Titans

I don't care what everyone else says I think it's a great show. I'm not the biggest fan of Ingo Rademacher and Casper Van Dien, but I think they're great actors. I have never missed a episode yet and I don't plan to either.

Someone tell Aaron Spelling - the days of the nighttime soap remain, alas, over. Particularly if this is the best he can come up with. First of all, there is no longer the budget pool available to do a prime time soap about wealthy people the way it should be done so there is no opulence - just a lot of outdoor settings and a hallway. Melrose Place, set in an apartment complex that looked like a sleazy motel was a better idea by far. Secondly, the cast is too young. To have the patriarchs be 50-ish Perry King and Victoria Principal means that we're into teenagers by the time we get to the bottom rung. Badly needed: David Selby. Worse, Perry, playing a complete idiot, was killed off and Jack Wagner, age 40, was brought in. Spelling tapped into the Beverly Hills 90210 ex-cast INSTEAD of the Melrose ex-cast, which is where he should have gone. This show was badly in need of Heather Locklear. Thirdly, no bitch. Principal had the turn of a phrase with a velvet glove - where was the knife? Calling Morgan Brittany! Fourth, too many characters were introduced too quickly, confusing the audience.

All in all, the cast was badly in need of fire, chemistry, dialogue and storyline. It had none.

I was not paying attention to what was on the TV while working on some emails. I turned around to see that "Titans" was 'coming up next on NBC'. Titans conveyed to me a sense of giants playing in the fields of mortal men.

As it turns out, the main characters were perfect archetypes of quasi-realistic mythical figuers that might exist. In other words, there was not one human character in the show. All were plastic (and badly molded) figures with a shallow attempt at inserting personality.

Given the writer, and the cast, this was not a surprise. The main characters all rely on physical appearance, and their ability to pout and get angry. Throw in a little hard core sex, cheapen the filmography, and you have a nice little soft-porn to peddle to the masses.

I have to admit, I almost thought that this was going to be a satire due to the over-use of the extremely obvious. When the identified alcoholic female character sat by the window awaiting her boyfriend (who was ... married) there was a liquor cabinet within a few feet. The set up was so telegraphed that it was comical.

All in all, this show may survive if the brainless daytime-soap crowd manages to shake off their substance haze, and manage to stay tuned.

What's tv without a steamy Aaron Spelling production! That's right, the man that brought you "Melrose Place" and "Beverly Hills 90210" is getting back on top with TITANS. The new guilty pleasure that oozes with unlimited wealth and intoxicating beauty cooks up prime-time with rich people in complicated situations. Yasmine Bleeth leads an all-star cast as Heather Lane, the young and manipulative gold-digging new wife of Richard Williams (Perry King), the wealthy owner of a powerful international company. It just so happens that Richard's son Chandler (played by hunky Casper Van Dien) had a rompy relationship with his new step-mom two months earlier. Heather, dropping the bombshell that she's pregnant with Chandler's child DURING her wedding, goes head-to-head with Richard's ex-wife Gwen (played by former Dallas babe Victoria Principal) who lives right across the street. Jennie (Elizabeth Bogush), a recovering alcoholic and Laurie (Josie Davis), the owner of dance club Pulse, share sibling rivalry when David (General Hospital's Ingo Rademacher) arrives on the scene to romance the sisters. Business son Peter (John Barrowman) has eyes for the family secretary Samantha (Lourdes Benedicto), who has eyes for only Chandler. The troubled family gets even more complicated when Uncle Jack (Jack Wagner of "Melrose Place") takes over the family empire after brother Richard dies before episode 6 and kicks up a relationship with sister-in-law Gwen.

Secret pasts, sibling rivalry, steamy sex, battling the bottle, and untimely death is flooding TITANS. Just think... all that and only 6 episodes have been shot so far. Forget the dying "Millionaire" rage and sink your teeth into TITANS!

At first glance, Titans seems like just another one of Aaron Spelling's "guilty pleasures." However, after a few minutes of watching, this show obviously does not come up to par. The characters are dreadfully cliche and unoriginal. You have your gold-digging, trophy wife Heather Williams, (Yasmine Bleeth)and her hopelessly in love older husband Richard Williams, (Perry King). She also is bent on seducing her new husband's son(Casper Van Dien), whose baby she is also carrying. I also found the casting to be quite awful. Casper Van Dien shows hardly any emotion, and when he does, it is through a tightening of his mouth or tensing of his jaw. Yasmine Bleeth is too transparently evil and doesn't even have a bad girl, man-eater appeal. Most of these actors were obviously hired for their looks alone, except Spelling's alummni, such as Jack Wagner.

As the show progressed, I was so turned off by Van Dien and Bleeth, that I found myself rooting for Peter Williams (John Barrowman), Van Dien's cynical smart alec brother, who has a special soft spot for Samantha Sanchez, (Lourdes Benedicto).Unfortunately, she is hopelessly in love with Chandler. Why, I don't know. Barrowman shows much more of a range of emotions in one show than Van Dien has in the entire series run.

All in all, Titans disappoints.It definitely does not come up to any of Spelling's previous shows in quality, casting, or plots. Titans is not inventive or creative in the least. But if you need an hour of mindless entertainment where you don't need to use your brain, this is the show for you. I give it a 3 out of 10.