Halloween is just around the corner, and so is daylight savings time (for those of us in such unfortunate time zones), or as I like to call it: eternal night. When I can arrive at work in the morning in the dark and get off work in the afternoon, still in the dark, something is very, very wrong with the way the clock is setup.

But enough about that. It’s time to hand out the award for the best new television show this season.

Every year the networks flood us with a bunch of copycat programming designed to ride the wave of successful shows from the previous year. Most of the time, what they give us is crap. That’s what happens when you clone something; the second version is always worse. If Michael Keaton’s horrible Multiplicity movie taught us anything, it’s that a copy of a copy of a copy usually ends up retarded.

Thankfully, however, there’s usually at least one person in Hollywood willing to take a risk, even if it’s small. Two years ago it was Lost, which is now must-see programming for the TiVo. A few years ago it was CSI.

This year, two months into the new season, I think it’s safe to say that show is Heros, the comic-book-meets-real-life drama about a bunch of “ordinary” people discovering “extraordinary” powers.

I have to give full disclosure here. I’m a huge fan of M. Night Shyamalan’s Unbreakable. In that film, Bruce Willis discovers that he has a superhero type of power: he can’t be hurt. In Hollywood-speak this is known as an “origin film”, because the central story is about the discovery and development of the hero; how he or she came into being. Unlike a lot of other “origin stories” though, Shyamalan’s movie wasn’t the typical superhero fare: all costumes, special effects and explosions. Instead, the film was crafted like a standard drama, paced with a slow and deliberate hand, treating the material seriously, as if it had nothing to do with comic book heros at all. It was the most unique spin I’ve ever seen on the “super hero” genre, and it worked brilliantly.

If CBS’s failed Smith television show, which they yanked this season after only three episodes, was the television counterpart to Michael Mann’s Heat, then Heros is most certainly NBC’s answer to Unbreakable.

Hero’s gets the same sort of treatment that Unbreakable did. There are no men in tights and capes, no Fortress of Solitude, and no Batmobile. Instead, there’s just normal people from various walks of life who happen to be experiencing some really fantastic changes within their own skin.

A Japanese man who can bend space and time to his will. A teenage cheerleader who can regenerate her own cells, and thus escapes from her own autoposy after her chest has already been cut open. A man who can paint the future, revealing a nuclear attack on New York City. Another man and his brother who can fly. A cop who can hear the thoughts of those around him. Neat stuff eh?

But also easily turned into a pile of corny crap in the wrong hands. And that’s the real fear with anything emminating from the genre of the “super hero”. In the right hands, you get Batman Begins. In the wrong hands you get Batman Forever.

So far, NBC and the creators of Heros have done things right. The show feels more like Unbreakable than it does Fantastic Four, or any number of poorly executed super hero films. The cast is larger than for most shows; an ensemble that reminds one of a Robert Altman movie if he were the kind of guy to do American television. And that helps move the pace of the show along. We’re never exposed to scenes that drag on too long or feel forced to fill air time. Instead, we get a show has what I like to call The Lost Factor.

The Lost Factor is when the writers and directors of a show can architect the episodes in such a way that they do three things very well. First, by virtue of the way the a show is written, directed and filmed, with a certain style and pacing, it seems to move quickly; it doesn’t seem like you’ve just spent an hour of your life watching TV. Second, the writers construct the show in such a way that for every question answered, two more questions are raised. Third, the thing these sorts of shows do better than any others on television is leave the viewer begging for the next episode.

We’ve witnessed this phenomenon before with serial television shows like The X-Files (main story arc) and Twin Peaks. Sometimes everything comes together - cast, writing, directing, network support - and the whole thing works to create something that cannot be better described other than to call it “Must See TV.”

Heros is on the verge of staking that claim. After watching the first few eposides I find myself reaching for Heros almost as quickly as Lost or Grey’s Anatomy on my TiVo. And considering the sheer volume of television shows that my wife records on our TiVo, that’s saying something.

The good news is that, unlike Smith, NBC has ordered the full season. Heros gets to stick around, at least for this year. I recommend watching it, even if super heros (and villians) aren’t your thing. Because like Unbreakable, Heros transcends the comic book genre. And whenever a television show or movie does that, it’s worth paying attention to.

In early 2004 Atari released a Troika game called The Temple of Elemental Evil. It was subtitled as “A Classic Greyhawk Adventure.” Originally, The Temple of Elemental Evil (abbreviated as TOEE) was a module, released in 1985, for the pencil and paper Dugeons & Dragons game. Fans of the pencil and paper version of D&D always loved the TOEE module, and hoped it would one day be reincarnated as a video game, especially given the success of certain roleplaying computer games like the Baldur’s Gate series.

The catch in all of this was that many pencil and paper roleplayers often disliked the way computer games translated the D&D universe.

Video games are a different animal than traditional pencil and paper roleplaying games. P&P games were designed to be played at a table, with friends, and often involved long nights, lots of pizza and Mountain Dew. D&D in the pencil and paper era was as much a social event (if not more) as it was a game.

Video games changed all of that. Baldur’s Gate, and it’s wildly successful sequel, Baldur’s Gate 2, were single-player games. The social aspect of D&D was dropped and computerization took over. The result was a mixed bag. While Baldur’s Gate was a really fun video game (and one of my favorites as well), it was not what many old school players considered as true D&D. The biggest complaint from D&D fans was that the combat happend in real-time, as opposed to the turn-based nature of a P&P game. Yet, because of the success of games like Baldur’s Gate, nearly every other roleplaying game to hit the PC has utilized a real-time combat engine.

Enter Troika and The Temple of Elemental Evil. The developers for TOEE decided that it was time for a computer roleplaying game to finally deliver a product that emulated the pencil and paper experience. Combat in TOEE is turn-based, and as much as possible, every single rule and detail in the Dungeons and Dragons handbook was coded into the TOEE engine.

There was just one problem. Atari wanted to publish the game too quickly, and it flat-out was not ready. With their feet held to the fire, Troika pushed the game out the door in an unfinished state. What resulted was one of the worst game publishing nightmares of all time. TOEE was one of the most bug-ridden pieces of software ever to hit store shelves.

Fans who had waited for a turn-based Dungeons and Dragons game were at once elated, and then mortified. The game had the mechanics correct; it was a thing of beauty from a purist point of view. But it was littered with so many bugs, flaws and glitches that it was virtually unplayable, even after several patches from Atari. The Temple Of Elemental Evil looked like it could have been one of the greatest roleplaying games of all time, but a poor decision to publish it before it was ready killed the potential for the game.

But the story isn’t over.

Just when things looked grim, the Circle of Eight showed up, a group of fans with coding and hacking skills and a passion for Atari’s butchered game. They loved the game so much, and realize it had so much potential, that they spent their free time trying to reverse engineer and demystify the TOEE game engine. They worked tirelessly to modify it, and in the process turn a turd of a game into something worthy of every D&D fan’s PC gaming shelf.

The end result? This past July the Circle of Eight released their final patch to update The Temple of Elemental Evil. While they weren’t able to fix every bug (you can only tweak things so far without access to the source code) they did a fine job of modifying the game and bringing it out of the deep hole that Atari had cast it into.

I just finished playing through the game with the Circle of Eight’s final patch, and the improvements are amazing.

For the longest time I’ve considered the Baldur’s Gate series of games to be the best Dungeons and Dragons roleplaying games ever made for the PC. And in terms of story and character they still are. But The Temple Of Elemental Evil is the only game I’ve ever played that gets the turn-based combat engine correct. It is perfect in every way.

I know in our fast-paced, reward-me-now, instant-gratification society, turn-based combat isn’t as popular or stylish as real-time combat. But after playing through The Temple of Elemental Evil with the Circle of Eight patch, I can honestly say I prefer roleplaying games, at least in the Dungeons and Dragons universe, to utilize a turn-based combat system. It saddens me a bit to know that future games (for instance, the upcoming Neverwinter Nights 2) will not be utilizing a turn-based engine for combat.

My hope is that somewhere a roleplaying developer gets a chance to play this patched version of The Temple of Elemental Evil. In fact, every developer working on a roleplaying game for the PC ought to play this game. At least see how it feels. It’s a totally different experience.

Which brings me to my last point. In the latest issue of PC Gamer Magazine, one of their columnists wrote an article about (paraphrasing the exact title here) “Five things the developers of Fallout 3 can do so it doesn’t suck.” He had some basic, common-sense advice for the developers of Fallout 3. But nowhere in the five suggestions did he mention turn-based combat.

So, let me do it. Fallout, and it’s sequel, Fallout 2, are generally regarded as some of the best Roleplaying Games to ever hit the PC screen. And those games exclusively used a turn-based combat system. Due largely to this design decision, the Fallout games provided a much more strategic and rich combat experience.

Please, whoever you are, whoever is responsible for developing Fallout 3, strongly consider utilizing a turn-based combat engine. Moreover, please take a look at the way The Temple Of Elemental Evil handles things like Area of Effect and in-combat distance.

It would be a shame if the maligned, patched version of Atari’s game is the last, good turn-based game we PC gamers ever see…

Now this is what I call “leadership.” ESPN.com reported today that Michael Vick is not very happy with the offensive play calling in Atlanta lately. In an interview with Cris Carter for HBO’s Inside The NFL, Vick said he wants to throw more. He wants his coaches to trust him so he can throw more. This from a guy who can’t complete 50% of his passes and frequently throws the ball into the turf or five feet over his receivers’ heads.

But Vick wasn’t done. It’s one thing to question the logic of the gameplan; stupid, predictable gameplans should be questioned anyway. But it’s quite another to throw your receivers, and indeed your whole team, under the bus. And that’s exactly what Vick did when he said when Carter questioned him about playing with receivers like Chad Johnson and Randy Moss:

“Or a Marvin Harrison. … I always think about that, Cris. I always think, if I played in Indianapolis, what type of effect would I have on that team? Or what would I be able to do different? It’s something I wish I could do for just one week.”

The italics is mine. “I always think about that,” Vick says. That’s has to be the biggest slap in the face a receiving corps has ever taken from a marquee quarterback. Do you think you’d ever hear that from a guy like Donovan McNabb? There’s some similiarities here. McNabb struggled with his accuracy the first few years he was in the league, and pundits often pointed to the wide receiver corps for Philadelpha as the weak link, but whenever McNabb was questioned about his wideouts he always responded by backing them up.

You never, ever disrespect your teammates. Did Vick learn nothing from Terrell Owens the past three or four years? And what’s the difference between what T.O. said about his quarterbacks (he called Jeff Garcia “gay”, and blamed McNabb for the loss in the Superbowl) and what Vick just said on Inside The NFL?

I’m telling you: nothing. Nothing is different. In both instances, one guy is completely disrespecting his teammates and placing blame. This is no different than when T.O. said the Eagles would be better off with Brett Favre as their quarterback (the question then was phrased almost exactly as Carter phrased this one; a ploy designed to get players to open up and let their emotions get the better of them - and it worked).

Someone in the national media needs to take Vick to task for those comments. Better yet, someone on his own team, behind closed doors (preferably the receivers themselves) needs to pin him to a wall and give him a good shakedown.

You don’t throw your receivers under the bus like that.

I’ve not liked Vick since he was drafted, mainly because of the sheer volume of unwarranted hype for a guy who barely completes 50% of his passes, but at least I respected his atheleticism. Until now.

What a bad teammate he’s turning out to be.

Short Edit: I’m reading Jeremy Green’s chat on ESPN.com right now. Here’s some comments worth repeating:

Bob, Atl Ga: My brother - what is GOING ON with my team!!!? - How can the face of the franchise go on HBO and throw the entire organzation under the BUS. YOU CAN NOT RIP the entire team because you are frustrated.(at least not in public) I really Hope they start Schaub this week. If Schaub were to start and throw for lets say 250-300 yds- that would make Vick look awful stupid now wouldnt it?

Wes (Atlanta): Jeremy, if YOU were a 100 million dollar quarterback in the 8th largest city in the United States, would you throw your entire team under the bus on “Inside the NFL?” Seriously, how does this effect the Falcons chemistry - and why has the franchise not put a gag in Vick’s mouth?

SportsNation Jeremy Green: (4:28 PM ET ) No I would not, but that is what the league has right now. Too many players that pop off all the time. I think it has a real negative effect on team chemistry. The thing I never get is how he thinks a receiver will make him that much better. I bet you could send Steve Smith down the field uncovered 10 times and Vick would hit him in stride maybe twice.

That last line is precious. Way to go Jeremy

I was on my way out the door today, Friday, the most enjoyable work day of the week because it’s the last one, when I decided to give ESPN.com one more pass. I stumbled upon this column written by Scoop Jackson, the same Scoop Jackson that I took issue with last year.

Scoop is upset because one of his idols, Jason Whitlock, a famous black writer for the Kansas City Star, ripped him publicly. Scoop doesn’t try to understand why Whitlock takes issue with him and his work, and instead takes the approach that Whitlock doesn’t “get” his “words”.

Wrong conclusion Scoop.

Here’s my guess as to why Whitlock dismisses Scoop so harshly and in such a public fashion. It’s probably the same reason I dislike him too: Because he makes race an issue every single time he puts his thoughts down on paper. Scoop sees the world through tinted glasses; a world where black people are always at a disadvantage and white people are to blame. When Scoop Jackson writes about sports, he writes about race, and one doesn’t even have to read between the lines to understand the sheer venom and hatred Scoop has for the white race - it oozes off the page like ectoplasm.

Some of us white people grew up in households where we were taught that race didn’t matter. We grew up colorblind, believing that the good or evil of the person, the intelligence or ignorance, kindness or selfishness, had nothing to do with skin color. Yes, I’ve experienced racism; I’ve heard white people say things that made me very angry to be of the same color. But I recognize that for exactly what it is: ignorance. And just like there are white people who hate based on color, there are black people who hate based on color as well. I’ve experienced that too; I’ve had a black man want to beat me down simply because I was white. The thing about racism is, it doesn’t discriminate. Anyone is free to hate anyone else based on color or nationality, and unfortunately, some people do just that.

But the issue here is Scoop. When he writes, it reads like racism. It smacks of hate. It’s not sports that Scoop is writing about, it’s racism, 24/7. And for a lot of us who grew up colorblind, listening to our ignorant bretheren flap their jaws with racist remarks, the words of a person like Scoop Jackson make us pause. More than anything, they make us aware that hate based on color still exists, and the door swings both ways. Hateful, hurtful words from Scoop, whether blatant or veiled, feed the cancer of racism that permeates our nation.

I honestly want to forget about race. I want my kids to not even recognize that someone is of a different nationality or color. I just want them to see people. Good or bad, good hearts or meanspirited, but I want them to see people and not color. I want race to be a non-issue. And the only way that’s ever going to happen is if we work collectively, as a species, to ignore race. Journalists like Jason Whitlock have done that; they’ve moved beyond race. Whitlock isn’t a great black sports journalist - he’s just a great sports journalist.

Scoop Jackson is still staring the “black” part of his title; he can’t decide whether to be proud, angry, or both.

As long as Scoop Jackson keeps making race the focal point of every article he writes, racism won’t go away. And Scoop will continue to be perceived by people like me as a racist. And journalists like Whitlock will continue to dislike what Scoop does professionally.

So here’s my advice, Mr. Scoop Jackson: turn off the internal hate machine. Whatever it is at your core that’s made you see the world through racist eyes, just get rid of it. Quit making race an issue every time you fire up your world processor. Think about sports, and not race, when you write. Most importantly: just stop seeing color. Because the more people quit seeing color, the faster we’ll get out of this barbaric social stage we’re in.

CNN.com is reporting that CBS is cancelling Smith , it’s cops & robbers show that emulates a lot of Michael Mann’s Heat. I blogged about this show less than four days ago. Talk about a quick hook.

But the real travesty here isn’t that this show got cancelled; it’s that it exposes television executives for the morons they really are.

What I didn’t realize until I read the CNN.com article was that Smith was also going head-to-head against NBC’s Law & Order: SVU and ABC’s Boston Legal in the same Tuesday night time slot. I didn’t realize it because I own a TiVo and a satellite dish, which means I don’t have to choose; I can record competing shows by setting my TiVo to record one show on an east coast feed, another on a mountain timezone feed, and another on a pacific timezone feed.

But while I can do that, not everyone else can, which shows how stupid television executives are. For some reason they think there’s only one or two good hours a week to air their stuff, so they all stick their shows on the same nights at the same time. Thursday, for whatever reason statisticians have come up with, appears to be a huge night, with Survivor, Grey’s Anatomy, CSI and ER all jammed into a couple of hours of competitive television. If I didn’t have a TiVo I’d be downright upset about this.

Newsflash for the mentally handicapped in the television industry: there’s 7 days in the week. According to the Wikipedia, prime time television is considered to be a three-hour block, Monday through Saturday (although anyone watching television knows Sunday counts too, otherwise shows like Grey’s Anatomy, X-Files, Desperate Housewives and The Amazing Race wouldn’t be there).

Let’s do some math. Seven nights a week times three hours per night equals… 21 hours of television. Which means there no flippin’ reason you stupid bastards have to put all the good shows on at the same time, scratching and clawing for the same viewers.

Did any of you dummies watch A Beautiful Mind? Did you not learn anything from the Nash equillibrium? Let me spell it out for you in simple terms: when you try and win everything, you shaft everyone, including yourself.

There’s 21 hours of primetime television, yet all of you doofuses stick the same types of shows on during the same timeslots. You pit your dramas against each other, and your comedies against each other, and your news shows against each other. Did you ever stop to think you might make a killing on a good drama if it’s not going head-to-head against the other network’s great dramas? Why weaken your viewership by putting your show in a position of competition?

Bottom line: You’re screwing viewers over. This is why on-demand is going to kill you. Because you’re too stupid to recognize that viewers don’t want to be forced to make a choice between two shows they like. You think because you “won” a given timeslot that you’re doing the right thing, but in the end you’re just alienating viewers. Eventually it’s going to come back and bite you.

Finally: Memo to HBO - pick up Smith and retool it please. Good actors, good premise… And it’s about 100 times better than the lame Lucky Louie…