This year has seen a huge rise in the mediocre, and a decline in the artistically passable.  TV has become the launching ground for anyone trying to tap into Warhol's 15 minutes of fame. The American television scene was well on the way to the mess following the writer's strike last year.  Due to the lengthy contract dispute, several serious events stacked up to collapse an already-ailing industry:

*existing scripts (unedited, uncorrected, raw) were the only ones that could be used during the strike, so actors found themselves without coherent scripts, plots were lost, character development died

*pilot season 08 was lost, new shows were not developed, many actors, writers, production staff, etc. were out of work for 08-09 season

*rise of reality shows shot up dramatially, "actors" in these shows are not SAG members, reality was not subject to Writer's Guild Union rules