MTV's The Osbournes is not what it used to be.

Reality has this funny habit of changing, and the changes surrounding this reality program about the family of aging rocker Ozzy Osbourne have radically altered the viewing experience. Innocence might sound like a strange word to use with a family that uses more four-letter words than The Sopranos to communicate with one another, but a sense of innocence or fun about this weird-but-loving family is exactly what seems to have been lost as last year's surprise hit begins its second season.

The first two episodes made available to critics do still have some delightfully screwy Osbourne moments. Seeing the none-too-steady Ozzy trying to do yoga is not to be missed. This is still a remarkably original program with the potential to be landmark television.

But, at their core, both episodes are terribly conflicted in terms of attitude and tone, so conflicted that MTV sent along a statement with the screening cassettes saying, "Note that episode two is not indicative of a change in tone for season two. It is a stand alone episode." If the series were working, MTV wouldn't need to explain.

The difference from last year is apparent in the very first sequence of tonight's season premiere. It features Ozzy showing viewers how he's mastered turning on his television after only seven years of owning it.

Picking up the remote control and pointing it at the big screen, he says, "Simple clicker. ... It works every time."

But, of course, it doesn't work, and Ozzy quickly loses his cool, peering at the screen and mumbling, "What the [bleep] is this [bleep]? This is not allowed. What's happened to this [bleep] thing?"

Looking as though he's about to fall over from the trauma of his remote control not working, Ozzy sets it down and stumbles from the room screaming for his teen-age son, Jack, as the mock-1950s-family-sitcom credits roll.

Last year in the pilot, when I first saw Ozzy battle his remote control, I felt exhilarated with a sense of discovery. I wrote about Ozzy as the father who knows nothing in what amounted to a fabulous real-life parody of the family sitcom.

This year as I watched the opening sequence, I felt skeptical and slightly depressed about how staged it felt. The Osbournes was probably as artificial from day one, but last year as naive as I might have been in my viewing, I believed a little in the essential strangeness of this family.

Not any more, after the year of overexposure Ozzy and family had and the slick production of that opening. Both episodes this year are far more tightly edited, quickly paced and packaged. Rather than us peering in on them, it now feels as if they and the producers are consciously manipulating us.

Episode one is all about the aftermath of the phenomenal success the family has enjoyed as a result of its hit show. We accompany Ozzy and wife, Sharon, the brains of the outfit, to the White House Correspondents Dinner, which Ozzy calls "the greatest night of my life" after President Bush singles him out from the podium.

We also attend the MTV Movie Awards with daughter Kelly, as she sings her remake of Madonna's "Papa Don't Preach." Typical of this year's tone is the backstage argument during rehearsals between Jack and Kelly after she spritzes him with a can of hairspray.

"Kelly, stop spraying my Prada jacket," he whines.

"I wipe my [bleep] with your Prada jacket," she snaps back.

The worst choice the producers made in episode one is not dealing with Sharon's colon cancer, which was discovered in July. Is there anyone who has not heard about it? Knowing about it changes everything as you watch; at least it did for me. And not to confront it as the family returns to our living rooms seems absurd.

Next week's episode is about the cancer - that's the episode that MTV describes as "stand alone" and not representative of the series' tone. The half-hour is not that dark. While we accompany Sharon to the hospital for a chemotherapy treatment, we don't actually see the treatment or the misery cancer can cause.

Overall, we are kept at arm's length from the harsher aspects of the disease. This is accomplished mainly by focusing on Ozzy, who is away from home on his Ozzfest concert tour. We watch as he tries to cope with the news of his wife's cancer. A family friend, Robert Marcato, is sent to help Ozzy after what Sharon describes as "self-medicating" by her husband.

Marcato, who seems like the sweetest guy in the world, tries everything from yoga to poetry, but it doesn't go so well.

"The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. The door is round and open," Marcato says, reading a line of poetry to Ozzy.

"What the [bleep] is that all about?" Ozzy says, sounding annoyed.

There are moments in this episode - Ozzy poignantly singing "Mama, I'm Coming Home" onstage, or saying, "Hello, Sharon," somewhat desperately over and over into a wireless phone as he tries to connect with her from his tour bus late at night - that suggest how great The Osbournes could be if MTV and the family embraced the hand fate has dealt them with Sharon's illness and made an actual reality series this year.

The Osbournes

When: 10:30 tonight

Where: MTV

In brief: What a difference a year can make in reality TV.