The karma of creativity in TV land works in mysterious ways, thus the abundance of alien, psychic, and in-search-of shows to hit the networks beginning last season and continuing this fall.  If you’re the type of viewer who liked Twin Peaks and the X Files, then you’ll be a happy couch potato camper with shows such as Lost, Medium, Invasions, and Threshold invading the airwaves this season.  

The buzz is in abundance for the hit show Lost (Wednesday at 9 p.m., ABC), and with recent Emmy Award wins it is sure to keep up the momentum, at least for another season.  What Lost has going for it is a great cast and a nice blend of action, mystery, intrigue, and human drama.  The problem with shows that have a continuing mystery as part of the fabric of the show is the need to sustain a level of anxiousness while always revealing secrets to satisfy viewers and keep the storylines in perpetual motion.  The X Files was successful because it would pepper the central storyline of FBI agent Mulder’s search for evidence of his sister’s alien abduction with stand-alone episodes that explored other bizarre paranormal experiences while retaining the core human relationship between the leads.  Lost has such a large cast and so many storylines that it will be difficult to keep it going for multiple seasons without becoming a parody of itself or getting so “inside” (like Twin Peaks in its second season) that audiences get turned off and leave in droves.    

Another sophomore show is Medium (Monday at 10 p.m., NBC), starring Emmy-winner Patricia Arquette, that is half cop show, half family show and half paranormal show.  Aha, you say, that adds up to 150 percent.  You are correct and that’s the problem.  Medium  is very adept at depicting a middle American family; it has all the elements that make a cop show interesting; and it portrays the psychic ability of the main character in a believable manner, but those are too many things to pack into one show.  If they would drop one of the three — family, psychic, or cop procedural — then I think they’d have a decent series, but at this point, there isn’t enough of either to keep me coming back week after week.

Two alien invasion shows have landed dramatically this season, and both contain great casts, excellent production values, and mystery storylines.  The better of the two, Threshold (Friday  at 9 p.m., CBS), had a two-hour premier that instantly grabbed you as it introduced the members of a secret government cabal headed by the Deputy National Security Advisor, played by the accomplished Charles S. Dutton.  After a cargo ship appears to have been attacked by an alien craft, an elite group of specialists called The Red Team are brought together to check out the strange goings on.  Headed by the attractive Carla Gugino (Karen Sisco), portraying a worst-case-scenario expert whose worst case happens to be alien invasions, the group consists of individuals with a distinct expertise and personality that makes each character, and their interactions, very watchable, much in the vein of the Star Trek franchises.  

Speaking of Trek, the superb supporting cast has Brent Spiner (Data in ST: Next Generation) as a forensic microbiologist, Peter Dinklage (The Station Agent) as a womanizing mathematician and linguist, Rob Benedict (Felicity) as an astronautical engineer, and the resident commando, Brian Van Holt (Black Hawk Down) who keeps them all out of harm’s way.  What I like so far about Threshold is that it seems proud of its intelligence and the way it portrays the science by only explaining things when needed and in a seamless, organic manner, much like the characters in ER banter medical jargon.  I hope that the series doesn’t pander to network executives wanting to sex things up and that they let the geeks of the world word-of-mouth it to success.  If not, it can have another life as a feature film (see Serenity).

The other alien show is Invasion (Wednesday at 10 p.m., ABC), where presumably aliens have infiltrated a small South Florida town after a large hurricane blows through.  It is Invasion of the Body Snatchers for the 21st century.  A lot of critics have been raving about this show, touting its high production values and superb cast, but the premier didn’t impress me, and succeeding episodes haven’t gotten much better.  They have successfully set up all the players and their dynamics, but I just wasn’t blown away.  I saw no signs that the show would explore any new territory in the aliens taking over the world storyline and certainly not better than how Threshold is tackling the premise.  Only time will tell if Invasion can keep the big lead it inherits from Lost.

Another new show that should be included with this group is The Night Stalker, a reimagination of the 70’s TV movies and show that started this whole genre.  Since it was a favorite of mine as a kid, I want to savor the new version over time and weigh in later on whether it lives up to its predecessor.

As they say, stay tuned.

Lost: Must See.  
Medium: Pass.  
Threshold: Must See.  
Invasion: Wait & See.

Rich Burlingham