The Mole 2 (2008)

The Mole 2 is clever and loosey-goosey. Fourteen players wing off to Europe to complete ''games,'' such as carrying a greased gnome while riding a bike (see -- you already regret missing this show, right?), that win them money (up to a cool million). Among them is a ''mole,'' a ringer thrown in to disrupt the competitions and inspire vicious paranoia. At the end of each episode, the contestants take a 10-question quiz (''What is the Mole's favorite food?''); whoever answers the least number correctly is ''executed'' -- sent packing.

We're now more than halfway through ''Mole 2'''s run, but you can still get on board. Host Anderson Cooper, currently reestablishing himself as a journalist by getting up early with Paula Zahn on CNN, is exquisitely ''Mole'' droll; his deadpan stares as players blubber and sweat through challenges are wittily devastating. Cooper's weekly voice-over -- ''Watch for the clue to the identity of the Mole'' -- is silly: As we learned in the first ''Mole,'' the clues are more absurdly convoluted than an Agatha Christie mystery on LSD. But this denseness is what gives ''Mole'' its charm. (For the record, I think bespectacled, serene, well-muscled Darwin is the Mole -- even his name suggests a survivor of the fittest.)

ABC has jerked this series around in its schedule, failing to realize that like CBS' ''Big Brother,'' it has far more potential to become a cult fave with mass appeal. Maybe the real mole is actually an ABC programming weasel, doing his or her best to kill off the series.

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