I’m interested again, but only to the extent of wanting to find out where all the balls they just threw up in the air will land, and unfortunately, I suspect I can guess. Heroes arcs are almost always structured around an effort to prevent a story from happening, which (1) is almost always less interesting than the prospect of the story happening, (2) encourages the more solipsistic and rebarbative habits of any long-running TV series, and (3) usually leaves you running in place. Especially when your enabling device is time travel, and several of your characters have a healing factor.
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One of the big problems I have with Heroes post-s1 is that now Peter and Hiro are fully in control of their powers, they (and Peter especially) are virtually unstoppable, and they have to put a lot of effort into finding kryptonite for them. S2 used amnesia and feudal Japan, s3 appears to be using future-Peter and something with Ando to sideline Hiro, but it’s hard to do it when I am just wondering why Hiro can’t just time-travel and fix all his cockups.
(Episode one, or episodes one and two? The plot is too much of the fun to risk spoilers.)
I was utterly surprised to really enjoy the first three episodes of Heroes S3, considering what a mess S2 was.
There’s lots of emo, but plenty of fun to counter it. There’s some weird mysteries, which they’ll either sort out because they know what they’re doing, or they’ll mess up because they just threw them in because it sounded fun at the time…
Of course, if it’s the latter and it turns out to be Ron Moore rather than Alan Moore (so to speak) then I’ll probably stop watching once it becomes clear that there’s no plan. For now, it’s fun!
That said, Sarah Connor Chronicles is more intelligent (mostly), and Chuck is just funnnnnnn!
Liz: yes. Is there anyone left who doesn’t think Peter and Sylar shouldn’t both have died at the end of S1? Oh, and just episode one, not episodes one and two.
Peter: I’m pretty sure they’re not making it up as they go along, but I’m also pretty sure that the result at the end of the season will be a marginally modified status quo. Heroes plots are like those magic slipknots that vanish when you tug on them: after all, there’s not a whole lot in the first episode of S3 that couldn’t have happened immediately after S1.
I’m very happy to hear your comment that season 2 doesn’t seem to have changed much, since I made a considered decision to skip it completely, and am now considering giving it a go for season 3. I’ll be interested to see how much I’ve missed.
There are a few characters who will be new to you, but I think they’re re-introduced pretty well, and I can’t think of much that involves them (so far!) that depends on knowing their role in S2.
The first season of Heroes was great, because no-one knew what was going to happen. And they even had the audacity to kill one character off-screen in the comic.
Since then, they’ve hit one of the main problems that seems to hit every TV show that starts off being different and unpredictable; the audience want more of the same. Specifically, they want to see more of the fan-favourite characters. So that’s why Peter, Nathan and Sylar don’t stay dead, and it’s why now when characters are in peril we don’t worry so much – ‘they can’t possibly kill them off, the audience wouldn’t stand for it!’
The nigh-certainty that none of the main characters will ever suffer permanent harm or death would have bothered me in the show that I thought Heroes was trying to be when it started, about a bunch of normal people with superpowers. In the show that Heroes has developed into, which is a sprawling epic melodrama, I don’t mind so much as long as what happens is epic and melodramatic enough to hold my interest while I’m watching, and as long as it doesn’t pretend to be anything more.
I’d agree with that, to an extent. Where I’d diverge is that I found a lot of the second season didn’t hold my interest; too often I was left with the impression that a returning character was there not because the story dictated it, but because they had to bring that character back and get them involved somehow.
In any case, I shall be approaching season three with an open mind. But if if gets too melodramatic and uninteresting, then I shall start throwing my toys out of the pram.
Where I’d diverge is that I found a lot of the second season didn’t hold my interest
Oh, mine neither; I came into this season needing the show to do something to justify me continuing to watch it, and the gist of my post is that the first episode did it, just about, sort of. In some ways I’m surprised I don’t feel more bitterly disappointed by Heroes, because most days of the week I would prefer the show it appeared to be when it started.
Having now actually watched the first episode, I have a number of thoughts. Some good, some bad, but I think they’ve done enough to justify watching it.
Just, one thing. I can’t be the only person to think they’ve been taking lessons from RTD, can I?
I have to admit I don’t quite see the RTD influence myself … expand?
It’s a bit tongue-in-cheek, I admit, but my first thought on seeing the same painting appear twice was “BAD WOLF”. Whether it’ll carry on appearing in each episode, well, we’ll see, I suppose.
Ah, that! I mentally put it into the same category as the helix motif that cropped up everywhere in the first season, but you’re right, the painting seems to imply an agent to paint it, which the helix didn’t require.