io9 commenters are right. You keep asking me why I'm watching Heroes, and after last night's episode I'm finally beginning to wonder that myself. Now you can vote: Should I keep watching this show?
Feb 24, 2009 03:19 PM
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Wed Feb 10
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io9 commenters are right. You keep asking me why I'm watching Heroes, and after last night's episode I'm finally beginning to wonder that myself. Now you can vote: Should I keep watching this show?
First, allow me to retort even before you start, um, torting. Last night's episode, "Cold War," should have been fucking great. It was an HRG-centric episode, sort of a companion piece to "Company Man," which remains one of the most memorable Heroes episodes ever.
Peter, Suresh, and Matt have kidnapped HRG so that Matt can read his mind and get more information about the secret government program which led to their abductions. Again, this should have been great. The formerly rounded-up and tortured guys are now pulling the same tactics on their former captor. They'll be torturing HRG for information, using drugs on him, playing with his mind. We should be asking ourselves: Has every hero gone dark? Who is the moral center of this show? Nobody? Those are good questions when posed gracefully in the context of a show like Heroes.
Instead of grace, we got the worst Three Stooges-style episode ever. Except without the funny, and that's saying a lot considering that Three Stooges are barely funny at all (sorry to Stooges fans - I'm more of a Marx Brothers person). Anyway, my point is that all this episode delivered were a bunch of scenes where Peter flew a bunch of places and Matt and Suresh hit each other a lot. Plus flashbacks into HRG's mind, cunningly rendered in black and white to make them seem like they were Really In The Past.
The big reveal, which you see in this scene, is that Suresh kinda sorta knew about the government program. Oh and also Speedy is still alive, which is the dumbest reveal ever. Also, here's another not-new-who-cares thing about the episode: the Hunter is MEAN even though he's short. Yes, former Heroes fans, the supervillain of the season is mean. Can you believe it? I am in awe of this amazing new plot development.
I know, I am unleashing the mean myself and I should give this show yet another chance for the ten millionth time and you are all angry at me for saying that Heroes is delivering the suck despite Bryan Fuller coming on board to rescue us from lame txt mssgs from Rebel. But let's be honest. This show has moments of awesome and moments of terrible, and this was one of the most terrible and repetitive ever. HRG is a double agent YET AGAIN and we visit his flashbacks mostly to see him getting a retirement gift from Mama Petrelli and the gift isn't even a goddamn laser canon.
Even more awful? The episode ends with Peter and Matt at Isaac's old apartment/Suresh's old lab where Parkman has just painted the floor of the apartment EXACTLY THE WAY ISAAC DID. Except this time it's different! Instead of New York City blowing up, it's Washington, D.C.! This is not a clever callback. This is just terrible story recycling. If you're going to flagrantly rip your own show off, at least call back to the alternate future thing, because you can have a million alternate futures. But you can only menace us with a city inferno once. Seriously, relocating the inferno to Washington does not advance the plot, even incrementally.
I am seriously considering ending my relationship with this show. What do you think I should do?
Send an email to Annalee Newitz, the author of this post, at annalee@io9.com.
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