New TV Season, Part 2

Hawaii Five-O (CBS): It wouldn't be a new tv season without a rehash of a beloved show, and yet no one has tried to revamp Airwolf. Shameful. Anyway, as the original was inspired some of our generation's finest minds, including Mick Foley and Conan O'Brien, I decided to give this a shot.

The Bad- Oh, man, the two leads take every play out of the TV cop cliche handbook. McGarrett, a man seeking to bring the man who killed his father to justice, is a loose cannon. He doesn't like the system, he doesn't like the governor who gave him the authority to go outside the system, and he doesn't like his new partner who he himself picked. Meanwhile, Dan-O, an East Coast cop who moved to the Big Island to be closer to his daughter, appears to have gone to the Lenny Brisco Police Academy. He's sarcastic, talks a lot, and has a psychotic ex-wife. Together, McGarrett and Dan-O run the gamut of the TV/ Movie Police Range of Emotions, running from dislike, to grudging respect, to friendship. Together, they form a team of police force outcasts who are Hawaii's only hope of ousting corruption from the island. Meh.

There's also a decided lack of pompadours. What the hey?

The Good- Daniel Dae Kim is in this, and he's, as expected, awesome. At one point, he smacks a suspect across the face with an ash tray. James Marsters also plays the pilot episode's villain, but he's only in it for five minutes. Finally, they kept the original theme song, more or less unchanged.

Undercovers (NBC): This show would probably win the Most Hyped Show of the Season if The Event didn't exist. The ads have usually taken one of two forms.

Ad One- "From JJ Abrams, the man who brought you such JJ Abrams programs as JJ Abrams' Alias, JJ Abrams' Lost, and JJ Abrams' Fringe, as well as the visionary who brought you JJ Abrams' Star Trek (but not Cloverfield; let's just pretend that didn't happen), comes the most JJ Abrams-est series in at least 3 months!"

Ad Two- This ad consists of nothing but the word "sexpionage" ad nauseum. You'd think it was some lame word invented by a marketing exec, but no! They actually use that word six or seven times during the course of the pilot. And it's not like you even need a new word combining sex and espionage. Sex has been a part of the spy genre for decades, thanks to James Bond and others.

Anyway, the premise of the show is that two CIA agents, Steven and Samantha Bloom, get married, retire, and then are brought back into the spy business years later by Major Dad. This helps to rekindle their marriage, as evidenced by slightly humorous but forced banter throughout the course of the pilot. They also cross paths with the guy who played Sammy's evil ex-husband Franco on Days of Our Lives.

Anyway, as this is a JJ Abrams show, I'm waiting for the inevitable WTF turning point. My theory is that the Blooms' marriage was subtly orchestrated by a secret government conspiracy. Their retirement threw a wrench into the secret cabal's plans. Major Dad brings the Blooms back in so they can rekindle their romance and proceed to boinking. The desired outcome of said boinking is to produce a super spy baby who is genetically predisposed for sexpionage. This baby will grow up to be Major Dad, who will travel back in time to continue the loop.

Either that, or something totally ludicrous.