Desperation time

IN a recent Times article [“Is It Desperation Time for ‘Housewives’?”, by Maria Elena Fernandez, Oct. 18], we learn that fans and critics are disgruntled over the second season of “Desperate Housewives.” What a bunch of whiners!

Folks, let’s put this in perspective. Take your average television series and you’re lucky if you get three or four terrific episodes in a season of 13 to 22 episodes (assuming the show stays on that long). With a truly great series, you will find it rare to get all 22 episodes in a season to be truly superb. So when you turn out multiple seasons, it is impossible to think that they will all be gems.

Try to remember, this is the series that made many of you want to watch TV again, along with “Lost,” another show mentioned in the article as having second-year couch potato quarterbacks. With the amount of trash on the tube these days, are there any of us who can name more than a half-dozen series that are worth returning to week after week with devotion?

If you are honest with yourself, even if either of these shows is not living up to the expectations of last season (a tough act to follow, you must admit), aren’t both of them in their current form better than most of what you suffer through on the average evening?

Grow up folks. Even Shakespeare turned out some duds.

LARRY DEUTCHMAN

Thousand Oaks