29 new shows are headed for your TV

MOONLIGHT (Fridays, 8 p.m., CBS/Ch. 2) is the latest in a surprisingly long list of TV shows about vampires who are also detectives. (A list that includes "Forever Knight," "Angel" and "Blood Ties.")

It's also a show that's already been through three sets of show-running producers, including, for a few weeks — until he quit — one of the creators/executive producers of "Angel." And a show that, two weeks before it's supposed to premiere, still hasn't been shown to critics.

We do know that Mick St. John (Alex O'Loughlin) is "a captivating, charming and immortal private investigator from Los Angeles who defies the traditional blood-sucking norms of his vampire tendencies by using his wit and powerful supernatural abilities to help the living."

The cast includes Coraline (Shannyn Sossamon), the wife who turned Mick into a vampire 60 years ago; Mick's vampire friend Josef (Jason Dohring), a mischievous hedge-fund trader; and Beth Turner (Sophia Myles), a beautiful, ambitious Internet investigative reporter.

What's to like/what's not to like/will it work? Impossible to say. But the fact that CBS picked this show up without a pilot, all the behind-the-scenes changes to the writing and producing staff and the replacement of all the cast except for O'Loughlin makes this a very, very iffy proposition.

Debuts: Friday, Sept. 28

WOMEN'S MURDER CLUB (Fridays, 8 p.m., ABC/Ch. 4) is a very traditional TV crime/mystery drama — not that there's anything wrong with that.

Based on James Patterson's series of novels, the "Club" is four female friends who solve murders. At the center of the action is San Francisco police detective Lindsay Boxer (Angie Harmon of "Law & Order"). She gets help from medical examiner Clair Washburn (Paula Newsome of "Little Miss Sunshine"); assistant district attorney Jill Bernhardt (Laura Harris of "24"); and newspaper reporter Cindy Thomas (Aubrey Dollar of "Guiding Light").

It's sort of an updated "Murder, She Wrote" with four women — any two of whose ages add up to Angela Lansbury's age, more or less.

The crimes are pretty grisly — sort of "CSI" territory — but the mysteries are pretty good.

What's to like? Again, not every show has to break new ground. There's absolutely nothing wrong with refitting the old murder-mystery genre when it's as well done as it is here. You may find yourself sitting down in front of an episode, getting sucked in and watching from start to finish.