Original, No; Violent, Yes

After Sunday’s Super Bowl of hype on CBS comes Sunday’s Super Bowl of bodies and car chases. Well, not so super, actually.

Premiering at 7:30 p.m. on Channels 2 and 8 is “Grand Slam,” an often mindless, plotless, witless, pointless--but never bloodless--action-comedy series about modern-day bounty hunters. Certain to benefit from the NFL championship game as a lead-in, the 90-minute opener racks up fewer laughs than bodies (10), with four victims getting blasted away in the first couple of minutes.

The Sunday night premiere is a case of CBS opportunistically exploiting the popularity of the Super Bowl. Three nights later, “Grand Slam” returns in its regular Wednesday time slot at 8 p.m. Yes, get it on early so all those kiddies can see it.

CBS--which University of Pennsylvania researchers have concluded was the most violent network in prime time in the latter 1980s--indicates with this series that it is also opening the ‘90s with guns blazing. Baseballs, too.

Hardball Bakelenekoff (John Schneider) is an ex-cop and baseball player who picks off some of his human targets with bean balls. Pedro Gomez (Paul Rodriguez) cracks self-deprecating Chicano jokes and drives a stereotypical Mexmobile. Hardball, who uses brute force, and Pedro, who uses guile, are competing bounty hunters who Sunday find themselves pursuing the same bail jumper, a murderous drug runner.

Hardball and Pedro just cannot get along. “One of us has to go,” says Pedro. Don’t hold your breath.

This is yet another variation of bickering buddy cops, with the ad hoc team of Hardball and Pedro as aggressive toward themselves as toward criminals. There’s an absolutely obnoxious level of gratuitous violence here, and although Rodriguez does inject some wit and style, the story gets stale quickly, as do the nonstop cracks about Latinos (“This guy ain’t the Frito Bandito, OK?”) and the squealing car chases, which do little more than waste good rubber.

“Man, this is stupid,” says Hardball. “Yeah, you’re right,” says Pedro. It’s unanimous.