Word’s out today that a couple of the characters from Heroes last season may not, in fact, actually be dead. It’s doubtful that this will be enough to bring me back to watch Season 2 – I still think the writing near the end of the first season was pretty lousy. But it is interesting that Kring has provided an ‘out’ for these characters. I’ll probably sit back and listen to reviews. If they end up being positive enough, maybe I’ll catch up.
Tags: heroes, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
Season 1 of Heroes goes on sale August 28th. Nope, I won’t be buying it.
Tags: heroes, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
Well, Season One of Heroes is now complete, and to be honest, I’m not sure I’ll even bother tuning in for Season Two. Tim Kring has me that upset with his piss-poor writing. I could have written a better show here, and I’ve been tempted to draft a couple of sample scripts for episodes myself just to prove that I can. Mind you, I don’t want an X-Men knock-off here. That’s been done already, and by much better writers than Kring. But Kring’s premise for the show was fabulous. In the X-Men series, you have mutants who effectively become larger than life. In Heroes you have regular people coming into their abilities who just want to continue being regular people. Kring tried to tackle this subject – and failed. Miserably. What he ended up with were weak, pathetic people who were never really able to get a handle on who they were now. His characters all felt watered-down and washed out.
The moral of the show came out in the final monologue – the hero’s true values are not the powers he possesses but the people he comes into contact with and loves – but I suspect that moral will have gotten lost in the absolutely terrible way the show ended. I can even see how Kring tried to demonstrate this moral in each of his characters’ development throughout the season, but I think it could have been done much better.
Kring can write drama (albeit, not well), and he can certainly handle suspense (he had me on the edge of my seat more often than not this season) – but I’m convinced that Kring has no clue how to write conflict. Every single instance of conflict in every episode was like a flashbang – loud and noisy but ultimately causing no real damage. For instance, the first fight with Peter and Sylar was over before it even began. Peter hardly put up a real fight and then somehow (conveniently) ended up with his back to Sylar. Likewise, the final battle with Sylar was sloppy and chaotic. Niki had one solid strike in, and Peter, who supposedly has all this power and great ability, opts to use his frickin’ fists on Sylar’s face? Remember? The guy with the great telekinetic ability? And of course Hiro’s little jab was cheesy and completely unbelievable. But there are others, as well. Niki’s physical attacks were always one strike, and then it was either the victim was rendered unconscious or Kring decided it was to cut to another scene. See? Even he realized he had no grasp on writing conflict. Turns out, it was just easier for him to change the subject rather than let us see that too soon. But he couldn’t avoid that in the final battle, and there we got to see what a hack he truly is.
I’m disappointed in the lack of real character development in this season. It’s my opinion that Kring set too high a goal by creating so many characters for himself. Some TV writers could have developed whole, well-rounded characters that only got richer and fuller as the season went on (see: Joss Whedon). Kring’s characters, if anything, seemed to become more shallow and faded the closer to the finale we got. I don’t feel like any of them really grew or developed all that much, mostly because they simply continued to react to events around them rather than becoming stronger and taking a more proactive stance. Sure, there were many feints and attempts at action – Hiro’s first attempt to destroy Sylar, Peter and Claire searching New York, Parkman and Bennett going after Molly – but mostly everyone seemed to be trying to run away.
Conspiracies were revealed, and only some of the answers were given. This part I’m fine with – I like a little suspense. But the pacing was all wrong. I could deal with the first half dozen episodes kind of dragging out answers for us, but they never really seemed to gather any steam from there. Kring knew he had a good thing with the cliffhanger, but then couldn’t seem to find the courage to move behind the cliffhanger and give us some real action. All these characters had such great potential to become true superheroes, to develop and become true forces for good. Sadly, I think he mostly ended up with superflops, and this is why this former fan may not be able to stomach tuning in for Season Two next fall.
I loved the principle of this show. I think it had merit. Frankly, I think it still does. But I think Kring needs to concede control of the writing to someone else, someone who can actually write for TV and do these characters justice. They have the potential to be inspiring, engaging, and interesting. Right now, they’re… not. I think I’m almost sorry now I even got hooked on this show. It certainly didn’t meet my expectations in the end.
Tags: heroes, Rants, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
I’ve little good to say about this season finale. To say it was anti-climactic would be a major understatement. It was simply terrible.
Sure, Kring tied up most of his loose ends – Claire found her adoptive father again, Niki finally banished the demon of Jessica and reunited with Micah and D.L., Hiro fulfilled his fate and saved Ando at the same time, Parkman did his part to stop Sylar (albeit ending up in critical condition), Mohinder has a new cause, and Peter and Nathan saved the world – or at least, New York City. Kring also managed to open some new doors, alluding to a villain worse than Sylar who can see Molly when she thinks about him. Sylar, of course, isn’t dead, but we knew this would be the case. Questions were raised about Simone’s father, questions that I suspect will forever go unanswered; I simply don’t think we’ll ever really get to see much about this elusive and shadowy group of which Linderman, Peter’s mom, and Simone’s father were all a part, let alone what made them special to begin with.
There was so much bad writing in this episode that I hardly know where to begin. Niki and Candace’s face-off was weak and pathetic – a couple of punches thrown, and it was all over. And somehow that was Niki’s catalyst for putting Jessica behind her. Somehow.
Nathan’s inner dilemma was there, but if you weren’t paying attention, you could almost miss it completely. In fact, had it not been for his mother saying something to him (“I know what you’re thinking, Nathan – don’t do it.”), it’s likely that it would have gone completely unnoticed. Shoddy writing, to be sure.
And what was up with that “fight” with Sylar at the end? I use the word “fight” loosely here, because there really wasn’t much of a fight at all. Sylar shows up, puts Peter in a choke he can’t break (even though he was put in a very similar choke hold by the invisible man during his training which he broke free of just fine there), and then gets knocked down by Niki. Fine, I can accept that he might have gotten blindsided there. But then Peter tells Niki to go to her family and get them out of there, which she does – without argument. And then she doesn’t get her family away. What?! Niki, are you feeling alright?
Then, Sylar is able to stop Peter cold in his tracks, even stops bullets from Parkman’s gun (and throws them back at him), but he gives Hiro a 10-foot running start at him and doesn’t prevent him from running him through?! I don’t get what Kring was going for here. Any moron can see that this sequence of events just completely breaks the suspension of disbelief. I’m sorry, sir – I’m not buying anything today. You’re going to have to do much better than that to convince me that Sylar didn’t see that one coming. It would have been much more convincing if Hiro had teleported around Sylar several times, keeping him on his toes, then appearing suddenly in front him with the instant fatal jab through the chest. Instead, we got a paltry running Japanese man that anyone would have had time to sidestep to let him fall flat on his face. And Sylar wouldn’t have had to work that hard at it.
And the final coup de grac on this whole fiasco – Nathan and Peter doing the noble thing and sacrificing themselves for the world (or at least, New York City). I hate to break it to you, Mr. Kring, there was no victory in this, no triumph, no glory. Only pathetic writing that says to me that you didn’t know what the heck it was you intended to do here. Peter overcame nothing, learned nothing, mastered nothing. Nathan’s sudden appearance to save the day was cheap and flimsy, unsurprising insofar as it went – he was never more than a paper character to begin with. And instead of having the cheerleader truly save the world by being the one to help Peter control his nuclear ability, she stood by helplessly while Heroes went to hell because the most powerful hero of them all couldn’t even save himself.
Peter may not be truly dead, of course – his ability to heal will likely have saved him from that fate. But Nathan is almost certainly gone, and maybe Season 2 will be the stronger for it. When all is said and done, though, I think this was probably the single worst episode of the entire season. I was expecting some huge climactic event to happen here. The entire season was building toward one – or at least trying to, if Kring hadn’t kept getting in the way. If nothing else, the final battle with Sylar should have been huge, epic, and nearly apocalyptic. But no – like everything else about this show, it fizzled, turning Heroes into a 23-episode fart.
Thanks very much, Mr. Kring. You’ve just ensured that I will never watch anything you write or produce ever again.
Tags: heroes, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
Next to last episode of the season, and this one comes with a bit of the good and a bit of the bad. Let’s start with the bad.
Once again, Mr. Kring demonstrates a bad case of clumsy screen-writing. He’s driving at a goal, that being the impression that the future simply cannot be changed. Everything that Hiro and Ando saw in the future is coming to pass. People are dying, and the dominoes are lining up to create exactly the bleak future that we witnessed just a couple of episodes. We knew this was coming, though. The season finale has to end on this climax. What is going to matter is those final five minutes before the blast.
But Kring is taking shortcuts in the writing, cutting corners on plot points because, quite simply, he’s running out of time to tell his story. We need Hiro to be more warrior and less comic book geek. So, we have him spend a couple of hours – at most – sparring with his father, learning in that time fighting techniques that take a lifetime to master. This is all forgetting, of course, that those techniques are virtually worthless against the likes of Sylar. With a flick of his fingers, he can freeze Hiro right in place and take the top off his head. Hiro’s only true advantage over Sylar is in maintaining his focus on concentration at holding time in place while he makes the heart-thrust necessary to end the villain. But of course, even this cannot happen – Kring tells us that Sylar’s evil will continue.
Ando is a bit of a puzzle. At one moment he is Hiro’s faithful puppy-dog, encouraging him with his absolute devotion and trust, and the next he’s taking matters into his own hands because he’s so sure that Hiro is going to bail out on his duty to save the world. This, too, is Kring trying to drive the plot toward its fateful conclusion, but this element also reeks of clumsiness.
Niki/Jessica is still an almost pointless character. Who is she right now, aside from a driven and protective mother with super-strength? We saw in this episode the beginnings of what I believe is finally the merger of these two split personalities into a cohesive whole. But we’ve still hardly seen what this woman can really do. She’s ruthless, we know, and she is adept at the art of killing. But there is much more potential here than a pseudo-evil Wonder Woman – which makes me wonder if Kring will ever really tap into this potential. We caught a glimpse of what Niki can be in this episode. I want to see it taken further.
Those two gripes aside, the rest of what I’ve seen has been good. Really good.
The heroes are all grouping together now, using their abilities together to accomplish common goals. This is almost as thrilling now as those first three or four episodes where the characters were just beginning to realize they are special. We’re starting to see just what they can do, both individually and as teams. Some of it’s a little cheesy, even yet – like D.L.’s method of getting himself and Jessica through security in Linderman’s building – but it’s a start and most of it’s actually pretty good.
And the one thing element that I think has, for the most part, been strong all the way through the season is the character development. Each one has their own inner turmoils and dilemmas, their conflicts that continually put them between a rock and a hard place and force them to make conscious decisions. All of them, it seems, want to do what is right – none of them are sure what the right thing is to do. And so we see our heroes continually working together and then seemingly again at odds. It is a complex array of storytelling that weaves together for one larger, broader narrative, one that the city of New York may not survive.
Tags: heroes, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
It’s nice to see some lingering humanity in our favorite villain. He’s still a monster – but apparently he’s got a code of ethics, such as it is. Sylar kills the other Specials, takes their abilities, because he views them as being unworthy. He sees himself as the only one worthy to carry all these abilities and use them – though to what purpose and end we don’t know. But, when faced with the prospect that he may end up destroying millions of ‘innocents’ who have no special abilities, he hesitates and wrestles with the illogical nature of this seeming moral quandary.
Sylar still loves his mother, and in fact, seeks her approval. She herself seems to be the sort of self-involved woman who is utterly incapable of dealing with reality as it is. She has to create a fiction in her mind, both for herself and for her son, a sort of watered-down delusion of the way she thinks things ought to be. She wants her son Gabriel to be special, to be something more than he is – while he wants nothing more than to be normal again.
For the first time, we realize that Sylar is actually caught in a dilemma. He has suddenly found himself to be Special and is compelled to become even more special. We find in this episode, though, that this compulsion is driven with the power of an obsessive-compulsive. It seems that, all things being equal, if Sylar had the power to do so he would change things so that all people could be normal again, equal again, if only so he himself could find inner peace.
Sylar’s view of the other Specials seems to be mixed – at times he almost seems to harbor some small amount of guilt over his killings, but at others he sounds both vengeful and justified in them. And his reticence to kill millions of innocents adds another layer to his character that begs a question – were he to acquire all of the specials of all the Specials out there, what then would he do? Would he then use them to ‘protect’ those selfsame innocents through ruthless dictatorship? This is a question that we will likely never see an answer to. For now, Sylar himself may not know the answer to that question. He is simply driven to acquire more power from those too unworthy to carry them.
We continue to drive relentlessly toward the climax of the season. The heroes are gathering in New York, and we are left with Peter beginning to absorb Ted’s power. Hiro’s sword has been broken, though it seems to work every bit as well to help him focus his power. Mikah is in New York – for whatever Linderman’s purpose is for him; Niki and DL are looking for him. Parkman and Ted are with HRG now, as well as with Claire and Peter. And Nathan is being asked by his mother – who is apparently one of Linderman’s inner circle and who may herself possess some sort of ability we have to see – to allow the bomb and restore hope to the world in the aftermath. The plot thickens, as they say, and we can only speculate as to what will happen next.
Tags: heroes, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
I have to admit, Mr. Kring, that last night’s episode was better than some of your most recent episodes have been. It wasn’t blow-you-out-of-the-water good, it wasn’t showstopping or jawdropping, but the scripting was at least consistent and driving all the way to the end. I didn’t notice any glaring holes in the plot, no strange turns-of-phrase, nothing but a terrifying glimpse of a possible future.
One thing you have done very adequately, Mr. Kring, is create characters that we all care about. I was all aquiver inside as I watched my favorite characters – one who should have been allies and friends – duke it out, to the detriment of them all. I watched in horror as some of my favorites died and as the brutal scope of your terrible villain’s plans came to light. These characters are believable and likable because, special powers aside, they are all just like you and me – people with loves and hates, struggling just to do the best they can in life. They find themselves caught between a rock and a hard place, at odds with the people they love and trust and with doing what is right. Last night’s episode demonstrated just how easily a person’s loyalties may become divided and how they may ultimately end up serving evil unintentionally, all from the pursuit of trying to do what is right. The path of choices – both good and bad – can often lead to unintended destinations.
It was kind of cool to get a better look at our heroes to see how much better they might be able to handle their abilities in the near future. Peter is especially formidable, which his peculiar ability to absorb the powers of the others and master them, as well. It was gratifying to be proven right on one of my predictions, yet again – to see Nikki and Jessica unified, with no loss of her singular strength and power. We can only hope now that the future that Hiro and the others create through stopping Peter from destroying New York City and Sylar from killing everyone else will be better than the one that we saw last night.
What did Hiro learn from his brief jaunt into the future? Certainly he met a couple of the other specials. And he learned, through Isaac’s art, that it is his fate to kill Sylar. He learned about one possible future, one which he now hopes to put a stop to and change for the better. But most of the other plot points and information that the audience learned was withheld from Hiro. So it will be up to him and the others to somehow determine what the catalyst is for Peter’s explosion and douse the fuse before it can create the cataclysm that destroys the world.
I approve of this episode, Mr. Kring, and I sincerely hope that the writing will only get better. I’m still waiting for another “Wow!” episode, like unto the first half dozen or so that began this series; I hope that’s something you can deliver – and soon.
Sincerely,
A Loyal Fan
Tags: heroes, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
I just love it when I’m right. I had predicted that Linderman was himself special, hence his fascination and connection with every single one of our heroes in this show – and I was right! Granted, the man is also a stark, raving lunatic, but I do believe his intentions are good. But it is not just his former core group of friends who have lost their way. Linderman has lost his, as well, if he believes his plan will really cede the results he desires.
And Kring must have heard his fans speak – this week’s episode had a voiceover, albeit from Linderman himself. Of course, with the kind of break they just came off of, the voiceover was more or less necessary to bring everyone back up to speed on what’s happening.
I must admit to being somewhat dissatisfied with the show as a whole right now, though. There’s been some commentary that Kring doesn’t seem to really know where he’s taking the show, and that it’s showing up in the hodge-podge manner of the overlapping story arcs. I’m ok with this, to some extent, because a lot of novelists don’t know where there books are going until they are done. What I’ve noticed, however, is that Kring’s writing seems…. shallow – a necessary evil for so many story arcs in one show, I admit, but in my opinion several story arcs does not necessarily mean that the writing need be any less rich. But I do get the impression that Kring isn’t quite sure what to do with all these special people, and so he’s started writing them more shallowly and thinly, spreading them out and never really letting the audience get to see or know any one of them for more than a few seconds. We know what they can do but we still don’t, for the most part, know who they are – and I, for one, would like to get to know these characters a lot better than I already do.
Along those same lines, I get the impression that Kring is getting impatient with his own storyline – and that’s never a good thing. The previews for next week suggest that at least one or two of the remaining chapters will be spent exploring the world of five years future, a world that none of us will like. I suspect that we’ll get to see our heroes with their developed abilities and that Kring will then try to tie that back into the bomb that will level New York. This could be done with such aplomb and flare as to leave us breathless with the beauty of it, but I suspect it will end up being just more shallow writing. There is so much potential here to make this a stunning final few episodes. I just don’t know if Kring has what it takes to write these episodes with that kind of artistry and skill.
I was very disappointed in the fight between Peter and Sylar. That had the potential to be epic, and instead it fell flat on its face. Literally. Twice. It was, in a word, pathetic. I can understand Kring not really wanting these two characters to truly face-off yet, but it certainly could have been better than it was. Heck, Peter had more than ample warning about what Sylar was planning to do, and yet he still fell victim to the trick. And why the heck was his back to Sylar, especially when he started out facing him?
I’m trying very hard not to be disillusioned by the way I think this show should be written, but honestly, I almost think I could make a better show of it than Kring is doing right now. I see narrative shortcuts taking place that serve to move the story forward but that do so very awkwardly. I’d even be ok with the fact that most of his characters have been blatantly ripped off from other sources, since for me it’s more about the way the story is told – but as you can see, I’m not altogether satisfied with how the story is being handled and would like to see Kring do some better things with it.
Anyone think he’d hire me on as a staff writer for the show? I’ll continue watching to the end, just because there are enough redeeming factors to keep it interesting and fun – and I’ll hope that the writing improves from here on out.
Tags: heroes, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
Heroes is back this coming Monday, and does anyone actually remember where we left off? This ultra-long break has left me, for one, very disconnected from the Heroes storyline. They had better give us a nice, long montage at the beginning of this week’s episode to refresh fans on what’s happening in the various storylines. I still don’t know what NBC was thinking, but it’s terrible form to string their audience out on a line like this. They do this with Season 2 and chances are good I simply won’t watch – DVD releases make it much more convenient to follow a serial plot than this start-and-stop method they’ve been doing.
No. I’m not bitter. Whatever would have given you that impression?
Bad form, NBC. Shame on you.
Tags: heroes, Rants, science-fiction, Speculative Fiction, tv
I’m having a day of snark – one of those where everything I want to write about involves some sort of sarcastic response toward ridiculous opinions and viewpoints. Hazards of coming off a couple of sick days, I suppose – I tend to be a little less patient and tolerant.
For starters, in response to the shooting at Virginia Tech the other day, gun control outcriers have cropped again. And they’re welcome to their opinions, of course. But I still think they’re wrong. There seems to be this mentality that allowing people to own and carry weapons will only cause the crime rate to increase, since guns will be that much more available. Almost without exception, though, I find that those opinions come from folks who have had very little exposure to guns. For those of us who have grown up with guns and have been taught how to safely handle them, we know that those folks who make the decision to 1) own guns and 2) earn the license that gives them the right to carry said guns are far more likely to handle them safely. These are the people who respect these weapons enough to, get this, keep one with them at all times. The people who go on these shooting sprees usually acquire their weapons by illegal means or, if they’ve acquired them legally, haven’t bothered to learn how to use them properly or gained the licenses necessary to carry them. In short, shooters like this do not respect the laws that govern the use and ownership of guns. It places those of us who actually do respect these laws in a difficult spot because the resultant fear from tragedies like these threatens the right of American citizens to own and carry guns.
Recognize this – psychos like this Virginia Tech shooter will always be able to find guns when they want them, no matter what sort of legislation is in place to make it “impossible” to do so. The black market will never be shut down. All these gun control laws do is make it more difficult for honest citizens to put a quick end to a shooter’s spree should such a crisis arise. Personally, I feel much safer with a licensed-to-carry citizen next to me than without. But then again, I realize that said citizen has been trained in how to use that weapon and would never casually use said weapon unless there was no other option.
The other thing that has my snark up right now involves Fox News apparent posthumous besmirching of Kurt Vonnegut. Apparently, Fox News ran a story the other day that wasn’t terribly flattering to the late science fiction author. Ultimately, I couldn’t care less what Fox News thinks of the author or how people are reacting to the news story. I deliberately tend to avoid the news in any form exactly because the news seems to bring out the worst in people.
What I am a little bit surprised by is Fox News’s deliberate mention of Vonnegut being a ‘leftist.’ Well, of course he was a leftist – most science fiction authors are. Read just about any science fiction novel, and you’ll see worlds in which religion is all but dead, with God having been debunked and traditional and historical forms of morality having been given up in favor of less restrictive and more ‘liberating’ personal values. These are worlds where anything goes, guilt-free, so long as others are not harmed in the process. This is the ideal of 21st-century man, to live as he desires rather than being bound to a set of rules set down by a third party, whatever that third party may be. This view is liberal and leftist, and for some reason this viewpoint, this hopeful future, goes hand-in-hand with science fiction. The shirking of religion, with all its rules and regulations, is seen as progress for mankind, and science fiction embraces this hope with vigor, eagerness, and passion.
What I’d like to see is science fiction where the future world doesn’t look all that much different to the world we see today, with the obvious exception of more advanced technology. I’d like to see some science fiction where, if anything, morality and religion have become more entrenched, just to see what that kind of world would like. I wouldn’t mind seeing such worlds built in both a positive and negative light, since either outcome is equally likely, in my opinion. Essentially, I’d like to see a more deliberate exploration of such universes. And just once, I’d like to see a world of the future where religion isn’t the demon that it’s made out to be today, where religion is actually beneficial and productive. Stephen Lawhead attempts this in his Empyrion set, and Orson Scott Card presents another version in his Ender series. But these are the exceptions, rather than the rule. I just tend to think that science fiction does not necessarily need to be divorced from religion and morality in order to be good and exceptional. But since many times science fiction expresses the ideologies of each writer, they tend toward a certain brand of preachiness against religion that grows wearisome after a while.
So that’s a bit of the snark factor bouncing around in my brain today. And now that it’s out there, perhaps it’ll leave me alone.
Tags: gun-control, kurt-vonnegut, morality, orson-scott-card, politics, religion, science-fiction, shooting, snark, stephen-lawhead, worldview
