Just Shoot Me : Seasons One and Two

The show's premise was fresh, too, and the nice thing about revisiting JSM's first two seasons is realizing how well the whole enterprise holds up. Giacomo stars as serious-minded journalist Maya Gallo, fired from her job as a television newswriter after sabotaging a clueless, on-air anchor. Desperate for work, Maya turns up at the offices of Blush, a women's fashion monthly published by her estranged father, Jack (Segal). Maya reluctantly takes a job writing sex quizzes and similar dreck for Blush, but it's the snippy and vainglorious crossfire between the magazine's staffers, and between Maya and Jack, that makes JSM so much fun. Malick's aging diva, Nina Van Horn, alternately lashes out and unburdens her soul in a failing bid to remain vital in a youth-obsessed culture. Self-centered Jack offers Maya a father's long-delayed love--albeit on his terms. Spade's Dennis Finch chases leggy supermodels around the office like a pathetic loser in junior high. Another cast member, Enrico Colantoni, is very good as the likable but impulsive, womanizing photographer Elliot DiMauro, who becomes an increasingly important player as he and Maya develop feelings for one another in season two. Somehow Just Shoot Me never quite lit up NBC's primetime stable of hit sitcoms, but it did respectably well and now looks even better divorced from its television competition. --Tom Keogh