Viewers should give 'The Nine' a chance

Alex Strachan
CanWest News Service

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

A year ago, The Nine seemed poised to score a nine out of 10 among viewers and critics alike.

One of the more distinctive pilot episodes of a new TV season full of distinction, The Nine had the benefit of strong buzz and solid reviews. The tense tale of nine hostages trapped in a bank-robbery-gone-wrong was emblematic of a new trend in TV drama: tightly wound serialized tales that reveal their story a piece at a time, week by week, like the chapters of a novel.

Trouble was, there were too many of them. Viewers, already committed to Lost, Heroes, Intelligence, Prison Break, 24 and other serial thrillers had too little time to follow new series like The Nine, Day Break and Kidnapped, no matter how compelling they were.

And so The Nine was pulled in November, after just seven episodes, leaving the story up in the air and viewers -- what few were still watching -- hanging.

The Nine returns tonight, eight months later, with the first of six episodes that were filmed but never shown.

Even a six-week summer run is no guarantee. If The Nine's ratings fall below that of Shaq's Big Challenge or The Next Best Thing: Who is the Greatest Celebrity Impersonator? -- two reality shows that performed respectably, if not spectacularly, this summer for The Nine's parent network -- ABC may well pull The Nine again.

That would be a shame, because even though The Nine will not wrap up its story comprehensively -- 13 episodes were filmed but 22 were planned -- even a cursory glance at tonight's episode, about the killing of a security guard, shows how much more thought-provoking and ambitious The Nine was than most procedural TV dramas.

The Nine could be hard to follow at times, but in a smart way. It challenged the viewer, by telling its tale through flashbacks and flash forwards. That was part of what made it exceptional, and tonight's episode is no exception. Eight of the nine survivors are reunited at the District Attorney's office to re-live the security guard's murder, and once again at least one of them has a dark secret to hide.

Many more viewers will watch tonight's repeat of CSI: New York, in the same time period, than tonight's new episode of The Nine, but The Nine is by far the more compelling program. Check it out, if you doubt that. ABC

- According to Jim just keeps on going, no matter how much some wish Jim would just go away. In back-to-back repeats -- no lie -- Jim (James Belushi) becomes a reluctant guest on a talk show after he tells Cheryl (Courtney Thorne-Smith) that men shouldn't let women "feminize" them, and then he accuses her of turning their son Kyle into a mama's boy. Enlightened -- that's our Jim. ABC

- Former kung fu mystic David Carradine tries his hand at real-life ghostbusting in Celebrity Paranormal Project, as he and fellow celebrity D-listers Coolio and Andrew Firestone investigate the haunting of an abandoned industrial mill. Worth it if only for the spectacle of Carradine squinting real hard and trying to summon the spirit world. Slice

- One-time New Yorker editor, Talk magazine founder, celebrity culture vulture and CNBC talk-show host Tina Brown is Stephen Colbert's guest on The Colbert Report. Colbert and Brown: a match made in late-night heaven. CTV, Comedy Network