MONDAY, SEPT. 1
PRISON BREAK
8 P.M. | FOX
Season 4 begins as Wentworth Miller (far right, with Dominic Purcell) heads a new caper. It's turning into a grubby Ocean's Eleven.
TUESDAY, SEPT. 2
90210
8 P.M. | CW
New version of the classic teen series beloved by at least one and a half generations. The cast includes Dustin Milligan and AnnaLynne McCord.
THE SHIELD
10 P.M. | FX
Will the final season bring redemption or ruin to corrupt cop Mackey (Michael Chiklis)? The excellent CCH Pounder (right) is gunning for the latter.
WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 3
BONES
8 P.M. | FOX
Dr. Brennan and Agent Booth (Emily Deschanel and David Boreanaz) are in London investigating an American heiress's death. Season premiere.
TOP DESIGN
10 P.M. | BRAVO
The new season starts with a new host, taste-maker and model India Hicks, and an opening project featuring some formidable clients.
AMERICA'S NEXT TOP MODEL
8 P.M. | CW
A new cycle, back in L.A. with a controversial model: Isis, a pre-op transsexual. Tyra (left) makes her usual batty grand entrance.
CW, Sept. 1, 8 p.m ET
IT'S BACK!
DRAMA
The new season of the gorgeously silly melodrama about jaded young Manhattanites opens in late-summer Hamptons. Everyone dresses up in creamy white, maybe channeling The Great Gatsby, and heads off to a society event where romantic intentions misfire. The episode ends with an audacious twist for Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester, who has a nice sense of camp and a dazzling flair for headbands). One potential problem: The crusty, oppressive grown-ups are largely absent in the first few weeks, and without them the plots can seem a little mushy. But the dialogue is irresistible (shouts one girl: "I didn't sign up for some creepy love triangle with you and someone's mom!"), and Blake Lively hasn't lost that floating air of mystery as Serena van der Woodsen. Let's put it this way: Gossip Girl is superior to the arid, retro-chic Mad Men.
TNT, Sept. 1, 10 p.m. ET
NEW SERIES!
DRAMA
To play an unconventional public defender named Jerry Kellerman, Mark-Paul Gosselaar has let his hair grow out as if in emulation of the Geico caveman. Raising the Bar, cocreated and executive produced by Steven Bochco (NYPD Blue, L.A. Law), is an adequate but not very interesting show: Like Gosselaar's hair, it could use some styling. Bar is about a batch of young New York City lawyers—working as rival teams for both the public defender and the district attorney—who are also buddies. This could create a nice flow of relationships back and forth, but it mostly plays out without nuance. Even after three episodes, everyone still seems to have just met at an American Bar Association convention. You wonder why they don't wear name tags.
FX, Sept. 3, 10 p.m ET
NEW SHOW!
DRAMA
With a gun-running motorcycle gang as its subject, this impressively unpleasant drama kicks up a cloud of dust, dirt, blood and death. It's not much fun, but it has its own ugly integrity. Charlie Hunnam plays Jackson "Jax" Teller, a kid in line to become the leader of the Sons of Anarchy—it was founded by his late father—who thinks the gang should avoid murky illegal business. He's something of a noble princeling, only in a black T-shirt. Everything else is explosions, tattoes and Drea de Matteo, who is convincingly, pathetically messed up as Jax's drug-addict ex-wife.
Roswell's former brooding alien, 30, plays a ninja on ABC Family's Samurai Girl (Sept. 5-7). At home, his role is father to a 5-month-old.
WHAT WAS THE APPEAL OF SAMURAI GIRL?
I loved the character. He is a lone wolf, an outsider. Jake is forced to use [his power] and doesn't want to.
YOU SURVIVED BEING A TEEN IDOL IN YOUR ROSWELL DAYS.
The one time I was literally mobbed was at Disneyland. There were probably 200 16-year-old girls.
WHY NAME YOUR BABY GIRL JAMES?
I always liked boys' names for girls. It was inspired by my favorite musician, James Hetfield of Metallica.
ARE YOU A HANDS-ON DAD?
I am. I'm faster than my wife at changing diapers.
Wearing a touch of leather, the former Married ... with Children star, 54, now plays an intensely protective motorcycle mama on Sons of Anarchy.
ARE YOU REMOTELY LIKE YOUR CHARACTER?
I have the maternal instinct since I have three children [Sarah, 14, Jackson, 12, and Esmé, 19 months]. I'm very "don't cross my kids." But Gemma's an exaggerated version. She'd put a gun to your head.
ARE YOU INTO BIKES NOW?
I love how they look and the whole vibe. But when I was younger, I used to do wacky stuff like [ride] on the back of a bike on the freeway. Now I just think, "That was not smart."
HOW DO MARRIED FANS REACT TO YOUR LIVE SINGING SHOWS?
I don't know if they think I'm gonna have a red wig onstage, but they're a little surprised when they see I don't look that way.
Up for an Emmy as best actor in a comedy, the 29-year-old star is back on the set of ABC's acclaimed mystery-fantasy after the first season was cut short by the writers' strike.
HOW DID YOU CELEBRATE THE NOMINATION?
I have friends over for games, [so] we raised a glass. Our favorite game is Mafia, but we also play running charades and celebrity. Better than going to some horrible club.
YOU SOUND LIKE DAISIES' NED!
I'm shy, but [costar Anna Friel] is very gregarious and outgoing. She's good at getting me out of my house. My weekend is staying at home and going on hikes with my dog.
WAS IT TOUGH TO GET BACK INTO THE GROOVE OF SHOOTING THE SERIES?
We'd only shot nine episodes when we ran out of scripts, but, oddly enough, the first day back we had the exact same crew that we had when we left—and it was kind of like we had left on a Friday night and came back on a Monday morning.
HAVE YOU LEARNED TO BAKE PIES?
The last thing I want to do when I get home is bake. But we all get to eat on-set. This season Ned puts on 15 pounds!
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
