In what was truly a breath of fresh air after several weeks of upfronts madness, yesterday's USA Network presentation at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall -- the final event of the season -- didn't feature a single word from any executive. It's a long-standing tradition at the cabler to have their stars do the talking, which means a minimum amount of industry speak... and way more scripted banter. Since USA has acquired the syndication rights to Modern Family, the highlight of the evening was a digital short of series co-creator Steven Levitan standing in front of the Pritchett-Delgado house saying how excited he was to be part of the USA family, only to have Ed O'Neill, in character as Jay, come out and angrily demand, "Hey, get the fuck out of my driveway!" It was followed with the Modern Family framed-moment title song , where the casts of each USA original series held up a little frame until the final shot ended on the Modern Family theme final still. Another highlight, especially to WWE fans, was the announcement that in honor of Monday Night Raw's 1,000th episode, the series will now be expanded to three hours every week.

You've got to hand it to The CW: they know how to really keep an upfront moving. From kicking it off with a performance by Flo Rida to just jumping right in to a preview of their most interesting new series, Arrow, it flew by faster than any other network presentation this week. Sure, they spent time discussing social media and whatnot, but it was all broken up by on-stage appearances by the very beautiful people who are on their shows. And hey, most of their upcoming shows look watchable, if not legitimately entertaining, and since they're recycling a ton of their talent (and in some cases, characters), we feel like we know these programs already.

Supernatural and Top Model are swapping nights. Is this because Tyra fired like everyone on her show?

CBS president Les Moonves got us all excited about a one-minute long upfront at the beginning of the network's presentation this afternoon, but it actually went on for over an hour. And considering they only have four new shows this fall, that meant a lot of padding. So they filled it with Mike & Molly stars Billy Gardell and Melissa McCarthy bantering about their recent fake wedding and the lack of gifts they've received from their fellow CBS stars (except Ted Danson, who sent them a pony); the Two Broke Girls trying to find a way to make money; LL Cool J rapping; and Eli Manning trying to crack jokes (which, as we learned on Saturday Night Live, is not something he can do). Still, despite the fact that this was the network that showed us the fewest clips, the ones we saw actually had more promise than the other three this week so far.

We're still trying to figure out what ABC's execs were talking about at their upfront presentation when they claimed they were the "number one must-keep" network, but at least they had something resembling a sense of humor about their shows, talking about while their Bachelors may not stay engaged, their viewers are. And then, as usual, they unleashed Jimmy Kimmel, whose show has been on the air for ten years, which is about nine longer than I predicted way back when. He joked to the ad buyers in the crowd that "We don't know what we are doing. We have no idea what people want to see. If we did, we wouldn't have an upfront; we'd just put the shows on the air and you'd just mail us a check." Then he added, "That show Work It... you know we were just kidding about that, right?" Of course, he had to rip on the other networks as well. On NBC: "Spinning chairs and a monkey. This truly is a golden age of television." On Fox's X Factor: "No one knows talent like Britney Spears and Demi Lovato. Britney Spears wanted to be a judge since she's spent the last ten years appearing before them." On CBS: "For the 18-to-49-trips-to-the-bathroom demographic." On The CW's new musical chairs show: "Oh Sit! It used to be called Steaming Pile o' Sit, but they shortened it." Still, his best joke was also at The X Factor and Idol's expense: "I feel bad for Paula Abdul. She's the Rosa Parks of bipolar talent show judges. No one was more dedicated or more medicated." It's a good thing that Kimmel was funny, because none of ABC's new comedies looked amusing at all.

The Fox upfront presentation began with a pre-taped bit about the cast of New Girl interviewing for a new roommate, and their options were Fox stars ranging from Mr. Schue to Walter to the kid from Touch. Oh, and Emily Deschanel, because they couldn't resist making a sister joke. It was cute and the highlight of the network's hour-long presentation, for sure. Most of the rest focused on clips from this season of New Girl, a live awkward bit of banter between Zooey and Mindy Kaling about who is the most adorkable Fox star of them all, and Ryan Seacrest being Ryan Seacresty. They also made a big deal about The X-Factor and officially introduced new judges Demi Lovato and Britney Spears, while making a couple of digs at The Voice. I suppose they had to fill the time somehow, because aside from talking about some new random animation domination HD thing that's going to air in the dead of Saturday night (11 PM-12:30 AM), and referencing baseball as much as they could, there really wasn't a lot of new stuff to show off. But here's what we thought of the new programs they did preview:

This morning at Radio City Music Hall, NBC unveiled their new fall lineup with the help of a lot (a lot) of singing. Those of us in attendance were treated to a performance by Voice winner Jermaine Paul, a full gospel choir and orchestra backing Smash stars Leslie Odom Jr. and Katherine McPhee on "Stand" to close the presentation and, to open things up, McPhee and Megan Hilty doing "Let Me Be Your Star," complete with a bit of The Voice judges (sans Blake Shelton) spinning their chairs for them. And then in a pre-packaged bit, Tina Fey and Jimmy Fallon "found" footage of the returning shows infused with music (including The Office, Parks and Recreation, Law & Order: SVU, Meet the Press and, most amusingly, Grimm). Honestly, while NBC exec Bob Greenblatt joked that a Grimm musical episode was a long way from a reality, it might get me to start watching that show again. The network's execs promised that their fall lineup won't be all music, but there is a lot of it, and they are going really heavy on the comedies as well. In fact, they mentioned the word comedy about 1,000 times in the two hours, but given that they did see fit to renew both Community and Parks and Recreation (and I got to sit within 100 yards of Adam Scott, which probably violates my restraining order in some way), I am inclined to overlook that. However, I am not willing to overlook the fact that most of the comedies that they mentioned look mediocre and forgettable at first glance.

Let's get this out of the way: Richard De Longpre (voiced by French Stewart) looks, talks and acts distractingly like Community's Dean Pelton. I had to re-watch the first few minutes of the Allen Gregory pilot a several times because instead of paying attention to anything in the opening party scene, I kept thinking about how awesome it would be if this was just Community: The Animated Series (which got me thinking about Sabrina: The Animated Series). But then I heard Jonah Hill's voice coming out of a sharply dressed seven-year-old, and I had to quash those dreams and pay attention to the task at hand.

I'm curious to see how Man Up! will do in the Tuesday at 8:30 PM on ABC time slot. The premiere of Last Man Standing got great numbers, but for how many minutes can people stand to watch male-centric, gender identity-obsessed characters? Will viewers who hated Home Improvement: Daughter Edition even give this show a chance? Will audiences who saw how badly How to Be a Gentleman did avoid all shows with "man" in the title? Could people deem it to too much of a fool's Modern Family? Time will tell -- but if the ratings ultimately nosedive, I don't think it will be because the pilot was truly terrible on its own.

You have to be cautious when you recommend 2 Broke Girls to a family member, friend or co-worker. Sure, maybe the pilot made you giggle, but if a person randomly tuned into "And Strokes of Goodwill," they might assume you're a racist, raunch-loving freak who watches that terrible CBS show that comes on before Two and a Half Men. Forever more, your taste level will be scrutinized and people will think of you differently. It's a bad scene (and a true story).