I just watched a leaked copy of a new show coming this falll called Heroes. I have to say, it was quite fun. Light spoilers ahead.
There's definitely a bit of a Lost feel to it. Wierd things happening with no apparent explanation. Large chunks of screen time dedicated to dialogue in an Asian language (more about that in a moment). It reminds me of the beginning of Midnight Nation and a little of Supreme Power, both by J. Michael Straczinski. The premise is fairly simple. People are getting what can, and should, only be described as superheroes, all at once. They don't know it yet, and since they live in something like the real world, it either scares the hell out of them, or nobody believes them. It's your basic 'what if superheroes were real?' story. Nothing Earth-shatteringly new for comics, but pretty much the first time anyone's taken it seriously on TV, aside from light, action/adventure stuff like (dear lords) Mutant X.
But this show looks like it's trying to have somewhat deep characters, and there aren't likely to be any tights. The powers can be somewhat flashy, the cheerleader who regenderates like Wolverine for example, but it looks like they're trying to keep the visuals subtle. No heat vision or fancy super-speed effects. Downplaying the special effects will help keep it looking like a regular drama show, despite the content. It's a smart choice, I think.
As for the rest of the powers, it's a mixture of superhero 101 and some fairly creative stuff. There's a guy who can fly, a possibly super-intelligent kid, for example, and the previews show us a cop who get telepathy. There's also an artist who paints the future, but only when he's high, and, easily my favourite character, a starry-eye Japenese saliryman who's read comics and watched Star Trek all his life, and seems to have some fairly far-reaching potential abilities to violate the space/time continuum. So far, he can move time forward and backward, and he's mastered teleportation. Finally, there's a woman in Las Vegas who has some kind of mysterious power to do with mirrors. There might be something in the mirror, for her, that shouldn't be let out. I smell angst!
So far, it looks clever, it looks like it'll contain interesting twists and turns, and it's at least making an attempt to be international (read: there are two guys from Asia who, of course, end up in New York. Can you believe it? Asian people! In New York!). There are some implications crazy government conspiracy, too, and some yammering about 'the next evolutionary step,' which of course pisses me off for reasons I don't need to explain again, but the main plot looks compelling. I doubt it'll have any of the depth of similar stories that have already been done in comics, but the fact that NBC is producing a show with this premise makes me just happy to be alive right now. It is truly the Time of the Geek.
Posted by orion at July 22, 2006 10:26 PM