Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Heroes

8. Heroes

I wouldn’t call Heroes a surprise when I watched and enjoyed the premiere. I was reading about this crazy new show months in advance. The surprise to me was the quality of the final product. It was quite a shock to not have superpowers come off as a joke onscreen, any Mutant X fans in the house? So hooray for all the high points that came out of the bumpy first year on the air.

As an X-Men fan, I am finding a it difficult to balance my enjoyment of Heroes while still being constantly reminded of the similarities to the Marvel mutants. The powers, the world they live in, and even the storylines feel like someone has read one too many Chris Claremont X-Men books. The familiarity only bothered me when things became on the nose like the Days of Future Past episode. I mean come on I kept waiting for the Sentinels to show up. If Peter become Dark Petrelli, Sylar becomes a Holocaust survivor, a bunch of them move to the Australian Outback, or if the fricking Brood show up I may get a bit perturbed. But this is still future speculation of annoyance so for now it is all happy-go-lucky fun.

Okay now that that is over, back to the first season. The cast is way too damn big. I am growing to despise shows that just keep introducing characters until I need to take notes to remember all their storylines. It does improve the chances of stumbling upon great characters but there is also the downside of creating nearly as many wastes of space. This was painfully obvious during the first chapter of the season. Since the show needed to introduce each character every damn episode included one or two sections that bordered the boring/offensive line. Stuff like Parkman and his wife, anything located in Las Vegas, and whiny Peter held this show back for months. And by held back I mean from greatness; Heroes was still fun just spotty. Peter may have been whiny in the beginning but he eventually realized his potential and all bets were off. Plus the Invisible Man threw him off a roof. That was sweet. I miss Christopher Eccleston. Jack Bennet immediately earned the right to use the name Jack on television. He has a lot to live up to but has made good first steps. His arc might have been the strongest all year even though it seems like something that could have been drawn out over multiple seasons. But then again turning face allowed him to shoot Eric Roberts in the head. Plus Bennet’s changes were in step with Claire’s storyline. And to my surprise, Claire’s character was one of the best all season. I kept waiting for it to slip in quality but it never happened. Although, I was disappointed with how they spent the first half of the season building her relationship with Zach then wiped his memory and if that wasn’t enough all but wrote him off for the second half of the season. He wasn’t the only loss (and at least he can be brought back) during the year, Eden, Eric Roberts, Malcolm McDowell, Simone, Isaac, Ted, Hiro’s girlfriend, and whoever else died in the finale were crossed off the cast. There is a happy medium when it comes to killing folks, it is good to have that real threat but eventually you can’t keep replacing great characters. Hello 24. (Quick note about "great characters" the majority of the characters I just listed were not great just making a point here calm down people).

Now let’s take some time to talk about the best episode of the season; “Company Man” or Jack Bennet’s flashback story. This is the show that proved Heroes could become all-time great. His back-story was perfectly revealed. It weaved in George Takei, Eric Roberts, the Invisible Man, the Haitian, and the pieces fit together. But at the same time the live story with Parkman, Ted, and that other chick bum rushing the Bennet home was nice and tense. And the climatic scene was classic. Burnt Claire walking out of the house was unbelievable. It was too bad that the best episodes aired mid-season. The concluding episodes were all good but not a classic in the bunch. They attempted to not only wrap up all of the storylines but also have them all converge in the same damn spot. What the heck is that? Then that last scene, the prologue for next year, was not this great reveal making me amped for the future. It left me skeptical about the choices being made. Well, we’ll find out soon enough.


In conclusion Hiro kicks ass. Heroes not so much with the ass-kicking. This was a good foundation but it was nowhere near the first season of 24 or Lost in regards to the blowing of my mind. Still it could become great and you can’t ask for much more than that out of brand new programs.

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