I think we can safely say the most entertaining moments on television involving the cast of Heroes lately came in the form of a couple of cute promos during the Superbowl Sunday night. By the way, in the grand tradition of this past Friday’s Galactica, once again we end on a cliffhanger that is IMMEDIATELY resolved as they launch into the following week’s preview that shows everyone survives the plane crash. THANKS, NBC!
First, are there any Heroes fan out there that can please tell me why to continue watching this mess? I really really want a reason to not give up hope that this program can be saved. Unfortunately, the premier of the second story arc of season 3, Heroes: Fugitives was nothing short of mind-numbingly dull. I guess in some respects it was somewhat of a relief from some of the outrageous silliness that we’ve had to endure this year so far. I am really trying to scoop out some positives from this show that is spiraling downward faster than the plane at the end of the episode.
Second, for those that have noticed the rather odd coincidences between Heroes and the upcoming movie Push, it seems that Summit Entertainment finally decided “what the hell” and bought ad time right in the middle of Heroes this week. I guess they figure they might actually get some disillusioned Heroes fans hoping that there might be some entertainment left in the concept.
Now, what about A Clear and Present Danger? I think the major idea this week is that there seems to be a clear sense in they are trying to slow this mess down. The pacing was slow, the mood, for the better, was darker. The story however, was about as thin as a piece of cheesecloth. In fairness, it’s just one episode into the new story arc.
So, as I’ve started doing with my other reviews, let’s just break into my weekly bullet points.
My weekly State of Heroes summary
o Is it over yet? Well, no one in my family has given up on the show completely yet. My oldest son, knowing how I feel about Heroes right now, said to me at about 10 minutes to 9PM tonight that it was “about time for the ‘pain’ to start.” My wife actually made it over half way through before dozing off. My four-year old son simply made the observation that he hadn’t seen any blood in this episode and then asked if those dogs were dead (the scene in the taxidermist shop if you saw the epidode). Not sure if that’s good or bad. I would say that during the course of this episode, I only checked the clock about 3 times, though I didn’t wait for the commercial break to get up and take my cold medicine.
o I Remember Nathan. I actually like watching a program that inspires me to tune in each week to find out what’s going to happen. With Heroes we have the unique experience of tuning in each week to see who each character is going to be. Did the writers decide to make [Insert character here] a good guy or bad guy this week? Is it good Nathan or bad Nathan? Is it good Mohinder or bad Mohinder? Is it evil Saylor or sympathetic Saylor? Is it good Noah or bad Noah? Does it matter? The total disregard for any continuity with the characters is still obscene. The writers should be ashamed of themselves to be perfectly honest.
o Who Has What Powers? I’ve lost interest. I’ve lost track. Who has what powers? Why? How did they lose them or get them back? God, please make it stop. Now they’ve got Parkman painting the future. Original with a capital “O.”
o Speaking of Painting the Future… The show is not yet 3 seasons old and suddenly we are back to trying to rehash the “glory” days. Apparently the series needs to have a character that can paint the future. The writers have used this plot device since the pilot episode, and in season one, it was used diabolically well. However, for something so important to the plot, why do they continually kill everyone that has this power and have to come up with some contrived plot device to bring it back? For all this trouble they should just never have killed Isaac Mendez.
o The Hiro and Ando Show – Where did this crap come from? Honestly. I don’t know what else to say other than one of the things that was fresh about the characters in season one is now getting to be a major league annoyance. It was an intriguing idea in season one to see the child-like and excited Hiro exploring his powers while we got a glimpse into a future “bad ass” Hiro. Now, which each passing week, Hiro and Ando degrade into nothing more than silly, childish comic relief and totally unbelievable.
o This Week’s Great Spin-Off Idea – Heroes: Lost! So it appears from the preview at the end of A Clear and Present Danger that all of our heroes crash land on an island somewhere. I say END THE SERIES RIGHT NOW so we can immediately begin the spin-off series. Starting next week, Heroes: Lost will find our intrepid band of would-be superheroes facing off against John Locke, the Others, the Smoke Monster and Sawyer with a suitcase full of guns and nicknames. Immediately after meeting up with the Lost crew, Sawyer immediately gets a couple of zingers in referring to Hiro as “Kim Jong Il” and Matt Parkman as “Poppinfresh.” In the pilot episode of this series we get the pleasure of seeing Locke plant a hunting knife in the back of Suresh from about 20 yards. With the island moving in time, Peter is transported into the future again where he is “distraught” with what he sees and returns (with a scar on his face) to try to change it. Meanwhile, back on the… ahh screw this idea, I wouldn’t even consider putting anything related to this train wreck of a show near a show like Lost …not even as a joke.