Ox Notes: September 3, 2008

The CW's heavily promoted spin-off, 90210, debuted last night to lackluster reviews. The premiere was delayed in the Chicago area until after my bedtime because of a baseball game. Did I miss anything?

While 90210 may have been a miss, The CW scored two ratings hits with the season premieres of Gossip Girl and One Tree Hill, even thought their combined audience numbers didn't equal the 7.7 million people who watched the series debut of Raising the Bar on TNT on Monday night.

90210 and fellow remake Knight Rider may have started a disturbing trend: NBC is planning an '80s version of The Wonder Years.

Knight Rider is one of five NBC shows whose premieres will be made available at Hulu one week before they air on television.

For a little historical perspective, Variety's Brian Lowry looked back at the fall premieres of the 1993-94 TV season.

Variety also has an article about the changes Arabic TV stations make to their schedules during Ramadan. For example, MTV Arabia stops airing music videos, focusing more on "reality shows, celebrity news and pop culture documentaries." Based on that programming, MTV must be operating on a perpetual Ramadan schedule in the United States.

Dancing with the Stars 7 contestant Misty May-Treanor will play herself during a guest appearance on Disney's Wizards of Waverly Place.

May-Treanor is in Chicago today to film a special Olympic episode of Oprah, which will air on Monday, September 8. Nearly 200 American Olympians are scheduled to appear on the show, although being barely visible in the background while Oprah spends 45 minutes interviewing gymnast Shawn Johnson hardly qualifies an appearance.

In other Dancing with the Stars news, pro dancer Corky Ballas has a pair of short videos at his website, featuring his partner, Cloris Leachman, his son, Mark, and Mark's partner, Kim Kardashian. At the website, Corky also proposes a nickname for his DwtS 7 partnership: Clorky. Um, no.