Ellen Gray: 'Break' ending may move you

PRISON BREAK. 8 p.m. Friday, Channel 29.

MY DVR KNOWS better than I do when I finally gave up on Fox's "Prison Break," but I think it was sometime into the second prison, which would put it about midway through Season 3. When it comes to great escapes, I might have a one-institution rule. Nevertheless, there was enough lingering affection for "Break," its improbable premise and the brotherly love that fueled it for me to want to see Friday's two-hour series finale, one of the most satisfying I've seen for a series I'd long since stopped watching.

(And if you think that's not a legitimate category, just think of all the shows that outstay their welcome but manage to gather a crowd to say goodbye.)

If you're one of the people who originally fell for "Prison Break" because of Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller) - a brilliant structural engineer who got himself sentenced to prison so he could break his wrongly condemned brother Lincoln (Dominic Purcell) off Death Row - then the finale is probably worth your time. Especially the last few minutes.

Sure, it would probably help to know who some of the bad guys are at this point. This episode was my first introduction to Kathleen Quinlan as the Mother from Hell. She and some general (Leon Russom) seem to be competing to acquire something called Scylla, which would appear to be the technological equivalent of the Holy Grail.

Not everything that happens makes a lot of sense, and might not even if I hadn't skipped a season and a half, but "Prison Break" has always required a certain suspension of disbelief.

Michael, who, as always, appears to be in charge of protecting everyone he's ever loved, is like "24's" Jack Bauer on steroids for most of the two hours as he tries one last time to escape the web of intrigue that's been screwing up his life for four seasons now.

And while I still think that's maybe two seasons too many for such a high-concept show, the surprisingly moving closing stays true, at least, to the relatively few characters - and viewers - who've made it to the not-too-bitter end.

Yes, I was as stunned as anyone by the season finale of Fox's "House" Monday night.

I mean, I obviously knew he was hallucinating - I wrote about it in Monday's column - but didn't guess the extent of the problem, which appears now to have been much, much more involved than we'd thought.

And yet it's not the first time the writers of "House," who seem unfamiliar with the story of the Doctor Show That Cried Wolf, have played games with us.

What we see isn't always what's actually happening, so we should've seen this coming. Shouldn't we?

Given the shiny new hospital Dr. Gregory House (Hugh Laurie) practices in, did the mental institution he was off to Monday night have to look so much like the setting for a Stephen King novel?

Bad enough that he's still seeing dead people.

Still, this means we can probably stop wondering:

* How House will be spending his summer vacation.

* About the terrifying ramifications of the Cuddy-House coupling, which could have made an even bigger mess.

* About what even a hot doc's morning breath must be like after a night spent detoxing from Vicodin. *

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