PRISON BREAK Returns ...

Ahhhhhh ... after a few months of near-freedom from network television schedules, things are nearly back in full swing in TV land. Last night, FOX unofficially kicked things off with the debut of its new Monday night lineup, consisting of Prison Break and K-Ville. K-Ville was actually one of the few pilots I never saw over the summer, and for some reason it just doesn't interest me. Well, I guess I know the reason - I just don't really like cop shows, or lawyer shows, or medical shows. But, I was tres excited about the return of PRISON BREAK ... for two years now, it's been a weekly slice of pulpy goodness that features some of the craziest characters I've ever seen on a TV show, especially when it comes to the show's great rogues gallery of colorful villains. So, how was last night's Season 3 Premiere?

PRISON BREAK:

- So, Prison Break kind of painted itself into a corner with last year's season finale, as we left off with intrepid action-hero Michael Scofield locked up in a brutal Panamanian prison, along with dogged FBI agent / psycho murderer Mahone, thuggish former prison-guard Bellick, and serial killer T-Bag. This time around, Lincoln was on the outside looking in, desperately trying to find a way to free his brother. So ... would we simply get a repeat of Season 1, with Scofield plotting a breakout, except this time with his brother as his man on the outside? Well, after last year's on-the-run plot, it looks like this year we are very much back to Prison Break actually being about a prison break, which is cool with me. The nice thing about this show is that it tends to be pretty unpredictable, so while this premiere set up another prison escape, in three or four episode's time, who knows if that will still be what the show is focused on.

Already, we've gotten a number of swerves that, sure, were a bit predictable, but also kind of fun. The main thing the episode needed to do was establish a reason for Michael to stay in Sona prison and feel the need to escape rather than just wait out his sentance or get let off following his brother's exoneration. So now we have a somewhat intriguing setup where Michael is being blackmailed into using his skills as an escapist to free a particular prisoner from Sona, likely at the behest of the mysterious Company, Prison Break's very own Big Evil Conspiracy.

There were some very quick allusions in this ep to the bizarro scifi-ish stuff that was hinted at last season - that Michael is some kind of genetic test-subject or something? I'm kind of curious to see just how out-there this show would go with that whole subplot, though the results could be pretty disasterous.

As it is, the show is awesomely over-the-top. The new villain, a Duke of New York-esque self-appointed king of Sona prison is an instant classic, delivering all of his lines with foreign-accent flair and sprinkling plenty of "how you say ..."'s into his speech for just the right amount of comic-book flair. T-Bag was also in fine form, proving to be, as ever, a true snake in the grass. "Call me ... Friend." Hahahaha ... I also love Bellick - he is the classic down-on-his luck B-list badguy. While he started as just a peripheral character, Bellick was one of the highlights of last night's ep. His expression as his fellow inmate attempted escape, only to get mercillessly shot down by the guards, was priceless.

William Fichtner has also been awesome on this show as Mahone, and it's cool to see him stripped of his FBI and Company allegiances and potentially forming an uneasy alliance with Michael. The scene where he comes to Michael's aid during Scofield's to-the-death street fight was a classic. "No weapons. That's the rule." = daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn.

The main thing that dragged this ep down was Lincoln on the outside trying to navigate the Company's attempts at extorting he and Michael. LJ kidnapped yet AGAIN? An unseen Sarah Tancridi in mortal danger (shades of FOX Mulder on Season 9 of X-Files when David Duchovny was oft-mentioned but never seen). Lincoln is a character who works best when he's kicking ass and taking names, so hopefully we get more of that soon and less of him being jerked around by mysterious members of a black-ops consortium. The conspiracy plotline on this show has been cool at times but more often than not it's felt like retreads of stuff we've already seen on shows like The X-Files and 24. If the whole Company thing is going to be a major plot point this season, they've got to do somehting to really make it pop, because having 22 episodes of lame text messages from LJ crying for his dad, and assuring us that Sarah (just off-screen of course) is also there and in trouble, is going to quickly become a bit of a drag.

But overall this ep was a lot of fun. Seeing Scofield square off with the savage inmates at Sona was pretty cool, and seeing familar faces like Mahone, T-Bag, and Bellick adapt to their new, dog-eat-dog environment was interesting. Count me as excited to see where things go from here. This is a show that, even though it looks to be getting back to its more serious roots a bit, is best taken with a grain of salt and just enjoyed for what it is - a serialized B-movie that wears its cheesiness with a badge of honor.

My Grade: B+