How was Britney Spears' MTV comeback?

LL Cool J should have had the final word on Britney Spears sweeping the MTV Video Music Awards Sunday: Don't call it a comeback. The rapper ladies love didn't perform the hit that contains that line, choosing another oldie, "Goin' Back to Cali," for his barely-featured performance, but the phrase applies.

Spears won in all three categories in which she was nominated -- for Female Video, Pop Video and Video of the year -- which would have been impressive at any other awards show. But this sweep felt meaningless, not only because the actual winners are the least important part of this staged and schticky media event.

What viewers witnessed every time Britney took the stage (or appeared in an MTV promotional skit, like the dull one that preceded her opening the program) was not only an expensively refurbished body in a laudably tasteful silver dress, but the relaunching of a brand. Britney Spears, the phenomenon, has been very good to MTV, and to the ever more synergistic corporate entertainment world that its awards show represents. A star on video first -- she gained early notoriety playing Lolita at her high school locker in the clip for "Hit Me Baby One More Time" -- she's now a governing force within the shock-and-celebreality-based world view that creates success for MTV's biggest current hits, such as " The Hills."

Spears' breakdown has been good business for the scandal machine, but no one earns the public's sympathy forever: Witness the sad spiral of Michael Jackson. Besides, a healthy Britney -- one who can actually tour behind a musical release, work to promote her perfumes and other ancillary products, and participate in performances that end happily, unlike her last real attempt at a comeback, at last year's VMAs -- can earn on multiple platforms, not just for the gossip rags and tabloid TV shows.

Tonight she received multiple honors for a mediocre video in which she communicates none of the heat and swagger that made her an intriguing star in the first place. Opening the ceremony, she stumbled only once (announcing the 25th "anniversity" of the VMAs), and bit her tongue in a sweet self-comforting gesture after saying her lines. Accepting her kudos, she betrayed no happiness or even relief. She acted as if . . . she knew it was going to happen.

I'm not saying the awards were rigged. Such accusations are ridiculous, irrelevant in fact, since when it comes to actual honors the VMAs are more satirical than serious. But amid the show's usual weird juxtapositions (Kid Rock and Lil' Wayne, why oh why?) and accidental joys (wasn't it great when Tokio Hotel won for Best New Artist?), Britney's triumph felt almost scheduled. A year to the day since her failure to perform banished her, the prodigal daughter returns to the corporate pop fold. Let's just hope, for her sake, that she's ready and able to work.