TV Review: 'Event,' 'Lone Star' best bets

Chase: Drama. 10 p.m. Mondays on NBC.

Detroit 1-8-7: Drama. 10 p.m. Tuesdays on ABC.

Welcome to TV series demolition week. For your viewing pleasure, not only will you get all your favorite returning series, but the broadcast networks thought they'd dump a bunch of new shows in the road. "A bunch" - as in 16 of them.

Two of the most interesting - and most challenging - will be going head-to-head tonight. The other two are less interesting and more familiar, but could end up living longer.

NBC has been pushing "The Event" all summer as, well, an event. With "Lost" now retired, there's a vacuum where a series or three detailing unexplained phenomenon should be. And so "The Event" surfaces, with its visual influences not too difficult to check off - "Lost," "24," "FlashForward," etc. "The Event" is a conspiracy thriller about how newly elected President Elias Martinez (Blair Underwood) discovers a group of detainees that the United States has held, apparently, for some time (in a remote area of Alaska). He decides to free them, and that kick-starts a series of crazy events, including the seemingly random cruise ship disappearance of a girl named Leila (Sarah Roemer) in a twist that freaks out her almost-fiancee Sean (Jason Ritter), who now plans to solve her disappearance, which will lead to one of the biggest cover-up conspiracies in history.

All of this is intriguing if confusing. Much of it is vague on purpose, of course, but in the pilot there are so many flashbacks (23 days ago, 8 days ago, one nanosecond ago, etc.) that it becomes almost comical. And yet, it's mighty entertaining. The question you need to ask yourself is whether a serialized drama with loads of twists and turns - and no guarantee of success - is worth the investment of your time.

There's always a need for a pulse-pounding mystery with a little paranormal thrown in. If "The Event" proves it can let out the story while reeling viewers back each week, it could be something special.

Fox is hoping that instead of a massive conspiracy with shadowy figures and unexplained phenomena, you'll go for "Lone Star" instead. It's the story of Robert Allen (James Wolk), a.k.a. Bob Allen, who is one handsome con man linked to two different women, one in Midland, Texas, where there's not much of anything going on, and the other in Houston. Robert/Bob has been working a long con in the oil business to people in both places and, conveniently enough, fallen in love with a woman in each location. Lindsay (Eloise Mumford) is the down to earth beauty in Midland. And Cat (Adrianne Palcki), is the princess-like daughter of a rich oil man in Houston.

As you might imagine, leading a double life is difficult - especially when your con man father John (David Keith) is mad at you for breaking the don't-fall-in-love rule - twice. And Cat's father Clint (Jon Voight) believes you can succeed at his business, but in the process of sniffing out your worth, is all up in your business, which is bad for stealing his money as well as his daughter.

"Lone Star" has enormous potential to be a complicated, tightrope-walking tale of two lives. Or it could just implode. Like "The Event," it's worth your investment, but you'll have to record one or the other.

"Chase," on the other hand, is a show you've seen a million times - another procedural from Jerry Bruckheimer. It revolves around a U.S. Marshal (Kelli Giddish) tracking down runaway bad guys and locking them up. Not nearly as good or as complex as "Justified" on FX, but it's a decent hour of mindless entertainment.

The dark horse here is "Detroit 1-8-7" starring "Sopranos" veteran Michael Imperioli as a homicide cop, Tuesday nights on ABC. While the cop genre is all but played out, "Detroit 1-8-7" is stylish and acceptably rough-hewn enough to make it worth your while. It's visually interesting, keeps several storylines spinning at once and has an agreeable cast. Sometimes all you need is a good cop show, no matter how familiar. Because not everybody wants to work hard to solve a paranormal puzzle or invest in a complicated long con.

E-mail Tim Goodman at tgoodman@sfchronicle.com. Follow him at www.twitter.com/bastardmachine.

This article appeared on page E - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle