The TV Zone

Every year in January, hundreds of TV editors around the country look dolefully out their cubbyhole office window as their TV critic heads off to the California press tour - where, said editor is convinced, said TV critic will spend the next three weeks poolside with daiquiri in hand. Said TV editor is wrong: The critic actually spends three weeks inside a cavernous cold ballroom, listening to news, spin, show talk, star babble, and BS, and comes back paler than when he or she left.

In any event, TV editor guy won't have to worry about that fictional pool this January: The so-called TV press tour has been called off, due to the writers' strike. A surprise? Hardly, but a disappointment no doubt to the TV Critics Association which had hoped that members would still be on hand to cover the strike and its various permutations. Problem is, the networks don't think the strike will be over by January and I suppose they had no appetite to show critics clips of their newest reality shows ("Howie Mandel Searches for the Next Great Dog," and its spin-off, "Howie Searches for the Next Great Cat;" or over at Fox, "Incredible Race: The Little People Version," or over at ABC, "Dancing with People Who Would Like to Be Stars," and its spin-off, "Dancing with People Who Would Like to Be Stars But Probably Won't Be;" etc.)

The cancellation is interesting (and for TV fans, a little chilling) for another reason: January is when critics get a cold hard look at the midseason crop, and sometimes a look at stuff in development that might even hit the fall schedules. For obvious reasons, this cancellation means that the networks have NOTHING to talk about for mid-season and beyond. With writers on strike, they are truly deep deep in a hole - whether they and the Big Bad Studios care to admit it.