Each fall, the TV networks trumpet their dozens of new shows. By the time spring rolls around, the fanfare has faded, and so have most of the programs. It's hard to sort the good from the bad, particularly based on pilots and early episodes. Witness NBC's remake of the British series The Office, whose mediocre first episode has given way to a brilliant ongoing series. Or Millennium, whose thrilling première quickly gave way to mediocrity. This year, The A.V. Club decided simply to go in cold, offering our best guesses based on all available evidence—apart from the shows themselves. Carefully scouring advertisements and promotional spots, then taking educated guesses based on the talent involved, we offer our best guesses about some of this fall's more notable shows. (Note: all air times are EST.)
Monday
How I Met Your Mother
When: 8:30 p.m., CBS (premières Sept. 19)
Concept: In the year 2030, narrator Bob Saget looks back at his wacky courtship of his progeny's mother, which is then shown entirely via flashbacks to the good ol' present.
Will it be any good? The show boasts an intriguing gimmick, but at heart, it looks to be yet another sitcom about quirky twentysomethings living and loving in New York. (Cue the Friends theme song.) Everyone loves co-star Alyson Hannigan, though, especially those of the poindexter persuasion. But do they love her enough to make the show a hit?
Likely most memorable episode: In a riveting twist, it's revealed that Saget is actually narrating the show from a dystopian, cannibalistic future, and he plans to devour his children immediately after regaling them with the story of their parents' wooing. Viewers are horrified, but not as horrified as when Saget ends the episode by reprising his performance in The Aristocrats.
Just Legal
When: 9 p.m., WB (premières Sept. 19)
Concept: Best known as the star of Undeclared and the developmentally disabled boxer in Million Dollar Baby, Jay Baruchel stars as a teenage legal prodigy who's too young to secure work at a reputable practice. The solution? Try a disreputable practice, specifically one run by last-resort lawyer Don Johnson.
Will it be any good? It sounds like Doogie Howser, M.D. with a legal twist, but Baruchel's presence is a promising sign, and the commercials suggest that Don Johnson has learned to embrace the ham within. Could a William Shatner-like comeback be in the cards, or is it Nash Bridges reunion movies from here on out?
Likely most memorable episode: Baruchel uncovers a dark corner of his boss's past when Johnson tunefully informs him of his ongoing search for "A heartbeat... beating like mine."
Kitchen Confidential
When: 8:30 p.m., Fox (premières Sept. 19)
Concept: Based on Anthony Bourdain's salty autobiography about his adventures in the restaurant business, Kitchen Confidential follows a culinary master (Bradley Cooper) who sabotaged his career with boozing, drug use, and womanizing. When he's given an unlikely opportunity to be head chef at a top New York restaurant, his second chance rests on the shoulders of a motley kitchen crew.
Will it be any good? If the show can recreate the feeling of Bourdain's passionate, scabrously funny book, it has the potential to be a winner. But network television may not be the right place for material that thrives on dirty trade secrets and backroom profanity.
Likely most memorable episode: When the meat freezer shorts out overnight, Cooper and the gang proceed with dinner service anyway, covering the spoiled cutlets in a delicious array of spices. An hour later, there's more vomit on the floor than in the end of Monty Python's The Meaning Of Life.
Out Of Practice
When: 9:30 p.m., CBS (premières Sept. 19)
Concept: Lowly psychologist Christopher Gorham clashes with his family of "real doctors," including his divorced surgeon parents, his ER-physician sister, and his plastic-surgeon brother. Hilarity may or may not ensue.
Will it be any good? With the writers of Frasier on board, Kelsey Grammer directing, and Stockard Channing and Henry Winkler in starring roles, Out Of Practice has a sitcom pedigree that's hard to beat. It's sure to pull off canned-laughter humor well. But the subject matter—uppity doctors and their uppity, dysfunctional families—sounds a little like Frasier redux.
Likely most memorable episode: The inevitable installment where all the MDs grudgingly agree to attend family counseling, but instead of hashing out their feelings about each other, they simply take turns ridiculing Gorham, and psychology in general.
Prison Break
When: 9 p.m., Fox (premièred Aug. 29)
Concept: A Chicago engineer deliberately commits armed robbery in order to land himself in prison, where he can help his brother, a death-row inmate who insists he's innocent. The crime? Killing the Vice President's brother.
Will it be any good? A show with a premise as baldly ludicrous as this one would seem to have nowhere to go but up, and indeed, the pilot episode has been collecting a surprising number of good notices. But how many seasons can this elaborate escape plan possibly chew up?
Likely most memorable episode: Determined to uncover the truth about what happened to his dead brother, the Vice President tries to get into prison by violating Illinois' sodomy law, but he's embarrassed to discover that the law was repealed in 1962.
Surface
When: 8 p.m., NBC (premières Sept. 19)
Concept: Something is lurking underwater—and beaching on a South Carolina coast, and leaving slime trails all over a suburban home, and devouring the crew of a submarine near Antarctica—confounding oceanographers, fishermen, teenage boys, naval officers, and preview audiences alike.
Will it be any good? NBC has sunk a lot of money into promoting this hourlong sea/sci-fi drama, so they certainly think so. But though the previews look thrilling enough, mysterious sea creatures can only stay mysterious for so long. It's only a matter of time—an hourlong first episode, say—before the silhouettes, weird whale noises, and quick glimpses of slimy tails grow tiresome.
Likely most memorable episode: Curious teenager Carter Jenkins trying to hide his newly hatched best friends from the research-hungry scientists who are certain to show up at his door.
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