New Series Trailers Link My impressions: I loved the promos for Elementary and Vegas. Elementary should appeal to the same audience as The Mentalist and could possibly skew a little younger. Vegas seems like something totally different for the netwoek, but if they write the show like The Good Wife and Blue Bloods where there are ongoing storylines to supplement the usual procedural case of the week, I see no reason CBS's audience won't accept it. Oh, and there is one other thing that could help Vegas. The promos prominently feature Muse Watson, who played Gibb's mentor, Franks, on NCIS and he is a HUGE fan favorite and CBS could use this to promote the show which will air after NCIS and NCIS LA. Partners was eh, but CBS has never had a track record where the pilots for their comedies have been particularly great. 2.5 Men, TBBT, M&M, and RoE all had pilots that were universally panned by the critics. The nets' strength is picking up shows that have potential and then making subtle changes in subsequent episodes to improve the show. My first thought about Partners is the producers should tone down Urie's being so nelly and possibly even hire a couple of recurring characters to make the show feel a little less like Will & Grace 2.0. My first suggestion would be to hire Judd Hirsch as the father of David's character and Lainie Kazan as the mother of Michael's character and give the show more of a family comedy vibe. As for Made in Jersey, I wasn't particularly impressed, but the promo really didn't turn me off either. It looks like a show that could do well on USA or TNT, which could be good for a Friday broadcast network show. As a matter of fact, one of the show's executive producers, Dana Calvo, has been a producer on such series as Covert Affairs, Franklin & Bash, and Greek.
Elementary? blergh. Couldn't CBS come up with something more original than doing a modern day version of Sherlock Holmes which has already been done by the BBC. I won't be watching it I just think they got the casting really really wrong and the ideas not that original either. I just feel like CBS saw the success of the BBC Sherlock and are trying to cash in by doing a full length series which Sherlock is not. I don't think it'll get very far unless it's exceptional brilliant. The idea that the only original thing about it is that Dr. Watson's character is female and that Holmes is in Brooklyn, New York makes it totally bizarre in my opinion.
My first impressions, FWIW: Vegas will die. I'm not saying I won't like it, because I like the cast and I tend to like 'different' shows, but the CBS audience won't take to it. And it doesn't seem compatible at all with NCIS or NCIS: LA. I'll probably like it (but, I don't watch the NCIS'), so it will, no doubt, be cancelled. Elementary, I hope, will be good and succeed. I've loved Lucy Liu in just about everything she has done; and I was an Eli Stone fan, so I'm looking forward to Jonny Lee Miller in something. I don't watch POI, but, with Awake gone, there's nothing else at that 10pm hour that I would watch. Here's hoping it does well. Partners seems like it could be good, and as a huge Michael Urie fan since Ugly Betty, I hope it is. If the CBS audience likes Two Broke Girls, I think it will like this. I was also a big fan of Will and Grace, so I'm looking forward to this one. Made in Jersey is a perfect Friday show. Hopefully, it won't take itself too seriously, like A Gifted Man, and just be entertaining. On Friday nights, after a long work week, I just want to be entertained. I think I like the lead actress, and I am a fan of legal dramas, so this is another I am looking forward to. And it seems like a good 'breather' between CSI:NY and Blue Bloods.