Now that the fall television season has started, I made a point of trying out several new shows to see if they would hold any interest for me. For the most part, I’ve been disappointed.

Chuck, on NBC, didn’t do it for me. The premise was interesting. but the techno-babble part really stretches the limits of believability for me. I find it hard to believe that all of the CIA and NSA’s top secret information could be implanted in Chuck’s mind by simply watching a string of images. I find it even harder to believe that that information would continue to be relevant beyond a certain point. And the way he saved the day in the end? I might be a little hard on the show -it’s supposed to be a light comedy, but I missed the second episode and then realized I didn’t care. I will say that the main character comes off as likeable, though. And I didn’t hate it.

Journeyman, also on NBC, was much better. The concept has been done to death already (man jumps through time fixing wrongs), but it’s the relationship aspects that add an interesting element to this show. When Dan travels through time, he falls out of his life into the past. But things around him keep going on as normal. He crashed his car in the first episode because he disappeared while he was driving. He constantly misses out on dates and appointments with his wife. And everyone thinks that he is crazy. Add in an ex-girlfriend (believed dead) who can also time travel and you have an interesting show. The problems he has to fix are by the book “mysteries” – we figure out what the real goal is as he does – but it’s the relationships that work for me – Dan’s relationship with his wife, who used to date his brother, who is estranged because of that, etc. And I like Kevin McKidd from his time playing Vorenus on HBO’s Rome.

The Bionic Woman, on the other hand, had promise but seems to have failed to deliver on that promise. The first episode was as shaky as a newborn faun, but I thought that it might find its legs. Some of the dialogue came across as heavy-handed and seemed to be written to make the characters sound cool. And the lines were delivered poorly, possibly a failure of direction. I thought that they would give us a Jamie Somers on the run, from both the “bad guys” and the so-called good. But by the end of the first episode she’s ready to join up. They also made her too powerful and confident off the bat. Combat programming? I’d much rather see her work at learning how to use her enhancements. When she faces the original bionic woman, who has been using her abilities for years, she should have been destroyed. I watched the second episode, hoping that it would improve, but I got bored halfway through and no longer cared what was happening. Not a good sign. I won’t return for a third episode.

The only other show that I saw from the new lineup was Dirty Sexy Money which I quite liked. Yes, it’s over the top. Yes, it schizophrenically can’t decide if it wants to be serious or funny or both or neither, but I enjoyed watching it. Peter Krause plays a lawyer (a moral lawyer) who ends up working for a ridiculously rich family, the Darlings, a family full of personalities pulled from the ranks of celebrities – Paris Hilton, the Kennedys, etc. They are almost caricatures, but I think that they are actually trying to give the characters a little bit of depth. I love stories about families and family relationships and so this appeals to me. I like Krause, too, from his time on Six Feet Under. Unfortunately, I see Nate in his performance here, too. A little too much. At the end of the first episode they dropped in a mystery plot as well – a bit tired these days, the overarcing mystery that will become clearer over time, but that was enough to keep me interested. We’ll see how they do in future episodes.

That’s been it for me so far. Except for Pushing Daisies, which is currently sitting on my DVR, waiting to be viewed. I’ll post something on that when I see it.

In the meantime, I will continue to watch Heroes and House and Torchwood until Lost and BSG start up again. I don’t really need to watch any more television anyway…