“Heroes” continues to please, and “Studio 60” improves…although I muse on a missed opportunity. Minimal spoilers below:
HEROES: Another strong entry as more and more of the threads begin to intertwine. Yes, it’s a huge coincidence that a flying superbeing happens to skid to a landing one hundred feet away from a diner where another superbeing is having breakfast, pretty much up there with three of our heroes happening to converge on Las Vegas all at the same time. Then again, I suppose one does have to allow for the hand of destiny here and there. And I can just see the mantra of the series—“Save the cheerleader”—showing up on buttons or t-shirts. It may be that we’re angling toward a climactic sequence where she has to be sent in to defuse a weapon and she’s literally the only one who could survive the experience…walking through a wall of fire or somesuch. Have to admit, I loved future Hiro, complete with samurai sword strapped to his back. I see now why I wasn’t sure it was the same actor: It’s amazing how much difference a haircut can make. Unlike other series which make you feel that the producers are kind of drifting along and even making it up as they go, “Heroes” gives you a clear sense that you’re watching a novel unfolding on a weekly basis. I suspect by the time we get to the end of the launch storyline…at the end of the season, most likely…this series is going to feel like a hurtling freight train, and we’ll all be holding on for the ride.
STUDIO 60: Okay…I figured out what’s wrong with the series. Yes, this week’s was an improvement over last week’s, and we actually got some interesting storylines and characterization that doesn’t make my teeth hurt. But here’s the problem: When the old guy who was a veteran of the Philco Theater was reminiscing about the 1950s and the blacklist, I found what he had to say—and his capsule description of the other writers—more interesting and more intriguing than anything I’ve seen in the first few episodes of “Studio 60.” I realized I wanted to see that show. A series set in the 1950s with old-time comedy writers producing sketches that are supposed to be goofy distractions from the real world, set against a growing encroachment from the government and the slow erosion of civil rights. Just as “MASH” was able to comment on the Vietnam war even though it was set against Korea, a 1950s “Studio 60” could have commented on what’s happening now by showing what was happening then, and underscoring how little things have changed. I’ll grant you, period shows can be a tougher sell…but Sorkin would have carried over a lot of “West Wing” goodwill into the launch, people would have sampled it, and they might not be jumping ship as rapidly as they are now. Plus it would have given it further breathing room from the more entertaining “30 Rock.”
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I just love the fact that not only was future-Hiro accessorizing with a katana, he also sported a trenchcoat, soul patch, and ponytail . . . just like a geek who wanted to look like an uberbadass would.
I just hope they have an episode called “Hiro’s Journey” soon. 🙂
BTW, any chance for a roundup for BATTLESTAR GALACTICA? “Exodus, Part 2” was just chock full of great scenes and kickassery.
I actually thought Studio 60 wasn’t as good as last week’s. I guessed the outcomes of at least two of the 4+ plots (baseball player and old guy) pretty much exactly about 15 minutes before they were shown. Sorkin was telegraphing it all over the place. If I can guess it, I’m figuring it’s way too contrived.
Seemed like Sorkin took the easy way out at every turn on this episode.
Nice to see The Ugly, but you could figure out where that story was going from the start.
The writer showing around his parents came off as a total twit. His parents, simply good natured and stupid. Exposition, exposition, exposition… almost redeems itself at the end, but by then it was far too late for me.
The Black Comedy Writer… heavy handed and preachy, plus exposition, exposition, exposition as we get into Hughley’s back story.
Drunk Jordon… trying real hard to be funny but never connecting. Watching characters stumble and trip over their words is rarely amusing on its own.
Harriet… don’t like her.
The Hot Chick with no comedic talent… don’t like her.
The Three Bimbos… for the love of god, why couldn’t one of these girls display some sort of redeeming feature. Pure cliche and the lowest form of comedy. You see, Hollywood actresses are stupid… and black people and white people are different, but that’s stupid to joke about.
Best part of Steven Weber thoroughly mocking the TV series about the U.N. And unless there’s some serious great writing on that show, he’d be right… and considering how seldom there’s seriously great writing on any show, he probably *is* right. But I’m sure we’ll learn later on that the show becomes a monster hit and America suddenly becomes informed and literate overnight because of it.
I’ve got to agree with both of you, but it was still must-see for me. The bit with Hiro was cool, but Isaac and Petrelli completing the painting was cooler, and I really dug the zoom-zip flight scene. The brain sucker bit in the hospital was really good. This show is addictive.
Studio 60: I figured that the baseball player was gonna pull something like that and it was gonna get back to Harriet, so no real surprise there. There were some heavyhanded bits, but all told it was very well written, and I stayed glued to the screen except during commercials when I went to tell my wife the Adventure Quest junkie what was going on. Eli Wallach was a joy, even though there wasn’t enough of him. And DL finding out that he was hipper than Willy was great. This was the best Studio 60 since the pilot. Give Aaron a few more episodes to get his feet under him properly, and we’ll see Emmy noms.
and I really dug the zoom-zip flight scene.
I think that scene pretty much epitomizes the concept of “Up, up, and away!”
“Best part of Steven Weber thoroughly mocking the TV series about the U.N. And unless there’s some serious great writing on that show, he’d be right… and considering how seldom there’s seriously great writing on any show, he probably *is* right.”
I have a funny feeling that some parts of Weber’s rant was lifted from some TV exec who despised the notion of turning “West Wing” into a series.
PAD
My only issue with the episode is that Ando meeting with Nikki seemed a little forced, and could probably have been cut.
Loved Heroes of course, though too many dámņ commercials. (Sorry no tivo here!) Heroes is the fastest hour on tv (whereas it used to be Lost!).
I liked Studio 60 once again!
I’m sorry, but the bimbette scene was one of my favorites, cliched or not. It made me fall in love with Matt even more. As a woman, we crave more men to be attracted to brains AND exterier, not just the latter- and SHOW IT.
Too many times I see my co-workers (educated men at that!) slobber over eegits blondes just because they laugh at their lame jokes and have hot bods. Ugh. Intelligent gals know that men like Matt are far more attractive than men like Baseball player playuhs– just wish more men realized the same about women.
The whole “So what does a writer do?” bit had me in stiches!
>too many dámņ commercials. (Sorry no tivo here!)
No VCRs, either? People used those to zip through commercials in seconds long before Tivo ever existed.
Yeeees, I have a VCR, but not blank tapes on hand. Guess I’ll have to make a stop and pick some up just so I can enjoy the show without interuptions …
The whole scene was the typical cliche about writers… the bimbos wouldn’t give him the time of day because he wasn’t famous. It’s not that Chandler rejected him, it’s that they were never the slightest bit interested in him because he’s a writer… and writers aren’t important in Hollywood. The whole scene is about him flailing, trying to impress them with the knowledge that he’s the boss and they’re too stupid to understand this.
On Heroes and coincidental meetings: I think all shows deserve get some leeway on this at first. Not forever, if they keep coincidentally meeting forever then that’s a stretch. And I’m not saying there isn’t an overabundance of coincidence, Hiro meeting one super and then calling his brother a few hours later is a bit much.
However, several of them coming together in Vegas doesn’t bother me at all. Here’s why: Usually, that happens in the first episode or before. Star Trek: Next Generation started with all the crew meeting on the newly completed ship. A-Team started with the team already formed and the audience was just given a brief description of how they met in the war. Sitcoms generally start long after the Mom and Dad got married and had the kids, or else they start when the couple first meet.
There are lots of supers out there, that was established by Syler’s map. What we’re seeing is the story of these particular supers, and the first several episodes are about how they got together. If the first episode had been the meetings in Vegas, nobody would have thought anything of it. The unusual thing is that we’re getting little bits of their lives *before* they all get together and get organised.
Again, the show definitely has the potential to overdo it if the meetings keep happening too easily. But so far things aren’t that odd.
The opening narration of this week’s HEROES talks about how the newly evolved species follows some unseen force that brings them to a new place… or something like that.
They are drawn together because the siren call of Evolution draws them together.
Peter: Pitch the show. It’s a great idea.
It is official. Heroes has move to the top of my list. If I could only watch one hour of TV during the week, this would be it. I do still enjoy Lost, but it can’t compete with this runaway freight train!
I was confused by one thing. Hiro suddenly seemed to have a better mastery of English. If he could talk this well, why was he leaving Japanese messages on Isaac’s machine? Maybe it is part of his “powers,” but it was the one wrong note for me in the episode.
Has the congressman flown before (other than to rescue his brother)? I suspect not much, but it was definitely a cool scene. It did make a certain amount of sense that he wouldn’t fly all the way back to NY since it would raise too many questions. It also seemed to indicate that Claire’s Dad doesn’t know everyone’s powers since he didn’t stop the escape.
His brother (sorry, forgot the name) seeing and then completing the painting was cool. So if he is next to the cheerleader, does he become invlunerable?
One thought: Much as I would hate to see it being true, the congressman seems to me to be someone to watch out for. Not just because he would cheat on his wife, but because of how he handled the blackmail situation. It would not surprise me to find the show ending up being brother against brother. I hope I am wrong.
Iowa Jim
Nathan, (Congressman Bro), is definately headed for the dark side unless something changes. (Sorta like Pyro joining up with Magneto- the aspects of his moral ambiquity is making him ripe for classic villian material.)
I think “brother against brother” would make for excellent viewing.
Haven’t watched the whole episode yet (Heroes), but that opening sequence, where he flies away, the speed and sound made me immediately think of Sam “Cannonball” Guthrie (I think that was the character’s last name)…
“The whole scene was the typical cliche about writers… the bimbos wouldn’t give him the time of day because he wasn’t famous. “
The thing is, that’s not a cliche. Those people exist (male and female) and people like Matt have to deal with them. Heck, I design video games for a living, and it drives me nuts that every video game award show *ever* has had tons of awards for the voice actors who worked for 2 days but none for the programmers and designers who spent years actually *making* the games. People who don’t understand the industry (like Nate’s Dad) and stupid hangers on (like the bimbos) are very real. The scene wasn’t about Matt failing, the scene was about how he actually does *extremely* well, so well that he is the boss of the famous people, but he has to deal with true idiots sometimes.
I do agree with Steven Clubb that Studio 60’s biggest problem is the gobs and gobs of exposition. I kept wondering why Nate Cordry was giving his parents the *entire* history of the studio. Then I saw the bit with the old writer and realised that Nate’s history lesson about black listing was to set up the old guy. That felt forced.
But overall, I still liked the episode. The whole thing was about appreciation. The stage manager appreciates the old guy before he even knows who he is, and later the two producers want to experience everything he has to tell. Nate just wants his Dad to appreciate him. Harriet and Matt both already have people who appreciate them, each other, but they’re being distracted by various kinds of idiots currently. D.L. Hugely has some serious concerns that he feels need to be addressed, and goes nuts when even the comedian he picked out seems to be failing him. Even Steven Webber thinks he knows what’s best, but everyone else may be correct in *not* appreciating him. There were weak points in places, but the episode as a whole resonated with me.
Heroes: In a way, less happened in this episode than most. However, it still seemed extremely important to the story because it unfolded how several characters relate to each other.
Cheerverine’s Dad especially impressed me. Before I thought he was a sociopath who didn’t feel any emotion, he just faked it so he could pretend to be a normal guy with a normal family. That was pretty scary. Now I’ve seen that he really loves his daughter, and he’s *much* scarier because of it. I can believe that this guy would get much, much worse if Cheerverine dies.
Thing is about the writer gag… it’s been done and done and done and done and done some more and done a lot more and done to death. It’s the single most obvious joke to do in any movie or TV show about Hollywood. It’s the Hollywood equivalent of brothers like sisters with big butts.
When the old guy who was a veteran of the Philco Theater was reminiscing about the 1950s and the blacklist, I found what he had to say—and his capsule description of the other writers—more interesting and more intriguing than anything I’ve seen in the first few episodes of “Studio 60.”
I have a funny feeling that some parts of Weber’s rant was lifted from some TV exec who despised the notion of turning “West Wing” into a series.
I said almost the samething to my mom. It should have been at least a whole episode about the previous incarnation. They could even use existing cast members playing other characters like in ‘The X-Files’ episode ‘Triangle’.
Cheerverine’s Dad especially impressed me. Before I thought he was a sociopath who didn’t feel any emotion, he just faked it so he could pretend to be a normal guy with a normal family. That was pretty scary. Now I’ve seen that he really loves his daughter, and he’s *much* scarier because of it. I can believe that this guy would get much, much worse if Cheerverine dies.
That’s where I think this is going. Dad set off the nuke after he flips out and decides that all Specials must die when his daughter is killed by Syler. Saving her keeps him on kilter so to speak.
OK, here’s a question about Studio 60: What did everyone think of the comedian who bombed but got the job?
When I saw him bombing, I got what they were doing. They were saying that he had more potential than the first guy, he just needed a lot of help. I even chuckled a little at his jokes. However, the emotion of the scene was still dominated by people booing in the audience, and I thought that might make it feel too much like he *wasn’t* actually talented.
I was expecting this thread to have people saying how unfunny the guy was and how that scene was another example of the same problem as the sketches not being funny. Did anyone actually feel that way?
“It’s not that Chandler rejected him, it’s that they were never the slightest bit interested in him because he’s a writer… and writers aren’t important in Hollywood.”
John Ordover has said that there’s never been a film in production that ground to a halt because the writer refused to come out of his trailer.
“Thing is about the writer gag… it’s been done and done and done and done and done some more and done a lot more and done to death. It’s the single most obvious joke to do in any movie or TV show about Hollywood. It’s the Hollywood equivalent of brothers like sisters with big butts.”
Which doesn’t render it any less true. I’ve told people I write comic books and often been greeted with, “Someone WRITES those? Seriously?”
My favorite fictional writer moment was in the original play of “The Odd Couple.” Oscar rustles up the dippy Pidgeon sisters as their dates, and (unwisely) leaves Felix to entertain them. They asked what he did for a living and he said he wrote for the evening news. And one of the sisters asks, wide-eyed, “Where do you get your ideas?”
PAD
“Which doesn’t render it any less true.”
Exactly what I thought as well.
OK, here’s a question about Studio 60: What did everyone think of the comedian who bombed but got the job?
When I saw him bombing, I got what they were doing. They were saying that he had more potential than the first guy, he just needed a lot of help. I even chuckled a little at his jokes. However, the emotion of the scene was still dominated by people booing in the audience, and I thought that might make it feel too much like he *wasn’t* actually talented.
I was expecting this thread to have people saying how unfunny the guy was and how that scene was another example of the same problem as the sketches not being funny. Did anyone actually feel that way?
I certainly didn’t. Like you, I get what they were doing and I think they framed things well so as to set up where they were going with the second comedian.
When Simon and Matt see the first comedian and walk out, they talk about how he’s getting big laughs with unoriginal, unsophisitcated white-people-are-so-this-black-people-are-so-that humor. Because we know they were hoping for more, we’re not surprised when there turns out to be something more in the second guy’s performance. Or to put it another way, since Simon & Matt, the characters we (ostensbily) care about, don’t like the guy getting the big laughs, doesn’t the absence of laughs with the second guy subtly reinforcce or imply the idea that he’s someone Simon & Matt (and by extention, us) would like?
I don’t think it was done as “anvil-iciously” as some other writers (or Sorkin at other times) would do it, but especially when you add this sequence to the recurring themes of the show so far–funny isn’t necessarily immediately popular, etc.–I think the whole thing was constructed well enough so the audience would understand where they’re going. I suppose they could have been clearer in positing that the second guy’s talents were in his jokes and his ideas rather than his performance ability, but I think as it stands, things were done well enough.
I’m late to the Heroes train, but TIVO’d episodes 2-5 this week. Does anyone know if they’ll be replaying the first episode anytime soon? Can I make a go of the series without seeing the first one? It seems odd that they’d replay all of them except the first.
I’m Brazilian, so I can watch Heroes only by downloading the episodes. Probably won’t be able to until later tonight. 🙁
Very good news: Zap2It says Heroes still is the leading show among adults Monday nights, and furthermore the fifth episode had the best ratings yet.
For a variety of reasons, Heroes was a very risky bet, but thankfully it seems to be paying off so far. It’s actually gaining viewers, instead of slowly losing them, as might be expected from a truly serial story with a complex plot.
Still hope for intelligent television! 🙂 And it’s great to see serious stories about superpowers being better accepted by the general public. Who’d think, 10-15 years ago?
“I have a funny feeling that some parts of Weber’s rant was lifted from some TV exec who despised the notion of turning “West Wing” into a series.
PAD”
I get the feeling that there are many, many parts of “Studio 60” that are lifted from episodes in Sorkin’s life. I would bet good money that the relationship between Matt Perry and Bradley Whitford’s characters rather closely resembles Sorkin’s with Tommy Schlamme.
Bobby, starting with the second episode shouldn’t be a problem. I think part of the reason that the show is gaining viewers is that they do a good job of recapping. So far all you really need to know is that people are developing powers and the public doesn’t know about it yet. You should be able to pick up everything else without too much problem.
Well, I watched the marathon of episodes 2-4 of “Heroes” on Sunday, and now I’m hooked. I’d have to say that, based on my own experience, you don’t need to have seen the first episode to jump on.
Iowa Jim, the reason Hiro spoke good English on the train and later needed his brother to translate is that the Hiro who speaks good English is from the future–he even said so. Presumably, his English improved with practice after the disaster he’s trying to avert.
Man, I loved the takeoff-and-blast-away that Nathan did, and the landing was excellent, too–particularly the wincing and ouching when he landed. Clearly, he’s been practicing, but obviously not barefoot on dirt and gravel.
Claire’s power seems to depend on the nature of her fatal injury: When she got sacked by the football player and her head got turned completely backwards, she recovered almost immediately, but when that branch pierced her brain, she stayed dead long enough for her assailant to dispose of her body, for her body to be found, taken to the morgue and the autopsy begun, only reviving after the branch was removed from the wound. I wonder if she would have revived if the guy had buried her instead of dumping her in the river for someone to find within hours? There’s gotta be a level of damage beyond which she can’t recover.
Over on “Studio 60,” I really felt for the writer showing his parents around, because the message he has to take away from that is “Mom will never understand what I do for a living and Dad will never be proud of me.” The first is frustrating, the second is devastating. And you just know Dad will spin that record once, say he doesn’t get it and never play it again.
“I’m late to the Heroes train, but TIVO’d episodes 2-5 this week. Does anyone know if they’ll be replaying the first episode anytime soon? Can I make a go of the series without seeing the first one? It seems odd that they’d replay all of them except the first.”
Bobby, I’m not sure how acessible this series is if you lose one episode. I suppose you’ll catch up to what is happening real soon, but still HEROES is, like PAD said, truly like one big novel, and every chapter seems important.
But if you feel confused, there are very detailed synopsis of all the episodes so far in wikipedia and NBC’s own site for the series.
You also can always download the pilot episode in one of the many Torrent sites. Technically illegal, but I doubt NBC would object to potential fans using this resource as a way to jump on the bandwagon…
I thought last night’s Heroes was the best episode so far, and Studio 60 was the best episode since the pilot, so I’ll be sticking around for both of them.
Two things bugged me about Studio 60, though: the fact that Tom’s relationship with his father is an almost exact duplicate of Dan Rydell’s relationship with HIS father, and the fact that the token black guy comes from a “Boyz N the Hood” background. So while I’m glad that those two characters finally got some character development, I’m annoyed that that development is based on cliches and recycled material.
Oh, another “Heroes” thought:
They’ve been cagey about what Niki’s power is, exactly. I had a thought about that during last night’s episode: NIKI doesn’t HAVE any powers–but the person she becomes during her blackouts does.
“Nathan, (Congressman Bro), is definately headed for the dark side unless something changes.”
I’m thinking the opposite, that he’s the Sawyer of the show (i.e. a character who initially seems to be a villain, but turns out to be a decent guy after all).
Paul1963,
I don’t think that IowaJim was referring to the different levels of English fluency between Future-Hiro vs Present-Hiro. I think that he’s referring to the fact that Hiro was able to have a passable conversation with Nathan without the aid of his friend (Ando?) to tranlate. Jim, if that’s what you’re wondering, I’ve got an idea.
First, Hiro was shown to speak some English in Episode 2 when he tele/timeported to New York. He could answer some simple questions in passable English, but answering more complex questions from the Police stymied him. Second, most people have more difficulty with a second language when they’re upset. It might be that Hiro was uneasy about calling a man with the goal of convincing him that a man from the future knows he’s going to die. Third, Hiro seems to be more capable of communicating face-to-face. Think of the increased difficulty in conveying humor or other complex emotional statements on this blog without the ability to use body-language and facial expressions. Hiro was trying to communicate with Isaac over the phone and Isaac didn’t strike me as the type of guy to patiently try to figure out what a foreign-sounding person is saying. Finally, Hiro’s conversation with Nathan stayed close to comic-book style themes and Hiro is known to be a major fan of American Comics. He might simply be more capable of discussing such matters in English (as opposed to other subjects, not as opposed to describing them in Japanese).
Also to Paul 1963: I’ve stated this in other HEROES entries that Mr. David has posted, but I’ll say it here too. I don’t agree with the idea that Niki’s powers only work when Dark Niki is dominant. I think that she’s got super-strength and simply suppresses that knowledge. In circumstances where she really needs that strength, her alter-ego tends to come out anyway. Just my two cents.
Various thoughts concerning “Heroes”:
First, “save the cheerleader…”? Nice mantra and all, but in this Post_ Buffy_ world, my first thought is that it’s the cheerleader who _does_ the saving.
But then if PAD’s “defuse the bomb” theory is correct, the cheerleader _will_ save the world.
By the way, points to whomever coined “Cheerverine.” What can you do with these points? What else? Be the first on your block to collect ‘em all.
Jason M. Bryant, does Claire’s dad _really_ love her, or does he just have his own plans for her? I got the impression that he A) knows about her unique status (or at least _something_ about it) and B) believes she _doesn’t_ know (or perhaps doesn’t know the full extent of her capabilities). He wants to make sure she remains in the dark, at least to some degree. Why? Perhaps he wants to properly “guide” her.
Conversely, if he _does_ really love his daughter (and knows of her abilities) he might want to keep his own superiors from finding out about them. He doesn’t care about the others, but Claire is _his_ daughter (adopted, yes, if I remember correctly, but still part of his family) Thus, she’s _not_ expendable.
Speaking of what Claire’s dad does to show his “love” for her, he tells the quarterback he could kill him, but won’t. Yet he has his associate wipe his memories clean. What’s the difference? Sure, the _body_ is still alive, but isn’t Quarterback himself now dead? As the Doctor once said, “A man is the sum of his memories, you know.” Take away his memories, does Quarterback still exist? Are you still _you_ if I erase every memory you ever had of being you?
“I think, therefore I am,” Descartes said. Yes, but if you’ve been mindwiped, are you whom you were?
Second philosophical matter: If Claire had come to the conclusion that since the quarterback had killed her (and presumably had been the one to dump her body), she was free to kill him with impunity (since dead people cannot be held accountable to the law), wouldn’t it also follow that she’d have to give up the protections of the law? In other words, wouldn’t the flip side of “you killed me, so I can do anything I want” be “since you’re dead, you have no civil rights. Off to the lab with you.”? I would think so.
As to the “coincidences”, they don’t really bother me. They’re not of the “oh, come on!” variety. And sometimes you _do_ need to escape from an exploding Skrull saucer. Plus, in works of fiction, you know the various disparate characters you “meet” will eventually come together (or at least most of them will); otherwise, they wouldn’t be in the story. I introduced a friend to _Doctor Who_ in college, and remember his having a hard time understanding how it is that the Doctor would _just happen_ to meet the people on the planet, space station, starship, whatever that the audience “met” in the opening scenes. I explained to him that we saw those people _because_ they’d become involved with the Doctor. If they didn’t, why have them in the story? He still didn’t quite get it.
But then he also believed that if you took a gun back in time to a period before its invention (or the discovery of gunpowder), it wouldn’t and couldn’t work. I tried to explain that all the appropriate laws of physics (and chemistry) would still apply, but he couldn’t quite wrap his brain around the concept.
Oh, and again to Jason M. Bryant: if Hiro had called _Peter_ after meeting Nathan, you might have a point, but he called Isaac. It just happened that Peter was there. O.K., it’s a subtle distinction, but I think the former scenario is much more of the “oh, come on!” school.
I don’t watch _Studio 60_, but by an interesting coincidence I did recently come across a theme similar to that show’s “writer’s aren’t important in Hollywood.” In this case it was from the movie “Dead Again”, which I watched on Sunday. When a starlet asks Roman Strauss if he’s in “the (moviemaking) business”, and he says “no, I’m a composer”, she says, “Oh, then you’re not anybody”, and walks off.
When you think about it (and I just checked with friend and co worker who has composed music, for confirmation), a composer _is_ a writer. At least in most cases.
Paul1963, you’re right about future Hiro on the subway. Obviously, his command of English will improve between “now” and “later.” However, I was under the impression his fellow office worker is a friend, not his brother. Is that incorrect?
Iowa Jim, as to Peter and Nathan ending up on opposite sides, it could happen. “Brother against brother” isn’t an uncommon theme. Same with “former best friends become enemies.” Returning again to _Doctor Who_, the Third Doctor once said he and the Master had been good friends, years ago; and apparently there had been some fan speculation either during the time Roger Delgado played the Master, or after his death, that we would learn/would have learned they were actually brothers. Whether such a revelation was ever seriously considered by the producers, I don’t know; but either way, they had once been simpatico.
On the other hand, maybe Nathan will have an epiphany and realize that with great power comes great responsibility.
Hey, that’s not a bad line. Some superhero somewhere should embrace that.
Rick
HEROES: I just had a thought. Someone above posited the speculation that Claire (Cheerverine) would be needed to do something that no one else could survive in order to stop the nuke that’s going to hit New York. I think that’s almost correct. I think that the heroes are going to be put in a situation that calls for most or all of their powers to be vested in a single person. In other words, I think they’re going to have to come together and vest all their powers in Peter and he won’t be able to pull off the Big Effing Feat without Claire’s ability to instantly herself.
Just my two cents.
Rick, the image that I got of Cheerverine’s Dad is that he started his investigation into supers because of his daughter. He wanted to understand her without doing anything to her, so he started kidnapping and doing who knows what to others. When Syler kills her, Dad starts nuking whole cities just to make sure that he doesn’t miss Syler. He really seemed to be generally angry when he talked to the quarterback, and not “you almost ruined my plans angry” but “keep away from my daughter” angry.
It could certainly be something else. It’ll be fun to see!
About Heroes; You seem to be forgetting to how little of the things mentioned above (Hiro talking to both brothers inside day; all coming to Las Vegas) is actually an accident.
Hiro went to Las Vegas because of Isaac’s comicbook, which was supposed to make things RIGHT. Therefore of the three people in Las Vegas, only two had come there willingly, instead of three.
Peter was at Isaac’s place because future Hiro had asked him; therefore, it wasnt a chance at all, but a planned event. Its also possible that many of the other accidents were caused by either Isaac or future Hiro (or both). In a show where you can see/read/change future, it should not be assumed that everything is just a convenient plot device, without any grounds in the world itself.
If you go thru the storylines again, you will notice how they start intercepting. If Peter wouldnt have seen Isaac’s painting about himself flying, he wouldnt have tried it (and would therefore still be nursing the old man, without trying to talk to the indian professor etc). Nathan got apparently lots of sympathy votes from Peter’s suicide attempts, which got him to Vegas (asking money).
Hiros trip into future made him want to travel to America, and because of the comic he brought his workmate with him. Because of the comic, he chose a car he couldnt himself operate (thus stranding him to Vegas when his friend abandoned him) and the workmate also made him fall into trouble with the cowboy, causing them to be stranded at the diner.
Many of the accidents were not accidents at all, but planned scenes, from the seers as well as from the writers.
I see what you’re driving at with the cliche of the writer not being respected. It is true enough, but at least the Odd Couple example that was sited led to a reasonably witty punchline. They had a good gag there.
On Studio 60, the whole gag seemed to be that this one girl just couldn’t figure out what a writer did… which was kinda funny the first time, but got old the second or third time they revisited it.
That is pretty much the problem. They go for the obvious, the stuff that’s been done a bazillion times before and they’re not really giving that little extra special that makes the scene truly memorable. Off the top of my head, I could think of a way to play that scene better… have the girl asking what a writer does be messing with Chandler, playing dumb to see if he’s a completely shallow male only interested in her tits, and have *her* hit him with a zinger at the moment of his ultimate frustration. That would even fit in with how the show operates, with a bunch of super-clever folks swimming among idiots, but she’d need a really good line to pull of the scene. Instead, the three bimbos are all completely shallow and stupid, and not even stupid in a particularly clever way.
As for the black comedian. His stuff wasn’t terribly funny, but was decently clever. I thought it met minimal standards for a scene in which an undisciplined talent is brought into the fold. Had his stuff been really funny, then the scene wouldn’t have worked. If it wasn’t clever, it wouldn’t have worked. But they hit the mark. You can see how his material could be funny, but it wasn’t there yet.
Ok. I think I’ve figured it out.
The African-America star of the show, who is so special that the “cool gang kids” kick him out so he won’t end up in prison for the rest of his life like they will, uses his power to rescue another African-American whose humor isn’t as crowd pleasing because he’s too smart for the room.
The funny but obscure TV history obsessed son who isn’t appreciated by his parents because he’s not as important as their other son, the uniform clad defender of freedom risking his life for God and country.
The smart, sexy, funny star of the show dumps the handsome, popular (but caddish) baseball player so she can further pine over the guy who, instead of hanging out with babes and booze at the party, would rather spend 3 hours talking to a guy about the 50-year old McCarthy hearings.
Studio 60 is Arron Sorkin’s “Ultimized” version of “Revenge of the Nerds”!
Now that explains Timothy Bussfield.
I got the impression that he A) knows about her unique status (or at least _something_ about it) and B) believes she _doesn’t_ know (or perhaps doesn’t know the full extent of her capabilities).
He certainly knows, and knows that she knows. Her father was shown, in the 2nd episode, as being the one in posession of Zach’s missing videotape of Claire’s jump off the bridge and subsequent run into the fire.
“Cheerverine’s Dad especially impressed me. Before I thought he was a sociopath who didn’t feel any emotion, he just faked it so he could pretend to be a normal guy with a normal family. That was pretty scary. Now I’ve seen that he really loves his daughter, and he’s *much* scarier because of it. I can believe that this guy would get much, much worse if Cheerverine dies.”
“Cheerverine” – BWAH!!
I don’t think the dad really loves her – I think he’s using her. I think he knows how powerful she is, may even be responsible for it in some way, and only wants to protect “his investment”.
Someone said they expected “Save the Cheerleader Save the World” to show up on t-shirts, etc.
It’s already on cafepress!
see:
http://www.cafepress.com/buy/SAVE%20THE%20CHEERLEADER/-/cfpt2_/cfpt_/source_searchBox/copt_
Niki is Hulk/Jeckle&Hyde/Typhoid Mary. Take your pick.
“I would say that it’s a very safe thing to sort of assume that it’s a Dr. Jekyll-and-Mr. Hyde or Hulk kind of personality,” Kring said.
http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=0&id=38572
Sorry to spit it out, but if readers of PETER DAVID’S blog can’t see Hulkesque characters, there’s a problem:)
Someone mentioned the Father not approving of the son’s career as coming from Sport’s Night. There were similar themes with Bartlett in West Wing.
Sorkin has daddy issues, and the same things keep showing up in each of his show. He reuses…A LOT…if seeing characters/plots/jokes/themes from SN or WW show up on S60 is gonna bug you, bail now.
Torchwood has been very enjoyable. Two episodes so far, both were lots of fun.
I just thought I’d mention that. 🙂
“I get the feeling that there are many, many parts of “Studio 60″ that are lifted from episodes in Sorkin’s life. I would bet good money that the relationship between Matt Perry and Bradley Whitford’s characters rather closely resembles Sorkin’s with Tommy Schlamme.”
And Matt’s relationship with Harriet draws comparisons to Sorkin’s relationship with Kristin Chenowith.
Heroes continues to give off a very Rising Stars vibe to me. As a couple of people have mentioned, it has a very strong sense that it knows where it’s going.
Maybe it’s just me, but the father of the cheerleader (can’t think of her name right now) was definitely acting as a father protecting his daughter. I get the feeling that he’s going to turn out to not be as bad as his first impression. He could have just as easily killed the quarterback, but he didn’t. He let the cop go relatively unharmed, with only a partial memory wipe.
Still not entirely sure what direction they’re going to take the elder Petrelli brother. True, he’s a politician, and corrupt by definition, but he doesn’t seem entirely irredeemable.
-Rex Hondo-
Nytwyng: “He certainly knows, and knows that she knows. Her father was shown, in the 2nd episode, as being the one in posession of Zach’s missing videotape of Claire’s jump off the bridge and subsequent run into the fire.”
I’ll have to take your word for it. I didn’t see the second episode. But even if Claire’s dad knows that she knows about her powers, it’s still possible she doesn’t know _everything_ about them. Again, I got the impression from his… chat with the quarterback that there are some things he _doesn’t_ want Claire to know about herself. But perhaps it was more about his own activities.
Rick
HEROES: David Hunt beat me to the thought about the cheerleader surviving so that her healing could be combined with the others’ powers in Peter to stop the catastrophe. Of course, Peter’s power will have to have a greater range or longer duration than it does now; or he’ll have to tie all of the other characters to him.
Future Hiro looked and sounded cool, but they will have to give him some limits on his power or he can simply redo anything that doesn’t work. (“Turn left! D’oh.” [travels back in time] “Turn right! Alright!”)
STUDIO 60: I think the 2nd black comic was meant both as an antithesis to the first one — humor not as obvious but far more intelligent and original — and paralleling the bimbos’ earlier reactions that they recognized all the famous actors but couldn’t understand that someone actually *wrote* what they said. When I was in college, I knew an excellent poet who had an actor read her poems because she knew she wasn’t that good at public speaking. I’m sure if D.L. Hughley’s character had done the second comics’ material, the audience would have loved it. (Of course, it remains to be seen if the new writer will actually appear again, or will be relegated to the sitcom “we’ve shown we’re not racist, now this character will vanish entirely” limbo.)