It was also hard not to see that despite its graphic updating Sex and the City adhered to the rather dated formula of “three gals seek husbands” that goes back to the silent era. It's almost as if Gloria Steinem never existed. Then again, I've often said that if I had a daughter I would tell her to get her own life and then find the man (or woman) who could fit into that life, and to a certain extent the women on Sex and the City seem to have done that. Carrie, Samantha and Miranda all have careers, for instance. But Carrie's chasing – and chasing -- after Mr. Big always seemed a bit pathetic (and why was the age difference rarely addressed?) In the final show Carrie is back with Mr. Big, but you notice she still hasn't gotten a wedding ring – and probably never will.

Another problem I've always had with the show is that these women live in the greatest, most exciting and culturally rich city in the world yet all they ever did was go to openings of restaurants and silly clubs. You never saw them at the symphony, the theater, the ballet, or a museum (probably because the writers were unfamiliar with such things). Carrie Bradshaw, in fact, was so unsophisticated that she blows off a chance to go to the Metropolitan Opera (with the character played by Baryshnikov) and instead asks him to take her to Macdonald's! What an uncultured nincompoop – what a complete dork! Baryshnikov may have been self-absorbed in Paris, but if Carrie hadn't left him, he would have gotten quite bored with her in no time.

For a show that tried to be sophisticated about women, it was rather self-conscious when it came to minorities, including Blacks, Jews, and Gays. The two recurring gay characters, while likable and appealing in their own way and well-played, were both ridiculous, laughable stereotypes, another dated aspect to the program.

Occasionally the show seemed more like Melrose Place than Sex and the City with its inappropriate “heartlessness.” I'm referring in particular to the episode when the character of “Lexi” (there was also a “Lexi” on Melrose) falls eighteen stories to her death, which is played for ill-advised laughs and elicits mostly callous reactions from the other characters who make tiresome “splat” jokes (the episode -- one of the most forgettable -- is even entitled “Splat” -- ha ha). Sex and the City may have been a black comedy at times, but I don't believe these characters would react the way they did to the woman's gruesome death, which was pointless to begin with.

But there were some good moments in the series and in the final episodes. One of my favorite shows was the one wherein Miranda not only learns from Carrie's boyfriend that some guys are “just not that into” a particular woman and to accept it and move on, but Carrie herself gets dumped by this same guy with – get this – a post-it note on her computer! Cold – and very, very funny. The final episode had the touching business of Miranda giving a sponge bath to her difficult mother-in-law (well-played by Anne Meara) and Samantha realizing that the handsome hunk she's been squiring around is actually and genuinely in love with her. Nice moments in a series that was often good, not often great, but could be and generally was extremely entertaining, well-scripted and very well-acted by all. If you haven't seen the show, by all means rent the DVDs – or borrow them from the library – and make up your own mind. -- William Schoell

I didn't expect much from Boston Legal, another ABC show and a spin-off from the defunct Practice, but it has turned out to be quite entertaining, generally well-written, and well-acted. It's a show that can rarely be taken seriously, however; although some of the situations are “dramatic,” the emphasis is on humor and black comedy. William Shatner is amusing and on-target as Denny Crane, who seems constantly on the verge of imploding but always manages to come through at the last minute, amazing his perplexed and often irate colleagues. James Spader is equally good as the smug, multi-leveled, rather fascinating Alan Shore. Newcomer Monica Potter has apparently stepped in for Rebecca De Mornay who either played the same character or a similar one in the final days of The Practice, and she's fine. The other actors all do a good job but the stand-out is the always excellent Rene Auberjonois as a partner and dutch uncle who oversees the others and keeps Shatner on his toes. Auberjonois receives as much screen time as Shatner but is only listed in the credits under “with...” Considering the value of his contribution, why isn't this fine, veteran actor one of the bona fide stars of the show? Let's hope creator David E. Kelley rectifies this situation in the near future. Update [10/6/05]: He has. Auberjonois now appears in the opening credits with the other stars. But so far this season he hasn't had much to do on the show itself. Let's hope that changes soon.

The highly entertaining Desperate Housewives, also on ABC, is not quite as great as some critics would have you believe, but it is a good show with interesting scripts and some very good acting. Since it's another comedy-drama or black comedy, I suppose people who normally hate soap operas can tell themselves that they've watching a spoof and in some ways they're right – although there's no getting around that Desperate Housewives is a somewhat quirky but otherwise traditional soap opera. The basic premise has four suburban women – married and divorced – wondering why the fifth woman in their group (who narrates and comments upon the proceedings from beyond the grave) committed suicide at the opening of the first episode. The makers of the show create suspense by wisely withholding information from the viewer (this same approach backfires on Lost, however, which is simply not a lot of fun and not deep enough to make up for it), and the generally comical antics of the wives have enough twists and turns to keep the show absorbing. Now and then Desperate Housewives makes a wrong turn, and one might wonder if the suicide of a mother and the reaction of her depressed teenage son are really the stuff of comedy, but this is just a framework upon which to build some hopefully surprising developments in the future. It may also be besides the point to wonder if the women, particularly the divorcee played by Teri Hatcher, spend too much time obsessing over and pursuing the opposite sex. A show called Desperate Housewives is obviously not about Modern-Day Woman pursuing all the options available to her in the 21^st century.

NOTE: For more about daytime soaps such as the Young and the Restless, The Bold and the Beautiful, and Days of Our Lives, click on SOAPS on the navigation bar.

Late in the game (11/27/04), 48 Hours Investigates  (CBS) did an “all-new” program on the Black Dahlia Murder and Steve Hodel's book, Black Dahlia Avenger, in which he claims his father, a once prominent physician, murdered Elizabeth Short and many other women. After the book was published, many experts on the Black Dahlia affair claimed that the photos that Hodel says his father kept in a locket were not of the Black Dahlia at all but of some other unidentified woman. In the final moments of the program, which comes off largely as a puff publicity piece for Hodel's book, 48HI finally adds some balance by giving us the results of its own investigations: A celebrated handwriting expert says that he can not conclusively link Hodel's father's handwriting with that on a letter supposedly written by the Black Dahlia killer. Another expert says that she is 85% certain that the woman in Hodel's photos is not Elizabeth Short. Hodel tells Erin Moriarity that none of this makes any difference to him, his father (whom he says he loves) is the Black Dahlia Killer. Maybe if he admitted he might have made a mistake he'd have to pay back the advance? 48HI also interviews the kid sister who claimed she was molested by Hodel Senior when she was a child, but the program never calls her credibility into question. In Hodel's book, he tells the reader that years after she made her accusations his sister let the father who supposedly molested her spend the day alone with her own young daughter, either making her a liar or what has to be the very worst mother on the planet! [This reviewer even emailed Hodel on this matter some time ago but – no surprise -- he never replied.] A geeky DA who listened to some tapes declares that Hodel Senior treated women terribly and went through them like they were Kleenex. So did Frank Sinatra and other members of the Rat Pack, but that doesn't make any of them serial killers. Until we have much, much more conclusive evidence, Black Dahlia Avenger will have to be lumped with Patricia Cornwall's fairly wretched Jack the Ripper tome as books that present a theory about these terrible murders and nothing more.