It’s the open-hearted abandon of My Name Is Earl that keeps winning me back.

I was an early fan during its first season, but back then I still got the sense that it was bordering on the snide just a little too much.  There was just something about the idea of Ivy League graduates and millionaire movie stars playing white trash (and often in the crudest, last appealing possible light) that made me pause.  I couldn’t deny it was funny, but I wasn’t sure whether it was also being condescending.  As the season progressed, the writing sharpened.  The characters became deeper, arguably more sympathetic, and it became easier to empathize with their points of view.  Eventually, I felt like I was laughing with them rather than at them, and that’s the point at which My Name Is Earl hit its stride.

Nonetheless, they lost me during season 2.  I don’t claim a drop off in quality or anything, it’s just that my time got a bit more scarce, and it was easier to lose track of an episodic sitcom in the face of my generally stronger draw toward serialized dramas like 24 and LOST.  Ironically, as I lost track of Earl, it started experimenting with its format, trying longer-form storytelling, including a season-long arc about Joy’s (Jaime Presley) impending date with life behind bars, a result of a Three Strikes violation she was too reckless to notice until it seemed to be too late.

I caught the season finale, in which Earl (the continuously delightful Jason Lee) sacrifices himself to a multi-year prison term in order to save her, and I was taken aback by how moving it was.  My Name Is Earl made me get weepy, and that’s not something I ever anticipated.  Consequently, I’ve chosen to reward it’s quality with a renewed commitment, and so far season three is proving that a wise choice.

So to get back to the matter at hand, which is the latest episode, I love that the producers are so brave as to take feven greater chances with their format whilst still managing to maintain enough of Earl’s original charms so as not to alienate long time viewers.

One of My Name Is Earl’s greatest assets is its willingness to hand focus over to an ever increasing number of wacky eccentric guest characters, as well as its tendency to cultivate them into an ongoing farm team for future episodes.  “The Gangs of Camden County” featured a number of new eccentrics, from the warden (played so affably by Craig T. Nelson that I never realized before how much I like him) to the two unexpectedly gay gang leaders (one of whom played by Page Kennedy coming off an interesting run on Weeds).  I hope that we will be seeing more of the warden in future episodes, and since one of his functions was to shave off some of Earl’s 2-year sentence, I think that’s probably a good bet, particlarly since I don’t believe the current plan is to leave Earl locked up for the next two seasons.  That said, there really does seem to be comedy gold available for mining, so I hope they don’t leave the setting too soon.

Randy’s new job as a prison guard was a welcome surprise, also, and a nice way to come back from the otherwise depressing ending to last week’s episode which saw him stealing a car in an attempt to get sent to prison so he could be with Earl.  That Randy would do this after all the effort made to become more functional and independent lent a kind of depressing vibe to the ending of what was otherwise a stellar season premiere.  Re-connecting him to Earl in this new capacity actually seems like a much better way to go, and I’m looking forward to seeing how it plays out.

So that’s my take on Earl 3.3 (or 3.2 depending on how you count it).  Now you!