And the shows gone on...

It's a funny thing...we're nearly a month into the new TV season and there have only been two causalities. Nashville, which Fox canned almost before the season started, and Online Nation on the CW. If you never heard of the last one, don't worry. I think it was pulling in about half a million people a week. And even for the CW that's pretty damn pathetic.

Anyway, I read an article the the other day which said that networks are giving new shows a lot of rope to hang themselves with. It seems quite likely that Hollywood writers are going to go on strike at the end of October. The theory is that it's easier at this stage in the game to keep a show on the air that's struggling or outright sucking than trying to develop and launch something new. Which makes sense, I guess.

So the good news is if you like a show, it might stick around for awhile longer. The bad news is that after the end of October there might be a very short window on how much more new programming there will be.

Oh, and on a related TV note, I just watched the first 15 minutes of Viva Laughlin. I recommend you not even waste that much time on it.

On a better note, I want whatever drugs the producers are slipping the writers of Pushing Daisies. Because there is some seriously demented and funny shit happening in that show. After the great pilot, the second episode was good, but there was still a bit of a drop-off. But the third episode had me laughing almost constantly. The secret origin of Wilfred Woodruff, unusual uses for plastic wrap and the dialogue, my god the dialogue. It's one beautiful bit of crackling conversation after another:

Salesman: "It's homeopathic."
Olive: "You mean it deeply relates to gay people?"

Olive: "That's not a truth bus; it's the bitchy crosstown express."

Olive: "This is a pie shop, not an herbal crack den." (Actually, Olive got a lot of the good lines this this week.)

Emerson: "I might be stuck, but I can still reach my gun."

Chuck: "Kick, Pooh!"

Ned: "I always wanted to be a Jedi."

And so on, and so forth. Best new show of the season by a mile. Please God, let it keep being this good.