'Once Upon a Time' is entertainment from a surprising place

I had been looking forward to the release of the first season of Aaron Sorkin's "The Newsroom" ever since I saw the Jeff Daniels clip that had gone viral on the Internet.

I have been a fan of Sorkin's ever since the first episode of "The West Wing," and I watched every episode of "Sports Night" on DVD and also of the one season of "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip." Seven seasons of "West Wing" were enough, but I would have loved to see additional seasons of the other two.

So I picked up "The Newsroom" on Tuesday, and brought it home to start watching.

It was strange, though. Before I was halfway through the episode, I lost interest and decided it could wait for another time. I decided instead to watch another show that I had picked up on a whim.

The other show was one that has been on ABC for two years, but I had never heard of it until I saw the DVD. The premise behind it is either one of the most original in years or the most ridiculous. I still haven't decided which, even though I've watched most of the first season.

Would you watch a show in which all the characters from famous fairy tales were banished to our world without the knowledge of who they were? That's a simplified explanation of "Once Upon a Time," which will begin its third season this fall.

Jennifer Morrison plays Emma, the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming, who finds herself in Storybrooke (get it?), Maine, the town where all the characters are trapped.

Of course she doesn't know who her parents are, and when she's told, she doesn't believe. None of the characters know who they were, other than the two villains. The mayor, Regina Mills, is the Evil Queen who got Snow White to eat the apple, and local mogul Mr. Gold is actually Rumplestiltskin.

It all sounds incredibly goofy, but I can't get enough of it. Season Two will be out on DVD in late August, and I'm actually considering making this the first show I watch on live television since "24" went off the air.

That doesn't mean it's a good show. There are plenty of bad shows I've enjoyed.

But it's a lot more entertaining than "The Newsroom."
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