"Prison Break" is back, but Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller) ... is not? He's there, but like Arya Stark, he is now No One. The premiere left him brushing off bro Lincoln Burrows (Dominic Purcell) as a stranger.

Show creator Paul Scheuring talked to The Hollywood Reporter about the surprise twist of Michael insisting he's not Michael, he's Kaniel Outis. That last name Outis, Scheuring explained, is Greek for "nobody" and pulled from the name Odysseus used after being presumed dead in "The Odyssey."

"It's this tease: 'Who did this? Nobody did this,'" Scheuring said. "I thought that would be nice, if Michael had a name that's almost a phantom name. He's nobody."

Scheuring said he didn't want to just throw Michael into the mix right away; instead, he wanted to take us down the rabbit hole for a long-unwinding mystery:

"It's sort of withholding from the audience a big thing that they want. It puts you in Lincoln's shoes of discovering it, and it deepens the mystery. You'll find out a lot more in subsequent episodes. It's going to be a little bit challenging for people, but hopefully in a good way. We don't give you all the answers right away."

You have to be wary when a showrunner openly admits a storyline will be "challenging" for viewers, but "Prison Break" fans have always been a patient lot. He continued:

"I wanted it to be a far more mystifying reason that he went missing. It's something that takes episodes and episodes to unpack. Initially, if it was just Lincoln walking up to Michael at the end of the episode, and he walks up to Michael and says, 'I'm here to break you out,' and Michael says, 'Good,' it just feels like ... I feel like it was done in Season 3. It becomes this trope in 'Prison Break' where one brother comes up and says, 'I'm going to get you out.' And the other one goes, 'Good!' But if we take that entire idea and turn it on its head, and this man denies his brother — that he says, 'I'm not Michael Scofield' — then that's a twist that no one will see coming. It's part of that question: What happened to Michael in the last seven years? For me, that's a central thrust and drive of the season."

So get used to that mystery. Fans turned out in force for the return of "Prison Break," and had great reactions to the Michael twist:

Here's a preview of what's ahead in this mini season:

"Prison Break" airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on FOX.

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