The 10 highlights of summer TV 2009 (part I)

USA's great sophomore summer effort, "In Plain Sight.

Thanks to the imminent turn of the calendar (and the last gasp of Hurricane Dan), the oppressive, gelatinous weight of summer humidity here in Washington, DC, has just been shattered and in its wake we’re enjoying our first day of early fall weather. But before we slide into September, Emmy Awards season and start looking ahead to the new fall TV shows, everyone here at Worst Episode Ever — from the board of directors down to Gino in the shipping department — has asked that we take one last look at the summer 2009 TV season and hand out some accolades.

Regular readers (all 12 of you) voted earlier this month on your summer ‘09 favorites. The results were, no offense intended, predictable… except for one tidbit: “Mad Men” received 5 votes as best show of the summer before its season premiere. Congratulations, dear readers, on your seemingly extra-human powers of prescience and future-casting. Perhaps you can tell me where I left my Washington Nationals cap? Not the free one I got with the Bud Lite logo on it, but the good one from the team store… you know the one?)

Before we dive into the awards, please know that I have no intention of naming the best shows of the summer. Let’s just assume that we all agree already on what they are – ”In Plain Sight,” “The Closer” and “Top Chef Masters.” I’ll also throw in “Mad Men,” though I have to admit that I’m at least 12 episodes behind on the show — yeah, that’s right, I’m still making my way through last season. But I’m pretty sure it’s going to be/is great. And hell, if you guys can vote for it before it even airs, then I can vote for it before I’ve seen it.

So now, the first five highlights of the 2009 summer TV season. We’ll present the top four tomorrow and then the number one highlight of the summer season at the end of the week:

Best Second Banana(s): It’s a tie between Detective Lt. Provenza and Detective Flynn from “The Closer.” As members of Deputy Chief Brenda Lee Johnson’s Major Crimes Squad, Provenza and Flynn (portrayed with minimalist precision by G.W. Bailey and Tony Denison) are often the cynical voices in the squad room providing just enough sarcasm to bring the show’s flair for the melodramatic back to earth (and just enough humor to pierce the darker moments of the plots). It’s impossible to think of these two characters individually — hence the tie — and the show’s producers and writers know enough not to separate them; the obsequious Provenza and the distrustful Flynn together provide enough sugar and salt to balance each other out — and provide a full range to the voice of veteran cops making their way in a 21st Century, female-led police squad.

Runner-up for Best Second Banana goes to U.S. Marshal Marshall Mann, the loquacious, Cliff Clavin-esque partner to Mary Shannon on “In Plain Sight.” (And yes, finally this season a character got to ask him, You’re Marshal Marshall?) Well-schooled to a fault, Frederick Weller’s character is the over-intellectual Ego to Shannon’s Id and the cerebral counterbalance to her school-of-hard-knocks sweat. And with Shannon, he’s one half of some of the fastest, wittiest banter this side of “The Thin Man.” Demerits (and thus the second-place finish) because the show started dropping hints that he harbors unrequited love for his now-engaged partner. Attention USA: I do not want another “Moonlighting.” If you screw this show up with a will-they-or-won’t-they romance I will pitch a hissy fit the likes of which you’ve never seen.

Worst Show of the Summer: It’s a tie — “Royal Pains” and “The Real Housewives of New Jersey.” Over on the USA Network, they’ve built a nice little niche for themselves as the home to serio-comic, character-driven, mystery-lite programming. “Monk” was the template and they’ve been stamping out good shows ever since — “Psych” leans toward the comic side of the equation, “In Plain Sight” and “Burn Notice are a bit more serious — but for the most part, they’re all variations on the character theme. But with “Royal Pains,” USA went to the well one time too many. Rather than a light show with engaging characters whose story arc takes seasons to suss out, “Royal Pains” aims more for “Gossip Girl” for adults, with just a hint of suspense thrown in to make sure it still qualifies as a USA show. In reality, “Royal Pains” feels like an excuse to show fancy cars, big houses and tiny bikinis. And star Mark Feuerstein’s modern-day, poor-man’s Woody Allen-lite schtick becomes grating quickly.

As for “The Real Housewives”… well, if you have to wonder why I hate this show, you haven’t been paying attention. Read this and this and then come back. We’ll wait…

Best Ratings for a Terrible Show: By some miracle, USA’s “Royal Pains” is a hit — 5.9 million people watched its first season finale last week, and USA is crowing about how its got the best first season ratings of any original USA show. You people are crazy.

Biggest Surprise of the Summer: Without a doubt, the sudden transformation of Michael “What’s my name?!” Chiarello was one of the weirdest moments of the summer.

One of the joys of Bravo’s “Top Chef Masters” was that, unlike its parent show (“Top Chef”), the contestants were all veteran, successful (sometimes world-renowned chefs) and restauranteurs — folks who’ve already reached a level of success in the kitchen that gave them security and ease of mind as they entered the reality show’s culinary competition. In addition, they were playing for charity instead of cash in their pockets, so instead of back-biting and anxiety-fueled pettiness, the chefs of “Top Chef Masters” were a chummy bunch; the chrome-plated playing field actually cozy home to a camaraderie and bonhomie that made the show that much more enjoyable. Here were some of the country’s greatest chefs bantering and trading shop talk as they prepared sumptuous meals; watching them was akin to watching comedians who truly enjoy each others work swap stories and jokes.

And the leader of that entree of good feeling was Michael Chiarello — chef, author, entrepreneur, restauranteur and easy-going, Emmy Award-winning TV chef. But as the finals approached and the remaining contestants started working with younger chefs, the huggy bear of the kitchen started throwing his weight around, belittling his charges, barking demands and basically, well… acting like a chef.

Here’s the Michael Chiarello we fell in love with, gentle of manner and quick with the compliment:

And here’s what, overnight, he became:

Michael… ease up on the Napa zin, buddy.

Biggest Virtual Audience: Some shows have great ratings. Some shows have great tabloid buzz. The top shows have both. Low-brow hit shows can have the former without the latter. But it’s the rare show that exists only with the latter; that is, a TV show that bombs in the ratings but is obsessed over by tabloid magazines and is the talk of the office water cooler, despite the fact that nobody knows anybody who’s actually watched the damn thing.

That, my friends, is a virtual audience — a show that has all the trappings of cultural buzz, but none of the actual viewership. And that, my friends, describes NBC’s “I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!”

In a way, it was amazing to watch a desperate NBC wring as much publicity as possible out of a terrible, limited run reality exploit-a-thon that most of America wouldn’t be caught dead watching. Even before it aired, NBC dangled the possibility that Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich might appear on the show, putting political bloggers in a tizzy about whether the federally indicted and already impeached governor would be allowed to leave the country for the show’s taping. He wasn’t.

But NBC needn’t have worried if it thought its publicity chances were sunk thanks to the by-the-book actions of the fun-police prosecutors in the U.S. Attorney’s office — because they had the Dickensian-named Spencer Pratt up their sleeve. It was as if NBC told the quasi-famous MTV reality show star: “Pratt, we know you’re a shameless fame-whore who will exploit any opportunity — from profiteering your dim-witted wife’s body and self-respect to leveraging international fear about Swine Flu — into an excuse to flash your snide, avaricious grin to the tabloid lenses… but can you turn it up a few notches for our show?”

The appropriately named Pratt obliged in spades, knowing exactly what reality show strings needed to be pulled to keep his name in the paper (fake confrontation? check. fake breakdown? check).

Pratt’s antics got him nightly face time on “Extra,” but did little keep his show in the ratings black. It’s likely more people watched this clip of “I’m a Celebrity…” on “The Soup” than actually watched the real program. Kudos, NBC… You really did… something.

Coming Next: The top four highlights of the summer 2009 TV season…