Dead Again. Again. And Again

Okay, we're a couple of weeks into the new season. I've actually watched a couple of new shows out of the gate, and I can't help feeling some kind of deja vu. I wrote a couple of weeks ago about The Dead Zone, based on the Stephen King novel where the lead character wakes from a near-death coma with psychic powers that help him solve both crimes and mysteries. So along comes UPN with Haunted, it's new follow-up to Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Tuesday nights. Turns out the former cop has a near-death experience and now has the uncanny ability to communicate with the dead. He also seems to commune with every cop-show cliché in the book, like the ex-wife district attorney with whom he split over the loss of their son. And the black ex-partner.

As if that weren't enough, now Fox has debuted John Doe, where we meet a mysterious character who doesn't know who he is, but has an uncanny knowledge of, well, EVERYTHING. After finally caving into the armchair quarterback's idea of supernatural powers and exploiting them for massive financial gain, Doe turns to crimes and, ostensibly, other mysteries. Not the least of which is his own identity, and what happened to him. I'm guessing maybe a near-death experience or a coma?

The one show setting itself apart in the uncanny ability to solve crime department is USA's Monk, which ABC seems to have some additional rights to air on network TV. Adrian Monk has some peculiar abilities, but they're born out of neuroses (he's obsessive-compulsive and anal-retentive to a fault) and not neural rewiring. And while there is a near-death experience involved, it actually crosses the line to an actual death, and while his wife's passing certainly affects his character, it doesn't explain away his deductive gifts. Monk also plays more like a cop show than an X-Files episode that's gotten too big for it's britches, which is what the UPN and FOX offerings feel like so far. Granted, it typically takes a couple of episodes for a new show to find it's legs, so we'll try to check back in as the season progresses. Right now, both Haunted and John Doe have the good fortune of being in a VCR sweet spot for me, so I'll keep watching them for at least a couple of weeks.