Showrunner Switches We'd Like to See

[Emperor]

http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/telefile/2009/05/twop-10-showrunner-switches-we.php

 

I read this and thought... huh?

 

1. J.J. Abrams, Dollhouse

Joss Whedon and J.J. Abrams are being compared a lot lately, and probably unfairly, but it still got us thinking -- could J.J. improve Dollhouse? It's certainly possible. After all, he's great at the conspiracy theory thing, and creating characters whose loyalties and motivations are dubious, and if Dollhouse is going to have an overarching mythology that gets rolled out in weekly cliffhanger reveals like it has been, the guy who brought us Alias, Lost and Fringe is the king of that. And it's not like the fun, Whedonesque geeky references would go away -- Hurley, Marshall Flinkman, Walter Bishop, anybody? At the very least, it would probably be a tighter, more focused show. At least until J.J. got bored two seasons in and up and quit, of course.

 

2. Rob Thomas, 90210

Since Cupid is basically dead... again, it's time for Rob Thomas to return to the other show he was supposed to work on this past season. The 90210 redux could really use Thomas' help to make these teenagers actually seem realistic. He could make bad boy Liam into an ass like Logan was for most of Veronica Mars, transform Silver from a wishy-washy blogger into a cool Mac-like nerd and turn Annie into someone with an actual personality.

 

3. Mark Burnett, American Idol

Even though we're happy with the final two results, this season has been a train wreck with the overruns, annoying Kara and the unnecessary wild card. But reality TV mastermind Mark Burnett could make the top reality show exciting again. Perhaps there could be challenges between the contestants in which the bottom three have to stand on teeny tiny posts, and whoever stays on the longest is safe. Or they could have them fight for their lives Apprentice-style by arguing with their judges about who deserves to stick around.

 

4. Aaron Sorkin, The Office

Imagine Michael and Dwight pedeconferencing around the Dunder-Mifflin office in circles, picking up random characters as they all rapid-fire idealistic sentiments and literary/sports/historical/political references before dropping out of the parade and tagging someone else in, the lot of them taking breaks only for either some old-timey slapstick or melodramatic speeches about friendship, duty and loyalty. And they sell paper sometimes, but that's not really the point, is it?

 

5. Joss Whedon, Castle

Castle's got quippy dialogue, a sassy gal and Nathan Fillion -- all elements that Joss has plenty experience with. It may not be as lofty as what he attempted with Dollhouse, and it doesn't have much to do with the supernatural, but it certainly has completely implausible cases. It's like Angel with less vampires. Whedon could work with that.

 

6. Ron Moore, Smallville

We'd love to see Ron Moore tackle this twisted world. Lana could come back wearing skin-tight dresses and existing solely in Clark's mind, Chloe could take up smoking cigars, drinking too much and punching people, while all the action scenes could either involve robots or guys in wife-beaters in a boxing ring. And if Moore really writes himself into a corner, he can either skip ahead a year to get to a more interesting part, or jump a million years into the future and completely ignore most of the show's mythology.

 

7. Alan Ball, Heroes

Despite several exceptional episodes and our most fervent wishes, Heroes has been more boring than not for the past two seasons. We keep watching it because we're sci-fi junkies (not to mention TV masochists), but this thing has become a white bread X-Men. Alan Ball would sex it up, crazy it up and add vampires. And then he'd give Peter a brain tumor and Angela a love life. Oh, would that it were so.

 

8. Marc Cherry, The Hills

We've given up any pretense that this reality show is in any way, shape or form something approaching real, so why not give in and just have a real writer take over? At least then it might be more than just vapid twentysomethings staring at each other while having boring conversations about nothing. Put Marc Cherry on the case and The Hills girls will at least be more entertainingly campy when they're backstabbing each other.

 

9. Amy Sherman-Palladino, Gossip Girl

The problem with Gossip Girl is that, once the awe of everyone's fabulous wardrobe subsides, the only people saying anything funny or interesting are Blair, Chuck, Dorota and sometimes Jenny. Amy Sherman-Palladino was able to fully flesh out a fantastic cast of witty, youthful characters on Gilmore Girls, and she could fix the imbalance here. Plus, Blair is the only character who talks fast enough. They all need to be quipping at Palladino-speed.

 

10. Shonda Rhimes, Ghost Whisperer

This show used to be a perfectly fine little series about a woman who helps ghosts cross over to the other side, but it got lost somewhere along the way, around about the time when they decided to kill off their male lead and then have him come back in someone else's body (though we see him looking like he originally did). Shonda does good mushy romance, and she drove us crazy with the Dead Denny ghost sex over on Grey's... maybe if she worked on this show she could get it all out of her system.

[Far Dareis Mai]

As evidenced by Joss's directing an ep of The Office, and being a writer for Toy Story, I don't think Joss can only do the nifty sci fi thing. It's just what he loves. :D

 

(He also used to write episodes of Roseanne...but ya know...it's Roseanne).

[Majsju]

Can we not just clone Joss a couple of times, and put him in charge of every show worth airtime? ;D