Ah, out with the old, in with the new. The television season is dead, long live the next television season. And to prepare for it, I’m going to review new shows as the pilots become available I get the chance to catch up.

Ghost Whisperer; CBS, Friday Nights 9:00 pm

Did you ever wonder what Medium would be like in less capable hands?

According to the press release, “Melinda Gordon (Jennifer Love Hewitt) is a young newlywed with the unique ability to communicate with the earthbound spirits of people who have died - and who seek her help.” The show opens with a young Melinda at a funeral talking to an older man…and then we see into the coffin and know the man is the guest of honor with a message for his widow. Cut to Melinda’s wedding reception, where she talks to her new husband’s brother…it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that he’s been dead for years, and she’s speaking to his incorporeal ectoplasm, restless soul, or whatever.

Anyway, when the kids move into a new “fixer-upper” house with lots of gothic shadows, a soldier appears to her begging for her help; the rest of the episode is her trying to convince the soldier’s now-grown son that his father is really here, and looking for the peace that can only be found by having his body located and buried. Yes, she succeeds in the end, but the getting there tends to the predictable, with a constant stream of plot exposition in the form of her best friend and employee.
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