The Best Show You're Not Watching: Life UneXpected

If you have not caught an episode of Life UneXpected yet, you don't know what you are missing.  This brand new show has not yet been renewed and I have added it to my mission list.  I don't watch much television anymore, but I saw previews for this and I had to watch.

It stars Sherri Appleby, who rocked it on Roswell back in the day with Katherine Heigl, as a popular morning radio show host Cate who has been living the perfect life with her boyfriend and co-host Ryan, played by Kerr Smith.  And Kerr played Jack on Dawson's Creek, which let's face it, was one of the first major gay characters on a teenage drama.

After spending all of her 15 years bouncing from one foster family to another in Lux has decided it's time to take control of her life and become an emancipated minor. When she was a baby and put up for adoption, she had heart problems.  After she had the surgeries and had finally healed, she was older and everyone wanted to adopt babies.  She finds out she needs her biological parents to sign papers to emancipate her so she tracks down her biological father, 32-year-old Nate "Baze" Bazile, who owns a bar, lives above it like an aging frat-boy with two slacker roommates, and is shocked to learn that he has a daughter.

Lux is equally astonished when Baze reveals that her mother is Cate Cassidy, a star on the local "Morning Madness" radio show along with her on-air partner and real-life boyfriend, Ryan Thomas. Lux has been listening to Cate's voice on the radio as long as she can remember, so she feels an instant connection with the mom she's never met. Baze takes Lux to meet Cate, who is shocked and saddened to learn that Lux has grown up in foster care instead of the adoption she believed would take place, and is reluctant to commit to her daughter.

Eventually, Cate wants to be a part of Lux's life, and she shows she really does care. When a judge decides that Lux isn't ready for emancipation and unexpectedly grants temporary joint custody to Baze and Cate, they agree to try to get past the awkwardness and make a belated attempt to give Lux the family she deserves. Cate, due to her job as a radio host, and the fact that she has a suitable house, is given primary custody of Lux. Ryan also takes to Lux.

Kristoffer Polaha plays that hot dad Baze and it's worth tuning in just to see him.  But the main reason is, this show has a hint of Gilmore Girls and it's good to see something different on television.  It's a family show about people trying to become a family.  And Cate is definately feeling nostalgic for her baby daddy.  They hooked up after a drunken night in just the first episode!

If you are out there and you have missed Gilmore Girls, consider this the just as cool, younger sister.  Watch it, before we lose yet another good show.