Episode 24 "Next" 9/25/05 ***SEASON PREMIERE***

[Brent88]

3 weeks to go!!



From Spoilerfix:

08/24 - ABC says that the second-season premiere of the hit series, scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 25, will pick up pretty much where May's finale left off, with plumber Mike Delfino (James Denton) coming home to find Zach Young (Cody Kasch) holding a gun to Susan Mayer (Teri Hatcher). What happens, of course, is a secret; the network is saying only that he "has to find a way to rescue them both." The premiere will also continue a few other storylines set up in the first-season finale. Lynette Scavo (Felicity Huffman) will interview for a job at an ad agency after she and her husband, Tom (Doug Savant), agreed to flip roles and he's staying home with their four kids. Her prospective boss ("Wild Card's" Joely Fisher, who will have a recurring part), however, is skeptical about hiring a mother. Shirley Knight ("Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood") will also guest-star in the episode as Rex Van De Camp's (the departed Steven Culp) mother, who comes to town for her son's funeral and promptly sets about driving his widow, Bree (Marcia Cross), nuts. Alfre Woodard ("Beauty Shop," "Miss Evers' Boys") and Mehcad Brooks also join the cast as a mother and son who have just moved onto Wisteria Lane. Source: Zap2it

[Brent88]

Preview at the end of the encore of the finale tonight:

Announcer: It's been a cruel summer... waiting to see how this would end
Zach shoots at someone(presumably Mike)

Announcer: But the agony is over

Tom on the floor crying(kids must have hurt him, LOL)

Lynette: Geez, are you crying?

Announcer: 2 weeks from tonight... a juicy new summer begins

Bree at Rex's funeral: Do not close that coffin!

Gabrielle to Carlos: I said I was sorry, what more do you want?

Carlos: A paternity test

Announcer: Desperate Housewives Season Premiere... Two weeks from tonight 9/8 Central... only on ABC.

[spunkygirl]

Thanks Brent Only 8 more days to go

[bossradio93]

Next, on 'Desperate Housewives' ...

Hit show's new season begins Sunday

Thursday, September 22, 2005; Posted: 12:19 p.m. EDT (16:19 GMT)

NEW YORK (AP) -- With the return of "Desperate Housewives," scads of pressing questions will be answered. Or at least addressed. Or something. Please!

Ever since the hit ABC series wrapped its first season, fans have been marking time, itching to learn what lies ahead for Bree (Marcia Cross) whose husband Rex up and died on the finale.

Will the grieving widow have to defend herself against accusations by Rex's doctor that she -- at one point a vengeful, cheated-on wife -- is somehow responsible for his death? And what about George, Bree's creepy suitor? Can there be any doubt that this Bree-obsessed pharmacist tampered with Rex's medicine? When will the murderous scheme come to light?

But that's not all the show left hanging four long months ago.

Mike -- the hunky plumber who dates Susan (Teri Hatcher) -- was last seen walking into an ambush by unhinged teenager Zach, who was holding Susan at gunpoint while holed up in Mike's house. How will Mike save the day?

Oh, and by the way, how is Zach gonna take the news that he's really Mike's son?

These and other matters will be dealt with (hope, hope!) in the season premiere airing 9 p.m. EDT Sunday, as "Desperate Housewives" resumes the narrative juggling act that made this mystery/melodrama/boudoir comedy last year's most popular new show.

It joins no fewer than a dozen new dramas that take a similarly serial approach to their storytelling -- and whose arrival on the schedule "Desperate Housewives" surely helped inspire.

Cycle of serials

By now you already know that Lynette (just-crowned Emmy winner Felicity Huffman) is going back to work and letting her hubby play Mr. Mom. Gabrielle (Eva Longoria) is expecting a child -- maybe her husband's, maybe not -- as her husband heads to jail. Susan's ex will get it on with Edie (Nicollette Sheridan). And Betty (new cast member Alfre Woodard) settles in with Some Sort of Secret only her teenage son shares.

In short, complications run wild on Wisteria Lane, where each answer seems to breed only yet another question.

Same for ABC's "Lost," which returned Wednesday with precious morsels of new info about that confounded hole as well as other issues challenging the island castaways -- but left the audience panting for next week's handout.

Such are the unrequited appetites of viewers in this age of continuing story lines.

You recall how it began. In a major change from the self-contained episodes of most weekly dramas, prime-time borrowed the serial model of daytime soap operas a quarter-century ago for "Dallas," whose "Who Shot J.R.?" cliffhanger spurred a guessing game that consumed the whole nation.

Then, in 1980, the police drama "Hill Street Blues" took the complex structure of the soap opera world and married it with narratives of equal complexity. This kind of multithreaded drama caught on big, and only grew bigger as shows like "St. Elsewhere" and "thirtysomething" paved the way for today's "The West Wing," "24," "Alias" and "The Sopranos."

On Fox's new "Reunion" this season, six high school friends will age 20 years -- one year per week -- while a murder mystery enfolds them. And the same network's "Prison Break" will take viewers step by exhaustive step as a man lands himself in jail to bust out his brother, who is due to be executed in just 30 days.

On ABC's "Invasion," alien body snatchers descend upon a small Florida town (will they take over the world?). On CBS' "Threshold," aliens try to rejigger the DNA of the human race for their own peculiar purpose (will they take over the world?). On NBC's "Surface," strange sea creatures bob up all over the place (will they take over the world?).

'Positive brainwashing'

You know the drill for the audience: that oh-so-gradual accretion of facts, those buried references to dislodge, the grand revelations booby-trapped with red herrings. There's always more to learn and you resolve, over time, to master it. Who can resist the potential payoff? After all, you build equity from your investment watching "Lost" in a way that close-ended hours of "Law & Order" or "CSI" could never provide.

Besides, serial TV might even boost your brain power.

Television is "demanding more cognitive engagement with each passing year," Steven Johnson writes in his recent book, "Everything Bad is Good for You: How Today's Popular Culture is Actually Making Us Smarter."

"Think of it," he proposes, "as a kind of positive brainwashing -- the popular media steadily, but almost imperceptibly, making our minds sharper, as we soak in entertainment usually dismissed as so much lowbrow fluff."

But as you soak, you sometimes stew. That's the mixed blessing of serial TV. Fans of shows like "Lost" know all too well how there's an escalating burden, along with the reward, involved with keeping up. Hurley's lottery numbers! That toy plane of Kate's! How much minutiae can any viewer process?

And what about the ladies of Wisteria Lane, romancing and seducing, then withholding from the audience? Must every fact be so hard-won by the viewer? Must these "Desperate Housewives" be such a tease?

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

CNN.com-Thursday, September 22, 2005

[TexasGurl]

Just two more days!! YAY! With this hurricane coming, this cheers me up. I am actually from Houston and so it is my home that is at risk. I am in Austin tho at school so it is weird being away now.

[vashti1999]

Originally Posted by barwars

My how opinions change so quickly. One commercial break later and I suddenly realize why this show is so great once again. I really like Alfre Woodard's new character.... more than everyone on the show besides Bree in fact.

Wow, you sure don't waste time forming opinions.

But I agree, I'm gonna dig seeing Alfre as a regular on this show.

I'm surprised Bree didn't ask for the basket back.

[Munsters#1]

Who's the chick giving the blonde lady the interview? Damn!

[vashti1999]

I think this episode is about to be entered in the Guinness Book of World Records for Most Commercial Breaks During a One Hour Telecast.

[Brent88]

I hate these stupid commericals.

Otherwise I love it. It started with Rex's mother freak out as she arrived... and I absolutely loved Bree's "I will have security guards with sticks to beat you"

[Brent88]

That was a better cliffhanger than the one in the finale. What is living up there??

[Munsters#1]

I heard The Munsters old house is close to the set of Desperate Housewives. What if Herman popper out, and shouted, "Hi Teri! HAW HAW HAW HAW"

[Munsters#1]

Originally Posted by barwars

I think Bree lives in it.

My, she fixed up the place quite well.

[vashti1999]

Going by Betty's remark to her son about him pretending his dad was dead when he consoled Bree's daughter, I figure that's who they have locked up.


Or is that too obvious?

[Pavan]

Awesome premiere! Maybe Zach is being kept by Betty? Long shot, but still...

[Caffeine King]

I wasn't that impressed with this episode but I know that it'll get jucier and jucier as each episode comes.

wtf at the person in Betty's basement...

I pitied Bree when she went to change Rex's tie. It's sad that Bree was more concerned on perfection then to just stop and ponder that Rex is gone.

I'm glad that I wasn't the only one who noticed all of the commercials...maybe that lent to the so-so vibe I got from this episode.


I hope we get more of Edie & Felicia this season! They're both hysterical and they're not used to their full potential on the show.