Half of the four new ABC shows debut tonight. Half are worth watching.

        • The Geena Davis Show (9:30 p.m., Channels 9, 2): Sad to say, but the script for Geena Davis' new sitcom is as transparent as her Emmy Awards dress.

        Ms. Davis plays Teddie Cochran, a New York career woman whose idea of dinner at home is Chinese takeout, and whose “family” is her Sex and the City-style girlfriends (Mimi Rogers, Kim Coles).

        Then she meets a widower named Max (Peter Horton of Brimstone, thirtysomething), and becomes the stepmother of a 13-year-old boy (John Francis Daley, Freaks & Geeks) and a 6-year-old girl (Makenzie Vega).

        Teddie's tough adjustment to motherhood — like walking through the house without pants — grows tedious before the pilot ends. (Imagine 22 episodes of this?) And who had the mistaken impression that Mr. Horton could do comedy?

        For this sitcom to work, ABC must chose between the Sex and the City or the Sex and the Soccer Mom situations. Or maybe it can't be salvaged.

        • Gideon's Crossing (10 p.m., Channels 9, 2): Emmy-winner Andre Braugher (Homicide: Life on the Street) stars in ABC's only new fall drama in the network's surprisingly weak slate of four new shows, its smallest new fall season in history. (The Trouble with Normal and Madigan Men premiered Friday.)

        ABC has gone conservative this fall, scheduling four Who Wants to be a Millionaire programs a week to eat up time slots that could be filled with eight sitcoms, four dramas or four more 20/20s.

        Gideon's Crossing could be ABC's only fall show to survive the season, though that's no lock because of the intense, complex scripts from creator Paul Attanasio (Homicide). Think of this as Homicide meets St. Elsewhere (or ABC's short-lived spring Wonderland mental hospital drama).

        Mr. Braugher plays Dr. Benjamin Gideon, chief of experimental medicine at a Boston teaching hospital, who gets all the impossible cases.

        “I'm not a wizard,” Dr. Gideon tells a cancer victim tonight. (The dying man is played by Bruce McGill, the motorcycle-riding “D-Day” from Animal House and its TV spinoff, Delta House).

        By the end of the show, it's clear that Dr. Gideon's colleagues consider him a modern miracle worker.

        “Be angry with God. Pick on someone your own size,” hospital administrator Dr. Max Cabranes (Ruben Blades) tells him.

        Mr. Braugher and Mr. Blades are part of TV's most diverse new show. Gideon's Crossing also has an African-American chief resident (Russell Hornsby), and three immigrant interns (Ravi Kapoor, Rhona Mitra, Sophie Keller).

        Author Dr. Jerome Groopman, whose “The Measure of Our Days”was the basis for the series, said the multicultural cast was “a very authentic reflection” of today's medical school population.

        Like Mr. Braugher's police drama, Gideon's Crossing isn't easy to watch. Viewers may have trouble sticking with the show tonight, when the 50-minute pilot airs without commercials in a broadcast sponsored by Johnson & Johnson.

        Those who watch will find a thought-provoking hour that could develop a loyal audience — though it may struggle (like Homicide) to find a mass audience. Particularly when it moves next week to 10 p.m. Wednesday, its regular time slot, opposite NBC's Law & Order and CBS' movie.

        CHANNEL 9 NEWS: WCPO-TV (Channel 9) is losing two high-profile reporters: Bob Holtzman leaves Oct. 27 to work for ESPN from Atlanta, and Deb Haas departs Nov. 9 to be a segment producer for Scripps' new Fine Living cable channel.

        Ms. Haas, who is married to WEBN-FM's Eddie Fingers, has been part-time since her son was born nearly two years ago. Scott Diener, Channel 9 news director, says she has offered to do free-lance fill-in reporting for Channel 9.

        ONN HERE: The Ohio News Network, added to Greater Cincinnati's Time Warner systems in August, airs a live town hall meeting today (8-9:30 p.m.) on education issues from Walnut Hills High School with Cincinnati Schools Superintendent Steven Adamowski and other experts.

        A special Cincinnati-area edition of Ohio Sports Insider will air at 7 p.m. Thursday as part of ONN's “Celebrate Cincinnati” week. ONN is Time Warner digital channel 105.

        Not Normal: Danny Jacobson (Mad About You) won't be producing John Goodman's troubled Normal, Ohio, the Fox sitcom set in suburban Cincinnati, the Washington Post reports. Carsey-Werner Productions has dumped co-creator Bob Kushnell, in addition to changing the title, cast and premise for the Nov. 1 debut.

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