Aliens Infiltrate the High School: It’s Way Cool

The WB is being like so way cool on Wednesday nights by following “Dawson’s Creek” with the teenage aliens of the highly inviting “Roswell” at 9 p.m., whose first two episodes are irresistibly murky and funny.

Just the way high school wasn’t.

But who’s demanding reality from this series whose catalysts are three high schoolers--siblings Max (Jason Behr) and Isabel (Katherine Heigl) and their friend, Michael (Brendan Fehr)--who were on a UFO that crashed in New Mexico in 1947. In 1989, they emerged from their pods as humanoid 6-year-olds and somehow (facts to come later, presumably) wound up with foster parents in small town Roswell.

Learning their secret tonight is a classmate, Liz (Shiri Appleby), when Max uses his special powers to instantly heal her after she is mortally wounded in a shooting incident. She wonders where he’s from. No Conehead, before he can answer Southern France, she’s got his number. And apparently so does the local sheriff (William Sadler), Roswell’s relentless Javert of alien hunters.

Meanwhile, evidence surfaces of a possible fourth alien in this ominous galaxy of pubescence. Who is he? Where is he? And will these kids be able to spot him and keep their own identities secret, as tender romance blooms between Max and Liz?

Based on the “Roswell High” books by Melinda Metz, what a dandy little series this appears to be, one that belies its surface gleam by avoiding the glib and predictable. A more facile approach would have dictated painting the three aliens with the same brush, for example. Instead, they project separate and distinctive tones. Taciturn Max is the thoughtful one, voluptuous Isabel a social animal and frazzled-looking Michael impulsive and just a bit sad while living in a cluttered trailer with a jerky foster father.

“Roswell” matches mystique and poignancy with humor from another teen, Maria (Majandra Delfino), who learns about the aliens from her best pal, Liz, and for security reasons refers to them in code as “Czechoslovakians.”

What a promising start. Episode 2 is even better, happily, introducing a gorgeous substitute teacher whose suspicious behavior thickens the enigma and causes panic, as freaked-out Maria worries about the government learning that “we’re like accessories to Czechoslovakians.”

Like watch and see for yourselves.