For all the ink — not to mention bodily fluids — spilled on "The Shield" and "Rescue Me," the show FX execs hear most about is still "Nip/Tuck," its ugliness-is-more-than-skin-deep soap opera, which returns for its third season Tuesday.

"We get more e-mails and mail on a daily basis about 'Nip/Tuck' than any of our other series," FX Networks president John Landgraf told TV critics this summer.

Ryan Murphy, a former journalist who also created the wickedly funny WB series "Popular," manipulates his "Nip/Tuck" characters like chess pieces on speed, moving them through crises in an episode or two that on most dramas would occupy a whole season, and giving them no time to catch their breath before the next shocking development occurs.

So it's ironic that his audience has become so attached to one of those shocking developments — the advent of a masked butcher who calls him or herself "The Carver" — that Murphy's actually planning to devote an entire season to the resolution of his Season 2 cliffhanger, which found a helpless Dr. Christian Troy (Julian McMahon) face-to-mask with the mysterious slasher.

Even Murphy seems bemused by the Carver's popularity, admitting he was "unprepared for the avalanche of interest" in the story line. "I don't understand why people are so obsessed with this thing," but they are, "and once that character came on, the ratings, like, doubled."

"I only was going to do that in one episode, and then it clicked," he said, acknowledging that viewers might be reacting to a storyline that's taking a little longer to play out than usual.

"Yeah, they like that. I think that has made a difference," he said.

Oh, and if you're looking to be The Carver for Halloween, you'll probably have to carve your own.

"We designed the mask," said Murphy.

"It was sort of modeled after 'The Scream' a little bit ... I also liked the Dresden quality of it, that he was making a comment on artificial beauty and the facade," Murphy said.

"I didn't want it to feel like a slasher movie. I wanted it to be a little more delicate ... and weird."