Turning the clock on HEROES

[Joe Washington]

Let's say if you were able to turn the clock on HEROES from its cancellation brought on by low ratings to its very beginning. And let's say you had the power to change anything or anyone on the show to alter its diastrous future, what things or characters on the show would you have changed?

 

[The Comedian]

I'd have made it more like Watchmen, and show the effect the supers would have on society and not trying to soap each other to death.

 

[Hermiod]

Let's say if you were able to turn the clock on HEROES from its cancellation brought on by low ratings to its very beginning. And let's say you had the power to change anything or anyone on the show to alter its diastrous future, what things or characters on the show would you have changed?

Get the obvious one out of the way first.

- Peter keeps his original power with stronger limitations - can't recall powers of people he doesn't care about, can become dangerously unstable if he uses too many different powers.

- No depowering! EVER!

- Hiro would have evolved gradually in to Bad-Ass Hiro but would not have been able to use time travel too easily due to the potential for "rifts" he mentioned early on.

- Jessica would have become the dominant personality permanently and become a significant villain.

- Claire would have stopped rebelling against her father and learned from him instead, becoming the One of Them to his One of Us.

- More minor villains. There was too much emphasis on Sylar being the only real villain.

 

[the Dagman]

Fire Tim Kring. Promote Bryan Fuller to show runner. Never allow the hiring of Jeph "Teen Wolf" Loeb.

Have the heroes actually be heroes. You know, actually save someone. Put out a fire.

The only person who ever even stopped a bank robbery was Sylar. And even then, he stopped for brains.

 

[Hermiod]

^The 'lack of heroism' thing was part of a bigger problem.

Peter was actually trying in between seasons three and four, using his job as a paramedic to cover his use of Mohinder's powers. He then duplicated superhuman speed because he felt that would be a more useful power to help people with.

So far, so good, right ? Problem is that he loses that ability accidentally and just shrugs his shoulders. He's not at all bothered that he doesn't have a useful ability anymore, just like when his father took his original ability.

 

[Dac]

Maybe they thought Zachary Quinto was brilliant and just used him as a major villian

Ha!

 

[Christopher]

Fire Tim Kring. Promote Bryan Fuller to show runner. Never allow the hiring of Jeph "Teen Wolf" Loeb.

Pretty much summed it up right there. Heroes was great with Fuller aboard and fell apart without him.

Although if Fuller had stayed on Heroes, there would've been no Pushing Daisies, and that would be unacceptable.

 

[captcalhoun]

have at least one character running around using their powers for good as vigilante, have at least one character out themselves and use their powers to be a showbiz sensation and one character out themselves by being a complete fruit-cake villain out for WORLD DOMINATION!!!!!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!

cuz you KNOW that if superpowers were real there'd be people who'd do those three things and not be all 'boo hoo, i have super-powers, woe is me!' or 'i have super-powers but i must hide it at all times and never even try to adopt a masked identity' all the time.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I should dig up the old posts I saved on this topic, but to be brief:

1. Every major character on the show needs their own arc. Where are they going? How are they evolving? When they reach the end of their arc, they die or leave the show. If you can't figure out an arc for them, they are relegated to minor status or killed immediately.

Details like "should Peter ever be depowered" or decisions about what his powers are, and the logic behind them, should be determined by his character arc. Anything that serves the arc and can be integrated well into the overall story is a good potential story direction.

2. Decide who Sylar is and stick to it. Is he a normal guy made crazy by his powers or a crazy guy made worse by his powers? Both approaches have pro's and con's. Figure out which is the lesser evil and go with it.

3. Accept that there are unkillable fan favorites and work within that constraint. Sylar, Hiro and Claire are all a nuisance to write for, but that's why you get paid the big bucks to write for network TV.

4. The theme of the show is: can people who gain the powers of gods ever learn to use them responsibly? The theme is not: people discover they have powers. That's not a story, that's the beginning of a story.

5. Avoid crappy writing such as stupid characters, incoherent plots, bad dialogue, et al. Professional writers shouldn't even need to be told such things.

have at least one character running around using their powers for good as vigilante, have at least one character out themselves and use their powers to be a showbiz sensation and one character out themselves by being a complete fruit-cake villain out for WORLD DOMINATION!!!!!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!

Great ideas! You're on the writing staff.

Another thing that would happen: at least one character would have a possibly looney religious interpretation of his/her powers (possibly even imagining they are the Second Coming) and behave accordingly. They pussyfooted around with this a little for Nathan, but Nathan isn't the right character for this plotline. Not sure who is, maybe a new character.

 

[captcalhoun]

^ good point! super-powers as religious mettyfor.

kinda like Mark Millar did with Ultimate Thor. he thinks he's a God, everyone else thinks he's a nut with powers.

 

[StarshipDefiant]

Even though I didn't really watch the show much beyond season two (Between being unable to stay caught up with season two and other reasons), I am sure I could safely say...cut down on the frakkin' time travel. I know that is somewhat the point behind Hiro's character, but it's my understanding that the time travel was overused and made things controverted. A little bit goes a long way, combine different aspects of time travel, use the Back to the Future concept on some things, minor things can be changed, blah blah blah while major things (such as the series history, most of the characters history, etc...) and make it somewhat a predestination paradox type, maybe show something happened the way it did because of the time travel.

Give season 1 (or is it better termed Volume One?) Hiro and Ando their own series. 'Nuff said.

If you kill someone, stick with it, or at least make a plausible reason why the character (or actor/actress) can stick with the show. In a similar pattern, only do this once or twice, other wise it just gets repetitive.

If you kill someone, stick with it....oh, oops. I said that one already.

Enough of the whiny teenager rebellion, we get the point, Claire thinks her father is a dick. Unlike many others, I personally think it worked in season one, beyond that, lame.

If someone is foreshadowed to be a bad ass, make them a bad ass, a dream walker or whatever is just fucking lame. Let Freddy Kruger number 1,000 (or how ever many films they have) continue to do that.

Chose a source of the powers and stick with it, I've heard that there was like, twenty different depowering episodes that all worked through one fashion or another, lame.

Don't add the twist that a powerful family has about three or more illegitimate children (OK, I guess it was really one), then add in another twist that this was all a manipulative lie.

Sylar is good or bad. Make your choice, and stick with it (Better yet, call him 'misunderstood' my friend does)

Figure out who Sylar's father is, and stick with it (See above for illegitimate children thing)

Thats my say, for now at least.

 

[Obiwanshinobi]

I kind of wish they started with an outing kind of scenario from the getgo or at least have season one about building up the characters and introducing The Company as a major threat.

Season 2 would be about the lore of the company and then there would be an outing towards the end, much in the vein of 4400 or even V, which is a flawed show but has an interesting concept about an alien species on earth and how society has been affected by it, totally out in the open. Also like some people mentioned about religious groups popping up and people trying to exploit there powers for fame/fortune, etc

Season 3 would have been similar to a war brewing amongst metas and nonmetas leading into a fugitives-esque crackdown of people with powers

Season 4 would introduce a virus of sorts to wipe out metas and a terrorist group of metas is formed leading up to an actual doomsday scenario, being the nuclear explosion in NYC

End the show with season 5 and the aftermath of the explosion and a war is started

I would balance out the limitaitons of powers so nobody is overly overpowered, time travel would not be in the show whatsoever, although seeing glimpses of the future is fine. We would see the gradual character growth with guys like Hiro much akin to Westley Windham Price on Angel.

Essentially 5 Years Gone seemed like where the show was heading in season 1 and still boggles the mind on why they dropped the ball and not head in that direction. You had a 5 year arc right there but to keep in mind of a contingency arc to speed up that story incase the show wasnt performing say around season 3. God this show had so much potential! Pisses me off.