Broadcast Networks Fall Sked: New and Old Genre Offerings, Part 2

With the broadcast networks done shoring up their fall schedule, let’s take a look at what genre fans (and the gays) have to look forward to:

ABC offers two genre themed show’s next season, one drama the other a comedy. 666 PARK AVENUE returns LOST alumni and bad-ass actor Terry O’Quinn to the small screen. Everyone has needs, desires and ambition, and for the residents of The Drake, these will all be met, courtesy of the building’s mysterious owner.  But every Faustian contract comes with a price. When Jane Van Veen (Rachael Taylor) and Henry Martin (Dave Annable), an idealistic young couple from the Midwest, are offered the opportunity to manage the historic building, they not only fall prey to the machinations of Doran and his mysterious wife, Olivia (Vanessa Williams), but unwittingly begin to experience the shadowy, supernatural forces within the building that imprison and endanger the lives of the residents inside. Sexy, seductive and inviting, The Drake maintains a dark hold over all of its residents, tempting them through their ambitions and desires, in this chilling new drama that’s home to an epic struggle of good versus evil. The series gets the prime 10pm Sunday slot, and will be teamed with two returning hit shows,  the fantasy series ONCE UPON A TIME and guilty-pleasure that is REVENGE, both coming back for their second seasons. While the Alphabet Network still faces ratings challenge due to run-over on football games at CBS, this new Sunday schedule should easily beat NBC and FOX.

On the other end of the spectrum, ABC offers us the single-camera comedy, THE NEIGHBORS, which will inherit the lucrative post MODERN FAMILY (yep, that’s for the gays) timeslot of Wednesday at 9:30. The Weavers’ are a family who are hoping for a better life for themselves, so they purchase a home in Hidden Hills, a gated New Jersey townhome community. It’s clear from day one that the residents of Hidden Hills are a little different. For starters, their new neighbors all have pro-athlete names like Reggie Jackson, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Dick Butkis and Larry Bird. Over dinner, Marty and his family discover that their neighbors receive nourishment through their eyes by reading books, rather than eating. The Weavers soon learn that the entire community is comprised of aliens from Zabvron, where the men bear children and everyone cries green goo from their ears. Jami Gertz and Lenny Venito star.

Poor ALF, must be turning in his TV grave. So is MORK.

Thursday will launch the thriller series LAST RESORT. Andre Braugher and Scott Speedman star in this conspiracy show about submarine captain who is given orders to destroy Pakistan. But he tries to verify the orders, Captain Marcus Chaplin finds himself relieved of duty from the White House. Soon his sub comes under attack, fired upon by their own people and are declared rogue enemies of the United States. While the concept seems flawed, Braugher is a great actor in search of good TV series. The show, however good (or bad), will face an uphill battle against CBS and NBC, both networks that air popular comedies like BIG BANG THEORY and TWO & HALF MEN at the Tiffany Network, and cult comedy shows 30 ROCK and UP ALL NIGHT over at the Peacock. As well as THE VAMPIRE DIARIES on the CW (and possibly), THE X FACTOR results show on FOX. Plus, the show seems more male skewered; on a night that includes female skewed GREY’S ANATOMY and SCANDAL. Let’s just say this is an odd place to air a highly expensive, fairly male dominated show in a timeslot that has been, historically for ABC, a very difficult hour for them to find a footing.

Waiting in the wings is another global conspiracy series called ZERO HOUR. ER vet Anthony Edwards stars as a publisher of a paranormal enthusiast magazine called Modern Skeptic. Edwards’ character, Hank Galliston, has spent his career following clues, debunking myths and solving conspiracies. A confessed paranormal junkie, his motto is “logic is the compass.” But when his beautiful wife  is abducted from her antique clock shop, Hank gets pulled into one of the most compelling mysteries in human history, stretching around the world and back centuries. Contained in one of his wife’s clocks is a treasure map, and what it leads to could be cataclysmic. Now it’s up to Hank to decipher the symbols and unlock the secrets of the map, while ensuring the answers don’t fall into the wrong hands – a man they call White Vincent (Michael Nyqvist GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO).