Heroes: Episode 3
Let’s call this the Homecoming edition of our weekly Heroes wrap-up. A few central characters had been MIA since last season’s finale, but now they’re back. Was it a good Homecoming? Well, it far exceeded any I experienced in high school. Of course, that’s not saying much at all.
So, what happened? Who returned? Who died? Did the writing improve at all? How many Nissan Rogues would show up?
Dumb criminals — I’ve been intrigued by the Alejandro and Maya-the-crying-chick arc, but man did it ever take a turn for the stupid here. They’re in Mexico and trying to get to America, so what does Alejandro do? He busts out the window of a car in broad daylight in the middle of a crowd with a cop standing nearby. Who would’ve thought such a thing could’ve landed him in the clink?
Packin’ heat — You have to wonder if the writers are making a joke of Parkman and his position with the NYPD. As I mentioned from episode one, he’s a bit over zealous with the firearm. More of the same here, as he wakes up and immediately pulls the hammer and nearly shoots Mohinder. A tip to Mo: You live with a nutjob. Might want to let him know when you’re coming and going.
Sylar’s back — In case you missed the episode and the 20,000 commercials NBC aired last week, the man the world loves to hate has returned, albeit with a big hole in the chest and apparently no powers. More questions to come.
Weekly WTH? — In a single scene, Ando pulls a huge sword from a small cabinet (seriously, how did that happen?) and then finds a note for him on the bottom of the hilt, revealing a secret storage spot for notes from Hiro-in-the-past. So, a famous sword has been studied by historians for ages, yet they all miss a series of notes hidden not-ver-well in the handle? There’s a word for that: unbelievable.
Peter Parker, I mean Petrelli — The sequence of a newly ripped and memory-less Peter trying to use his powers by spouting goofy commands and gesturing wildly is just an offensively blatant ripoff of the first Spider-Man movie. I channel my inner South Park and shout, “Sam Raimi did it!”
Speaking of — It’s nice to know the actor who plays Peter spent the summer lifting weights and waxing his chest. But, seriously, at least come up with a reason for him to take his shirt off. He’s like one of those guys at the gym who wears as small a shirt as possible and spends half the day flexing in front of the mirror. Give it a rest.
Douche boy — Every superhero should have a nickname, and the dork who’s seducing Claire is no exception. After acting like a total prick this week (after being utterly generic previous episodes), I think he’s earned the moniker Douche Boy.
Or… — We could call him Superman Wannabe. Continuing the mode of ripping off superhero movies, we get a straight take from any Superman film as he takes Claire and flies her high above earth. My wife even made the comment during the scene, “Hey, that guy just made the Superman Face.”
Forbidden Love — Who saw it coming that Douche Boy had been tagged by Claire’s dad? What a twist! (This is what we call sarcasm.)
Farewell — Adios to DL, or so we think. Something tells me that cat’s not dead yet.
Rogue sighting — And here you are, the Nissan Rogue Moment of the Week. As was pretty obvious from the moment we saw Generic American Guy in the jail cell, Maya broke Alejandro free and the American agreed to drive them to freedom. The big twist? HE’S GOING TO DRIVE THEM IN A NISSAN ROGUE!!!
He’s a bad guy, duh — When Sylar smacked Illusion Lass over the head, I thought, “This is ridiculous. If the Company is guarding him, they would realize he’s a BAD guy and take that into account.” Then I thought, “Oh, wait, Illusion Lass is just making him think he killed her. That’s kind of obvious but not quite so bad.” Then I realized that apparently I was right the first time. Just a stupid lack of logic for a plot point that only revealed that Sylar doesn’t have the power to take powers, which we pretty much already knew.
There you have it. Much like Doom Deluise and Countdown, I’m really starting to consider jumping ship. At least Deluise has booze to get him through that crapfest. Maybe I need to start drinking…
I’m just watching this episode now. I’m sure I’ll have more complaints to heap on later, but, for starters, I think that watching Maya and Alejandro is very indicative of how awful the rest of the show is. Since I can’t understand the words coming out of their mouths, it’s easier to realize how overdramatic they’re being, and, when you think about it, isn’t that the number one problem this show has? It’s so completely melodramatic and ridiculous, first and foremost. Everything else that sucks about it falls into place after that.
Not so impressed so far, either. Why are we getting another flier, and another quick healer? Where are the crazy powers, like making plants grow faster, or creating darkness, or making things heavier?
That Rouge was a notably nice car, for parked in back of a Mexican jail.
I have a question, Van Doom. Did you just start disliking this series recently because you just recently started actually THINKING about this series? It’s been this bad all along, with no discernible difference, so I’m confused as to why you suddenly turned on it. I mean, to call out a single scene where Peter is trying to figure out his powers and say it’s derivative is INCREDIBLY short-sighted. The entire fucking show is derivative clap-trap. You say the first episode you really disliked was last season’s finale, but, honestly, I never saw the shift. It’s ALWAYS been this way. It’s always been a money-fueled, derivative cliche.
Although, in its favor, this episode gave me a new favorite scene from any television program ever. The beach scene, where generic boyfriend describes the day that he was molested by the Man with the Horn-Rimmed Glasses.
It was always derivative, and it was always overly emotive, but at the very least, the bulk of last season was entertaining enough that I was able to just “enjoy the ride,” I guess you’d say.
The finale last season was the first real chink in that, because they built up to a great fight between Peter and Sylar, and it wasn’t entertaining at all.
The difference with this season is that it hasn’t been very entertaining, there’s been too little plot movement, and the Nissan product placement is terrible. For me, it’s that there isn’t enough of the campy fun to make up for the stupidity.
And the difference with that Peter scene is that it’s not just derivative, it DIRECTLY RIPS OFF A SPIDER-MAN SCENE. They did everything but take the dialogue. There’s a difference between being derivative and stealing exact scenes.
I’m going to use some names you’re not familiar with, so use the IMDB if you doubt me. Peter is Jack Shepard. Niki/Jessica is Kate Austin. Nathan is Sawyer. Isaac Mendez is Charlie Pace. Claire is Claire. Hiro is Hugo. Sylar is Ethan. Every character in the show, from the outset, was seemingly ripped directly from another hit show at the time. The entire foundation of this show is a blatant, well-marketed rip off.
If you’re only going to complain about direct scene-for-scene rip offs, though, you even missed one IN THIS VERY EPISODE. When the shape shifter tells Sylar that she can be anything he wants her to be, she shifts from one hot bitch to another until she switches to a man, giving us the comical idea that maybe Sylar’s gay. Remember how Mystique did that to Wolverine in his tent in X2? Remember how the punchline was the exact same thing?
It makes me wonder, like I said. Is this the first time you’ve stopped to pay attention? This show has always been bad, worse than bad. Perhaps it’s just becoming more blatant now. It’s not like they had scenes last season where some bald character directly ripped off Vision’s famous “hand-through-the-chest” move. That would surely be enough to make somebody stop enjoying the ride and see how blatantly ripped-off everything in this godawful series is. Oh, and by the way, speaking of the first season, Watchmen called, and it wants its premise back.
PS. Please don’t quit the blog.
Why would I quit the blog?
“Not so impressed so far, either. Why are we getting another flier, and another quick healer? Where are the crazy powers, like making plants grow faster, or creating darkness, or making things heavier?”
Personally, I think that Kensei is going to end up being related to Claire, and therefore possibly the Petrellis.
As for the flying kid, who knows. Unless the writers are flat out lying, the kid isn’t some relation to Peter or Nathan, nor is he some kind of manifestation of Peter’s lost personality. So, no clue.
-M
“I’m going to use some names you’re not familiar with, so use the IMDB if you doubt me. Peter is Jack Shepard. Niki/Jessica is Kate Austin. Nathan is Sawyer. Isaac Mendez is Charlie Pace. Claire is Claire. Hiro is Hugo. Sylar is Ethan. Every character in the show, from the outset, was seemingly ripped directly from another hit show at the time. The entire foundation of this show is a blatant, well-marketed rip off.”
I see some of those, but not all of them.
Personally, I don’t see much similarity between the two Claires except their names and blonde hair. Nathan is only Sawyer in the sense that he is, in fact, a douchebag – the douchebaggery comes from two different portions of the characters’ personalities. Sylar is Ethan? Okay, they’re both villains? I can’t see that at all.
Peter is Jack – okay, both characters are meant to be the window through which the audience views the actions of the story.
Niki/Jessica is Kate – yeah, both are firey vixens with dark pasts and secrets.
So yeah, I don’t really get it. For the most part, I don’t even see them match up as archetypes.
-M
I don’t get how you don’t get it. You matched them up yourself, right there. I mean, when the show was created, they sat down and made these characters directly based off the characters from Lost. Obviously, when you get to the nitty gritty of the characters, they’re different (like Sawyer never ran for Congress), but come on, their base archetypes match up.
I guess this is my biggest problem with Heroes:
I never liked According to Jim, so I didn’t watch it. Nobody said it was anything worth watching. Some people left their TVs on while it aired, so it got some ratings and the network renewed it.
The problem with Heroes is that it’s an awful show, yet you’re never a stone’s throw away from any number of smart, respectable, well-informed people who are gigantic fans. I just don’t fucking get it.
I’m no gigantic fan, but maybe you weren’t referring to me (smart, respectable, etc.).
I’m also with Matt. You’re really stretching to say all those characters are that direct of rip offs. I’ve seen Lost, plenty of times. I would say, though, that Heroes characters are pretty archetypal. Of course, that’s true of what, like 99 percent of TV, movies, comic books, etc.? And to say it’s as bad as According to Jim is just preposterous. So quit copy and pasting the same anti-Heroes diatribe you stole from your brother’s blog.
Actually, I was copy and pasting from the same anti-Heroes diatribe that I wrote myself. My brother’s was much funnier.
I don’t think it’s that big of a stretch to see the parallels, in most of the character types (main hero, tough but pretty bad girl, douchebag guy who has good in him, chubby comic relief character, bad guy with unknown motives–okay, that’s like every bad guy) and more of the direct straight-up ripoffs of characters like the heroin addicted artist. And, considering how it came just two years after Lost came out and was hugely popular, it seems pretty convient.
Will you accept that? The suits saw a winner and copy and pasted the formula that won.
And, yes, Heroes is as bad as or worse than According to Jim, I’d bet.
I mean, how can anybody possibly enjoy scenes like where that kid asked the teacher what would happen if a human mated with a lizard? That’s just terrible, terrible dialogue, and I can’t see how you’d argue.
I’m glad you’re not as gung ho about the show now as you used to be, but, seriously, what I’m arguing is that it’s always been this bad, and you’re just now realizing it. But go on and drink the purple punch if you want. It was poison last season, and it’s poison this season, no matter how you look at it.
It’s nice to know that your perspective is the only one that’s true. 😉
I’ve watched According to Jim and have deliberately done so numerous times.
The first episode of Heroes was so bad I never watched it again.
“I don’t get how you don’t get it. You matched them up yourself, right there. I mean, when the show was created, they sat down and made these characters directly based off the characters from Lost. Obviously, when you get to the nitty gritty of the characters, they’re different (like Sawyer never ran for Congress), but come on, their base archetypes match up.”
I can understand where you’re coming from, to be sure, but they’re not direct rip-offs of LOST characters, are they? If anything, I would argue that they both use archetypes and go from there. Sawyer is the bad boy with the heart of gold – but he’s not the FIRST bad boy with a heart of gold. Nor is Claire from LOST the first spunky blonde, and Kate is not the first hot girl with a secret.
I also wonder if one can reasonably say the archetypes are a direct rip-off of LOST’s. They’re similar, I suppose, but Heroes premiered when LOST was beginning it’s third season – which was preceeded by a second season that was panned by critics and fans alike.
So, say they’re using archetypes that are similar, and I can’t disagree with you. But I can’t imagine that the characters are direct translations from the Castaways, because despite some basic similarities, they don’t add up.
-M
First of all, the second season of LOST wasn’t panned by critics and fans alike. It had its problems, but the final few episodes are widely regarded as some of the show’s best.
Now, I’ll say what you want me to say. They’re using archetypes that are similar. Fair enough. The fact that Heroes used all of these similar archetypes so soon after LOST premiered (you have to imagine it took a couple years to get off the ground), and I’d say what we’re looking at is a direct rip-off, with a few differences tossed in to make it seem less obvious. That’s what I’m saying. And that should be something that Heroes should be called out on.
My older brother just sent me this letter, which he sent to a friend at the beginning of season two, trying to convince said friend to not start watching. It has many good points. Give it a read:
“Heroes stinks. It’s probably not the worst show in television history. Fuck, it’s probably even better than Knight Rider. I dunno. The point is, it’s not as great as everyone says it is, and it’s certainly not worth the hour it takes to watch each week. There are several compelling reasons why this is the case:
1. None of the characters are fun to watch; most are exceptionally shallow, in spite of the time the writers are given each week to flesh them out. Scenes are written with characters in interactions which, more or less, seem to boil down to someone always waiting around for something to happen. It’s sterile, washed-out, and surgical, with each character constantly interacting like those morose Mulder-Scully exchanges from X-Files season 5+. They are devoid of life, and where they are given chances to animate, it is awkward.
2. Coincidence is piled on coincidence for no discernable reason. In Lost, for instance, you at least get the picture that there’s a special reason all of the characters are staggeringly woven together, despite their happenstance bunching on one fateful flight out of Australia. In Heroes, the characters are similarly coincidentally linked to one another, but it’s only groan-inducing, since these coincidental linkings don’t seem to have anything in particular to do with the crux of the storytelling. The genetic freaks of Heroes are supposedly random mutations, the world ’round, so intricate linkages amongst all of these disparate parts amounts to nothing more than laziness and stuff that kills suspension of disbelief.
3. For being a comic book, there is almost no action. The action sequences you do see are usually shockingly inept. There are rarely heroic moments.
4. Too many mutants. They call each new introduced character a “hero” (even a little girl who sees the future or something, who plays into a later episode, was classified as a “hero” in promotional materials. As far as I can tell, she’s just a mutated girl). Hero is as hero does, i.e. performing heroic actions in the face of great distress or danger. I hate the mangling of this ideal. Similarly, mutate bastard villains, even though they aren’t on the side of the good guys, tend to be called “hero” out of sheer idiotic convenience. Why is a mind-controlling mutant who works under H.R.G (“horn-rimmed glasses” – Heroes’ shoddy answer to Cancer Man), whose only function was basically doing dirty work for some large organization, referred to as a hero by all the assorted promotional media? What else could the producers call their mutants? Everyone seems to be too lazy to care.
5. These people behave strangely, to the point of everything being ridiculously unbelievable. This is hard to illustrate in a mere bullet-point, but to watch the show is to be given a crash course in Lazy Writing 101. An early-season plot device had Suresh finding a critical plot item by throwing his laptop PC off of his desk in a fit of rage (the laptop contained key components of his dead father’s life’s work, which he was attempting to work with at the time of the incident).
6. It doesn’t seem to have any particular purpose. It’s always working toward some larger “save the world,” “the search is on for mutant X,” yadda yadda bull crap, but we have no clear idea of what the purpose of anything is. The characters’ motivations are disparate and unyielding, to the point that I don’t see any specific reason to want to see any of them succeed or fail in whatever the hell it is they’re supposed to be doing in life. Bland, robotic, inhuman character arcs poignantly illustrated by slipshod plots, half-baked character crossovers, and arguably pointless story scenarios (we all know the world isn’t going to end, so why do we care if they save it or not?) all add up to a big Nonsense Stew. I don’t want any.”
I guess I saw Heroes season 1 as a nice guilty pleasure show that had its moments. Then this season came around and it was preceded by Chuck, a show that has all the same drawbacks but is actually trying to be a dumb, fun guilty pleasure.
Honestly, I would definitely watch Lost over Heroes. Lost is infinitely better. I never said it wasn’t. But Monday is the only TV night my wife and I have (weird work schedules), so Heroes is our only decent option, since we don’t have cable. At least until I can’t stand it any longer.
I don’t wanna tell you how to run your marriage, but if you only have one evening a week in which your wife’s schedule matches up with yours, you shouldn’t both watch something that is insulting and dehumanizing with your collected four eyes. Try checkers for the win.
dude, we do plenty of non TV stuff. It’s just nice to sit down for an hour and relax.
I hear “Hardball with Chris Matthews” is a hot hour of nightly show.
I don’t understand why people hate this show so much that they want other people not to watch it. Heroes existing does not do anything to harm the people that don’t watch it, and it brings enjoyment (of varying degrees) to those that do watch it.
Is it derivative? Yes. Is it extremely poorly written at times? Yes. Has there been a lot of dissapointing moments? Yes. But not everything can be Battlestar Gallactica or Arrested Development.
Here’s the thing: I like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I know it has its faults. I see them, I really do. I realize why other people don’t like it, and I accept that it just isn’t their cup of tea. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad show, it just means that some poeple don’t like it. There’s never been anything thats universally loved (aside from puppies and ice cream, of course), and there never will be. So just get off your fucking high horse and accept that you are not the be-all and end-all of what someone can and cannot enjoy.
You see, Aaron. You’re missing the point. The point is about mediocrity. It’s lowering the standards of what we are capable of. If this is what we accept as good entertainment today, what will we accept as good entertainment ten years from now? I mean, if it weren’t my cup of tea, I wouldn’t give a fuck, and I’d let you jack-asses have your fun. I do recognize the difference. I never watched Buffy (and I’m not alone on that one), and I don’t care that you were a fan, because it wasn’t regarded as all that great, and it didn’t have near universal praise heaped onto it. Heroes does. It was a highly-rated, award-winning smash hit last year, and everywhere I looked, there were people talking about how it was the greatest new show of the year. It’s not great. It’s less than mediocre.
Make that argument to people who gave it awards and said it was great. No one here was among that group, you sot.
You said it was great. Should I find a direct quote to “use your words against you,” or should we not let this get personal and keep to the discussion at hand?
if you can find a quote of me saying the show is the greatest of the year, please use that against me. Having another tough day, sweetie?
“It was a highly-rated, award-winning smash hit last year, and everywhere I looked, there were people talking about how it was the greatest new show of the year.”
Here’s a list of the awards Heroes has won: 2 Young Artist awards, a Televison Critics Association award, a Teen Choice award, a TV Land award, a People’s Choice award, a ASCAP Film & Television award, and a Saturn award. Not exactly the most coveted awards out there.
Can you really make the argument that Heroes is lowering the standard of entertainment when shows like Ugly Betty and Grey’s Anatomy are getting great ratings and receiving major awards?
Not at all, Fin Fang. Those are quite a few awards, though. And Heroes was [i]nominated[/i] for all sorts of more prestigious awards. The thing about shows like Ugly Betty and Grey’s Anatomy is that they’re not targeted directly toward my demographic. I don’t give two shits about those shows, but Heroes was marketed directly to you and me–comic book fans. So, I figure it’s something I have every right to be upset about.
And, Van Doom, fuck you. 🙂
For the record, it had eight Emmy nominations and two Golden Globe nominations.
I would also point out, for posterity’s sake, that even though Buffy wasn’t winning awards like crazy, it WAS (and still is) pretty highly acclaimed from a critical standpoint.
I love it! The more people are forced to argue about and defend Heroes, the more critically they’ll look at it the next time they see a new episode! The new episode will suck, and these people will, in turn, look deep inside of their souls and wonder why they sat down to watch such a shitty, shitty show, with such high hopes, in the first place! Then, they’ll see Hiro Nakamura clobbering their soul with a big, fake samurai sword as beads of sweat stream down his fat, fat face.
“I don’t understand why people hate this show so much that they want other people not to watch it.”
Then you must not understand why people hated “Batman and Robin” so much that they wanted Joel Schumacher banned from Hollywood forever. Reasonable people tend to hate comic entertainment which resembles fecal matter more closely than it resembles the dynamic that makes comic entertainment, at its best, inherently great (a hero, enabled with great power or will, shall rise to serve as a ward between the forces of evil and the innocent). As a major proponent of the idea that people shouldn’t spend 40 minutes a week staring at a turd on the ground, I do what I can to wake people up to this ideal.
“Heroes existing does not do anything to harm the people that don’t watch it, and it brings enjoyment (of varying degrees) to those that do watch it.”
The Iraq War existing does not do anything to harm the Americans who don’t pay attention to it in the news and couldn’t tell Anbar from “Aladdin.” That doesn’t mean it’s somehow not a detrimental thing.
I actually do enjoy Heroes a lot, actually, because I get huge LULZ from the awful dialogue. I also am a major fan of groaning in agony, and shouting at my TV when it insults me. I realize that this equates to watching the show for the wrong reasons, but at least I can sleep at night.
One could easily argue that the Iraq War does in fact harm the Amercians who don’t pay attention to it. And seriously, that’s got to be the worst comparison ever.
From February 2nd, 2007: “It’s entertaining. It has surprisingly good effects and cinematography, good pacing, a strong cast and an interesting if opaque mystery. Yeah, you have to suspend your disbelief, it can be pretentious and the writing leans to hackneyed. But it’s infinitely better than most of what’s on tv and deals with superheroes – a nerd bonus.”
From March 6th, 2007: “Freaking great episode. Wow. It’d be nice if there was a little more action spread out through the other episodes, but I’ll take it.”
In the first quote there, you at least acknowledged that it may be less than great. In the second quote, you said it wasn’t “great,” but, rather, “freaking great.” Considering that I never said you thought it was the “greatest show of the year,” but, instead, that you said it was, “great,” I suppose I’m right? Maybe? I mean, you did say it was “infinitely better than most of what’s on tv.” Shoot, I should’ve said that you said it was, “freaking great.” Split some more hairs, though, by all means, and focus your attention on the least important parts of my arguments, refute those, and then act like you’ve somehow bested me or whatever you feel like doing.
Actually, it’s a very good comparison. Think of what a rip-off Heroes is of the Iraq War:
Claire = Jenna Bush, HRG = Dick Cheney, Sylar = Zarqawi, HRG = Saddam Hussein, Suresh = Ayad Allawi, and Hiro =Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Do I need to keep going? These people are totally bankrupt of new ideas!