• by Paul Gough , May 21, 2003

The idea that reality (at least most of it) may be on its way out doesn't seem so far-fetched. But, judging from the proposed schedules put forth by the networks, don't' look for a new blaze of creativity to take its place.

Most of the networks pooh-poohed reality shows it the upfronts last week, although Fox didn't apologize for its success with American Idol and Joe Millionaire. We'll see both again next year. But conventional wisdom says that after a burst of reality programs during the summer, balance will return to the networks' schedule with only a handful of new unscripted shows among the newcomers (Fox's American Juniors and The WB's Steve Harvey's Big Time). Watch for conventional wisdom to change, however, if one of the summer shows catch fire, a la Fear Factor, Survivor or American Idol.

Yet with a cooling trend on the reality front, don't expect the broadcast networks to set the world on fire with its originality. It doesn't seem to have that much new to offer on the creative side. What's most remarkable about the new season is that many of these shows are just updates of the tried and true or, in some cases, the tired and true.

Some of these aren't bad. Take Tarzan and Jane, The WB's new Sunday series following Charmed. This update of the old Edgar Rice Burroughs classic has several things going for it: Attractive male and female leads, a storyline that carried its way through dozens of books and movies over the years, and what seems, judging from the pilot, to be high production values. Its pedigree is pretty good, too. Executive producer Laura Ziskin was responsible for last year's blockbuster, Spiderman. And Smallville's success could pave the way for this to become one of the big shows on The WB.

Other shows might turn out to be little more than warmed-over retreads. Fox's new Skin, set in Los Angeles, proposes a Romeo and Juliet romance for the 21st century: The teen-age son of the Los Angeles district attorney falls for the daughter of the king of a pornographic empire, even as the DA swears to destroy the porn king. You can see where it's going but whether it's going to last even a season doesn't seem likely. Karen Sisco recycles a 1997 movie - Out of Sight - for new adventures with Jennifer Lopez's U.S. Marshal character in the flick, without J-Lo and without the help of George Clooney, who was also in the movie. Former Spin City star Carla Gugino plays Lopez's part in the show, assisted by a weathered Robert Forster as her father.

And other shows, particularly sitcoms, just seem to feed off sitcoms that worked in the past. Many seem to be extension of the fish-out-of-water concept that has worked so well in the past, like ABC's Hope & Faith (Kelly Ripa as a down-on-her-luck soap star who moves in with her housewife sister, Faith Ford), ABC's Back to Kansas, about a New York writer who falls in love with a Kansas farm girl and moves to her home with her and Fox's A Minute with Stan Hooper, about an Andy Rooney-style commentator (Norm McDonald) who chucks city life to move to a small town. Another sitcom that could rise to the level of witty social commentary - It's All Relative - looks like it will go for the cheap laugh instead.

Better bets are ABC's I'm With Her, a comedy about a high school teacher's star-crossed romance with a movie star, based on Chris Henchy's marriage to Brooke Shields and The WB's Like Family, which finds a white teen-age troublemaker who moves with his single mom into the home of an African-American family with children of their own.

This past season was tough on dramas, particularly on ABC, where not one new fall drama survived 2002. ABC hopes to change that with Karen Sisco, a revamped Dragnet and an 8 p.m. Thursday pariah, Threat Matrix, that turns today's headlines about domestic and international terrorism into a weekly drama. NBC's new dramas, Miss Match, Las Vegas and The Lyon's Den, depend on stars to pull interest. With the most success in new dramas under its belt, CBS spins off JAG, gives David E. Kelley another chance and adds two new cop shows. CBS counters Miss Match with a quirky show starring Joe Mantegna and Mary Steenburgen, Joan of Arcadia, where their teen-age daughter suddenly begins receiving messages from God.

Fox seems to be taking a chance creatively with two dramas, including Tru Calling, about a morgue intern who finds she can go back in time and help murder victims and a midseason replacement, Wonderfalls, about a souvenir-shop worker with a degree in philosophy and a discovery that inanimate objects are trying to tell her something or, as Fox called it in the upfront, Touched By a Crazy Person. The OC looks like Beverly Hills 90210 with a harder edge and a better soundtrack. And The WB tackles a crime drama with Fearless, about a young FBI agent born without the gene for fear, and, if they can get past the expository, might have a hit.