Baby Boomers are the first generation to have grown up with TV. But that doesn't mean we're any more discriminating than our parents. Is TV better these days because the average viewer has seen so much of it? Hardly. Schlock situation comedies predominate in the earlier hours of prime time, followed by standard action series. Sure, there are a few quality series around, but no more of them than 20 years ago. When ABC decided to program Saturday nights as Baby Boomers' night, it selected China Beach and Twin Peaks as the two offbeat series with the best chances of attracting the Boomers. Both failed. And so have other series (Cop Rock, American Dreamer, Grand)manufactured under the delusion that Boomers are more discriminating than other viewers.

TV-movies offer women over 40 the opportunities denied them on the big screen. Take a look at the cinema ads and you'll see very few movies in which a female star of any age actually gets first billing. But women dominate the TV-movie field. Every TV season, [Cheryl Ladd], 39, Lindsay Wagner, 42, Kate Jackson, 44, Jacqueline Bissett, 47, and a few other Fabulous Forties star in one or two dramatic TV-movie offerings. There's even room in TV-movies for Angie Dickinson, 60, and Elizabeth Montgomery, 57. But when was the last time you saw them at the cinema?