2005-06 TV Season Commandments

1. Pick Up These Pilots: There are more than 100 pilots (basically, show tryouts) in consideration for the new fall season, and no one is supposed to see them. But tapes are floating and sources blabbing, and I can tell you that the following pilots are, by all accounts, this season’s biggest and brightest:

• Pepper Dennis (WB), starring Rebecca Romijn as a Chicago-based TV reporter, is everything we used to love about the WB and more—and could help save the sinking Froggy net.

Chris Rock• Move over, Raymond. Everybody (with any comedic appreciation) will love Everybody Hates Chris (UPN), a Wonder Years-esque semiautobiographical show narrated by Chris Rock.

• My Name Is Earl (NBC), a comedy starring Jason Lee (Almost Famous) as a low-rent crook who wins the lottery, is the funniest damn thing you’ve seen since Arrested Development.

• Though everyone is doing their own version of Desperate Housewives, two knockoffs might even be better than Wisteria Lane: Soccer Moms (ABC), starring Kristin Davis and Gina Torres (Alias, Firefly) as suburban, well, you know; and The Commuters (CBS), a drama about three couples with husbands who take the train each morning to NYC, starring Jeri Ryan and David Arquette.

• Kitchen Confidential (Fox), stars Bradley Cooper (yum) as a down-on-his-luck chef who takes over at a top New York restaurant—and no, I don’t only love this one because it’s Bradley Cooper. It’s phenomenal, especially by Fox standards.

• The Unit (CBS), starring Amy Acker and Scott Foley as members of a special forces unit, is considered a shoo-in, and something of a male Alias, or Malias, if you will. The former missus will be so proud.

Greg Grunberg• And of course you know I have to mention the new dramas from Camp JJ Abrams (which we all know can do no wrong): The Catch (ABC), starring Greg Grunberg as a bounty hunter; and What About Brian? (ABC), starring Barry Watson as a single thirtysomething whose friends are all married.