Summer used to be when TV programmers burned off failed sitcoms and dramas. Now it's the time when we're inundated with "reality" shows.

Most of them are bad. And the crop headed our way in the next few days is no exception.

The Princes of Malibu (Sunday, 7:30 p.m., Fox/Ch. 13) is all about twentysomething spoiled brats. Yeah, that's entertainment!

Brandon Jenner, 23, and his brother Brody, 21, are the stepsons of the fabulously wealthy and successful music producer David Foster — who has won 14 Grammys and worked with everyone from Paul McCartney to Barbra Streisand. The "boys" are lazy good-for-nothings who lie around and drive poor David crazy.

In Sunday's premiere, David and his wife Linda Thomson (the "boys' " mother) return home to discover Brody's birthday part is hugely out of control. However, when David suggests that his stepsons/leaches (the biological children of ex-Olympian Bruce Jenner) shape up and get jobs, Linda suggests he's being too "harsh."

Fox refers to this as "humorous." It's not. It's sad and pathetic.

But, quite frankly, the solution is right in front of Foster. Either his wife backs him up or he sees a divorce lawyer. Immediately.

Not that we want to see any of that on TV, either.

Parents, be very careful about letting your kids watch this. The "boys' " bad behavior is portrayed as cute, funny and charming.

Is that the message you want your kids taking in?

Hogan Knows Best (Sunday, 11 p.m., VH1) is still more proof that not every faded "star" should have a reality show. Hulk Hogan embarrasses himself and his family in this unreal-feeling series, which casts him as a sitcom-ish dad to his real-life kids — a 16-year-old daughter and a 14-year-old son.

Hogan, his wife and his kids, try as they might to follow in the footsteps of "The Osbournes," aren't interesting enough to carry a show.

And Hogan proves he's not such a great father, simply because he's exploiting his kids in an attempt to revive his faded career.

Brat Camp (Wednesday, 7 p.m., ABC/Ch. 4) has only one thing to recommend it — it's not filmed in Utah, which has an unfortunate history with things like this.

Essentially, this series exploits troubled children for ratings. It's about nine teenagers whose behavior ranges from bad to worse — up to and including criminal behavior — who have been sent to a wilderness camp in Oregon to straighten them out.

I'm sure it will help that their parents (who had to sign off on this) have put them on national television for all of America to see.

Everyone involved with this should be ashamed.

Hooking Up (Thursday, 8 p.m., Ch. 4), from its title alone, seems like the worst of the lot. But it's by far the best.

Although that's faint praise.

From the producers of the medical documentary series "Hopkins 24/7," this is not so much a reality show — as that term has been perverted — as it is another documentary. It follows a group of women in their 20s and 30s as they surf the Internet to meet men, to date and to form relationships.

Yes, some of them are more than a bit shallow and more than a bit desperate to hook up. But they're far more real than the celebrities clogging most "reality" shows these days.

---

E-mail: pierce@desnews.com