• the217
• Movies + TV
• What's On: Monday, September 15- Friday, Sept. 26

Your remote control doesn’t know what’s coming. In one week, it’ll be thrust into the heart of television’s busiest time of the year. With over 40 new and returning shows airing that week, it’ll have little chance to rest its overworked batteries and over-pressed keypad.

But you can prevent it from malfunctioning by having it do a simple two-day workout- on Tuesday for two hours and Thursday for three. It’s a simple, yet fun way of conditioning your remote for the big week! Here’s the schedule:

Tuesday: House at 7 p.m. (Fox); The Biggest Loser: Families at 7 p.m. (NBC)

It just so happens that Tuesday’s premieres fall at the same time… Great! Seriously, no sarcasm here. Channel surfing between Dr. House and the latest batch of “Biggest” contestants is just warm-up for when you’ll have to juggle a slew of new shows in a few weeks. Might as well get used to it now.

If you’re not sure which show to tune into first, here’s a preview of what you’ll be seeing:

House— Your BFF kinda, sorta, might’ve had something to do with the death of your girlfriend, so naturally, you resign from the hospital and reassess whether your buddy is really BFF material. No, this is not a spinoff of The Hills. This is the relationship between House (Hugh Laurie) and Wilson (Robert Sean Leonard), eight months after Wilson’s girlfriend, Amber, died while trying to help a drunken House. Should be cute.

Biggest Loser: Families— Since the dawn of Survivor, producers of (relatively) groundbreaking reality shows have been trying to spice up each new season in hopes of convincing viewers that they’re watching a new and improved show. Biggest, a competition that pits contestants against each other to see who can shed the most pounds to win $250,000 (and, you know, a new lifestyle), is no exception. After five seasons, they enter round six with a half-recycled concept and a new gym. Instead of having eight teams of couples, there are only four husband-and-wife teams; the other four are parent-child teams. Way to live on the wild side, NBC! Maybe next season they’ll only have parent-child teams. Then the next season it’ll be half parent-child teams and… I got it! married couples!

Thursday: Unlike Tuesday, you’ll be able to watch these premieres back-to-back-to-back-to-back, with Smallville at 7 p.m. (CW); Supernatural at 8 p.m. (CW); It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia at 9 p.m. (FX); The Sarah Silverman Program at 9:30 p.m. (Comedy Central).

Today’s lineup is more of a warm-up with your bum than your remote, so if you sit through it all, you should be ready to go next week when the onslaught of premieres infiltrates your TV screen and study schedule. Here’s what’s on:

Smallville: The time has come, comic fans. The eighth season will more or less mark Clark Kent’s shift from small-town boy to Metropolis reporter-in-the-making. That translates to more superheroes and less supernormal (not that the show could ever be considered normal). Although it’ll will be drastically different than it was seven seasons ago (series regulars Lex Luther (Michael Rosenbaum) and Lana Lang (Kristin Kreuk) are sayin’ sayonara), fans shouldn’t have much to complain about, since the premise of the show has always been to follow young Clark from all-American boy to the dude with the red cape and thick black glasses.

Supernatural: Unfortunately for viewers like me, season four does not open in hell. Too bad. I was really pulling for an entire season following Dean’s (Jensen Ackles) encampment there, but I guess watching Sam (Jared Padalecki) trying to figure out how the h-e-double-hockey-sticks his brother returned from below should be fun.

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia: FX’s classy show about a group of friends who run an Irish bar and yack about nearly every non-PC topic in a tasteful manner is back for its fourth season. This time they channel another Thursday night show by launching their own crime scene investigation after discovering feces in someone’s bed. Maybe “tasteful” wasn’t the best word choice…

The Sarah Silverman Program: Silverman’s satirical take on… everything... launches for a third season, tackling issues everyone else is talking about (pregnancy and solving crimes while stoned, to name a few), but with her offbeat perspective.