“Pepper Dennis,” which may well be the last show ever launched by the WB, serves as a perfect epitaph for a network that never knew its audience. This one-hour “dramedy” (a better term for this one would be “coma”) concerns the pitfalls of being a gorgeous 6-foot-tall blonde with a great job and a fabulous apartment. Only in the offices of male television executives struck dumb by beauty could such a concept have emerged with a multiepisode order. If the WB executives who bought this bogus enterprise are wondering why they weren’t picked to run the CW, the new network born in the WB’s wake, they need only re-watch “Pepper Dennis” for the answer.

The premise of “Pepper Dennis” yet again depends on television’s most overworked theme – that men rule the earth. This time we’re expected to believe that Rebecca Romijn, the former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, can’t convince a co-worker at a Chicago television station to date her. By the end of Episode 2, Pepper and her sister – another model-turned-bad-actress named Brooke Burns – stand on the patio of Pepper’s swanky pad and declare themselves well rid of romantic entanglements with men who can’t commit. Pepper still has her job, as a local-news investigative reporter, and her wardrobe, which is 100% leather and silk.

But Pepper, like most women on television these days, has been forced to sacrifice her dignity in the process. She’s been dumped by Charlie Babcock, a bland anchorman who fears a relationship with Pepper will land him a sexual harassment suit. And her recently separated sister’s own pathetic attempt to reconcile with her husband falls flat when she finds he’s already hooked up with another bimbo. It’s the men who emerge intact and unscathed from these ill-fated relationships, of course – because it’s the eternal male television executive’s fantasy that beautiful women want only to mate and procreate, while the man’s role is to dominate and discard. This season, “Courting Alex” and “Emily’s Reasons Why Not” were just two high-profile examples of shows in which gorgeous women went gaga over guys who couldn’t care less. Not by coincidence, it turned out viewers couldn’t care less, either.

“Pepper Dennis” strives for a weightier context than a sitcom, with its “Lou Grant”-like premise of aggressive reporters on the prowl for scoops, but that only manages to heighten its absurdity. How seriously can we take a show in which a reporter goes undercover in a red sequin micro-miniskirt to expose prostitution at a private poker club? “I’m a woman of professional integrity,” Pepper declares to her camera crew as a soundman hides a microphone in her cleavage, “and yet here I am dressed like this in order to get what I want.” Exactly. Ms. Romijn’s body may well camouflage a serious actress, but her outfits do nothing to protect her from accusations that she’s selling her looks, not her talent.

Pepper keeps a framed photograph of herself as a child posing with Walter Cronkite, even though the journalism she practices would make Mr. Cronkite’s moustache hairs curl. The opening scene of the pilot shows Pepper – with the cameras rolling – accusing a woman of running an unlicensed day care center in her home. “My husband made me do it!” the poor, disheveled woman declares into Pepper’s microphone, the terrified victim of local news brutality (and yet another domineering male). Is this meant to make Pepper seem on the side of righteousness? The only thing she’s exposing is the tawdry tastes of local news shows, and their celebration of drama over substance.

It’s too bad Ms. Romijn has squandered her moment; there might have been a funny concept out there for a sexy woman seeking a comfortable fit in the real world. Beneath her smooth surface, there’s a wacky honesty that must have seemed endearing – make that tantalizing – to television executives in pitch meetings and story conferences. But to package her in this retro-fitted vehicle, overrun with vapidity, insults the intelligence of viewers hoping to find any reason – other than cheesecake value – to tune in. And as any lover of cheesecake knows, one slice is usually more than enough.

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In a recent episode of “Lost,” Locke was eating a banana and Sun was searching Sawyer’s stash of medical supplies for a home pregnancy kit. Wait a minute: If there have always been bananas on the island, then why weren’t people eating them before? And who packs a home pregnancy kit for a flight to Los Angeles from Australia? The best show on network television has started to slip a little in its second season, as plot lines dictate circumstances that stretch credulity a bit too far. Suddenly Hurley has unlimited access to books and candy bars, Jack shaves regularly, and Kate has discovered a whole new stash of stylish T-shirts. No one takes care of Michael’s dog; and hey, where is Michael, anyway? Nobody even talks about him anymore. The “Others” continue to hover over the story like a sinister cloud, but they don’t actually do anything or threaten anybody. And speaking of sinister clouds, where’s the one that moves around and has a face? Sawyer has settled into a habit of reading Judy Blume novels and making sardonic comments to passers-by. “The Dharma Initiative” is beginning to look like a test of the tolerance of American audiences for television shows with all questions and no answers.

dblum@nysun.com