Well, the new fall season is upon us. All the summer shows are ending (Closer, Dead Zone, Psych, etc) and all of our favorite fall shows are getting ready to begin again (and new shows getting ready to vie for our attentions). I posted last seasons premier dates at the end of August and they seemed fairly popular so I’m going to do it again. I would have done it before now, but I hadn’t seen a comprehensive listing of dates on any one site. I also was waiting for a definitive start date for Lost Season 4. While there is still no definitive start date for Lost, TVSquad finally came through with a list of premier dates. Below you will find this listing. The brand new shows are in all CAPS and I’ve put the shows I plan on watching in bold. If it’s not in bold, it’s CRAP (j/k, but seriously…it is).
Before we get to that however, I watched 2 of the below premiers. Blockbuster is offering a free rental of an NBC DVD that gives early access to the season premiers of Chuck, Journeyman and Life. NBC did the same thing last year with the premiers of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and Kidnapped. It must have been successful (even though both those shows were cancelled) that they decided to do it again. Well, I got this DVD the other day and I watched Chuck and Journeyman, the two shows I was really looking forward to. Both are really good. Chuck is about a shy, nerdy guy named Chuck who works for the Nerd Herd at a local retail electronics store. He inadvertently opens an email from his former college roommate and has all of the NSA and CIA secrets embedded into his mind. This causes him to have memories triggered at odd times. An extremely attractive CIA agent joins up with him to use his memories and get them under control. Very funny show that has me interested in seeing where it may go. The other show, Journeyman, is about a guy who starts spontaneously jumping through time. He discovers it’s not random jumping and that he’s following a specific timeline to possibly help specific people. Reminds me somewhat of Quantum Leap. The lead male is likable and the show has a very interesting concept, including a few surprises dropped in during the premier. I’ll definitely be checking both of these shows out come their premier dates.
UPDATE!! 9/14 – I was able to watch the full Bionic Woman pilot last night. Comcast is offering it for free on their High Def On Demand channel. I was really looking forward to this, and it was good, but some of the scripting was a bit contrived. Good action and it’s interesting enough for me to give it another chance, but it’s on a week to week basis. If it doesn’t get any better, there are too many other shows I want to see for me not to expel this from my viewing schedule.
2007-2008 FALL PREMIER DATES
September 6th * Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? (FOX)
September 9th * Curb Your Enthusiasm (HBO)
September 8th * Cops (FOX)
* America’s Most Wanted (FOX)
September 11th * The Biggest Loser (NBC)
September 14th * NASHVILLE (FOX)
September 15th * MADtv (FOX)
* Talkshow with Spike Feresten (FOX)
September 17th * Deal or no Deal (NBC)
* Prison Break (FOX)
* K-VILLE (FOX)
September 18th * Beauty and the Geek (CW) — Two hour premiere
September 19th * KID NATION (CBS)
* America’s Next Top Model (CW)
* GOSSIP GIRL (CW)
* BACK TO YOU (FOX)
* Til’ Death (FOX)
* KITCHEN NIGHTMARES (FOX)
September 20th * Survivor:China (CBS)
September 21st * Friday Night Smackdown (CW)
September 23rd * 60 Minutes (CBS)
* Cold Case (CBS)
* Shark (CBS) — New time slot
* The Simpsons (FOX)
* King of the Hill (FOX)
* Family Guy (FOX)
* CW NOW (CW)
* ONLINE NATION (CW)
September 24th * Dancing With the Stars (ABC) – 90 minute premiere
* The Bachelor (ABC) – 90 minute premiere
* How I Met Your Mother (CBS)
* THE BIG BANG THEORY (CBS)
* Two and a Half Men (CBS)
* Rules of Engagement (CBS)
* CSI:Miami (CBS)
* CHUCK (NBC)
* Heroes (NBC)
* JOURNEYMAN (NBC)
September 25th * Dancing With the Stars (ABC) — Perforance show
* Boston Legal (ABC) — 90-minute premiere
* NCIS (CBS)
* The Unit (CBS)
* Bones (FOX) — New Time
* House (FOX) — With five new cast members!
* CANE (CBS)
* REAPER (CW) — Written/directed by Kevin Smith
* The Singing Bee (NBC)
* Law & Order: SVU (NBC)
September 26th * Dancing With the Stars (ABC) — first results show at ‘special’ day and time
* PRIVATE PRACTICE (ABC)
* DIRTY SEXY MONEY (ABC)
* Criminal Minds (CBS)
* CSI:NY (CBS)
* Deal or no Deal (NBC)
* BIONIC WOMAN (NBC)
* LIFE (NBC)
* Ghost Hunters (SciFi)
September 27th * Ugly Betty (ABC)
* Grey’s Anatomy (ABC)
* BIG SHOTS (ABC)
* CSI (CBS)
* Without a Trace (CBS)
* Smallville (CW)
* My Name is Earl (NBC)
* The Office (NBC) — One hour season premiere, and hour episodes for about a month
* ER (NBC)
September 28th * Ghost Whisperer (CBS)
* MOONLIGHT (CBS)
* Numb3rs (CBS)
* Deal or no Deal (NBC)
* Las Vegas (NBC) — Two hour season premiere; No more James Caan
* Stargate: Atlantis (SciFi)
September 29th * 48 Hours Mysteries (CBS)
September 30th * Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (ABC)
* Desperate Housewives (ABC)
* Brothers & Sisters (ABC)
* American Dad (FOX)
October 1st * Everybody Hates Chris (CW)
* ALIENS IN AMERICA (CW)
* Girlfriends (CW)
* The Game (CW)
October 2nd * CAVEMEN (ABC)
* CARPOOLERS (ABC)
* Dancing With the Stars Results Show (ABC) — Regular time-slot premiere
October 3rd * PUSHING DAISIES
October 4th * Supernatural (CW)
* 30 Rock (NBC)
October 5th * Friday Night Lights (NBC) — New time slot
October 7th * America’s Funniest Home Videos (ABC) — Shouldn’t the show be called America’s Funnites Home DVDs to stay with the times?
* LIFE IS WILD (CW)
October 12th * 20/20 (ABC) — New time slot
* WOMEN’S MURDER CLUB (ABC)
* Men In Trees (ABC) — New time slot
October 15th * Samantha Who? (ABC)
October 18th * VIVA LAUGHLIN (CBS) — Series preview
October 21st * VIVA LAUGHLIN (CBS) — Time slot premiere
October 25th * Scrubs (NBC) — One hour Office shows dominate the schedule through October; hence, the reason for this late season premiere.
November 27th * CASHMERE MAFIA (ABC) — Premieres after Dancing With the Stars finale
December 4th * CASHMERE MAFIA (ABC) — Regular time slot premiere
Technorati Tags – TV television TV shows season premier
Next, I went to see a movie called DOA: Dead or Alive. Check out the wacky trailer 
Imagine you are a kid, at home, after a long day of school in 1986. You are sitting mindlessly watching the TV enjoying your favorite cartoons when the announcer says to stay tuned for the Ghostbusters. What? Hellz Yeah, Ghostbusters cartoons? Bring It! You are sitting there with your pouch of Capri-Sun ready to watch Slimer and the Ghostbusters kick some spectral butt. The show comes on and something looks off……..I didn’t realize the Ghostbusters hung out with …….is that a……..gorilla?! WTF?! This is what happened to me when I was about 12 years old. I was greeted with a Ghostbusters cartoon that was foreign to me. Was this just simple greed by a company looking to ride the wave of ghostbustin’ popularity, or was there more to it? This cartoon even used the actual name GhostBusters. What was this cartoon’s story? Well, after much research, I finally found out.
The Ghostbusters are pop culture icons. Ray, Peter, Egon and Winston. 
The phenomenally successful movie that spawned this group has entertained people of all ages. However, surprisingly enough, Columbia did not have the rights to the name “ghostbusters” before or during the filming of their titular 1984 blockbuster. Who owned the rights to the name, Ghostbusters? It was a production company called Filmation. After Ghostbusters hit it big in 1984, imitators began coming out of the woodwork. Companies were trying to ride the coattails of the hit movie with toys, games and cartoons with a similar theme. As stated earlier, if turned on your tv in 1986 you may have caught a show involving two friends and their gorilla using crazy equipment to capture ghosts. This cartoon was called Filmation’s GhostBusters. This series was created by Filmation, the aforementioned rights holders to the name Ghostbusters. Why did they have the rights and how did this cartoon come about? It all starts in 1975.
During the ’80s and ’90s, the Filmation studio was an immensely popular Saturday morning cartoon producer. They created the cartoons He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, Fat Albert, She-Ra, Star Trek The Animated Series, The Batman/Superman Hour and many, many more. With this pedigree, and the fact that they owned the name Ghost Busters, they naturally thought that they would get first crack at producing the animated Ghostbusters show. After much negotiation, Columbia backed down and said that they were going to focus on a live action Ghostbusters sequel and not do a cartoon series. Rebuffed, Filmation decided to capitalize on the Ghostbuster name by creating their own cartoon but based it on their original tv series. The cartoon’s premise had the sons of the original tv characters inheriting the business and continuing the fight against supernatural evil. For the first five episodes (technically a mini-movie), Larry Storch and Forrest Tucker reprised their roles and voiced their characters for the first time in 10 years in order to pass the torch to their sons. Bob Burns, the actor behind Tracey the Gorilla, would continue to voice Tracey in the new cartoon. The concept was set and the show debuted in February 1986.
Columbia, having gone through some changes in management since the negotiations with Filmation, were a little perturbed that another studio would get a cartoon bearing the name of their cash-cow movie franchise on the air before them. Especially the studio that owned the name Ghost Busters. This lead to Columbia partnering with cut-rate studio DIC Animation to get their Real Ghostbusters cartoon on the air. Filmation had to add “The Original” to their cartoon to make it stand out from Columbia’s cartoon. Needless to say, this still causes confusion amongst Ghostbusters fans who have no idea about the 1975 tv show.
Cavalcade of Awesome 