Snips from "Guy roles for women on CBS this fall"

On "Close to Home," the lead is a prosecutor who puts away creeps while storing her breast milk in a work fridge.

And on "The Ghost Whisperer," Jennifer Love Hewitt passes messages from ghosts to humans, while also running a small business and a new marriage.

"They're guy roles for women," Hewitt says of this bumper crop of acting parts.

CBS isn't marketing these shows for having girl power. Maybe the "year-of-the-woman" campaign has been used so many times before, it can't bear being repeated when it's applicable now? Or has women's equality actually arrived on TV, and we can stop taking count of gender leads?

I asked several of the actresses for their thoughts:

Jennifer Love Hewitt,
David Conrad
and Aisha Tyler

Jenna Elfman,
Jennifer Love Hewitt
and Shemar Moore

Jennifer Love Hewitt
and Shemar Moore

Jenna Elfman and
Jennifer Love Hewitt

Jennifer Finnigan and
Jennifer Love Hewitt

Jennifer Finnigan one of the stars of the new CBS series "Close to Home"

Q. Here's another thing, though. You and Jennifer Love Hewitt and some other women in these roles are crying in the pilots. You don't see men cry a lot in pilots.

Finnigan: That's true. Usually, you work up to it. For my character -- I can't speak for Jennifer -- but when women first have babies and they're still breastfeeding, their hormones are way out of control, and that's addressed a couple of times in the pilot. Her hormones are all over the place. There's no part of my character that's a caricature. She's not the vamp, or the good girl, or the housewife. She is truly every woman.

Jennifer Love Hewitt one of the stars of the new CBS series "Ghost Whisperer"

Q. There are a lot of female leads right now.

Love: Because women. Kick. Butt!

Q. You're part of that.

Love: Now I just have to be the one that doesn't fail, and then I'll be fine.

Q. You're crying a lot in the show. Do you take that emotion with you when you go home?

Love: You actually get rid of it. ... This show is great for me in that way, it's very cathartic. I get a lot out through [the character] every day, which is lovely. So I actually get to go home and do the opposite -- I get to go home and just breathe and be happy.

Q. Will such a heavy part affect your acting?

Love: I do think that I have an immense opportunity to become a better actor on this show, because to play her I have to be an incredible listener, which is hard to do as an actress, sometimes. You hear the lines 17,000 times in a day, you know? But you have to be a great listener every time. That's what [the character] does for these people.

Aisha Tyler one of the stars of the new CBS series "Ghost Whisperer"

Q. A lot of shows have strong women this year. What's your reaction?

Aisha Tyler and
Jennifer Love Hewitt

Tyler: Yeah, absolutely. I think maybe in the past, television networks didn't think that men would watch strong women. But I think you have a lot of shows on television now that have women in the leads. And they're doing really well.

Q. The women that are in these shows are, like, women saving the world. They're not hookers with a heart of gold.

Tyler: No, it's a far cry from "Pretty Woman," or even strong women in movies from 10 years ago or five years ago who were being saved by men. I think there's a trend now that it's the women who are saving the world. You have movies like "Kill Bill," and you have movies like "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider." ... They're not screaming and shrieking while the guy comes and lifts up the car and chases away the bad guy.