Heroes: SPOILERS!!!

Hehe... guilty as charged.

 

As much as I love this show, they are starting to take on some of the worst elements of comic books along with the best ones.

The promo based around a character getting killed next week is typical comic book stuff, making sure it is an event if they kill somebody off rather than letting it be a surprise.

 

Someone wrote that the show panders to the marketing people a bit too much by naming each story arc (Save the Cheerleader, Save the World...Someone flies, someone dies or whatever), and yeah this promising someone dies thing, though that's not as much a comic book as it is a tv show teaser.

Great stuff though last night. How did Jessica call Linderman? Maybe after she killed(?) the psychologist?

 

The line about nobody being safe really struck me as a comic book device, one I've seen used a lot.

 

Yeah, it's used in both mediums, especially in comic book covers...

 

I just remember as a kid reading G.I. Joe. They had apparently gotten complaints over the years that it was a story about military special forces, but not enough people died.

So they had a war in a fictional middle-eastern nation and killed off a bunch of characters very quickly. I rember the words "Multiple Deaths!" on one of the covers.

In other words...y'all want dead characters? We'll give you dead characters. Then we'll replace 'em all and sell you some more toys!

 

I hate hate HATE when TV shows promote a death like that. Lost's done it a couple of times. It just completely takes the surprise out of it.

Is it strange that in the whole Claire storyline, the character I felt the most empathy for was Mister Muggles? He's a dog for Chrissake, he doesn't know that his beloved owner's brain is now swiss cheese.

 

So is it Swiss Cheese because they went to the old erase-the-memory well one time too often?

One thing that's interesting about the show is that you don't really know who is good and who is bad and most of the characters seem flawed.

 

Well, Peter Petrelli is pretty solidly on the good-guy side. So is Hiro. But both definitely have their flaws.

And Sylar is a nutbag.

But there is plenty of wonderful gray area in between. I love the little moment when Parkman finally starts to break down from all the shit that has been dumped on him and keeps the diamonds. We've seen his temper before, but we haven't seen him do the wrong thing.

And seriously, what the hell is up with the Nikki/Jessica thing? Sure seems like they can actually manifest as two beings now and it sure surprised the heck out of Nikki when Parkman said he heard both of them. Though maybe that was only him hearing thoughts.

 

I'm not so sure Peter Petrelli will stay a good guy. He's got some potential for jilted anger.

I'm curious if the Petrelli mother has any powers. Is it coincidence that Nathan P and Claire's mom got together and Nikki and D.L. or did their powers somehow bring them together?

I love the Sylar character as a bad guy. Scary as hell.

 

I think that is the point with Peter...notice the Peter with the last initial P? The powers don't fit (no wall-crawling or super-strength), but the put-upon good-guy with more guts than brains sure seems familiar.

 

Thing is, unlike movies, surprises don't help TV networks. If they keep it under wraps, you might not make it a point to see the show. They want to make sure they do everything they can to get you to watch and satisfy their advertisers.

At least with movies, surprises generate buzz and drive more people to the film. With TV, once it's aired, they lose their chance to make money off it (for the most part).

So, while I agree that it sucks having the surprise ruined, I understand it. It's also why I usually don't watch to see what's coming up next week.