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shadowkatWell, I'm procrastinating again. Just finished revising one more chapter of my book and here I am. Again.
Read through my flist - and it appears that even the die-hard Heroes fans have jumped ship now. I'm still sort of watching the series. But not live. It's still watchable. Just a bit, well, far-fetched. Reminds me a great deal of some of the bizarre comic book plots I used to read. People who despise Jeff Loeb, may not be happy to hear that I believe he's one of the writers on Whedon's Buffy S8 arc. I could be wrong about that. Speaking of Buffy S8, I'm told that long-delayed issue is due out next week. Whedon apparently got distracted with Dollhouse and as a result had troubles getting it completed. For anyone that religiously followed Whedon's Astonishing X-Men arc - this is hardly surprising. Months went by before the next issue came out. Heck at one point I forgot about the whole thing and thought he'd quit.
Whedon is not the fastest writer in the universe - which considering his occupation, is not a good thing. TV, Film, and comic books requires fast writing, being able to churn out multiple pages, revise, fix, at the click of a button. The pace just about killed Rod Serling during Twilight Zone. It's not like writing a novel - you don't get five years to get it right.
More like 24 hours. Sometimes 15.
Back to Heroes. Heroes, sigh, is another show that has jumped the shark. I like the overall concept - the idea that villians can be heroes and heroes can be villians, but apparently, this isn't as easy to pull off as it may appear. You probably should for starters make your villians a bit more complex and a little less irreedeemably nasty. That would help.
Also you should build up to the switch, not just do it willy-nilly. As![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
selenak pointed out in a post - television writers have managed to accomplish this, both Farscape and Babylon 5 did.
Farscape did it with Scorpius, Crais, and that weird character who was with Crichton but took up with Scorpius and I can't remember the name of.
Bablyon 5 did - with G'Kar and Londo, two characters who at the beginning appeared utterly different than they did at the end. G'Kar in the beginning of the series was the scheming "villian" while Londo was the blustering victim, good guy diplomat. Over the seasons, it was revealed that this wasn't true. G'Kar turned out to be a true hero, self-sacrificing, and his "villianous" actions and attitude towards Londo, were revealed to be a lot more complicated that first perceived. Londo on the other hand came across as a complicated and tortured villian, weak, noble, but weak and tortured. You didn't hate him so much as pitied him. And their relationship also became fairly complicated. I bring them up - because Heroes appears to be attempting to do a similar thing with two key characters.
Mohindre and Sylar. But it's just not working.
I don't have any problem with Sylar being turned into a decent guy or Mohindre showing his dark side and becoming monsterous. I've seen this done so many times in stories that I find it interesting rather than morally alarming. But then, I've also seen it in real life - I've met hardened killers who are kind, and wonderous saints who were cruel. People, I've learned, are complicated organisms that defy simple and neat categorization - whether we like it or not, we are all angles and demons at times. So, dramas that depict this complexity attract me.
That said, it has been written well. You can't just decide to turn a character evil or good.
We need more build up. Otherwise it feels contrived. Sylar...becoming Angela's son felt off to me, like a retcon, doesn't quite track. As if the idea just popped into the writer's head one night and he did it. Same with Mohindre - this is a man who hated experimentation on others. Who denounced the Company for doing it. And refused to work for them if they did. A guy who struggled with what his father did with Sylar and partly blamed his father for creating Sylar. I can't imagine him experimenting with Maya or anyone else, including himself.
Nor was he particularly envious of powers or wanting them. Mohindre always came across as bit egotistical about his own abilities. So the switch just doesn't make sense. It didn't come naturally from the character.
Heroes has other problems, not just that. Which is why I think it may well be dead after this season. NBC, which doesn't have much else in the pipeline at the moment, may give it a fourth season. But I doubt it will get much more.
I'm watching for the Claire storyline mostly. Which to be honest has been consistently the strongest storyline throughout the series. Not sure why this is. It's not the acting, so much as the writing - it's just tighter and more consistent in regards to Claire, Noah, Meredith,
and the Company. Less so with everyone else. Almost as if the writers know these characters, understand them and feel for them, but are grasping at straws in regards to the others.
At any rate, I won't be surprised if it dies after next year, if not before. I think any attempts to save or ressurect it, may be too late. Audiences are fickle creatures and not that forgiving regarding their time.
Enuf procrastinating, back to my book.
Read through my flist - and it appears that even the die-hard Heroes fans have jumped ship now. I'm still sort of watching the series. But not live. It's still watchable. Just a bit, well, far-fetched. Reminds me a great deal of some of the bizarre comic book plots I used to read. People who despise Jeff Loeb, may not be happy to hear that I believe he's one of the writers on Whedon's Buffy S8 arc. I could be wrong about that. Speaking of Buffy S8, I'm told that long-delayed issue is due out next week. Whedon apparently got distracted with Dollhouse and as a result had troubles getting it completed. For anyone that religiously followed Whedon's Astonishing X-Men arc - this is hardly surprising. Months went by before the next issue came out. Heck at one point I forgot about the whole thing and thought he'd quit.
Whedon is not the fastest writer in the universe - which considering his occupation, is not a good thing. TV, Film, and comic books requires fast writing, being able to churn out multiple pages, revise, fix, at the click of a button. The pace just about killed Rod Serling during Twilight Zone. It's not like writing a novel - you don't get five years to get it right.
More like 24 hours. Sometimes 15.
Back to Heroes. Heroes, sigh, is another show that has jumped the shark. I like the overall concept - the idea that villians can be heroes and heroes can be villians, but apparently, this isn't as easy to pull off as it may appear. You probably should for starters make your villians a bit more complex and a little less irreedeemably nasty. That would help.
Also you should build up to the switch, not just do it willy-nilly. As
selenak pointed out in a post - television writers have managed to accomplish this, both Farscape and Babylon 5 did. Farscape did it with Scorpius, Crais, and that weird character who was with Crichton but took up with Scorpius and I can't remember the name of.
Bablyon 5 did - with G'Kar and Londo, two characters who at the beginning appeared utterly different than they did at the end. G'Kar in the beginning of the series was the scheming "villian" while Londo was the blustering victim, good guy diplomat. Over the seasons, it was revealed that this wasn't true. G'Kar turned out to be a true hero, self-sacrificing, and his "villianous" actions and attitude towards Londo, were revealed to be a lot more complicated that first perceived. Londo on the other hand came across as a complicated and tortured villian, weak, noble, but weak and tortured. You didn't hate him so much as pitied him. And their relationship also became fairly complicated. I bring them up - because Heroes appears to be attempting to do a similar thing with two key characters.
Mohindre and Sylar. But it's just not working.
I don't have any problem with Sylar being turned into a decent guy or Mohindre showing his dark side and becoming monsterous. I've seen this done so many times in stories that I find it interesting rather than morally alarming. But then, I've also seen it in real life - I've met hardened killers who are kind, and wonderous saints who were cruel. People, I've learned, are complicated organisms that defy simple and neat categorization - whether we like it or not, we are all angles and demons at times. So, dramas that depict this complexity attract me.
That said, it has been written well. You can't just decide to turn a character evil or good.
We need more build up. Otherwise it feels contrived. Sylar...becoming Angela's son felt off to me, like a retcon, doesn't quite track. As if the idea just popped into the writer's head one night and he did it. Same with Mohindre - this is a man who hated experimentation on others. Who denounced the Company for doing it. And refused to work for them if they did. A guy who struggled with what his father did with Sylar and partly blamed his father for creating Sylar. I can't imagine him experimenting with Maya or anyone else, including himself.
Nor was he particularly envious of powers or wanting them. Mohindre always came across as bit egotistical about his own abilities. So the switch just doesn't make sense. It didn't come naturally from the character.
Heroes has other problems, not just that. Which is why I think it may well be dead after this season. NBC, which doesn't have much else in the pipeline at the moment, may give it a fourth season. But I doubt it will get much more.
I'm watching for the Claire storyline mostly. Which to be honest has been consistently the strongest storyline throughout the series. Not sure why this is. It's not the acting, so much as the writing - it's just tighter and more consistent in regards to Claire, Noah, Meredith,
and the Company. Less so with everyone else. Almost as if the writers know these characters, understand them and feel for them, but are grasping at straws in regards to the others.
At any rate, I won't be surprised if it dies after next year, if not before. I think any attempts to save or ressurect it, may be too late. Audiences are fickle creatures and not that forgiving regarding their time.
Enuf procrastinating, back to my book.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-26 03:41 am (UTC)I agree - it's not the cast size that is the problem so much as the continued focus on the Petrillis. Which is fine, except the structure of the show wasn't on the Petrillis, it was on the idea of phenomenon happening all over the world and disconnected people coming together to save the world and connecting.
It was not set up as a story about a powerful family.
That is what it is becoming and in a contrived rather than natural manner. And as you point out, at the cost of other interesting characters - who are being either shoved aside or compromised to drive the Petrilli centric arc.
I actually liked the Second Season, much more than other people did. And a lot more than this season, it made sense and introduced some interesting characters and character arcs. It built to a logical pay off.
Here - they appear to be throwing stuff at the screen to thrill an audience with a short attention span. It has an air of desperation about it.