Where Have All the Heroes Gone?
SPOILERS AHEAD: This post contains potential spoilers for seasons 1 & 2 of the NBC drama, Heroes. If you’ve not watched yet but are planning to, then you’ll want to skip this post. You’ve been warned.
Unlike many of the fans that are addicted to NBC’s hit show, Heroes, I wasn’t hooked from the start. In fact, I never even tuned in until my wife convinced me to give it a try with the release of the season 1 DVD. She had been telling me how good it was for months and that I should really watch it. The guys at work loved it too and I often had to drown out their weekly discussions of the show with loud bouts of Tears for Fears pumping through my headphones while they would theorize about the various characters, plot points and next week’s episode. From the start, I had thought of Heroes as a cheap, TV knock-off of Marvel’s X-Men and not really worth my time. It took a couple of episodes before I saw how well crafted Heroes was, but once I did, there was no stopping. Burning through season 1 on DVD was thoroughly enjoyable & utterly addicting.
Each episode flowed freely into the next and I found myself caught up in multiple story arcs and solid character development. I really enjoyed watching Hiro Nakamura’s evolution from geeky Star Trek nerd to full fledged warrior, all the while keeping his sense of humor. Series favorite Claire, was surprisingly well handled too. I had assumed her character would be a rip from one of my all time favorites, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but again I was wrong. The story of Claire and her compelling father played by Jack Coleman, brought both drama and realism to this fantastical universe. The show even found a catch phrase that gave fans a type of “secret hand-shake” that only others of their kind would understand – “Save the cheerleader, save the world.”
Life was good. Until it immediately turned to crap.
I’ve been patiently waiting for season two of Heroes to “start”. So far, no luck. Unlike season 1, this year, the various characters don’t seem to be developing. There are vague notions of a new threat, and more foreshadowing of the future thanks to Isaac’s lost paintings, but in general, the arc is moving at a snail’s pace. By this time in season 1 viewers were solidly hooked and couldn’t wait for each new episode. This time around, I barely remember what happened last week. If it wasn’t for the “previously on Heroes” leader at the start each episode, I think I’d be lost. What’s going on? Where’s the magic?
I think one problem is expectations. So many fans got caught up in the amazing writing, acting and story arc development last year, that nothing the writers could do this time around could ever hope to come close. They’ve attempted to placate fans with new characters, abilities and a few geeky stars thrown in for good measure, all to no avail. Veronica Mars’ Kristen Bell and even Nichelle Nichols from Star Trek: TOS, can’t keep the sub-par writing of season 2 from showing. The new heroes we’ve been introduced to are relatively exciting (Monica the copycat girl and Parkman’s dad, aka Nightmare Man), but too many of the original favorites have taken steps backwards.
Peter loses his memory and has to rediscover his various abilities. Sylar lives, has lost all of his powers and is stranded somewhere in Mexico. Niki Sanders checks into the company “hospital” and suddenly she’s whole again. Claire has to go back into hiding and struggles to conceal her abilities from her high school peers. All of these developments are frustrating, regressive and unsatisfying. These “mini arcs” need to end immediately. Many series fans (including me) felt the season 1 finale was disappointing because Kring didn’t let the heroes be heroes. Instead of a climatic battle to defeat Sylar and solve the riddle of the exploding man utilizing all of the cast and their abilities, Hiro simply appears and stabs Sylar without so much as a whimper. Tim Kring spent the entire season introducing us to these incredible characters, building to a crisis the players would have to band together to stop, and it was over before it began. Kring can’t afford to make the same mistakes again, but he is.
Word comes this week that, due in part to the Hollywood writers strike, and dramatically reduced ratings, the planned mid-season spin-off, Heroes: Origins, has been shelved. The strike might be the official reason why we won’t see these six episodes (heck we might not even see the last half of season 2), but I think the drop in ratings is the more worrisome factor. Unless Heroes gets back to its roots and puts these characters in situations worthy of their namesake fast, we won’t have Claire, Noah, Sylar, and Parkman to kick around much longer. Will Heroes become just another great show killed before its time? As Hiro Nakamura might say, only time will tell.
UPDATE: Tonight’s episode “Out of Time” took some steps in the right direction. Several of the plot threads theorized by people commenting below came true (I won’t say which ones incase you don’t want to know) and things seem to be picking up. Perhaps November sweeps is just the kick in the pants the viewers like myself need to start to feel good about Heroes again. I just hope the writers strike doesn’t take the wind out of the series’ sails before it manages to get going.
UPDATE II: It seems that Heroes creator, Tim Kring, is aware of the problems with this season and issued a few statements about the fan’s disappointment. The good news is it seems he is committed to righting the wrongs and getting things back on track. Hat tip to Talos for this.
“This time around, I barely remember what happened last week. If it wasn’t for the “previously on Heroes” leader at the start each episode, I think I’d be lost. What’s going on?”
Part of it might be that you have to wait a week between episodes now, rather than a few minutes or a couple of days. 🙂
But I totally agree with this statement: “All of these developments are frustrating, regressive and unsatisfying.”
I think “regressive” is the key word there. Something has been bugging me so far this season, and I’m pretty sure that’s it. It’s like everything went into some kind of holding pattern.
I’ll try to ignore your snarky comment about watching it on DVD. 😛
The main storyline that has bugged me the most is Hiro traveling back in time. It’s not the fact that he’s stuck in the past that I don’t like, it’s that he’s stuck there with the crappiest character ever created for a TV show, Kensai. I don’t know who thought this guy up, but he was a letdown from the moment we met him. Also, Hiro is awesome x10 when he’s with Ando. They have great chemistry and play off each other wonderfully. But Kring decided to separate these two this season. BIG mistake.
And oh yeah, let’s kill off the cool chick who could make you see anything she wanted, DL and take the dude from Smallville and make him Claire’s love interest.
Okay, rant off. I’m done. Uuugh.
I know there is a lot of criticism of the show but
personally, I think the show has gotten better this season.
I’m afraid I don’t feel the same way, Hiro. It seems to me that the show has been treading water, with characters oddly repeating themselves. The producers and writers seemed to walk into several problems this year. The first was not killing off Peter and Nathan. We were supposed to believe they sacrificed themselves, and there’s very little that’s more annoying than the creators of a show going “Hah! See, they’re not dead! Ta-da!” It makes it a lot harder to be emotionally invested in any way when they kill off other characters we’re meant to care about.
The second problem was that the show has always been crowded, with its attention split between far too many characters — and for some reason they decided to introduce new ones. Apart from Monica they’re all quite dull, as well. As the show struggles to give depth to the new characters it has to sacrifice time from the existing ones, who aren’t up to much that’s interesting anyway.
Finally, they’ve lost the drive the show once had. There was huge momentum towards the finale last season as we came closer and closer to the point where New York would either be destroyed or saved, and what role Sylar was going to play in that. He was interesting, menacing, and nearly invincible. Now he’s reduced to mugging for the camera in a car. The bad guy is apparently *dun dun dunn!!!!* Parkman’s dad (why did they feel it necessary to do that?! The evil relative card never works. And shows like 24 have played that one to death recently).
I’ve been so disappointed I’ve decided to walk away from the show for a while. I’ll give it a try again in a couple of weeks to see if it has improved…but I’ve lost interest enough in the whole thing that, much like 24 and Lost, I think it’s time to walk away and find something new to waste my time on.
Last season of 24 was god awful. I stopped watching half way through and I don’t know if I’m going to watch this year or not. The creators had a tremendous chance at doing something very new and original: have Jack spend 24 hours trying to escape his captivity in China. But instead, they fell back on the tired LA is under threat scenario we’ve been seeing every single season. Moving the show to NY or Washington won’t change it enough to keep people interested. 24 is going down hill FAST.
Just give it time, the reason why things are moving slow is that this volume two is supposed to be almost completely unrelated to vol. 1 (per Tim on Post Show by g4). Thats why you see this ‘regression’, its cleaning the slate to get ready for this story arc, which is going to be bigger than the ‘bomb’. this time its the ‘virus’ and it effects more than just the city of NY, this time the ‘disaster’ will effect the whole world, making things way more epic.
I really think things are about to get going for vol. 2
And I believe you guys are going to be taking back what you say about kensai…
The Hiro is feudal japan timeline I think is neccessary.
Here’s my theory, Kensai still lives in modern times. He is the main supervillian of Season 2 (He is immortal!). The symbol we see originating with him is everywhere to be found around the company, and all things dark relating to the show. We have the scene set for conflict, with Hiro moving in on his girl…
Oh.. sylar and peter NEEDED the soft reset, without it we’d have characters much much much too powerful and they’d overshadow the entire show. It wasn’t the most graceful way to do it, but needed.
First of all your an idiot for saying this season is boring…. they are ramping up the story for the rest of the season. What is the point of blowing all the good stuff at the beggining….your stupid and should not be allowed to make comments on websites like this.
I want the significance of Kensai to hurry and be revealed. This is my theory, and probably a future spoiler, so stop reading if you want. The significance of Kensai, and Hiro travelling back in time, etc, is that the healing ability also is a sort of immortality ability (or at least live incredibly long), and he’s the present day leader of whatever organization is killing former heroes (turned bad by what we saw happen between him and Hiro). That’s why he has the symbol that is being used today.
But yeah, I’m thinking in the next couple episodes this will be revealed, probably to Peter, and hopefully the characters will be given a PURPOSE! They regressed, and none of them have any purpose, or unifying purpose.
Idiot, first try spelling your name right then we’ll talk. Second, it’s my blog so my opinion on stuff is kinda the point. Third, by six episodes in on season 1, the show was kicking serious ass and had legions of fans spreading the good word about the show. I see no such thing happening in season 2, in fact, I see the opposite happening. And I’m not alone. You of course are entitled to your own opinion.
I think, for me, the main problem is where last year it could start slow and build the mystery – because we were going through all the characters and they were new, and we were only just starting to see connections.
And then they answered a Lot of the questions posed. It’s what we as fans wanted.
Great! The season rocked! It had so much momentum!
And now? Now they’re stuck having to deliver a lot of questions, new characters to try and bring some mystery and create that sense of wondering what’s going on all over again… so they can use the rest of the season to have that momentum back.
This is the problem with answering all the questions people want anwers to, and as Lost can attest – the fans don’t like you dragging them out either.
Actually I was pretty happy with the amnesia storyline – I just wish someone would have the balls to play it up, make Peter a bad guy for the next couple of seasons… but that would cost them their little girly fans who would tune out, plus all the devoted guys who feel it’s a betrayal of Peter’s character.
When seriously, it would just rock for someone to break the mold that way.
But then I’m the guy who wanted Buffy to end with Dawn becoming a slayer while watching a broken Xander vamp killing Buffy.
I’m kind of sadistic that way 🙂
I agree with your opinions.
I was really looking forward to this season, but now I have to force myself to watch an episode in hopes it will get better.
Also I can’t stand the Hiro scenes anymore. They seem so cheesy, thank god I can skip past them with this PVR thing i have.
Steve
Honestly, you watched the series on DVD which means your viewing experience was no where the same as those who followed since day one (or close to it). You have no real place talking about the difference between the seasons.
My biggest problem with this season is the fact that as the new main heroes discover their powers they follow the same script as the heroes from the last season. If I hear the line ‘but what does this all mean?’ again I just may scream.
On the flip side, the characters that have already come into their full ability barely progress as characters at all. They turn into plot devices.
Either way, I find myself just waiting for the dialog to finish and move onto other story lines, or simply shocked that the characters seem unmoved by the fact that they now lack the ability to die.
The best Heroes forum I’ve found so far is http://www.superhiro.org
I agree completely with Ged’s assessment. Heroes Season 1 was interesting and fresh – up until the disappointing finale. Season 2 has been rubbish all along. The characters from Season 1 do little of interest, and the new characters are even less interesting. Further, there are obvious plot holes. If the black-eye Mexican dude wants to kill Sylar, all he has to do is get his sister to cry. All three of them are in the same car! Problem solved. It makes that whole storyline even more painful to watch. I can’t see this show making it to a third season.
Heroes is getting dangerously close to being pulled from my MythTV recording schedule.
Chris, that’s rich! Do you think NBC “owes” you something because you had to wait a week between episodes? That’s about the funniest thing I’ve read all year.
I agree with Oea520 on both points and is closest to what I was thinking is going to happen, entirely correct about Sylar and Peter they would have been way to powerful compared to the others, It is lacking somewhat but I think it is needed to let us “ramp” up again.
Oea520 and Evan are probably right regarding Kensai, and I really hope they are. It would explain a great deal, especially why this pathetic white guy is the hero of ancient feudal Japan. They just better pull it off soon.
Second, I agree with the notion that the budget for effects is in the dump this season. I can spot the fake blue-screens a mile away. The entire trip to Russia looks like its been shot on the set of Phantom Menace. Could we at least send these actors to a place with real snow and film their scenes? The early shots of Mohinder in India seemed real enough. The CGI pullout of Sylar’s hut in the jungle didn’t do anything for me either.
Man, I’m gripey! See what this show does to me?!
If I recall, about this time last year we had the “Save the Cheerleader, Save the World” which was pretty lame then as it is now (and I’m still unsure how it was relevant). It was gaining steam because it was a new original concept that hadn’t been done before on TV (a superhero ongoing drama for adults). I don’t think much has changed, last season was full of teasing and not being sure what fit in where (DL and Nicki for instance). I’m going to reserve judgement till after Vol 2 is done, if the ending is as anti-climactic then i’ll agree with you.
The writers are going on strike. 😉
Am I the only one who caught on to the Peter multiple personality hint in the last episode (taking Jessica/Nikki’s ability). When they walk into the room in Montreal and Peter gets the note, he glances at the mirror. I think they’re building Peter to have an internal conflict much like Jessica/Nikki from last season. And if that’s the case, the Company knows because they have a file on the new personality. I don’t know, I’m still holding out hope for a pickup in the pace of the season.
I pretty much agree. I couldn’t stop watching it on my DVD till it ended. The Season 1 Finale wasn’t all that great, as i was hoping it would be.
To me it took a few episodes for Season 1 to draw me in, and i hope thats what Season 2 is going to do. So far its taking a while though. I have faith in it, Season 1 was the best thing my eyes have ever seen, i loved it.
Is it just me, or is the Nissan advertising getting on anyone else’s nerves? Peter and DL both drove Sentras in season one, but now…
“Look Ando, Nissan VERSA!”
“Oh, Dad, thanks for the NISSAN ROGUE!”
“You’ve earned it, Claire-bear.”
Come on!
I agree with all this. I stopped watching Heroes a few weeks ago after realizing it’s just season one all over again. Claire hiding her powers, her dad, Parkman and Mohinder fighting the company, Peter lost, alone, and trying to find himself, Sylar looking to get powers again. Ugh. It’s just plain boring!
Maybe I just expected more after last season. Last season was them learning about who they are and how powerful they were. The finale could have used a little more teamwork, sort of a “greater than the sum of its parts”. Then this season could have been more of them coming together to fight the company.
Instead, let’s hit the reset button and do it all again!
Heroes has always sucked. Face it, it’s overrated piece of trash.
to toneDef who said “Am I the only one who caught on to the Peter multiple personality hint in the last episode (taking Jessica/Nikki’s ability)…” The note on the mirror was left by Adam, most likely the same Adam Monroe who is mentioned earlier in the same episode. This can mean 1 of 3 things. Either Peter is also Adam and a founder of the company (Fight Club anyone?), Peter met Adam sometime in the four months betweens Seasons 1 & 2, or Peter is also Adam and there is another person on the show named Adam. I really don’t think it could be the latter because even with the bad writing I don’t think they would create two new characters with the same name.
Am i the only one who couldn’t stop laughing when i saw this new hero strut her new found powers by taking on some kids in a mean game of double-dutch? Wow, man o’ man what i wouldn’t give to have her power. Seriously so she can cut tomatoes and do gymnastics, am i missing something that is suppose to be interesting in this? Unless she can start duplicating powers, the pinnacle of her powers will be some sort of martial arts ninja 007 agent spy or something? She would still get owned by almost every other hero present thus far.
For me, the problem has been the hamfisted soap opera nature of it. Every commercial break is a cliffhanger, every plot point is overdramatized. Everything, except the action.
We spent 22+ episodes waiting for a showdown between Silar and Peter (Both billed as the most uber thing since Superman) and when they finally do meet, its Peter punching Silar in the mouth?.. wtf?!?!? AND Silar gets away.. *sigh*.
I honestly expected the 2nd season to start with Silar telling someone that “He’d have gotten away with it too, if it hadnt been for those meddling kids” while Scooby and Shaggy bitched about lack of Scooby Snacks.
The second season is worse, imo, in that they arent even building expectations. Who cares if Hiro falls in love with a chick 500+ years old?
I like the concept of heroes, but it feels like a carney game to me. All talk, lots of hype, but in the end, it’s just turning out like a daytime soap, aired at night. The knowing looks between characters like everyone else in the room is blind, the over-hyped storyline that goes nowhere really, the complete lack of action in most episodes, and the worn out plot lines, like Matt’s dad is the boogyman, etc.
Tim, you could have done so much with this.. Oh well, when everyone gets tired of watching you flail around and not get anywhere, I guess the point will be made..
I can tell you don’t watch LOST. What Heroes is going through right now has happened a few times on LOST so far. The problem with serial drama is that you need the dud episodes to setup the good and great episodes. While it would be ideal to have action packed episodes every week, it’s just not possible. Episodic television has the ability to reset the characters every week and start a new story arc. Since serial shows just pick up where they left off the week before it’s kinda like a game of chess. All the characters need to be moved into their positions before you can achieve a checkmate. This really pisses off fickle viewers who watch CSI every week, since every episode doesn’t have a satisfying resolution. But when you wade through a few boring episodes it usually pays off with spades. Watching serial drama requires patience.
It is my considered opinion that history will look back on Heroes as the most relevant example of a stellar show that vanished into an abyss of epic suck during its second season.
IMHO, Heroes peaked during Season 1 at episode 20 (the dark future episode), and has never recovered.
The problem, as far as I can fathom it, is twofold. Firstly, bear in mind that Heroes, for all its apparent flash, is a low budget show. It makes heavy use of cheap greenscreen effects rather than actual locations, and the majority of “powers” require no expensive visual FX eg Mika, Parkman, Nicky, etc etc. Peter’s constant wussiness about his powers is largely budgetary, I think.
The second problem is Heroes’ meteoric rise to popularity. It was projected as a 15 episode one-off series, but by episode 11 it was clear that the show was HUUUUUUUUUGE, and extra episodes were commissioned. This resulted in the writers having to shove a lot of cotton wool and sawdust in to fill the substantial gaps created by stretching the plot points out by an extra 8 episodes.
Ged is correct, Series 2 has utterly failed to start. It has become Desperate Housewives. I’ll keep watching, but I no longer care.
reply to JamEs:
But James, none of the episodes are “action-packed”. Last season is a perfect example. The entire season built up to a grand battle between Peter and Silar and they went with 1 TK action (bullets back @ Matt), then it was Peter swaggering over saying, “I’ll handle this”. With all the powers at his disposal, he chose to punch Silar in the mouth? Then explode?
*I* could have written a better ending and I’m not a writer..
Sorry, after 23+ episodes, that ending just sucked.. period..
I, like the writer of this blog, didn’t get into Heroes until I could watch it in a Marathon format on DVD. No commercials, no interruptions. It was easy to follow the storyline without ads for the latest Scion or people letting me know that Mydol helps their cramps. I started to watch this season while it was airing and seemed to lose interest a LOT. I finally just set my DVR to record and started watching without commercial interruptions. It has made ALL the difference.
Damn jamEs, you must be related to Parkman because you were reading my mind. I was just thinking about the chess analogy this morning. These first few Heroes episodes of Season 2 have definitely been about moving the characters into place, and I think that we’ll be able to look back and say, “Oh, that’s why they did that?” The next couple shows should answer some questions, but like in Lost they’ll also bring up more. I’m certainly looking forward to Four Months Ago, which ought to explain much of what happened between the end of Season 1 and the beginning of Season 2.
Part of the fun for me in watching Heroes (as well as Lost) is the experience outside of just the hour it’s on TV each week. There are the graphic novels, the 360 sites (Primatech Paper, Activating Evolution, & Yamagato Fellowship) the fan podcasts (http://www.thetenthwonder.com/- my favorite since early S1), and the many forums where fans can share their reactions, theories, praise, and complaints. Trying to piece together the puzzle adds to the appeal of both shows. Fill in the Company for the Dharma Initiative and everything little nugget of revealed information leads to some gratification, but always more questions and speculation.
To those who expected a knockdown, action-packed, drawn out fight in the Season Finale, remember the conversation Charles Deveaux and Peter have in that episode –
Charles – “You came here because you needed to. You needed to hear the truth before you could save the world.”
Peter – “I save the world?”
Charles – “You’ve had the power all along, Peter. You just needed to learn how to use it.”
Peter – “Why me?”
Charles – “Because there has to be one that’s good. There always has. And your heart has the ability to love unconditionally. Like I told you, in the end, all that really matters is love.”
Cheesy? Maybe? But very telling. Size matters not.
I think that the effects last week looked really campy but over all im happy with the direction of this season. there just building up. *:)*
There seem to be a lot of people around here that are optimistic that the creators of the show do have an overall plan, one which will make the episodes that we’ve slogged through thus far worthwhile.
That’s certainly a possibility, but here’s the problem I have with that notion: the creators of the show haven’t tipped their hand enough to viewers to prove that is the case. The audience needs hints from time to time that we’re headed somewhere, and the glacial pace of the episodes thus far hasn’t done much to prove that. Indeed, much of what we’ve seen could have been successfully done in half as many as it’s taken.
The old cliché is that the journey is more worthwhile than the destination, but in this instance thus far the journey has been like a bus ride through flatlands. If there are mountains on the horizon I’ve yet to see them, and the bus driver so far hasn’t given any indication that they’re coming (yes, I carried that analogy too far, but hopefully it does illustrate my point!)
That people have to look at summaries online of upcoming episodes to know that what they’ve seen may turn out to be worthwhile is proof enough that the show is in trouble, I think.
The show seems to be more about trying to introduce (more) ethnic diversity so far this season… cause apparently someone felt there wasn’t enough… honestly some of the new characters are more annoying than interesting this far… I jsut hope it starts to pick up soon or I’m going to stop bothering to “make” time to watch it and just look for the reruns when I have the time…
According to TV guide, Adam Monroe left that note, and he is Taekezo Kensai, Who is the Killer of the 1st Gen. of the Company. Thank You TV Guide!
I didn’t jump in ’til like episode seven or eight of the first season. I also assumed it would be Mutant X or Birds of Prey caliber network comic nonsense, but once I saw an episode and dispatched with my assumptions, I was SOOO onboard for the ride and completely enthralled by every episode (until the finale, definitely some disappointment there), My point, however, I went back and watched the initial episodes I had missed on Winamp and thought they also had a pretty slow build-up. I thought I hadn’t really missed much and that jumping in so late in the game actually served to stoke my interest further. That being said, the shit this season better start getting interesting real soon. This will be episode seven of this season and not a single episode of season two has had me excited or anticipating the next. Loyalty is still there but I’m getting hella bored so far.
It’s been weak up until last week’s, which was fantastic. I’m hoping tonight will get us back into the groove.
Ged – I hope you watched tonight’s episode and are writing a new post 🙂 The pieces have been set…
Based on comments here and a positive review I saw elsewhere I decided to download last night’s episode. Unfortunately my feelings remain mixed on the show.
At long last the writers have finally pulled together some of the plot threads, but I do wonder if it’s far too late at this point. They certainly shouldn’t have waited until episode 7 — much of this should have taken place by episode 3 or 4 in order to maintain a decent pace (and they probably would have lost fewer viewers that way as well).
Some may argue that the slow pace allowed character development, and that’s certainly something I’m not opposed to. In fact, I enjoy it when a show fleshes out its characters. But what has taken place in the previous six episodes has been little more than going through the motions.
Would I — indeed, would many of us who’ve commented on the poor planning of this season — not have complained if much of this had taken place sooner? I definitely think so.
And thank God Matt was allowed to succeed for once. He’s always been one of my favorite characters, and I thought Greg Grundberg did a great job with his scenes.
I’ll give the show another shot next week, and fingers crossed it’s another step towards the sort of entertainment the show provided last season.
“At long last the writers have finally pulled together some of the plot threads, but I do wonder if it’s far too late at this point. They certainly shouldn’t have waited until episode 7 — much of this should have taken place by episode 3 or 4 in order to maintain a decent pace (and they probably would have lost fewer viewers that way as well).”
Did you watch the first season?????????????
I mean we didn’t actually SEE Sylar until like ep 8 man… relax
@ Oea520 —
Entertainingly enough, Kring just said the same thing I did 🙂
About the Hiro storyline: “should have [lasted] three episodes. We didn’t give the audience enough story to justify the time we allotted it.”
The issue with pacing it’s that it worked perfectly with the first season as we were being introduced to the “world” of Heroes, its characters, and the challenges they faced. When the second season came along, it tried to do much the same thing — but the audience was already aquainted with that world. We didn’t need to re-learn the rules, what the characters can do, and so on. Kring and the writers had the opportunity to jump into the story much sooner and still introduce new characters and situations as they saw fit, but chose a different route (which has been discussed ad nauseam here).
Ugggh, they had to retool the season finale AND they’re looking to “reboot” for season 3. No thanks to a reboot.
Ged,
I absolutely agree with you 100% Though I have to admidt this weeks (11/12/07) episode was the best of this season and even felt like it might be getting better. They should have actually started season two with “four months later”. That was a major boo boo on their part.