Prime objective: to topple ‘Idol’

Crack teams of FBI profilers and Pentagon analysts are arming for battle in coming months.

Their high-stakes mission? To combat threats to the American way of life and, they hope, loosen the stranglehold of “American Idol.”

As broadcasters unfurled their 2005-06 schedules at the “upfront” ad market in New York this week, Wednesdays at 9 p.m. has turned into a key battleground.

That’s where NBC’s “E-Ring,” the highly promoted Pentagon thriller from producer Jerry Bruckheimer, will stare down “Criminal Minds,” CBS’ new FBI procedural starring Mandy Patinkin. Both entries will face formidable competition from “Lost,” ABC’s deserted-island ensemble that turned into a major hit this season and is moving from its current 8 p.m. Wednesday slot.

But network executives are still facing a force far scarier than serial killers, terrorists or tropical beasts: Simon Cowell. As expected, Fox said Thursday that the half-hour “results show” for “Idol” will return to the 9 p.m. Wednesday slot in January -- and rivals don’t want to spend a fourth straight winter gaping helplessly as Fox’s hugely popular talent contest, featuring the tart-tongued judge Cowell, savages their midweek schedules.

“ ‘Idol’ is a complete hammer,” ABC prime-time entertainment chief Stephen McPherson lamented to reporters this week.

Case in point: “Idol” has wreaked havoc with ABC’s once-healthy midweek comedy block; partly as a result, the network this week axed Damon Wayans’ Tuesday sitcom “My Wife & Kids.” The “Idol” effect, in fact, has helped keep ABC scrambling to stay out of third place among the young-adult viewers sought by advertisers, despite big hits like “Desperate Housewives” and “Grey’s Anatomy.”

Viacom co-chief operating officer Leslie Moonves, who oversees CBS, sees a storm gathering as he and other network bosses race to beat back “Idol.” “Wednesday at 9 o’clock is going to be very hard,” Moonves admitted to reporters. “ ‘Lost’ is tough. ‘E-Ring’ is obviously one of NBC’s big guns.”

NBC, which has slipped from first to fourth among young-adult viewers this season, says they’re finally ready to take on “Idol.” The network has suffered considerably as its once-hot White House drama, “The West Wing,” has faded in the ratings (it moves to Sundays in the fall), and the midseason drama “Revelations,” about a professor and nun investigating signs of a looming Apocalypse, has stalled with viewers. “E-Ring” is the perfect antidote, NBC entertainment boss Kevin Reilly says.

“This is like a Bruckheimer movie,” Reilly said this week. “It’s big, it’s glossy. It’s got two big stars at the center [Benjamin Bratt and Dennis Hopper] .... Frankly, we also think [that] as ‘American Idol’ counter-programming, we finally have a show we can glue to the schedule. It’s got a different audience base.”

Advertisers couldn’t be more thrilled by such a hard-fought match-up. They like the idea of big hits spread across multiple networks because that keeps any one player from becoming too dominant and dictating the price of 30-second spots.

Wednesday’s “Idol” fetches the highest ad prices of any regularly scheduled TV program this season, more than $658,000 per spot, according to Advertising Age, a trade magazine. That is far higher than NBC’s “ER,” which at $479,250 per spot has been the most expensive scripted series to buy into. At the same time, viewers are obviously more engaged with hit shows than mediocre performers -- and, ad buyers hope, more likely to spring for products they see advertised during breaks.

“You want [the programming] to be competitive,” explained Lisa Sangalli, associate broadcast director at the ad firm Optimedia. “Everybody has been saying this whole ‘Desperate Housewives’ and ‘Lost’ [phenomenon] has been really good for TV, and it’s really true. It’s brought people back to TV, back to dramas, back to watching.”

Whether viewers will enjoy all the schedule posturing is another matter. Another fierce brawl is on tap for 8 p.m. Thursdays, when CBS’ “Survivor 11: Guatemala” will try to fend off three existing dramas with strong fan bases: ABC’s “Alias,” Fox’s “The O.C.” and the WB’s “Smallville.”

At the same time, NBC’s struggling sitcom “Joey” will likely face a surprisingly strong challenge from UPN’s “Everybody Hates Chris,” comic Chris Rock’s take on his Brooklyn childhood in the early 1980s, which had buyers and reporters buzzing after video clips brought down the house at UPN’s presentation Thursday morning.

Referring to the heavy competition at 8 p.m. Thursday in the fall, Brad Adgate, senior vice president at Horizon Media in New York, joked: “You’re gonna need two or three TiVos for that time period.”

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Times staff writers Maria Elena Fernandez and Matea Gold contributed to this report from New York. Scott Collins reported from Los Angeles.