Summer Glau

THE TV COLUMN : Mammoth has no mercy

Forget that lumbering Manny the mammoth in Ice Age: The Meltdown (voiced by Ray Romano ) - we all know woolly mammoths were giant, killer beasts waiting to stomp on folks whenever they could.

At least that’s the way the woolly critter is in Sci Fi Channel’s Mammoth. The thrills and chills kick in at 8 p. m. Saturday.

Fellow TV lovers, Saturday night on the tube doesn’t get any better than this. The tag line: “We hunted it to extinction, now it’s hunting us !” Wowzers. Pop the corn, sit back and enjoy.

Our heroes in this stompin ’ disaster flick are Summer Glau, who played the ethereal River Tam in the late lamented Firefly; Vincent Ventresca (The Invisible Man ); Leila Arcieri (Kevin Hill ); and the enduring Tom Skerritt (Picket Fences ).

Sure you’ll have to invoke what Samuel Taylor Coleridge coined in 1817 as “that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment.” In this case the moment is two hours (including commercials ).

And, naturally, Coleridge never stumbled upon a woolly mammoth with murder in its heart. How does Sci Fi take us down that road ?

“When a meteor smashes into a natural history museum,” the network informs us, “the fury of a partially frozen, 40, 000-yearold mammoth is unleashed on a small country town in Louisiana.”

Yes. The ol’ meteor ploy. Send in the National Guard.

Wait ! It’s not really a meteor. Send in the Men in Black !

Disbelief ? How many “small country towns” in Louisiana have their own museum with a partially frozen mammoth ?

Ordered to “contain the threat” at all costs (and we know what that means to the MIB ), special agents Powers (Arcieri ) and Whitaker (Marcus Lyle Brown ) are given only 17 hours to dispatch the possessed beast or the town will be wiped off the map.

Recruited to help the agents is local paleontologist Dr. Frank Abernathy (Ventresca ). Meanwhile, the mammoth is on a rampage and appears to be headed for the outside world.

Life as we know it would probably cease at that point.

Time is running out, and the body count is rising. In addition, Abernathy must save his daughter (Glau ) and his crusty dad (Skerritt ) before they are stomped.

Why do you have to suspend your disbelief ? Because everybody knows that if they really wanted to kill the mammoth, all Game & Fish would have to do is set a limit on the creature and 300, 000 hunters would have the thing dispatched a half-hour after sunrise. Just talk: Fox will take another shot at a late Saturday-night talk show come September. Talk Show With Spike Feresten will feature the usual late-night chat plus comedy sketches.

Who’s Spike Feresten ? He’s a writer who penned “The Soup Nazi” episode of Seinfeld. He’s also written for Letterman. Debut is 11 p. m. Sept. 18. Another round: ABC Family has renewed Wildfire for a third season next fall. New episodes film this summer. Meanwhile: ABC Family will introduce four new shows between June and August.

June 5 - Falcon Beach. Set in New England, the drama involves the conflicts between the locals and the vacationers.

June 26 - Kyle XY follows a brilliant teen who sees the world as a newborn sees it and is taken home by a psychologist.

July - Three Moons Over Milford will star Elizabeth McGovern trying to keep her family together while Earth is on the brink of destruction and chaos reigns.

August - Fallen. An adopted teen (Paul Wesley ) searches for his biological family and weird things start happening. Animals, for example, begin talking to him. Why ? He’s an angel. Don’t forget about suspending that disbelief. Promising pilot: If pedigree is any guarantee, then Brothers & Sisters has a good shot of making it to the ABC lineup this fall.

The family soap opera stars Calista Flockhart (Ally McBeal ), Rachel Griffiths (Six Feet Under ) and Balthazar Getty (Alias ). ABC has assigned Marti Noxon as the show’s executive producer. Noxon is a former writer and producer of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

With that direction and those actors, it looks as if ABC wants to give this series a serious chance of success.

Brainiacs compete: It’s time for the best and brightest in the Natural State to strut their stuff in Arkansas Quiz Bowl 2006. The questions and answers fly at 5 p. m. Saturday on AETN.

Quiz Bowl has been an AETN tradition since 1985 and is a test of student knowledge in literature, math, science, history, art and music. Ten teams will compete in five conference matches, each with a champion. There will be no overall state champion.