Heroes: Powerless

[butterfly]

Powerless

Unpopular Thought of the Day: Nathan deserved to be shot. How long was that speech of his? Good God, man, you start with the good stuff so that by the time they get in range to shoot you, it's already too late. I think I was supposed to be emotionally affected by the ending there, but I was too busy berating Nathan for his stupid, stupid lengthy (vague, unhelpful) speeches.

Also, how much does it piss me off that Claire's daddy talked her out of being pro-active? (lots) Just when I was being so proud that she'd stood up to her (one-week) boyfriend about it, too.

How stupid was Maya's plotline in this episode? She's a damsel-in-distress with anger that isn't allowed to accomplish anything.

Probably killing off Niki is made of fail. Completely made of fail. Monica being pretty much useless in the episode is also made of fail.

On the plus side, I really loved Mohinder. *paints Mohinder with sparkly stars*

And Peter. Peter was good. Peter was not a moron, not cruel, and not incapable of changing his mind.

Hiro... Hiro is forever changed for me. He buried someone alive. Forever. Adam can't die and Hiro knows that. Killing Adam would have been a mercy. Seriously, if Adam came back again with blood on his thoughts, I wouldn't blame him. If they actually work this decision into Hiro's character next season, that would be neat. If they hit the reset button on him, I'll never forgive them. Being capable of inflicting eternal torment on people is a major character trait.

Sylar... meh. He was a good villain for the first season, but I haven't been impressed this year. I'm not thrilled about having him around for next time.

In the first season, though I had issues with some things, I liked the show. It had a tight plotline, interesting characters, and didn't make me want to throw things against walls.

This season, I keep feeling my intelligence being actively insulted, I keep being personally offended by plots on the show (stalking=love!), and I want to smack half of the characters. Mostly for being morons.

The Ancient Japan plotline was far too long. West never should have existed. The Ireland plotline was too long. Hitting the reset button on Claire and Niki's personal growth was moronic. Not bothering to show whether or not D.L. was alive or dead for the first couple episodes was pointless, cruel, and stupid.

If they leave Caitlin stuck in a now-non-existent future, I'm going to be very pissed off, btw.

Maya and Alejandro were fucked over by having the same exact plotline their first four episodes, conditioning us to be bored by them by the time they got to do anything interesting.

So. Much. Fail.

Comments

[a-white-rain.livejournal.com]

Man I was looking forward to Clarie + Noah tension and they shot it down. I SUFFERED THROUGH THE WEST/CLAIRE THING FOR NOTHING. Good thing I haven't watched the show in a month.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You are so lucky! Don't bother watching! This is like when I was watching Dawson's Creek and wanting to claw my eyes out because Dawson and Joey have the most unhealthy friendship in the world and she's destroying everything good in her life by staying friends with him, but even worse, because it's happening to every character I liked last season.

And, yes, West/Claire was completely pointless, aside from being offensive. The most important thing he did was bring Claire to the attention of the company and they didn't need her to have a stupid boyfriend to do that.

[a-white-rain.livejournal.com]

Are Molly, Mohender and Matt still good? Because that's about all I like (and I'm still bitter about the DL/Niki/Mica thing. Damn it, they're plot lines were offensive sometimes, but I was really invested in their story. I'm at odds with fandom on this, I know. XD)

I was hoping so much that he was a plot device for Claire to do what she thought was right. The way she felt like she had to do something more vs. her father wanting to keep her safe was a spin on their tension from last year that I really enjoyed.

SDOIFD STUPID SHOW. :(

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Molly and Mohinder are good. Matt will be good as long as he never, ever goes inside Molly's head to make her change her mind about something ever again. Because that creeped me the hell out.

The whole Niki/DL/Micah thing depresses me so much. Because the actors are good and they had chemistry and the writers just wasted it.

I was hoping for the same thing with Claire. *sigh*

Stupid show.

For all that Doctor Who had a couple of fumbles in S3 (Martha's characterization, the Dalek episodes), it certainly didn't fuck up anything like Heroes. The last time I saw a show go so bad so quickly was when Kevin Sorbo took lead on Andromeda and it went (in the course of S2) from a tightly-written, realistic sci-fi show to just another show about action and half-dressed women.

[saelba.livejournal.com]

Hiro went to a very, very dark place. I wish I had any faith at all that we'll see his action reflected in his future character development, but at this point? I'm not trusting them to get *anything* right.

Niki was kicking ass & being a hero *all on her own,* no superpower at her disposal - so of course, she must (probably) die. FAIL.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Hiro went to a very, very dark place. I wish I had any faith at all that we'll see his action reflected in his future character development, but at this point? I'm not trusting them to get *anything* right.

After the way they hit the reset button on Claire and Niki at the beginning of this season, I have no faith in their abilities (because, yeah, if they did go there with Hiro, it would be so cool).

Niki was kicking ass & being a hero *all on her own,* no superpower at her disposal - so of course, she must (probably) die. FAIL.

Women who express agency are either a) evil, b) dead, or c) must be talked out of expressing agency. So much fail! There is no end to the fail.

*seethes*

[ataniell93.livejournal.com]

Nobody ever deserves to be shot. Come on.

IF he dies, I'm off this fandom.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Well, if Nathan dies, it will because Peter is a complete idiot who doesn't realize that if Adam's blood heals, so should Peter's, because he's been near him. I'm hoping that Peter will not prove to have lost his brains so entirely.

And Nathan let his impulse to be a politician and give a speech overrule his intelligence. For me, this meant that I spent his dramatic falling-down scene saying, "Oh, come on, if you'd gotten to the good part a little sooner, it would have been pointless to shoot you," and not actually being emotionally affected because I just couldn't take the scene seriously enough.

[jedi_of_urth]

Being capable of inflicting eternal torment on people is a major character trait.

Yes, and I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop on that on DW, but I actually feel more confident it will be addressed with Hiro than the Doctor, and I don't have scads of confidence they'll follow through on it here.

Hiro is totally the Doctor, shiny happy time traveling guy, until one day he breaks and starts trapping people in mirrors/burying them alive.

If they leave Caitlin stuck in a now-non-existent future, I'm going to be very pissed off, btw.

Gods yes, Caitlin's fate is really going to bug me until we get some answers (has been so far). Peter/Caitlin was like the only relationship plot this season that actually worked for me.

Oh and West needs to stay gone, I still don't know what that was all about.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

I dunno -- I actually do feel that it is... if not directly addressed on Who, something that is considered to be part of his character. The Doctor is capable of murder, genocide, and casting people to eternal torment. There are times when he's less likely to do those things than others, but he's always capable of it.

Gods yes, Caitlin's fate is really going to bug me until we get some answers (has been so far). Peter/Caitlin was like the only relationship plot this season that actually worked for me.

Even though Peter/Caitlin totally didn't work for me, Caitlin's fate is bothering me. Mostly because it totally sucks that she gets agency (goes against Peter's wishes because she wants revenge) and ends up powerless and trapped. Another ding against female agency from the Heroes team.

And West was just... wrong. All kinds of wrong.

[nicole-anell.livejournal.com]

PREACH IT. I agree with almost every single thing. (Like, literally everything except for Sylar = my supervillain boyfriend, but even I think the return of his powers was a big whatever.)

Mostly? I was also very disturbed by Adam being buried alive, and I forgot to bring that up in my "WTF?" post. I think the writers truly thought this was a better option than having Hiro chop his head off, like by the TV logic where you don't want to show your white-as-the-driven-snow protagonist do that kind of violence to anyone. So instead he does horrible, eternal psychological violence to him. That makes me angry. I predict reset button. And ew.

[fanaddict.livejournal.com]

Mostly I agree with your comments, my one caveat being that I'm not sure Hiro knows that Adam can be killed by chopping off his head a la Highlander. Everyone else and their mother knows, but Hiro doesn't as far as we saw. So maybe what he did was considered necessary by him? Eh, it's still really dark and bleak and I hope there are some characterization consequences from it.

I kind of felt it interesting that Claire and Nathan had the same plan, however Claire's was best on revenge and when she got her Dad back that stopped her (and also he was effectively the Company's hostage at that point just she is for him - both are hostage to the other's life). Nathan was acting to take down what he saw as a very dangerous organization and so he couldn't be stopped without literally stopping him - although as his mother pointed out, what he did say and then him being killed could have opened a big Pandora's Box for the reporters to investigate.

Of course, at this point I'm all for forgetting this volume so...

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Mostly I agree with your comments, my one caveat being that I'm not sure Hiro knows that Adam can be killed by chopping off his head a la Highlander. Everyone else and their mother knows, but Hiro doesn't as far as we saw. So maybe what he did was considered necessary by him? Eh, it's still really dark and bleak and I hope there are some characterization consequences from it.

Yeah, even if it had been the only way to stop him (as it may be in Hiro's mind), it's still a choice that Hiro had to make that will should affect who he is as a person.

[kalleah.livejournal.com]

Seriously, if Adam came back again with blood on his thoughts, I wouldn't blame him.

Yep. Hiro thought he was pissed when all he did was steal his girlfriend?

[go-back-chief.livejournal.com]

Hiro... Hiro is forever changed for me. He buried someone alive. Forever. Adam can't die and Hiro knows that. Killing Adam would have been a mercy. Seriously, if Adam came back again with blood on his thoughts, I wouldn't blame him. If they actually work this decision into Hiro's character next season, that would be neat. If they hit the reset button on him, I'll never forgive them. Being capable of inflicting eternal torment on people is a major character trait.

It would be awesome if they worked that into his character, but honestly, it seemed like they just had it there as a big anti-climactic comic relief. Also, if they let Adam stay there, while keeping Sylar as the most boring super-villain ever, I'm going to be very pissed. Or bored more like it. I mean seriously, there's no surprises in Sylar, but Adam still has a bit of potential and can be unpredictable, no matter how evil/insane he is. I'd have hoped Maya would kill Sylar and finally give hers and Alejondro's storyline a point, but no such luck.