We’re currently in an era of revival survival on the small screen, as shows from all eras are making returns through sequels, prequels and flat-out remakes. One of the latest projects to enter the comeback conversation is also one of the more unexpected ones, as Fox began talking about bringing back the hit action drama Prison Break for a new adventure. Well, that news has broken out of the rumor mill and has been officially confirmed to return to the network in 2016 in a limited format, but apparently with some major continuity changes.
Fox announced the news at the ongoing TCA press event, presumably not from behind bars, and said that the new semi-season will get ten episodes that will premiere at some point next year. Viewers who stuck with the show through its up-and-down four seasons will certainly have questions about how the update will re-visit this world, and who we might see again, so here’s Fox Television Group’s co-chairman and co-CEO Dana Walden with an explanation.
I would describe it as a bit of a sequel. It picks up the characters several years after we left them in the last season of the show. The brothers will be back. Some of the iconic characters from that show will be back. I don’t think Paul [Scheuring, executive producer] knows exactly where he’s going over the 10-episode arc, but it definitely will address some questions that were set up at the end of the series for a new audience.
I can feel the whoosh of eyebrows raising over that last part, and Walden doesn’t mind pushing them up a little higher by saying it will take “a little bit of a detour from where we left off” in the direct-to-video TV movie Prison Break: The Final Break. According to TV Line, the other co-chairman and co-CEO Gary Newman says that they’re actually going to ignore Michael’s final sacrifice in the show, but that there will be a “logical and believable” explanation as to why Michael and Lincoln and others are still around and about and up to no good.
If you’ll recall, The Final Break saw Michael breaking Sara out of prison and killing himself so that she and their unborn baby would be able to go free, saying (through a DVD message) that his returned brain tumor wouldn’t have given him much more time on Earth anyway. So will the show introduce a superpowered brain surgeon that arrived just in time to resuscitate Michael following the power surge explosion? Or will it, along with that scene at his memorial site, just all be a dream? Will we get to watch Michael and Sara (and possibly Linc) raising a son? So many questions!
Fans of Prison Break actors Wentworth Miller and Dominic Purcell have been lucky to get to watch the actors reunite as mega-criminals on The Flash, and they’ll soon be part of the core cast of Legends of Tomorrow. So now we’re waiting for the crossover episode where Michael and Linc have to break Captain Cold and Heat Wave out of jail. 2016 is going to be great.
