Good Morning, Miami, Without a Trace

Traditionally, NBC has had problems finding a good new show to
fill the 8:30 slot on Thursday. This year, they avoided the
failed guesswork of years past, and just slid a quality existing
series (Scrubs) into that slot.

Now the problem slot is 9:30, which they tried to fill with
a piece of drek called GOOD MORNING, MIAMI. Talented TV
producer shows up for a job interview for taking over a
drek TV show called Good Morning, Miami (see, life does
imitate art), falls instantly in love with the show’s hairdresser,
takes the job, and deals with the batch of wacky (yet uninteresting)
characters. Hilarity fails to ensue. Yeah, I was complaining yesterday
about the lack of new workplace sitcoms… but getting one didn’t help.

Tip to the makers of this show: a hairdresser working on a
morning show would not be leaving work at 5:45 pm, much less
feel the need to convince people she was leaving at 8 pm.
She’s a hairdresser — they don’t need her after the show
is over.

Tonight’s other premiere was WITHOUT A TRACE, a
police procedural drama about the FBI’s Missing Persons unit.
Think of it as CSI without dead people. Instead of CSI‘s
zooming-through-the-corpse effects, we get repeated crossfades between
the location where the FBI is currently investigating and what they
discover had taken place there earlier. The show kept me guessing
about the story they were unveiling, but the characters weren’t particularly
interesting. I’ve never been a fan of Anthony LaPaglia; he seems to be
slowly morphing into Alan Rosenberg, whom I do like, but Anthony hasn’t gotten
the likable portion yet.

All in all: if you’re into CSI, it’s worth looking at one episode
of Without A Trace, but I suspect you won’t like it as much.