Mark-Paul Gosselaar has long since graduated from Bayside High School, and his days as Zach Morris, and moved on to more intense roles – and less hair gel.

Gosselaar’s current role is playing public defender Jerry Kellerman on TNT’s drama Raising the Bar which returns for its second season tonight.

The only similarity Gosselaar’s new character has with the one who made him famous is, incidentally, hair.
In the first season of Raising the Bar, Jerry was known for his passion for justice, his passion for his clients and his long, shaggy locks.

The second season promos, however, show a cleaned-up Jerry Kellerman, which was big news to everyone except Gosselaar.

“For me personally, it’s hair,”Gosselaar said in a recent interview. “The initial hair was done for the character, and it seemed to work well for the storyline.”

Explaining the reason for Jerry’s shorter ‘do Gosselaar says, “Jerry is a bit more tactical this year… [he is] working the system a little bit better.”

Which is good for Jerry, who spent a lot of last season being knocked down in his search for real justice.

“The challenging thing [about playing Jerry],” says Gosselaar, “is we don’t hear from this side of the criminal justice system all that often. You don’t hear too much about public defenders and their clients. These are human beings. There are thousands of passionate, dedicated public defenders out there every day who are fighting against a system that they think is terribly stacked against the poor and the powerless.”

Last season also brought us a budding relationship between Jerry and Bobbi. Though the two shared a kiss in the season finale, Gosselaar says the two are still taking their time, especially since Bobbi is dealing with the drama from her, hopefully, soon-to-be-ex-husband.

“There is definitely a slow boil,”he said,“we’re just rolling along. But, you know, we have 15 episodes [this season] so I think we’re taking our time, which is good.”

But in the meantime, the viewers can certainly look forward to Jerry being just as passionate as ever.

The second season of Raising the Bar begins tonight at 10 p.m. on TNT.