“10 Things I Hate About You”
Tuesday 8pm, ABC Family
Ten years ago, the film 10 Things I Hate About You introduced America to budding film stars Heath Ledger and Julia Stiles. Now the teen-friendly retelling of Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew is back with a serialized take in this new show on ABC Family. It’s actually kind of brilliant: 10 Things had a strong voice and engaging supporting players (including Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Gabrille Union; you could make a compelling case that Ledger and Stiles were the least compelling actors in the flick). The show should allow some of the background characters room to grow, and hopefully keep some of the film’s (and Bard’s) signature wit. The TV cast is made up of total unknowns, with the exception of Larry Miller, who reprises his film role as the father of flirty Bianca and her headstrong feminist sister, Kat.
“Great American Road Trip”
Tuesday 8pm, NBC
This new all-ages reality series sends seven families of four across the country in a series of “comical” challenges that will take them through some of our nation’s greatest, and weirdest, landmarks. It sounds an awful lot like the disastrous family edition of “Amazing Race” a couple years back, but hopefully less dour and with more engaging teams. The families themselves come from across the country (two downstate New York teams, though; that’s too bad) and seem diverse enough. The whole shebang is overseen by comedian Reno Collier, who may in fact be a scientifically spawned blend of Andy Richter and Ricky Gervais.
“Warehouse 13”
Tuesday 9pm, Syfy
The concept for this new sci-fi drama is great: Two secret service agents are “promoted” from presidential protection duty to a warehouse in South Dakota that houses every supernatural and extraterrestrial artifact ever collected by the American government. There they must hunt down paranormal activity to acquire new items for the collection. So it’s kind of “X-Files” meets Indiana Jones, and if done well, could be really fun. Lead agent Eddie McClintock has been bouncing around TV a while now, while his Scully, Joanne Kelley, is probably best known from fellow Sci-Fi (note the network name change) show “The Dresden Files.” They’re joined by recognizable gruff character actor Saul Rubinek and the awesomeness that is CCH Pounder as the ball-busting warehouse director.
