THINK OF IT AS THE LATEST ROUND OF PILOT ERROR, NETWORK STYLE.

Byline: Ray Richmond

I have two words for anyone who thinks that next season can't possibly be any worse than this one has been in network television: Pauly Shore.

There is a chance that America's worst comedy nightmare could wind up in prime time next season on Fox, with his own series casting him as the slacker son of a rich business executive.

A hallucination? No, just pilot season. Like fall, winter, spring and summer, it always threatens to deliver a natural disaster or two.

During pilot season, the network chieftains sit back and absorb single episodes of comedies and dramas to figure out which of this year's 150 contenders will be turned into series. The schedules will be announced in May.

Last year, 42 of them became new shows. Only the Thursday night NBC shoo-ins "The Single Guy" and "Caroline in the City" cashed in to become hits. In midseason, NBC has scored a hit with the comedy "3rd Rock From the Sun," and it looks as if ABC has something of a breakout with "The Dana Carvey Show."

But that's about it. The majority of the "Friends" wanna-bes, ensemble dramas and family sitcom clones have gone floppola. And so the networks, undaunted, push forward into those pilot waters anew.

A quick check of the list confirms that doctors and coffee-swilling young singles are out. Lawyers, reporters, witches and undertakers are in. (And, if you were once a star of a series on NBC sometime during the 1980s, the chances are you'll be hanging around someplace.)

ABC is behind one comedy pilot, "Exit Elves," that explores the wacky wags who toil in the L.A. County Coroner's office and a second, "Toe Tags," that follows the nutty world of "bag-and-tag" body carriers in a Seattle morgue.

Ah, the dead. The laughs just never stop.

ABC has a witch comedy pilot, "Sabrina, the Teenage Witch," and so does the WB with "Spellbound," described as the story of a boarding school witch "who wants to be normal."

Attorneys are plentiful and varied in the pilot pack. They include romantic attorneys in ABC's comedy "Boys & Girls"; attorney-moms, from the ABC comedy "Life's Work"; Boston attorneys, in ABC's drama "The Practice" from producer David E. Kelley; African-American attorneys, in the UPN comedy "Sparks, Sparks & Sparks"; and even attorneys who turn into talk-show hosts in a CBS comedy starring stand-up Rocky Carroll.

There are also lots of psychologists, headed by UPN's "Phone Calls From the Dead," in which a shrink exhibits mysterious powers after a near-death experience, and ad industry types, private eyes and reporters, including one newspaper guy in the CBS drama "Early Edition" who is described as knowing the news before it happens. I'd like to sit next to this guy.

ABC has pilots based on the hit features "Clueless" and "Dangerous Minds" but without the stars who drove them: Alicia Silverstone and Michelle Pfeiffer, respectively. UPN has commissioned one with the borderline racist title "Black at Ya!" that is described as "an ethnic 'Larry Sanders.' "

Then there are the high-concept shows.

CBS has one titled "I, Werewolf" that is described as "'Beauty and the Beast' meets 'The Incredible Hulk.' " Talk about your bad-hair days.

NBC's "Bump in the Night" comes with the tag " 'Ghostbusters' meets 'Dragnet.' "

"Buffy the Vampire Slayer" - a UPN drama - is labeled " 'Clueless' meets 'The Night Stalker.' "

And just to be sure that outer space doesn't get shortchanged in the pilot game, UPN gives us the comedy "Homeboys in Outer Space," about hustlers operating a bar on a remote planet; the NBC drama "Dark Skies," in which a couple goes underground to battle aliens; and in the UPN drama "Them," a man and his nephew track aliens.

Closer to home, the networks have pulled out the stars to give some of the pilots a higher - and certainly more expensive - profile. More specifically, old NBC stars are busting out all over.

The star parade actually begins next Friday when "Miami Vice" alumnus Don Johnson shows up on a new CBS series, "Nash Bridges." It will continue into the fall with Ten Danson ("Cheers") starring with wife Mary Steenburgen in a new CBS comedy, Bill Cosby ("The Cosby Show") joining CBS in a remake of the British comedy "One Foot in the Grave" and Michael J. Fox ("Family Ties") playing the deputy mayor of New York in the ABC sitcom "Spin."

Edward James Olmos ("Miami Vice"), Bebe Neuwirth ("Cheers") and Scott Bakula ("Quantum Leap") also are attached to new projects, as is the newly engaged Brooke Shields (proposed for a new NBC comedy titled "Suddenly Susan").

Some high-profile producers also are tossing their hat into the pilot ring, including the "Murphy Brown" team of Diane English and Joel Shukovsky (the CBS comedy "Lawyers"); "thirtysomething"/"My So-Called Life" creators Marshall Herskovitz and Ed Zwick (the ABC marriage and family drama "Relativity").

The shows with the big stars and producers are sure things. A few even have contracts to that effect. Boring, boring.

The pilots that I'm more interested in are the underdogs, things like:

"Gun," an ABC anthology series that "tracks one gun as it passes from owner to owner."

"Oh !, Mom's Home," a UPN comedy about an African-American career woman and her three teen-age girls. I guess their names are , and !.

"Forever Young," an NBC comedy that finds Bronson Pinchot awakening from a 20-year coma and realizing, to his horror, that while comatose he had starred in "Perfect Strangers." (I just made up the "Perfect Strangers" part.)

"Second Time Around," an NBC comedy about a divorced man who falls for the woman catering his upcoming wedding.

"Four in One," a WB comedy about a kid with quadruplet siblings. It's like discovering that the Olsen twins had figured out a way to clone themselves, rendering suicidal everyone around them.

Don't worry. Most of these pilots will go away quietly without causing much discomfort. But I have this sneaking suspicion about Pauly Shore. He never goes quietly.

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Photo Pauly Shore could wind up in prime time next season on Fox.