New 'Bionic Woman'

This is not our mother's "Bionic Woman" — not that there's anything wrong with that.

NBC's new series, which premieres tonight at 8 on Ch. 5, is a "re-imagining" of the cheesy 1976-78 series about a woman who, badly injured in an accident, is rebuilt using bionic parts.

"Re-imagined" is a nice way of saying the producers and writers lifted the basic concept from a bad old TV show and turned it into what looks like a decent new TV show.

"I still feel like we are doing the 'Bionic Woman' for the same nucleus reasons that they were doing it back then," said executive producer David Eick. "It's just that the society and the culture and the methodology and the filmmaking styles have all changed. The storytelling style hasn't changed."

He's being kind. "Bionic Woman" is a quantum leap forward from "The Bionic Woman."

Jaime Sommers (Michelle Ryan) is struggling to build a life for herself and her younger sister. Jaime is nearly killed in a car accident, but her boyfriend, Will (Chris Bowers), who's a scientist working on a secret government project, rebuilds her. But she's aghast at what she's become.

Jamie is expected to go to work for the secret group that funded her rebuilding, and she learns there's another bionic woman (Katee Sackhoff) who went rogue.

Whereas the original series was just downright goofy much of the time, this re-imagined version is dark and dramatic. (And Ryan won't be running in slow motion with goofy sound effects the way Lindsay Wagner did in the original.)

The pilot is quite good; whether the concept holds up as a weekly series is the big question. That and the turmoil behind the scenes with turnover (twice) of producers running the show.

It's worth keeping an eye on, but don't get your hopes too high.

PRIVATE PRACTICE (8 p.m., ABC/Ch. 4) is probably as much of a sure thing as any new show on any network this fall. This spin-off of "Grey's Anatomy" not only has a built-in audience, but it has one of the best characters from "Grey's" — Dr. Addison Montgomery (Kate Walsh).

There's a great cast, including Tim Daly, Taye Diggs, Paul Adelstein, Amy Brenneman and Audra McDonald. And, every once in a while, tonight's premiere will make you laugh or bring a tear to your eye.