Here’s an interesting new NBC series that recently got the nod to broadcast a full season based on the strength of its initial pilot: Heroes. As you can probably guess from the title (and the skyward-gaze of the ensemble cast in the photo), this is a series about ordinary people who begin to manifest extraordinary powers. The premise doesn’t sound particularly original, but as with many shows, the difference is in the execution.
Comic book fans will instantly recognize the name of one of Heroes’ executive producers, Jeph Loeb, the Eisner award-winner who wrote such modern classics as Batman: The Long Halloween and Superman for all Seasons. He’s also been a supervising producer on Smallville for the last two years, so you can rest assured that the guys behind this show do know a thing or two about telling good superhero stories.
I’ve seen two episodes of Heroes so far (the third episode is coming out tomorrow), and it’s been pretty entertaining. The size of the cast is such that they’ll be introducing new characters until tomorrow’s show at the very least, and few of the current characters get more than a few minutes of screentime per episode. So far we’ve got a flying male nurse, a heroin addict who can see the future, a time/space-warping Japanese geek, an indestructible cheerleader, a psychic cop, and a Banner/Hulk-like adult entertainer (the hottie on the show).
The show itself is very slickly-produced, and has a lot of the subtle elegance of the original X-Files, where more of the story is told via conversations, than by in-your-face action sequences (so yeah, don’t worry, it ain’t Mutant X). I guess my only real gripe is that the powers I’m seeing so far are fairly mundane. It’s a great, mainstream attempt at bringing alternative superheroes to the masses, but The Authority it ain’t.
This is probably just conjecture at this point, but as far as I can tell, there is some kind of conspiratorial, government-related undercurrent floating around on the show, which would explain the sudden appearance of these individuals’ powers. (This particular superhero cliche involves some secret organization performing genetic experiments on unwitting human test subjects, and I’ve already caught some evidence of it in the two episodes I’ve seen.)
Because of the serial-style of this series’ storytelling, the stage has already been set for two big conflicts, one of which will probably be resolved mid-season. The first conflict will probably be with so-called Patient Zero, a super-powered serial killer who has (I guess) been driven mad by his abilities. (There’s already alot of fan-generated theories about the identity of Patient Zero, and the mysterious symbol that appears on a lot of the show’s props. This one is pretty well-done. Abrams, Lindelof and Cuse should send the Heroes creators their bill.)
The second, larger conflict will occur when the heroin addict’s prophecy of a nuclear bomb going off in New York comes to a head. I’m not sure when this particular conflict will be resolved, but from what I’ve gathered, the characters have just under 5 weeks of story-world-time before the big bang.
Good show. Check it out.