Heroes#10: The Eclipse : Part 1/Nov2008

[fba827]

Can someone explain the whole Clair-bear is the catalyst thing?

Didn't a bunch of people already have powers before Clair was born (Adam Monroe I'm looking at you)?

She is not the catalyst because of her power to heal. She is the catalyst because Kito (sp? Hiro's father) hid the catalyst in her. There was a conversation a couple episodes ago, regarding this.

As we knew from earlier seasons, Claire was Meridth's daughter who was taken by the company and handed from Kito to the Bennets to protect and raise. Once they realized there was a catalyst, they tried to figure out where Kito hid it. At that point, the different companies came to deduce that Kito hid it in Claire.

(Claire figured it out as a result of Sylar seeing something different in her brain and saying she was special; Arthur figured it out after reviewing case files that had both Hiro and Claire's profile in it)

 

[Ed_Laprade]

So...

An eclipse that lasts forever, everywhere at once, and doesn't actually darken anything. (Except in one shot at the farm.)

The whole Elle/Sylar thing.

Peter and Nathan in a rainforest in Haiti. I've seen infrared satalite photos of Haiti, there aren't any left.

If HRG was not going to take Claire to a hospital, but go back and shoot Sylar, why didn't he do so before he left?

Elle might have lost her zap power, but she obviously picked up super healing. Otherwise her jaw would have been dislocated, if not shattered. (But there's not a bruise to be seen.)

Claire-bear and dad get back together again. Dad immediately breaks a promise. Back to square one.

Mohindar: the less said the better.

The Parkman/Ando/Hiro/Daphne storyline was the only good thing in the episode.

That's it, I'm done. The show is just too stupid for words.

 

[DonTadow]

Hey, the basic concept of Heroes is pure coolness for a comic fan. The execution is what's hurting here, giving us a profound impression that there's a "making it up as we go along" strategy at work.

The eclipse can be the mcguffin that saves the show. Many characters have powers that need to be reined in, and this is the opportunity to do it.

I beg to differ, I think the problem with Heroes is that it tried to be the anti-comic book. It took a concept best suited for a one shot graphic novel and tried to stretch it to a comic book.

First it has "heroes" who have a wide range of powers. Not in variety, but in scope. You have flight guy, which is a basic.. not even real power in most comic book heroes, in the same class as a guy who can control time and space. This type of world can only exist for a little time (one season) before it becomes too silly. You have to figure out reasons why these powers don't make them powerful. (we'll make him a 10 year old kid, we'll nurf his powers... repeatedly). Else all of your plots would be shot to hell with (i just go back in time and change it, i just stop time and do what i need to do). Whereas season 1 had a few notable deaths in it, seasons 2 and 3 are trying to keep a cast together and drag on a nonstory.

Thinking of season 1 like a graphic novel, it had a beginning and an end. It was about something. There was a serial killer killing the mutants and a nuclear bomb set to go off soon. Season 3 seems to be consisently being rewritten. This eclipse seems important, yet it wasn't mentioned until a few weeks ago (if that). Whereas powers were described as genetic, it can not be provided through a formula and to a magical all covering the world for 24 hours eclipse.

Because this show did not go in a different direction at the beginning of season 3, i doubt it will get picked up for a full 24 eps next year. Tim Kring's loyalty to his actors was the death of him. He should have stuck with his original concept, a different "graphic novel" every season. Maybe kept 2 or 3 heroes a season, have the other pop up here and there.

Knowing all this, I watch cause its the only decent scifi show on tv. It's often a trainwreck.

I don't buy the reasoning that "oh its just a comic book" . I wouldn't continue to read a comic book written so poorly sometimes. Really a 24 hour multiple solar eclipse all day. Serious Plot Device.

 

[Darth Shoju]

What I don't get is why most of the people who post in ENWorld's "Heroes" threads even watch the show. If it is so crappy, why do you watch?

I absolutely loved Season One (still do). I actually liked the second half of Season Two. I was looking forward to the beginning of Season Three more than any other show I can remember in a long time. So far it has been horribly disappointing, but not enough to make me forget what I enjoyed about the series. I keep hoping it will return to greatness, but that hope is fading fast.

Ultimately, it is just a TV show, and I'm not going to stress myself out over it -- one of these days I'll just stop watching it. Frankly, if I didn't have a DVR that day would have likely come some time ago.

 

[Mark]

How about a full episode with nothing but Claire bare?

 

[Felon]

How about a full episode with nothing but Claire bare?

Sure, we can have an episode where she develops the power to apply makeup properly. She's looked pretty waxy-faced in a few episodes.

 

[Felon]

I beg to differ, I think the problem with Heroes is that it tried to be the anti-comic book. It took a concept best suited for a one shot graphic novel and tried to stretch it to a comic book.

First it has "heroes" who have a wide range of powers. Not in variety, but in scope. You have flight guy, which is a basic.. not even real power in most comic book heroes, in the same class as a guy who can control time and space. This type of world can only exist for a little time (one season) before it becomes too silly. You have to figure out reasons why these powers don't make them powerful. (we'll make him a 10 year old kid, we'll nurf his powers... repeatedly). Else all of your plots would be shot to hell with (i just go back in time and change it, i just stop time and do what i need to do). Whereas season 1 had a few notable deaths in it, seasons 2 and 3 are trying to keep a cast together and drag on a nonstory.

Thinking of season 1 like a graphic novel, it had a beginning and an end. It was about something. There was a serial killer killing the mutants and a nuclear bomb set to go off soon. Season 3 seems to be consisently being rewritten. This eclipse seems important, yet it wasn't mentioned until a few weeks ago (if that). Whereas powers were described as genetic, it can not be provided through a formula and to a magical all covering the world for 24 hours eclipse.

Not sure how anything you say here amounts to begging to differ.

The basic concept for Heroes is fine. But building on it, they should've taken into account proper scaling of abilities. It's not like comic books are jam-packed full of superheroes that have the power to travel back in time and change history. There's a reason for that. The ability to copy other folks' powers is usually the realm of a BBEG (e.g. Amazo, Super-Adaptoid); when Heroes can do it, it's usually with significant limitations (Rogue, Mimic). Conversely, most comic book writers would understand the limited potential of a character that's a petite little girl with a purely defensive power. For some reason, the writers of Heroes thought they could get away with it.

 

[Felon]

So...

An eclipse that lasts forever, everywhere at once, and doesn't actually darken anything. (Except in one shot at the farm.)

Heh. That bugged me too. Eclipses are brief events. Those heavenly bodies are moving around at pretty fast clip.

I can live with HRG not taking the time to murder Elle and Sylar properly; that's a standard trope in fiction (along with not confiscating weapons from fallen enemies).

 

[LightPhoenix]

I can live with HRG not taking the time to murder Elle and Sylar properly; that's a standard trope in fiction (along with not confiscating weapons from fallen enemies).

The problem with trope is that it has to make sense within the characters. Here's the problem I see with that scene:

1) HRG is blinded by need to protect Claire, carries her off and ignores finishing Elle and Sylar. Yet, he'll go and leave her when she's vulnerable to return and finish them off?

2) HRG is the bad-ass we know him to be and can (and would) finish Elle and Sylar, but chooses instead to whisk away Claire, whom he says has a flesh wound?

The two are mutually exclusive. Either HRG is merciless and kills Elle and Sylar when he gets the chance, or HRG is merciful and protects Claire at the expense of leaving Elle and Sylar alive.

The way I think the scene should have played is that HRG finishes the beat-down on the two, and draws his gun for the kill, assuming Claire is fine due to healing. Then she cries out (and is actually hurt), and HRG has to make a choice to do one or the other... but absolutely not both. It's not a choice if he can choose to do both. I'm thinking back to the S1 scene where HRG/Haitian are going to catch Peter/Claude, but HRG has to abandon that to attend to Sandra.

 

[Shayuri]

Here's my take on things:

First, yeah, it's a mess. A real disappointment. Having gotten that out of the way...

Elle, in the wake of her catharsis from Syler deconstructing her with his empathy (nngh), has become a rogue agent. No longer beholden to the Company, nor Pinehurst, she's decided that she, and Sylar, can do whatever they want...so why not do it? This is the agenda she pushes on Sylar...who continues to be ridiculously easily manipulated in this entire season. This is one of the many, many examples of weak, lazy writing in Season 3. Whenever they need Sylar to switch sides, they just have someone say a paragraph or so, and bam. Done. Swapped. He's done it THREE times now.

Sylar knew where Claire was because he's "analyzed" HRG's brainz0rs from when HRG and he were trading barbs. We've sort of seen this from Sylar before...it's not psychic so much as just having a quick ability to gauge a person's inner workings. Of course, I'm not sure how this would give him access to one of the -many dozens of places- HRG could have taken Claire. Especially when Sylar didn't even KNOW Claire had gone after Black Hole Man, and had no way of knowing that. Weak and lazy writing.

The theory of the eclipse seems to be: the powers started with an eclipse, and an eclipse can turn them off too. Why? Eh. I get a definite feeling that they're trying for a Hail Mary here...a sort of Crisis on Infinite Earths resolution to all of the innumerable continuity problems that their overuse of time travel, inconsistant pseudoscience, and the fiasco of Season 2 left them with. Reset to start positions. No one has powers again. Claire's good again. Sylar's bad again. Take it from the top, people.

It's gimmicky, and silly, but if it puts an end to the madness and lets them have a stab at recapturing what made the show great in the first place, I'll be fine with it. Everything now rests on what they do next.

My prediction is that when the eclipse is over, powers will return. Most likely gradually...though possibly with dramatic speed. Alternatively, Hiro will do something (the "I have a plan" clause) like bend time to make another eclipse that turns powers back on.

Sorta like The Clapper. Eclipse on! Eclipse off!

They'll be reset though. So Vampire Dad will have to start over. Peter will start over. Sylar will start over. Of course, with Peter that's not much of a burden...it is possible (though unlikely) that they'll find some other way to neuter him, up to and including killing him during the eclipse or before he absorbs Claire again.

I think Sylar will wind up killing Dad and taking his stuff.

I think Nathan will finally go public with superpowers, and this time Peter will either let it happen, or he'll be dead so he can't come back AGAIN. Then next season, if there is one, will be about the public reaction to superpeople, and the possibility of the show's mythology progressing onto things like supergroups, laws for powers, tension between normal people and superpeople...maybe even a cult of celebrity for supers and what that means.

Could be neat. If it was done well. Which I don't have high hopes for.