Free Heroes
05.23.07 By Collin DavidSo, Monday night was the season finale of Heroes on NBC. Allow me to say here, in case I slip up and some crystalline gem of plot passes through my keyboard, SPOILER ALERT. There. Now no one can do nothin’.
I’ve been a loyal viewer of Heroes since the premiere back in September of last year, reserving every Monday night for huddlings in front of the TV with cocoa and rapt attention, suspending disbelief longer than any sensible human ever should be asked to, and I loved every moment of it. Sometimes, it’s just nice to have something to look forward to or come home to… but the Heroes finale raised a good handful of questions. Not of the ‘man, I wonder what’s going to happen next!’ variety - more of the ‘wait, there’s no reason that should have ever happened’ variety. My disbelief was shattered for the first time, and I went looking for answers. You don’t invest that much time and interest into something without wanting to see it through to its completion. Seriously, Jim and Pam? I had intensely emotional dreams about their affection for each other while The Office was on a break. Because I’m a 45-year old spinstress in the body of a 25-year old nerd.
In my search for Heroes answers, I began to unwind the complex network of Heroes-related multimedia that NBC has been weaving around the show. TV shows aren’t just TV shows anymore - they’re interactive, they’re evolving, and growing increasingly complex. It’s TV 2.0, and we’re all invited. Just take your shoes off at the door and stay far, far away from The View. Those ladies seem innocent enough when they’re on the other side of the screen, but I swear that they’ll eat your legs. And then complain about them for 35 minutes. That’s how they keep their studio audience - no one can walk out under their own power anymore.
In addition to inviting Heroes viewers to submit their own YouTube-style webcam confessions with their theories about the show, and chat on their message boards, NBC has been releasing a Heroes webcomic weekly for 34 mini-issues. These issues provide small anecdotes about existing characters, revealing actions or decisions that they’ve made in their pasts, or even off-screen during the course of the episodes. In one instance, the comics served as the introduction of a character who had not yet even appeared on the show, only to appear a few episodes later (to the slight bewilderment of those viewers who had not read the comics yet, such as myself). While these comics enrich the characters and the experience of the show, the best part is that they’re completely free to download and collect, all in convenient PDF format.
While the notable comics team of Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale were involved in the production of the show (Sale providing the prophetic artwork ‘created’ by character Isaac Mendez), show creator Tim Kring approached the show with almost no knowledge or experience in comic storytelling at all. This kind of ‘outsider’ approach provided the fresh voice that was presented in Heroes, but the free Heroes webcomics invite in some more traditional comic artists and writers, including Michael Turner, to present the stories in a more familiar format to comic readers. Did I mention that these were all free?
Next season promises a time-travelling storyline, as well as a spin-off show called Origins, which will feature non-episodic, one-hour explorations into new characters. Viewers will then get to vote on which characters get included in the main show. Surely, more free comics are in the cards.
But seriously, who would have thought that the creative team behind Teen Wolf Too would come so far? Or anywhere at all? Or be allowed to live?
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Article Tags: Heroes, Jeph Loeb, NBC, Tim Kring, Time Sale, webcomic================
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May 23rd, 2007 at 1:11 pm
I’m a huge Heroes addict! Unfortunately, the interface that NBC uses does not sit well with my pc (I use Linux)… so maybe you’ll have to be my source?
May 23rd, 2007 at 1:13 pm
PS I don’t think Peter (and maybe even his brother) are dead. Or I should say the question of time travel brings the possiblity of intervention…
May 24th, 2007 at 11:14 pm
Nah, I don’t doubt for a second that they’re alive, somehow.
I was mostly bugged by the fact that a) Claire could have shot Peter and temporarily killed him, thus abating his power (as they abated when he passed out earlier in the SAME EPISODE) for at least that moment, and she would have KNOWN he couldn’t be killed, because SHE SAVED HIM once after he died. So I don’t know why she was so freaked out, and why that wasn’t an answer. And b) why didn’t Peter fly HIMSELF away? Unless he can only use one power at a time… which I don’t think we were ever informed of, but is possible. It’s the only ime in the whole show when I said ‘wait, that didn’t work so good.’ What do you think? And why did they bring him and Ted together anyhow? It seemed like it was pretty common knowledge that THAT should have been avoided.
May 25th, 2007 at 2:38 am
LOL You’re missing the whole humanity of Heroes!
These are folks who either have just discovered their powers or are unfamiliar for personal fears/reasons — they have no reason to trust when it’s all so unreal. So they have no idea what they are doing as compared to the traditional Super Hero mentality. (Which I must admit, was what first intrgued me regarding the show, and why I watched from day-one. lol)
As a result, they are driven by insecurity and things/reactions familiar, even if not ‘reasonable’ or logical. So Claire is still a teen who has trusted Peter the most because of her first connections to him — it would be freaky to shoot your favorite uncle
The meet-up with Ted was accidental and his intent to rush over to Peter in a “you’re dangerous I will stop you” mind-set seems perfectly natural — given they are all flawed with human emotions (which can also be their greatest strengths too).
As for Peter not flying himself, I don’t think we’ve ever seen him use 2 or more powers at once, so that tells me that while it’s a good question, it’s not an assumption that Peter can make it work that way either… Plus maybe the glowing-about-to-be-a-bomb thing required so much control that in order to concentrate to fly he’d not be able to hold it back? Or maybe he just was too scared to think clearly.
What did bother me, if anything was improbably seeming to me, was that once Peter made contact with Sylar — and before he began to glow — why didn’t Peter slice open Sylar’s head?
But then, who is the bigger boogyman than Sylar? Why did his blood ooze so creepily to the sewer? Will the cop die? And the old guy, Peter’s patient who died, what’s up with that? For that matter, what’s the mom’s power — besides being so bossy and controlling, that is… And why do I have to wait so long to find out? lol
But this still doesn’t solve my problem of the comics… Are you gonna be there for me with copies good ol’ buddy ol pal?
May 25th, 2007 at 9:25 am
I think that if Claire knows the full extent of her own power and actively uses it to accomplish things, as well as already seeing her own uncle die, there wouldn’t be much of an issue with shooting him. I don’t think that’s a superhero mentality at all - just logic based on experiences. And failing that, SOMEONE else should have known this much and shot him.
Wikipedia has a list of Heroes comics, actually, without the NBC interface, just direct links.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Heroes_graphic_novels
Check ‘em out!