tops of the ABC hours, but at the most a 4 in the demo (and thus losing in viewers and demo to the horrible Criminal Minds). Pushing Daisies will be lucky to breach a 2.5, as viewers gave up on it last season. Dirty Sexy Money is my question mark. Addition of Lucy Liu to the cast might help (and I love that sultry "so many secrets..." tag on the DSM ads) and I've heard amazing things about its creative direction this season (as well as a death coming up in episode two that will make me sad... but I'm not telling!) Plus, the competition is far less at 10pm than at 8pm (even if I'll be shocked if Knight Rider even does a 2 in the demo).

Speaking of... I can't wait to see how far NBC's lineup tanks. America's Got Talent will be pretty stable, but Knight Rider and Lipstick Jungle? Please.

Also Gary Unmarried. I will be quite surprised if it holds up week-to-week (and not because of increased competition, as ABC had the special DWTS which will undoubtedly do better than the Pushing Daisies premiere). Quite surprised.

I personally welcome the ABC dramas back because with the exception of Bones (which I am not recording tonight, as Hulu is a far better online player than The CW's) all I'd been watching on Wednesdays were reality programs (and next week, the diversion that was Top Design gives way to South Park).

Show reactions... relative to expectations, the opinions are these.

Pushing Daisies brought back its particularly brand of whimsy, no more and no less than I'd recalled. The partially-new, partially-not opening was a good intro to any new viewers, and they wove the various cliffhangers in throughout so it wasn't overload right off the top. The mystery of the week was, also, whimsical and weird and just so convolutedly strange in the way that defines the show's you-love-it-or-you-hate-it affect. Grade: B.

Private Practice was unexpectedly dramatic, following an opening few minutes that reminded us of the relationship status of all our main caricatures. In fact, this episode brought in things like issues! And drama! That kind of superseded the nonsense that is Oceanside Wellness' incestuous dodecahedron! It was some much appreciated gravitas (shudder). Though the baby storyline, I think, was far more effective than the HIV-positive teenager storyline. One of two ain't terrible, though! And a company dealing with financial troubles... hm, I wonder if we're going to be seeing a lot of that soon (and hopefully less of what occurred on How I Met Your Mother's adequately funny but terribly timed episode featuring a plot where a bank took over a local hamburger stand). Grade: A- (remember, this is all relative... I think it was the best PP episode yet, but that's not saying much, y'know?)

Dirty Sexy Money. Eh. Now sure what to think. It didn't really draw me back into the world of the Darlings until the very end. Which I guess is why they opened with the tired-and-true teaser and flashback to 48 hours prior. Grade: C.