Mania Grade: C+
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- TV Series: Heroes
- Episodes: The Second Coming and The Butterfly Effect
- Starring: Hayden Panettiere, Masi Oka, Ali Larter, Sendhil Ramamurthy, Milo Ventimiglia, Jack Coleman, Leonard Roberts, Greg Grunberg, Adrian Pasdar
- Written By: Tim Kring
- Directed By: Allan Arkush, Greg Beeman
- Network: NBC
- Series: Heroes
HEROES: The Second Coming/The Butterfly Effect
This is One Big Puzzle By
Stephen Lackey
September 24, 2008
Hiro (Masi Oka) and Daphne Millbrook (Brea Grant) in HEROES: The Second Coming(2008).
© NBC-Universal
There are a ton of characters in this series, so it takes careful writing and a really solid director to make all of them relevant and keep the train from leaping the tracks, as it were. The biggest problem here is just that, this train leaps off the tracks and keeps on going taking a very convoluted trip from point A to point B. If you didn’t watch the hour long recap special prior to the season premiere and you are a new viewer, you had no clue what was happening during that two hours. This is supposed to be a new start, a new chapter for the series, so why not make it accessible to new viewers? Maybe the writers need to take a literal page from Marvel and do some really good recap pages at the beginning of each episode.
This review isn’t going to be too spoilerific but one early sequence in the first hour requires discussion; the Sylar attack on Claire. Sylar finds Claire in her house alone and he wants to add her powers to the huge group he already ahs. He slams doors on her Jedi style and flings her around the house. Then she hides in a closet with really flimsy doors and just ties the two door knobs together. With all of his abilities, he gets mad and jerks on the doors like he can’t get them open. The sequence and specific shots feel like homage to Halloween but they don’t fit Sylar’s method of operation. He’s a creepy dude, no doubt, but once he’s in place to get what he wants he just takes it rather than torments his victim, so this who lengthy scene doesn’t work.
Another sequence that requires discussion is when Hiro discovers the video from his father. Hiro has always been the light hearted character of the series but these scenes border on slapstick and they play on a really groan inducing gag that doesn’t fit the serious nature of Hiro’s father. Again, this section of the episode feels like it was written for the gag rather than for the characters within the scene. On the upside, a new character is introduced that seems to be a lot of fun and a good “nemesis” for Hiro. Hiro’s new conflict with Ando is also interesting and is already weighing heavy on their friendship.
Heroes, like LOST is built on mystery and unanswered questions, but many of the questions posed this season so far just don’t seem all that thrilling and that may be due to poor execution by the writers. The whole new Nikki mystery is “meh” at best and Mohinder’s new direction is just way too predictable. Mohinder could have easily been at the center of this story arc without having taken the steps that he took in this first two hours. It’s an easy way out for him and disappointing. The closing moments of this two hour premiere should have been so exciting fans would be riveted and anxious for the next episode and while it was good it just doesn’t have that effect. Yes, Season One took four episodes to really get going but we are in Season Three now: the writers should be much more capable of getting things going quicker. The episode wasn’t a bad one; it just wasn’t as great as it should have been.
Some of the new villains are intriguing but all of the future stuff just feels so “been there, done that”. The villains are truly ruthless and they are begging for a big comic book style throw down later in the season. Elle was fun in this two hours but she won’t be returning as a cast regular she will be missed in upcoming episodes. HRG is again immediately cool and anything he does in these first two hours is good, but he’s not around much. Claire’s new story arc appears to be a bit of a reboot for her character and it leads to some really stilted dialogue from her on a video camera. Mama Petrelli is an evil woman and she actually does offer up an interesting mystery in stark comparison to some of the less interesting ones. So, there are some interesting characters in this two hour premiere both new and old but they desperately need more development.
In the end, possibly the biggest problem with this two hour premiere is that the writers tried to wedge too much in. Maybe some of the “mysteries” would have been more interesting had there been more focus on just a few of them and more set up on the story for the season. Peter Petrelli is too powerful and uninteresting this year; something needs to happen with him. Hopefully, Hiro’s story will continue to be amusing and not get too silly, and Nikki and Mohinder need some real help to become interesting. Look for nods in this episode to The Greatest American Hero and Babylon 5.
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