The CW’s newest program, “Life Unexpected,” is an exciting departure from the network’s traditional niche of teen soap opera fare: “Gossip Girl,” “90210,” “Melrose Place” and “Vampire Diaries.” Critics love to draw comparisons between this new show and WB programming of old, in the vein of “Everwood” and “Gilmore Girls.” But the urban setting and prominence of realistic adult characters (Lorelai Gilmore does not count as such) indicate that the network has grown just as its audience has.

Unexpectedly, Cate and Baze, the brunette high school overachiever and the brunette high school quarterback, had a one-night stand under the weak protection of a really old condom in the back of his mom’s minivan at Winter Formal (the scene in the Pilot that explains this more poetically is fabulously fast-paced without being “Gilmore Girls”-style nauseating). Even more unexpectedly, they produced a blonde daughter named Lux (yes, as in Lux et Veritas the motto of Yale. Maybe she’ll be just like Rory!). Cate never told Baze about Lux, and Lux, because of a literal yet symbolic hole in her heart, ended up being bounced around in foster care for seven years. The show’s pilot opens on a horrible portrait of a foster home, from which Lux is preparing to emancipate herself on the next day, her 16th birthday. In order to do so, Lux seeks out her birth parents for their signatures. What ensues is bonding between Lux and Baze over YouTube videos, bonding between Lux and Cate over the bond of motherhood, and bonding between Cate and Baze over the desire to have sex with the guy (who took your virginity) years later when you’re actually good at sex. Lux does not get emancipated, and by the end of the second episode Cate has built Lux her own room in Cate’s house.

First off, everyone on this show is really, really pretty; in fact, it’s almost distracting. But distracting in a good way, because even though their faults are clearly on display, we can’t bring ourselves to hate them because they are so damn attractive. I also appreciate that the scope of the show is, for now, small but broad: Cate has her fiance who is not Baze; Baze has his guy friends with whom he owns a bar; and Lux has her boyfriend and cabal of runaway foster kids. While the rebellions of Rory Gilmore and that pasty chick from “Everwood” provided their character arcs mid season, we are introduced to a 16-year-old who skips school, wears cool jackets and can sleep on the street if need be. This self-sufficiency is refreshing for the CW model, although one could argue that the ineptness of Cate and Baze is a more extreme version of Lorelai Gilmore.

I find Cate and Baze particularly compelling as adult characters because, through casting and writing, the show has managed to cast them accurately as very early 30-year-olds. Their professional worlds are not corporate or office settings, but rather unique small business pursuits: he owns a bar and she is a radio talk show host (the city choice of Portland helps in this regard). They feel very much isolated from the real world, so the introduction of Lux into their lives has narrative forcefulness. It’s not like Lynette on “Desperate Housewives” or Miranda on “Sex and the City” trying to balance a high-stakes professional career and an aimless teen. Instead, the high stakes that Lux inherently carries with her permeate into their traditionally relaxed and effortless worth environments. Contrived as the sophomore episode’s subplot about Cate having to deny her teen pregnancy on her radio show, the experimentation with the symbiosis of the two worlds shows promise for the show’s future.

If previous WB vehicles are about creating teenager-parent relationships onto which the members of the teen female demographic can project themselves, “Life Unexpected” and its premise reject projection and encourage introspection. It’s like that time in kindergarten when I pretended to be adopted to get attention: I’m past the age of pretending I spent seven years in foster care, so instead I look at my life and ask, what are my priorities? Am I self-sufficient enough? Am I running away from responsibility? Bravo, “Life Unexpected.” The juxtaposition to “Gossip Girl” and “ANTM” will serve you well.