On TV: 30 Rock

First, the tough love: For all of 30 Rock's single-camera comic supremacy, its season premieres have a tendency to be the worst of the season. In season two, we were treated to the misfired "SeinfeldVision" episode, and last season kicked off with the amnesia-laden "Do-Over," featuring a sullen, headmasterly Megan Mullally. Season four's premiere, which airs tonight, bucks the trend with a top-notch return, save for one strangely disconnected performance by a key cast member.

The premiere starts us with an affably screwball conceit: Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin) requires Liz Lemon (Tina Fey) to find new cast members for TGS with Tracy Jordan because the show's main draws Tracy and Jenna (Tracy Morgan and Jane Krakowski) don't test well outside major urban areas. Liz and Pete (Scott Adsit) begin an undercover trek to find new talent, forcing them to lie to the other writers and cast members -- which means this episode marks the first in a while to give Adsit something to do. While their foibles ensue, backwoods NBC page Kenneth (Jack McBrayer) initiates a page strike after intercepting Jack Donaghy's exorbitant paycheck. And Jenna spends a majority of the episode plotting a country/western image overhaul that comes complete with cut-off shorts and an "Are You Ready for Some Football?"-style music video.

A few of 30 Rock's ping-ponging one-liners don't match up to the greatness of "I want to go to there," (namely the oddly passé Baldwin line, "Our new mammogram machine is called the 'Git Her Done 2000.'"), but the show is still a swift, perfectly timed balancing act of showbiz caricatures and everyman sympathies. Mysteriously, the one actor who doesn't exude greatness in the opener is Tracy Morgan, who begins the episode with a sober grimace and proceeds with exhausted line reads throughout. You might recognize this delivery from his oddly monotone audiobook -- but where his chutzpah is held back, the writing compensates. It's impossible to undersell a line like, "Have I lost touch with my roots? I better talk with Rabbi Shmuley about this."

The most salient question left for 30 Rock remains: Where will this series go this season? Are we really in for another 22 episodes of harried Liz Lemon eye-rolls, and daffy Jenna Maroney cross eyes? The outlook from the premiere indicates that shake-ups in the TGS writers' room and power struggles between pages, writers, execs, asshole pedestrians, hot dog vendors, and the occasional freaky animal all provide potential. 30 Rock is TV's undisputed critical champion and has been for years, and while that's bound to engender a backlash at some point, it won't come from here.