The first season of Fox’s “Prison Break” challenged viewers’ willingness to play along as the gang of inmates made attempt after attempt to bust out, only to run into wall after wall.
But in the final minutes, they finally got over it, and we last saw the Fox River Eight fleeing from authorities from an airstrip outside Chicago.
It was just the start of what the show’s creators promise will be an entirely different experience in the second season, which premieres at 8 tonight on KCPQ-TV.
“We will not see a rehash of season one where these guys all end up back in the prison in episode three and they go, ‘Now we’ve got to think of another way out of here,’ ” executive producer Paul Scheuring said last month in Los Angeles. “Season two is a complete reinvention. So the prison really starts to fade away and the places that they try to get to for their ultimate escape come to the fore.”
It’s a little jarring, but you’ll soon see Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller) and Lincoln Burrows (Dominic Purcell) out of their blue jumpsuits and sporting suits and clean duds as they try to elude the cops.
Meanwhile, the rest of the group is on the run, and more than one of them is likely to seek the $5 million that fellow inmate Charles Westmoreland said is buried under a silo in Utah.
“Prison Break” just became “The Fugitive,” times eight.
The escape takes one major character out of the show: the Fox River Penitentiary. The prison’s cold walls, steel bars and system of pipes the gang used to escape were as much a part of the show as anything.
But it had to be left behind to advance the story.
“You know, (we couldn’t have) Scofield, the man who broke in with a perfect plan to get out of here, and in season three he was going, ‘No, guys, I can still get us out of here,’ ” Scheuring said. “It would have been a little absurd.”
But the story opens up as the inmates’ world does, making the possibilities virtually endless.
And they’ve got a new nemesis.
William Fichtner, who most recently appeared on ABC’s canceled “Invasion,” joins the cast as FBI Agent Alexander Mahone, the man responsible for tracking down the escapees.
Mahone is no bumbling cop, as we see in the first two episodes of the new season. He’s a welcome change from the goofs who ran the prison and let the guys get away in the first place.
Fichtner is a fantastic choice to fill the role, and his character’s experience and wisdom will provide a stiff challenge to Scofield and pals’ plans for freedom.
Stacy Keach’s Warden Henry Pope will soon be out of the picture. But Brad Bellick, the crooked correctional officer played by Wade Williams, will continue to make it a personal quest to find the men himself.
“I think Bellick is going. He’s got his shotgun cocked and he’s going to do some (butt) kicking,” Williams said last month. “And I give them two episodes. They’ll be back in prison.”
Perhaps not, but you’ve got to admire his spirit.
Victor Balta’s column runs Mondays and Thursdays on the A&E page. Reach him at 425-339-3455 or vbalta@ heraldnet.com.
For more TV and pop culture scoops, check out Victor’s blog at heraldnet.com/blogpopculture.
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