A Stroll Through the Park

The new TV season continued to unspool tonight with the debut of 666 Park Avenue on ABC. The ads for the series put out that common horror vibe -- could be good, could be bad. But I was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt for the cast.

Well, for one person mainly. Terry O'Quinn was not only a highlight of Lost in his performance as John Locke, but he's been the best thing about a number of movies and TV series both middling (Millennium) and terrible (Harsh Realm). His nuanced acting elevates just about everything he's in, which to me made this series worth checking out.

That said, there were other people in the cast I've seen before. Vanessa L. Williams is well known, of course, most recently wrapping up a stint on the final seasons of Desperate Housewives. Dave Annable gave a solid performance on the drama Brothers & Sisters. And Rachael Taylor is no stranger to horror, having given a decent performance in the not-all-that-decent film Shutter.

But despite connections to all those films and series, 666 Park Avenue can best be compared to another show entirely: American Gothic. That brilliant-but-cancelled one season show from the late 1990s starred Gary Cole as the evil sheriff of a small North Carolina town, capable of wielding demonic powers against the town's inhabitants in his apparent quest to simply be diabolical. His deliciously wicked performance was just the best of many reasons to tune in. (Too bad most people didn't.)

Unfortunately, this sets a rather high bar in my mind for 666 Park Avenue to hurdle. Essentially, the rural town setting is swapped here for a New York highrise, but the premise seems the same: a man with apparently demonic powers tries to corrupt innocent people into doing evil.

Being on ABC, the network that has perhaps launched more successful "genre" shows than any other, this new series may well go on to a longer life than American Gothic -- but the question is whether the content itself will improve. For the moment, I'm willing to give it a couple of episodes to see if it gets there. On the short list of actors that could compete with Gary Cole in presenting a thoroughly evil character in a fun way, I believe Terry O'Quinn could make it.

But judging just from the pilot, I'm skeptical. Basically, if this series hasn't shown significant improvement by the time the new incarnation of American Horror Story starts up in a few weeks, I'll probably just drop it and move on.