Lots and Lots of Heroes
Just so I can feel I did something remotely productive with my weekend in which I spent the entire time sitting on the couch watching my shiny new Heroes season one box set, I wrote ‘some’ thoughts. ‘Some’ of course meaning about two pages in Word. *cough* Anyway…
Heroes: Season One
I still think that the Bennet family story is the greatest thing about season one. I mean, you go from wanting the cheerleader to get as far away from the bad glasses man as possible at the beginning to so incredibly happy that Claire and Noah walk off home together at the end. Though it’s not just Noah and Claire - I adore Sandra, Mr. Muggles and even Lyle (I wish he got to talk more). I would really like to see what prompted Sandra to stick with Noah. Or what happened to Sandra and Lyle between Parasite and Four Months Later. Were the captured by the Company? Did they go on the run? Did the Company take in Mr. Bennet while they were out and they had no clue where he was and just stay put? I have this crazy little plot bunny in which, at Sandra’s request, Bennet and Claire spring Mr. Muggles from the canine hotel the Company put him in. And please please please PTB have some sort of Petrelli-Bennet family gathering in the future. The awkwardness alone would be all kinds of hilarious.
Speaking of Mr. Bennet, I really really do adore the character to bits (and the actor too, Jack Coleman’s quite wonderful). I could rave on about him for ages since he’s one of the best characters I’ve seen on TV in a long while. The character has sides, ya’ll, and every single one of them is believable. Mr. Bennet (I can’t really call him Noah just yet, it’s weird) is a slightly geeky and overprotective suburban father who takes pride in his job and loves his family. But he is also HRG, the creepy secret agent type who’s quite at home threatening people with a gun, taking on people far more powerful than he is and totally doesn’t mind the means (however gruesome) because he believes in the ends. I mean, you get both those characters a lot, but rarely do you get the both in one. And it’s not like they’re fully separate entities either, you see shades of one emerging in the other from time to time. And Bennet always has a plan. *loves*
On to the Petrellis, I alternate between loving and hating Nathan, depending on whether he’s being an arse towards Clair and Peter or not. Though whatever I think about Nathan, I’ve got to admit Adrian Pasdar is fracking hot. Also He and Hiro need to have more scenes together, their chemistry was awesome (“flying man!” XD). The Petrelli family though is just so amazingly screwed up it’s another brilliant thing about the show. More Angela Petrelli please - because she’s fascinating. Then again, somewhat-evil society widows always win.
Can I just be indifferent to Mohinder and Peter. They’re both lovely to look at, that’s for certain, and both of them have their moments of awesomeness, and moments where you just have to smile and want to pat them on the head for being well meaning, if a little dim.
I’m disappointed Isaac had to die. I know they’ve managed to integrate his paintings into season two, but they’re going to run out of them eventually, and I love the paintings. They’re gorgeous.
Hiro’s really really cute, but gets annoying at times. I love him and Ando together, and I love it when he teams up with the other powered characters, and I loved him with Charlie. But, the constant plotlines to keep him out of New York and de-powering him seemed to drag on and were rather pointless. I do adore the way they managed to get the flashback episodes happening by having him travel to those times as opposed to ‘let’s just look at the characters six months back for the hell of it.’ It gives the whole show a feeling of going in a straight chronological line, despite the future and past episodes.
I think Peter, Sylar and Parkman really shouldn’t have survived. Peter because he’s to powerful. They’re constantly going to have to do something with him to keep him out of the way so the other characters can struggle against the odds. Because really, when you’ve got Peter, the problem’s sorted since he’s their power’s combined. Sylar should die because he’s fulfilled his purpose of being the creepy villain and, again, he’s two powerful. Thing is, it’s the weaker characters that tend to be more interesting, i.e. one’s without powers such as Bennet, Mohinder, Ando, because they the odds are far more against them.
I also adore Sylar. I think as a villain he reaches his peak at about Distractions, when he goes after Sandra, which was also the point when I realised I loved this show. Thing is, I like him being a one-note killing machine. I like how he doesn’t really have layers and is pretty irredeemable. Better to have let him go out that way than constantly try to integrate him into the storyline.
And Parkman should have died because he’s boring. Who really cares about his marriage problems? He does get more interesting towards the end of the season, but I think that’s only because he ends up being Bennet’s sidekick, and when characters orbit Bennet, the tend to pick up some of the awesome.
Also, it would have been nice if Niki/Jessica, DL and Micah disappeared; their storyline was quite dull as well, which is a shame because Ali Larter does the whole multiple personality thing brilliantly, Jessica is really fun to watch at times, and Micah’s cute. But their plotline drags on for freaking ever and you just want them off the screen so the storyline can focus on the more interesting characters.
Meanwhile Claude needs to come back. Hell, Claude needs to travel from television show to television show finding the worst emo!hero characters and whacking them on the head with a stick and throwing them off 30-story buildings. Even better would be to team him up with Bennet and they can run Claude and Bennet’s school for fictitious characters teaching them how to be angsty but not emo.
But Heroes wins, because no other television show has made me sit up and go “Oh, hell yeah!” quite as much as Heroes does.
And because I love lists, I present twelve reasons to watch season one:
1. The bridge scene(s) in Company Man, hell, just the entirety of Company Man
2. Matt, Ted and Bennet’s jail spring in 0.07%
3. Any scene in which flying is involved (Hiros, Unexpected, Five Years Gone and How to Stop an Exploding Man)
4. Claude ‘training’ Peter by throwing him off a thirty story building and whacking him with a stick in Distractions and Unexpected
5. Matt vs. Jessica in Run!
6. “Your last thought!” in Landslide (and if you’ve ever watched Doctor Who: The Movie, you’ll probably love this scene even more)
7. Sylar going after Sandra Bennet in Distractions (and Bennet storming into the house, gun drawn: “He dies!”)
8. The entirety of Five Years Gone
9. Claire’s escape from Nathan and Angela in How to Stop and Exploding Man
10. Any scene with Hiro and Nathan (“flying man!”)
11. Hiro, Charlie and the paper cranes in Six Months Ago
12. How, in the end, they stop an exploding man.
Heroes: Season One
I still think that the Bennet family story is the greatest thing about season one. I mean, you go from wanting the cheerleader to get as far away from the bad glasses man as possible at the beginning to so incredibly happy that Claire and Noah walk off home together at the end. Though it’s not just Noah and Claire - I adore Sandra, Mr. Muggles and even Lyle (I wish he got to talk more). I would really like to see what prompted Sandra to stick with Noah. Or what happened to Sandra and Lyle between Parasite and Four Months Later. Were the captured by the Company? Did they go on the run? Did the Company take in Mr. Bennet while they were out and they had no clue where he was and just stay put? I have this crazy little plot bunny in which, at Sandra’s request, Bennet and Claire spring Mr. Muggles from the canine hotel the Company put him in. And please please please PTB have some sort of Petrelli-Bennet family gathering in the future. The awkwardness alone would be all kinds of hilarious.
Speaking of Mr. Bennet, I really really do adore the character to bits (and the actor too, Jack Coleman’s quite wonderful). I could rave on about him for ages since he’s one of the best characters I’ve seen on TV in a long while. The character has sides, ya’ll, and every single one of them is believable. Mr. Bennet (I can’t really call him Noah just yet, it’s weird) is a slightly geeky and overprotective suburban father who takes pride in his job and loves his family. But he is also HRG, the creepy secret agent type who’s quite at home threatening people with a gun, taking on people far more powerful than he is and totally doesn’t mind the means (however gruesome) because he believes in the ends. I mean, you get both those characters a lot, but rarely do you get the both in one. And it’s not like they’re fully separate entities either, you see shades of one emerging in the other from time to time. And Bennet always has a plan. *loves*
On to the Petrellis, I alternate between loving and hating Nathan, depending on whether he’s being an arse towards Clair and Peter or not. Though whatever I think about Nathan, I’ve got to admit Adrian Pasdar is fracking hot. Also He and Hiro need to have more scenes together, their chemistry was awesome (“flying man!” XD). The Petrelli family though is just so amazingly screwed up it’s another brilliant thing about the show. More Angela Petrelli please - because she’s fascinating. Then again, somewhat-evil society widows always win.
Can I just be indifferent to Mohinder and Peter. They’re both lovely to look at, that’s for certain, and both of them have their moments of awesomeness, and moments where you just have to smile and want to pat them on the head for being well meaning, if a little dim.
I’m disappointed Isaac had to die. I know they’ve managed to integrate his paintings into season two, but they’re going to run out of them eventually, and I love the paintings. They’re gorgeous.
Hiro’s really really cute, but gets annoying at times. I love him and Ando together, and I love it when he teams up with the other powered characters, and I loved him with Charlie. But, the constant plotlines to keep him out of New York and de-powering him seemed to drag on and were rather pointless. I do adore the way they managed to get the flashback episodes happening by having him travel to those times as opposed to ‘let’s just look at the characters six months back for the hell of it.’ It gives the whole show a feeling of going in a straight chronological line, despite the future and past episodes.
I think Peter, Sylar and Parkman really shouldn’t have survived. Peter because he’s to powerful. They’re constantly going to have to do something with him to keep him out of the way so the other characters can struggle against the odds. Because really, when you’ve got Peter, the problem’s sorted since he’s their power’s combined. Sylar should die because he’s fulfilled his purpose of being the creepy villain and, again, he’s two powerful. Thing is, it’s the weaker characters that tend to be more interesting, i.e. one’s without powers such as Bennet, Mohinder, Ando, because they the odds are far more against them.
I also adore Sylar. I think as a villain he reaches his peak at about Distractions, when he goes after Sandra, which was also the point when I realised I loved this show. Thing is, I like him being a one-note killing machine. I like how he doesn’t really have layers and is pretty irredeemable. Better to have let him go out that way than constantly try to integrate him into the storyline.
And Parkman should have died because he’s boring. Who really cares about his marriage problems? He does get more interesting towards the end of the season, but I think that’s only because he ends up being Bennet’s sidekick, and when characters orbit Bennet, the tend to pick up some of the awesome.
Also, it would have been nice if Niki/Jessica, DL and Micah disappeared; their storyline was quite dull as well, which is a shame because Ali Larter does the whole multiple personality thing brilliantly, Jessica is really fun to watch at times, and Micah’s cute. But their plotline drags on for freaking ever and you just want them off the screen so the storyline can focus on the more interesting characters.
Meanwhile Claude needs to come back. Hell, Claude needs to travel from television show to television show finding the worst emo!hero characters and whacking them on the head with a stick and throwing them off 30-story buildings. Even better would be to team him up with Bennet and they can run Claude and Bennet’s school for fictitious characters teaching them how to be angsty but not emo.
But Heroes wins, because no other television show has made me sit up and go “Oh, hell yeah!” quite as much as Heroes does.
And because I love lists, I present twelve reasons to watch season one:
1. The bridge scene(s) in Company Man, hell, just the entirety of Company Man
2. Matt, Ted and Bennet’s jail spring in 0.07%
3. Any scene in which flying is involved (Hiros, Unexpected, Five Years Gone and How to Stop an Exploding Man)
4. Claude ‘training’ Peter by throwing him off a thirty story building and whacking him with a stick in Distractions and Unexpected
5. Matt vs. Jessica in Run!
6. “Your last thought!” in Landslide (and if you’ve ever watched Doctor Who: The Movie, you’ll probably love this scene even more)
7. Sylar going after Sandra Bennet in Distractions (and Bennet storming into the house, gun drawn: “He dies!”)
8. The entirety of Five Years Gone
9. Claire’s escape from Nathan and Angela in How to Stop and Exploding Man
10. Any scene with Hiro and Nathan (“flying man!”)
11. Hiro, Charlie and the paper cranes in Six Months Ago
12. How, in the end, they stop an exploding man.