As a longtime fan of the original two TERMINATOR films, I really liked the idea of an ongoing TERMINATOR television series. However, THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES, due midseason on Fox, looks pretty dreadful.

Have a look here.

Now, 3 minutes of video footage does not necessarily give you a sense of the final product, but I must say that I’m very disappointed. The “touching” scene between John and Sarah came off as stilted, and let me go on record by saying that I am VERY unimpressed with the tool they hired to play the show’s first Terminator.

Next, please.

Why is it that Tim Minear continues to work for Fox? I know criticizing the “auteur” behind WONDERFALLS is a big no-no among genre fans, but it has to be said. Every single show he’s produced since leaving his post at ANGEL has resulted in ratings failure. This is not to say that FIREFLY wasn’t good, or that WONDERFALLS didn’t have its moments, but you have to wonder about the judgement that keeps him working.

Take his latest outing, DRIVE. Essentially LOST on wheels, it strives to have the same kind of sprawling cast and overarcing mythology that brought LOST, HEROES and even JERICHO their success, but it lacks … something. Sincerity, maybe, or a belief in its own concept. I just watched the first hour of the opening, and I found myself underwhelmed. The characters were thin, cliched, and the jokes fell flat. Even Nathan Fillion, who is great in nearly everything he’s in, can’t keep the first hour up. I wanted desperately to like the show because of Fillion, but found myself laughing and groaning at the hackneyed dialogue and cliches.

In some ways, DRIVE feels like a fictionalized version of THE AMAZING RACE, except THE AMAZING RACE is actually entertaining and engaging. Throughout the show, Tina scolded me for not burning this week’s DOCTOR WHO onto DVD so we could watch it, and I found myself checking the timeline on the DVR to see how close we were to the end. I just couldn’t get into the show — its mysteries lacked the teeth necessary to keep you coming back.

Surprisingly, the twist at the end of the first hour — though not particularly original — was enough for me to give the show a second chance with hour two. But if they can’t pull it off, I’m deleting hour three from the cable box and moving on. Though, I have to say that the show stinks of early cancellation.

Maybe Minear, who isn’t a bad writer on other peoples’ shows, could go back to writing under another showrunner. He wrote some great episodes of ANGEL and FIREFLY — maybe all he needs is someone else’s material.

So, season three of Battlestar Galactica is over, finishing up with last night’s episode, “Crossroads.” I wish I could say it was a great season, but overall it was incredibly uneven. Not as bad as season six of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or most of your average scif television shows, but it was definitely a low for the series. It hurts to say that, because the New Caprica storyline at the start of the season was probably the best arc of the entire series, but left RDM and his team of writers groping around for a way to get back on track. Alas, it took the three-part finale centered around “The Trial of Baltar” to do it.

What I liked best: Lee Adama’s testimony and Bill Adama’s final decision. The fate of Baltar at the end. The revelation of the four of the final five Cylons (or maybe not). And the reappearance of an old friend. Oh yes, and the song they heard — “All Along the Watchtower” by Mr. Bob Dylan.

Now we only have to wait eight months for season four …

So, last night’s Heroes didn’t move the plot too far, although we did finally see Nikki’s shadow self in action, as well as the true nature of the painter’s precognitive ability. The best moment, however, came when Peter met future Hiro, which gave us a first glimpse of where the show may be going.

Unlike The 4400, Heroes does a lot with superpowers on a television budget — I actually feel like these people do have powers, even if they’re often left up to the imagination. And storywise, I’m reminded quite a bit of the old George R.R. Martin-edited Wildcards series of novels. The execution of the “superheroes in the real world” concept is very similar, but not quite as dark as Wildcards. Still, this is probably the closest we’ll ever get to seeing George R.R. Martin’s vision on television.

Last Friday’s 2-hour season premiere of Battlestar Galactica was perhaps the most painful hour of television I’ve seen this side of the episode of Six Feet Under when David was abducted and tortured. Maybe more painful. But I mean that in a good way.

Four months into the Cylon’s occupation of the humans on New Caprica, and Colonel Tigh is mounting an insurgency. But barring access to military hardware and faced with a superior force, Tigh resorts to terrorism and suicide bombers to try to beat back the enemy.

Galactica has never been an easy show to watch — it’s always been dark. But things are significantly bleaker on the outset of Season Three. The Cylons, who were softened and made somewhat sympathetic since the original mini-series, are now indefensible as they fight back with an iron fist, rounding up the families of suspect insurrgents and planning the mass-executions of those that resist. And Baltar, the humans’ collaborator President, is now completely irredemable, caving completely to Cylon control. There are plenty of parallels to be made between BSG and the U.S. occupation of Iraq, but I’m also reminded of Vichey France during World War II, and the Japanese occupation of the Philippines.

I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone who hasn’t seen it, yet, but I will say that while things have been bad in the past, I’m unsure of how the humans will get out of this intact. No doubt, Adama will manage to liberate some of his people and get them moving to Earth again, but not without a significant body count.

The other show I’ve enjoyed this season is NBC’s Heroes. With a sprawling cast, a dash of sci-fi and fantasy, and a focus on characterization, Heroes can easily be compared to ABC’s Lost. But unlike Lost, the production team (which includes comic book writer Jeph Loeb), clearly has a plan for where this is going. An apocalyptic event is coming in five weeks, and only a group of strangers with emerging super powers can stop it.

By far, the best character on the show is Hiro, a Japanese salaryman who develops the ability to control the space-time continuum. His joy at discovering his powers, as well as his drive to be a hero like the American superheroes he idolizes makes for an interesting and endlessly likable character. It doesn’t hurt that the actor is also extraordinarily charming.

Rumor has it that Battlestar Galactica will be moving from SciFi to NBC. If this happens, let’s hope they have the good sense to pair it up with Heroes on Monday nights.

The best show on television, genre or otherwise, is back. Well, sort of. SciFi has launched a new series of “webisodes” that bridge the gap between the season two finale and the season three premiere. I’ve already seen the first one, and I am happy to report that it feels exactly like the regular show, right down to the music and the writing. This isn’t the usual “let’s throw some characters we’ve never seen before and shoot on MiniDV” kind of thing — it’s got real cast members (Tigh, Tyrol, Cally), some background players and some interesting revelations about what life is like on New Caprica under Cylon occupation.

A good comparison would be the Star Wars: Clone Wars shorts that came out between Episode II and III, except that this is live action and uses the real actors. I can’t wait to see the whole project collected on DVD — I have a feeling it’s going to end up like a Season Three Episode 0 when all is said and done. It looks like there will be about the same amount of content as in a full episode of the series.

SciFi is pushing it so much, that they’ve made the first webisode their homepage. Check it out.

I watched the pilot episode of “The X-Files” in my dorm room at the University of Maryland the first night it aired, way back in the fall of 1993. I stayed in specifically to watch “The Adventures of Brisco County Junior” which debuted that same distant Friday night. I was a big fan of Bruce Campbell, in no small part due “Army of Darkness,” which I’d dragged some of my college buddies to see the year before, so “Brisco County” was a must see. I watched “The X-Files” simply because it was scifi and on, too. I was moderately impressed by “Brisco County,” but “The X-Files” failed to do anything for me. My initial thought was that the acting was bad, Duchovny clearly didn’t believe in Mulder, and the writers were throwing a lot of alien abduction cliches around because they didn’t know anything about real science fiction. Also, most of the actors were clearly Canadian, which I’ve always found jarring, particularly when Canadians are employed to play American characters. You tend to be pretty good at spotting Canadians when one complete side of your family hails from Buffalo, New York.

However, despite my earlier reservations, I came around to watching “The X-Files” regularly. There was a lot of hype at the time, and I started to “get” what Chris Carter and company were trying to do. In some ways, I think I just submitted and drank the kool aid. The forces in favor of everyone in America watching “The X-Files” were too great to fend off. Ultimately, I would get burned out on the show and by the ninth season, I only really watched the finale. The more convoluted and directionless the mythology became, the more tedious it was to watch.

Recently, I picked up the new “Mythology Collection” DVD’s that only contain episodes relating to the alien abduction story arc. The downside is that these sets don’t include some of the classic standalone episodes, but they do allow you to get a sense of the overall story. Having watched the first set of DVD’s, I find myself at a loss to describe just how disjointed and poorly written this show was. It’s like my years of being an “X-Files” fan were erased, and my initial impression of the show has taken root. A lot of this is probably due to the fact that it hasn’t aged well — in an era with programs like “Battlestar Galactica” and “Lost,” “The X-Files” seems weak and cheap by comparison. Some of its genuine contributions to television — including movie-level cinematography and an ongoing storyline, have been supplanted by newer shows. And moments that moved and excited me back in the mid-1990’s now seem underwhelming. There are so many basic storytelling problems — even in individual episodes — and Duchovny spends so much time hamming it up and phoning it in, that I find it hard to get through the DVD’s.

I can’t attribute all of the problems I have with the show to age, as I’ve also been watching “Star Trek: The Next Generation” and “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,” and although there are some rough patches, the two shows are probably better than I remember them. “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” in particular is as great as it was ten years ago and is clearly the progenitor of “Battlestar Galactica.”

Ultimately, I think “The X-Files” failings must be placed at the feet of Chris Carter. Although he came up with a great concept with “The X-Files,” the execution of much of the show was done rather shoddily. Looking back at “Millennium,” Carter’s other major show, I see similar issues. Largest of which is that the police procedural stuff isn’t handled very convincingly. Granted, I hate cop shows, but “Law and Order,” and especially “The Wire,” feel a lot more real to me in regard to the nuances of detective work than “The X-Files.” Dare I say that the police elements of “The X-Files” are genre cliches taken from a lifetime of watching television and not the result of years of painstaking research?

Granted, how much research could Chris Carter and company put into crashed alien spacecraft, UFO abductions, and shapechanging supersoldiers? But the least he could have done is read some literary science fiction and lift from the greats. Instead, he lifts from B-movies and bad television.

Sadly, I must betray my own nostalgia and admit that “The X-Files,” for all the good it did television as a whole, sucks. Big time. There, I said it. Flame away.

According to Ain’t It Cool, Jane Espenson, perhaps one of the best writers on Joss Whedon’s three television shows (”Angel,” “Buffy,” and “Firefly”) will be writing an episode of “Battlestar Galactica” in season three. This is really exciting news — Jane is one of the many great “Buffy” writers whose contributions to the show were often misattributed to its creator. Jane’s writing tends towards quippy and funny, so I’m interested to see just how that will translate to BSG’s darker universe.

If you’ve read Alberic Heresies #1, you may already be aware of Jane’s huge influence on my writing. I can’t wait to see what she does on my favorite show.

Here are my picks for the top five TV shows of the year:

5. Rome - HBO’s excellent period drama about the rise and fall of Julius Caeser. Ostensibly through the point of view of two average Roman army soldiers, the series turns out to be anything but. Still, an enjoyable series nonetheless, though I would have preferred more of the “average Roman” perspective. The climactic battle with Vorenus and Pullo in the arena is the most violent and awesome action sequence I ever saw on television.

4. Lost - Oh Lost. So much potential, so many great moments and ideas, so little direction. Lost has the frustrating distinction of offering great questions, but the lack of answers is incredibly unsatisfying. Usually Lost’s answers just lead to more frustrating questions. Still, the addition of the survivors of the tail section of the plan was a stroke of genius, and the character work is always great. Here’s hoping we get more answers as the series progresses.

3. Veronica Mars - Yeah, I was slow to pick up on this series, too, but the recent DVD release of season one has made me a true believer. Veronica Mars, the daughter of Neptune, CA’s disgraced former sheriff and resident Private Investigator solves crimes and tries to survive high school. Sounds like Nancy Drew, but the show is actually a clever look at class conflict and offers perhaps the best female heroine on television. Buffy was defined by the men in her life, but Veronica is defined by her smarts and her wits. I hope my girls grow up to be just like her.

2. Doctor Who - The world’s longest running scifi show and smartest kids’ show returns after over a decade away and it’s brilliant. Full of excitement, great ideas, humor and heart, Russell T. Davies’ take on Doctor Who is even better than the classic series. Christopher Eccleston established himself as one of the best Doctors’ ever and then he died! Rose manages to be the series most resourceful and feminist companion, while still being a working class London shopgirl. And let’s not even get into David Tennant’s 9th Doctor, whose Christmas day debut is one of my favorite hours of the series ever. Hopefully someday this series will get an American outlet and fans won’t have to resort to quasi-legal outlets to see it.

1. Battlestar Galactica - Ronald Moore took the best elements of Glen Larson’s cheesy Star Wars ripoff and turned it into the smartest, most political and contemporary show on television. The conflict between Adama and Caine over Boomer’s rape may as well be the debate between John McCain and George W. Bush on torture. Almost everything with the show deals with the issues we as a society grapple with — how much executive power should a leader take during wartime, how do you deal with a hidden enemy within your ranks, when does interrogation become torture, and how many of our civil liberties are we willing to sacrifice in the name of “security.” It’s all stuff we read about every day in the paper, and it’s the heart and soul of what Battlestar Galactica is all about.

Beyond that, Galactica is the best written show on television. Every second of screen time is important — there’s not a moment wasted. Each episode is so densely packed with plot, characters and ideas that it’s hard to go back to other shows where nothing happens. Throw in some amazing space combat sequences, compelling and flawed characters, and Bear McCreary’s incredble score (easily the best on televison since Twin Peaks) and you have something truly special. If you haven’t seen it yet, Netflix the DVD’s — I think you’ll find that they’reworth it.

When last we left Bill Adama and his ragtag fugitive fleet, Galactica was gearing up for a major battle with the other surviving Battlestar, Pegasus. As I’ve written before, this was in my estimation the greatest cliffhanger in a scifi show since Jean Luc Picard was turned into Locutus of Borg in Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Tonight we’ll be getting the resolution to the cliffhanger, amongst other things. Galactica airs at 10pm ET on the Scifi Channel. Time magazine says it’s the best show on television — and I have to say that I’m in complete agreement.