We don't know the real truth about what happened at Alcatraz.  That's the premise of the new Fox series, debuting tonight with a two-hour series premiere.  Back in 1963, when the prison closed, we were told that the prisoners had all been transferred to other facilities.  But, according to Alcatraz, the truth is far more mysterious: all of the prisoners actually disappeared.

Fast forward to nearly 50 years later, in present day San Francisco.  SFPD detective Rebecca Madsen (Sarah Jones) is investigating a case that turns out to be anything but routine.  The killer is a man named Jack Sylvane, a former Alcatraz inmate.  Only Sylvane hasn't aged at all in the last five decades.  Madsen needs some additional information about the prison and the former prisoners, so she turns to Alcatraz expert Doctor Diego "Doc" Soto (played by Jorge Garcia) for help.  While the two head to the prison to investigate, they come across FBI agent Emerson Hauser (Sam Neill) and scientist Lucy Banerjee (Parminder Nagra), who clearly know more about the prisoners than they initially let on.  Soon, Hauser is forced to tell Madsen and Doc that he's been waiting all this time for the prisoners to return.

Alcatraz is one of those procedural/mythology hybrids that you a lot of these days.  During a visit to the set back in October, Garcia explained "[The show] is a mix.  There’s a goon a week to go after, for sure.  We’re trying to catch them before they do something or before they do something again.  It’s more of a manhunt, rather than solving a crime.  But there’s these unanswered questions as to ‘how come this is happening?’. There’s something very odd, like a tear in the fabric of reality, to have these people resurface after disappearing and having not aged at all."  Executive producer Jack Bender (who, along with Garcia, used to work on LOST) says that "What’s really interesting about it is that it’s a very, very unique way to do a procedural show; it has an engine and a ticking clock in its contemporary story, but also has a very mysterious shadowy past."

Bender went on to elaborate that the arc for the first season will develop progressively.  "I think that networks are certainly afraid of the mythology of a show overpowering an audience's potential to come aboard the train if they missed a few. I think that our show is going to walk that fine line hopefully, because each week there’s going to be a story unfolding that begins and ends, and there’s still this overreaching ‘What happened?’ ‘How the hell did this happen?’ ‘What’s going on?’ vibe to the show, that will, season by season, hopefully reveal in a slow fashion, so that the mystery stays alive and well."

Tonight's series premiere will consist of a two-hour episode, with each hour focusing on different Alcatraz inmates, while also tapping into the overall mystery of the show.  Each episode will try to flesh out these individual inmates to a great degree.  Bender believes that the prisoners that Elizabeth Sarnoff and Jennifer Johnson and the other writers are coming up with from the 1960s and late 1950s "are going to be complex and equally haunted and haunting creepy killers and other criminals, because ideally, at the end of the day, after we’ve done a season of the show everybody should have their favorite killer, almost like they were on baseball cards."

Should we expect to see any real-life inmates popping up in Alcatraz?  Bender explained that "Certainly the writers have done an enormous amount of research, although I don’t think Al Capone is showing up.  Pretty much [the prisoners] are going to be invented, but certainly there are elements of criminals who have both been in Alcatraz and other places."  As for the male-heavy focus of the show, this isn't surprising since Alcatraz was a male-only prison.  But the show does intend to address some of the social issues from the 1960s.  For example, back then they had segregated cell blocks according to color and one of the upcoming episodes will deal with those issues.  Also, don't be surprised if you see familiar faces week to week.  Without spoiling anything for you, let's just say that you will see some of the Alcatraz prisoners again, no matter what happens when they're caught.

Of course, the central mystery is where these prisoners have been for the last fifty years.  Jones assured us that the mystery will be addressed as the series progresses.  "That is also, I would say, part of each episode.  You get a little closer to finding out why these [prisoners] are here, where they came from, who’s running it.  You get a little closer.  I’ve got my own theories about it with a bit of the clues we get every episode, but I’m sure I’m way off."  Could Hauser himself know more than he's letting on?  Madsen and Doc certainly have their suspicions.  Garcia explained that "There’s definitely secrets he’s keeping from them.  He lets stuff out, but really lets it out on a very thin trickle.  Little by little.  It becomes very need to know with him.  He’s old-school G-man."

Naturally, questions were asked about those inevitable LOST comparisons while we were on set.  After all, so many writers and producers from LOST are now involved in Alcatraz.  As we previously pointed out, Alcatraz will not be as dense with regards to mythology.  Jones told us that "I would say that this is a different show entirely.  I think that we’re really fortunate to have the people who were on Lost to work on this production.  Jack’s incredible….what he’s done with episodes 2 and 3 is so exciting, I cannot wait to see it.  It’s nice that there’s people from Bad Robot that are so hands-on in this production, because that really brings the quality of the show to another level, in my humble opinion."  When asked whether we would find any LOST clues peppered throughout the show, Garcia teased that "There are a few, for sure.  There’s a great one on the back of the book.  You’re just gonna have to go find it."

Alcatraz premieres on Fox tonight at 8:00 p.m. ET.  You can watch three sneak peeks and a featurette below.  Also, use the arrows at the top to browse through photos we took while on the set.

For more about the show, read our interviews with Sarah Jones and Jorge Garcia, who give us more in-depth information about their individual characters.

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