HERCULES THE STRONG Tries To Save TV!!

Memo to Programming: Herc’s Top Ten Ways To Improve Our Lives

The fall season officially launched on Monday with the season premieres of UPN’s “Moesha” and “The Parkers.” Now is the time on Strong Box when we offer the networks our top ten ways to improve the lives of television viewers everywhere.

1. QUIT CANCELLING GOOD SHOWS, YOU QUISLINGS.

“Well, duh,” mutters every programming exec from Century City to Burbank. And yet CBS yanked its best hourlong, “Now & Again,” NBC axed its best new comedy, “Freaks and Geeks,” ABC jettisoned its best half-hour, “Sports Night,” UPN axed its funniest show, “Dilbert,” and Fox quickly bailed on its funniest and most promising non-animated half-hour, “Action.” Praise only the WB, which has doggedly stuck with every show of even marginal value. Hey now: nobody watched “60 Minutes,” “All in the Family,” “M*A*S*H” “Cheers,” “Seinfeld,” “Drew Carey” and a lot of other eventual ratings bonanzas during their first seasons. If it’s good, leave it on long enough for the average human being to find it. Leave it on five years if you have to. It’s not like there’s an endless supply of other good shows waiting in the wings to replace it.

2. QUIT MOVING STUFF AROUND.

If you’re lucky enough to get your hands on a decent show, leave it where someone can find it! I don’t care if your show is routinely clobbered by “Two Guys and a Girl.” Think about this: “Two Guys and a Girl” will be in RERUNS 30 weeks a year. People will seek out alternatives to repeats of “Two Guys and a Girl.” The average viewer shouldn’t have to consult a search engine to figure out where NBC schedules a perfectly entertaining enterprise like “Freaks and Geeks” from week to week.

3. LOSE THE STUDIO AUDIENCE.

And don’t be bringing back that laugh-track either (hear me, Titus?). We as a culture have evolved beyond the need to have others tell us when to laugh. “The Larry Sanders Show,” “The Simpsons,” “Futurama,” “The West Wing,” “Ally McBeal,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “Angel,” “Freaks and Geeks,” “Now & Again,” “Twin Peaks,” “Hill Street Blues,” “L.A. Law,” “Moonlighting,” “Northern Exposure” and every decent movie comedy ever made have long proven that we can find the jokes on our own. “The Parkers” will be just as funny without yahoos howling at every entendre. (And the tourists will be just as star-struck when they run into Happy at Disneyland.)

4. LOSE THE “NEWS.”

Yes, we’re all very excited about how “cost effective” these magazine shows are. But, seriously, if we stuck Barbara Walters, Diane Sawyer and Stone Phillips into a big burlap bag and tossed it into the East River, would the nation’s viewers be poorer for it? I’ve seen enough editions of “20/20” and “Dateline” and “Primetime” and “48 Hours” to feel my heart sink at every televised utterance of the adjective “undercover.” There are only enough interesting stories for one weekly newsmagazine, and “60 Minutes” seems to find them all.

5. MORE FILMMAKERS

Some of the very best shows on the tube come from writers who have already proven themselves in the arena of motion pictures: witness the success of Joss Whedon (who went from “Toy Story” to “Buffy” and “Angel”), Aaron Sorkin (who went from “A Few Good Men” and “An American President” to “Sports Night” and “The West Wing”), and even Michael Crichton (who went from teaming with Steven Spielberg on “Jurassic Park” and “Twister” to teaming with Steven Spielberg on “ER”). If someone of James Cameron’s stature can write for the small screen (he co-created Fox’s first-rate new “Dark Angel”), why not air some pilots scripted by smart, original voices like Chris McQuarrie (“The Usual Suspects,” “The Way of the Gun”), Scott Rosenberg (“Con Air,” “High Fidelity”), Scott Frank (“Get Shorty,” “Out of Sight”), Steven Soderbergh (“sex, lies, and videotape”), Quentin Tarantino (“Pulp Fiction,” “From Dusk Till Dawn”), P.T. Anderson (“Hard 8,” “Magnolia”) Andrew Niccol (“Gattaca,” “The Truman Show”) and Frank Darabont (“The Green Mile,” “The Shawshank Redemption”)?

6. MORE REALITY SHOWS

The tribe has spoken! Forgive the repetition, but the reason we love shows like “Survivor,” “The Real World,” “Blind Date” and, yes, even “Who Wants to Be A Millionaire” is we have NO IDEA from moment to moment what’s going to happen. While it’s disheartening to see that evil triumphs as least as often as good, these shows make for useful life lessons. The networks shouldn’t give up on trying to duplicate “Survivor’s” success as quickly as the networks gave up on trying to ape “Millionaire.” Keep in mind that even “Big Brother” is a huge demographic success (and would be far more widely recognized as such had it not debuted the same summer as the more popular “Survivor”). Keep making reality shows with game elements, but also give decent shows like “American High” and “Johns Hopkins 24/7” a fighting chance.

7. MORE TIMESHARES.

One of the finest new programming trends to emerge last year was to have two shows share one timeslot. This happened by accident last year when “Once and Again” did so well in the “NYPD Blue” timeslot that ABC wound up delaying the premiere of “NYPD” until midseason. It worked so well, in fact, that ABC is letting “Once” and “NYPD” share again, and the WB has adopted the strategy by letting “Felicity” and “Jack & Jill” take turns occupying Wednesdays at 9. Anything to cut down on those reruns, baby.

8. QUIT SCHEDULING ALL THE GOOD SHOWS AGAINST EACH OTHER!

Would it kill Fox to NOT schedule its best new show (“Dark Angel”) against a show as good (and as similarly titled) as the WB’s “Angel?” Why not stick “Dark Angel” on Wednesdays at 8, where it could give us an alternative to “Bette,” “Titans” “7 Days” and “Millionaire,” and give discriminating young adults something to watch before “The West Wing?” Also, why is NBC’s best new comedy, “Ed,” stuck against “The Simpsons” on Sunday? And did the WB really have to sacrifice “Gilmore Girls” against “Friends” on Thursday?

9. LET’S WORK TOWARD A BETTER 10 P.M.

It occurs to me that what we REALLY need is for one (or two) of the three weblets (Fox, UPN and the WB) to start programming prime time’s 10 p.m. desert (even if it means bailing out of 8 p.m.). Wouldn’t “Dark Angel” do much better Tuesdays at 10 opposite “Once and Again,” “Judging Amy” and “Dateline?” And don’t say 10 p.m. is a loser daypart. “ER” and “The Practice” continue to prove that monster hits can inhabit 10 p.m.

10. DO NOT DEFY ME.

I am -- Hercules.