Premiere Watch '08: Heroes

Heroes: "The Second Coming" and "The Butterfly Effect"

Well, here we go again. I'm not going to lie and say I was at all bothered by the forced 8-month hiatus of Heroes. I took notes on tonight's 2-hour premiere episode for the sake of taking notes, but we all know that the only reason I'm still watching this show at all is because of actors I've loved from other, better shows: David Anders (Alias), Kristen Bell (Veronica Mars), Greg Grunberg (Alias) and now Francis Capra (Veronica Mars).

• Why did Claire think she could shoot Peter with a regular gun? Was she born yesterday?
• Eew, one Peter is enough. I don't need two.
• Ahh, Hiro, I have not missed you at all. Geez, Hiro acts like a 5-year-old. It's ridiculous. "My father left me a DVD before he died. It's about my destiny!!!!" Gag.
• Sylar: "That's all behind me now, like a long night after a bad taco."
• Wait, Maya still here? Crap.
• Mohinder: "I just hope I did the right thing." (I'm sure you didn't.)
• Hiro's dad: "In the wrong hands, this secret could destroy the world." Ok, yeah, great idea then, giving it to Hiro. If his aren't the wrong hands, I don't know whose are.
• Holy crap, this stuff is even stupider than when he was stuck in feudal Japan.
• Yep, Hiro has the precious formular for all of 10 seconds before it gets stolen. That's the very definition of "the wrong hands."
• Is future Peter shorter than present Peter?
• Wow, Mohinder just solved the whole mystery of why some people have powers in 10 minutes? The mystery his dad was working on for years and years? Please.
• Eagle Eye will never look as good as it does right now when it's held up next to Heroes.
• Eew, I so don't need to see Sylar digging around in Claire's brain.
• Hang on, if the cheerleader isn't like the other and can never die, why'd we spend the whole first season trying to save her (to save the world)? I guess that was a huge waste of time.
• Kristen Bell? Are you here? KB?
• Why does Future Peter talk like an 80-year-old Italian man?
• Now poor Grunberg's stuck in the middle of nowhere... (career metaphor?)
• I think I like Future Ando, what with stabbing Hiro and all.
• Is that Weevil?!
• Mohinder has super strength? My butt, he does.
• After one hour: Can't we call it a day? I so do not need to see another hour of this show.
• David Anders!!!!!!!!!!! Looking gorgeous as usual. With that 5 second clip of him, Heroes just bought themselves another hour of my time. Grrr.
• Mrs. Petrelli (to Peter): "You never were as smart as you thought you were."
• Oh, for crying out loud! Old Mohinder was hard to take, but New Mohinder is downright insufferable. Put on a damn shirt.
• Maya is falling for Mohinder's "I'm-not-wearing-a-shirt-and-can-climb-on-the-walls" act? She's even dumber than I thought she was.
• LOL at Grunberg going all bobble-heady in the dessert.
• KB!!!!!!!!! KB!!!!!!!!!! There she is!!
• Somebody needs to remind Hayden and Milo that their characters are supposed to be related. It's kinda getting gross.
• Nathan (sees Nikki): "Speaking of sin."
• OMG--Veronica and Weevil in the same scene!!! And she walked right past him! No, KB, help Weevil! You owe him. Or he owes you. It's hard to remember...
• Wow, watching Weevil/Peter yell at Sylar to leave Veronica/Elle alone seemed strangely fitting. If I shut off my brain just enough, it was almost like I was watching another, far superior show. It was nice.
• If Peter permanently turned into Weevil, I'd like Heroes a lot better.
• What are you supposed to do now, Elle, you ask? Find that "Peter" fellow, move to Neptune, buy him a motorcycle, and start solving crimes!
• Bet you're going to want to keep your shirt on now that your skin's melting off, Mohinder.
• Oh, thank goodness Grunberg didn't really just read the turtle's mind. I was about to turn off the TV.
• Hey, another guy who can paint the future, which is convenient because they killed off the other one of those.
• So Nathan is being haunted by Linderman now? That's just aces.
• I don't think there's been a scene with Claire yet that hasn't left me rolling my eyes.
• So Sylar's Mrs. Petrelli's kid too, huh. Trying to decide if I care. Um, nope, I don't.

Premiere Rating: 3.5/10 (and all of those points were delivered by KB, Weevil, and the 5 seconds of David Anders)

Gossip Girl: Restoring the Natural Order

Gossip Girl: "All About My Brother"
All hail Queen B! It's good thing that Blair didn't go to all the trouble of moving to France, because even without Serena's promised help, it only took B three episodes to fully resume her status at the top of the social pyramid. And thank goodness Jenny has finally socially crashed and burned for what we can only hope is that last time.

I thoroughly enjoyed this episode--at least as much as I can enjoy an episode with no Chuck and plenty of Jenny. Even though he recently developed a fairly pleasing personality, Nate was not particularly missed tonight. Chuck, however, must return. Immediately.

I really liked tonight's renewed focus on the Gossip Girl blog, which, after all, is the premise of the show. It seems to have been slipping into the background for a while now, but I'm glad it was at the forefront tonight. The more I get to hear Kristen Bell, the better (is it wrong that when she says "You know you love me, XOXO" in the opening, it almost brings a tear to my eye?).

Eric's outing was the second coming out I've seen on TV in two days. At least Eric is dealing with it 50-55 years before Uncle Saul got around to it on Brothers and Sisters. But, seriously, Eric met Asher at the Ostroff Center and liked him? Him? Because if the dude was half the asshat in rehab that he is in the outside world, Eric made a major character misjudgement.

And Serena. Oh, Serena, things are not getting better. Early in the episode, when Georgie showed up with the video, it felt very anticlimactic, because all I was getting from the video was that Serena was involved in some sort of orgy. Yes, participating in drunken orgies is not exactly a sign of great moral character, but it did not seem nearly bad enough to cause all this trouble--after all, whatever she did was supposed to scandalize even Chuck...and we all know that an orgy wouldn't phase old Chuck for a second.

But, then, in the final moments, we find out what I've been speculating for weeks: Serena killed someone, or so she says. I think the most remarkable part of the revelation scene was that Serena's tears and eyeliner were combining to make her look eerily like Mia from Heroes. And I want no reminders of Mia from Heroes.

I see why Serena maybe doesn't want to tell Dan that she killed someone during some sort of orgy, but not telling him anything isn't working any better. It seems like she could come up with some kind of half-truth ("I knew Georgina when I was really wild and she's a horrible influence and knows things that I did that I'm not proud of.") that would at least buy her some more time.

Highlights!

• Nelly Yuki is now part of Blair's gang! Yea! This is awesome news! (Look, she's in the picture on the far left!) That girl rocks some seriously wicked glasses. I'm surprised she has time for these events, parties, and scheming sessions, what with being a concert pianist, scholar and all, but I'm not complaining.


• Wow, "Sarah" really latched on to Dan/Vanessa. They should find that suspicious. They (especially Vanessa) are not that interesting.


• I called that Eric and Asher had a relationship even before Dan saw Asher kissing a boy on the street.


• Lilly: "When you revise the seating chart, don't forget to put Mr. Spitzer as far away from Serena's table as possible."


• Jenny's not a very good bitch. Her delivery on "Even you should know that jealously clashes with L.L. Bean pants" was off. Or maybe it's just a really weird thing to say. I don't know, something about that was weird.


• Dan: "And she dissed my pants."


• Hazel (?) (when Gossip Girl reported that Jenny's bf is gay): "Now you know how Vanessa Hudgens feels."


• Like the girls in Blair's posse, I'm glad Gossip Girl "got her balls back" too.


• Blair said "endgame"! For an Alias fan, that's pretty exciting.


• Why would Nelly Yuki be displaying such loyalty to Blair one week after she messed up her ability to do well on the SATs? I guess Nelly has yet to figure out the extent of Blair's scheming.


• Georgina! Outing Eric at dinner was way harsh! Wow, I knew he was gay and I knew he was going to be outed, but I didn't think she was going to do it. Poor Eric always gets dragged into Serena's battles


• Rufus should knock Jenny over the head with something. He's about the worst parent ever. She weighs like 90 pounds--how hard is it to keep her from going out a door?


• Aw, Eric confides in Chuck! That's so sweet.


• Blair's party dress was fantastic.


• Blair (dispensing life lessons): "The most important parties to attend are the ones you're not invited to."


• It's nice to see Blair's agenda finally lining up on the side of truth and justice for once. She's acting like a superhero tonight by avenging Eric and taking down Asher and Little J.


• Izzy: "And to think, I almost asked you to wear a matching dress!"


• Gossip Girl: "Don't worry, Little J, the sun will come out tomorrow, even though your boyfriend did today."


• If it's an consolation after her fall from grace, Jenny's dress was pretty. I wonder what she had to steal/pawn to get that one.


• And this line wasn't funny, but I thought it was sweet and rather beautiful. Blair: "We're sisters, we're family, what's you is me. There's nothing you could say that would ever make me let go."

And next week, it seems that Serena decides that the best way to keep her horrible secret drink heavily and sleep around. That's brilliant, S.

(photo: cwtv.com)

Ryan Hansen: Hot Step-Dad in 90210

Some interesting buzz in the TV world is that Rob Thomas, the creator of my beloved and revered Veronica Mars, has three different pilots picked up for next season: a reprise of Cupid, a spin-off of 90210, and a remake of foreign series Outrageous Fortune.

My take on this is that it's a good thing. It takes us several steps closer to my dream of someday having either Josh Schwartz or Rob Thomas create every show on television. My one reservation is that Rob is not going to have a whole lot of time to write us a Veronica Mars movie while he's writing three hour-long TV series. And, personally, I still want that movie.

Some of the best news of all is that Kristen Bell is in talks to star in the Outrageous Fortune show. That's great because KB is fantastic, and I know that Rob can utilize her talents in a much better way that Heroes has done/will do.

The good news about KB's possible casting made me think that Rob should focus on getting some of the other VM actors on his three shows. Surely there must be something for Wallace to do--my heart aches when I see him in Hot Pockets commercial. And I'd love to see Weevil resurface too.

But, my most awesome idea is that Ryan Hansen needs to have a role on 90210 as the really young, hot husband of somebody's mom. How great would that be? He could be the Ashton in an Ashton/Demi-type relationship. And, of course, all the high schoolers would be in love with him, and all kinds of inappropriate things would happen. It would be amazing.

Please, Rob, you know I'm right about this.

Snarky 'Heroes' Retrospective

In honor of tonight's nebulous Heroes "finale" (season finale? arc finale?), I compiled a list of--mostly snarky--comments I made but didn't post about the past 5 or so eps of Heroes. I was going to break them up by episode, but since episodes of Heroes tend to all run together anyway, I'm just going to lump them all in one big list.

While the WGA strike shortening the seasons of all tv shows really stinks, I can't say I'm at all bummed to see the virus/assassinating the older generation story line come to an end prematurely.

I am worried that Adam/Kensei/Sark/David is going to meet an untimely (well, I guess it can't be 'untimely' if you're 400+ years old) demise tonight since we now know he's the superbad (to borrow a term from Seth Rogen, etc.). And I really think he's a goner since it was explained in a heavy-handed manner last week that even the "immortal" cannot survive getting their heads chopped off (so, just in case any of you were wondering if Mary Queen of Scots happened to have the same power as Adam and Claire and maybe survived her execution, there's your answer).

In any event, I have decided to be optimistic and have faith that, if he's killed off Heroes, David will be able to find work somewhere else in a project that doesn't make him speak Japanese/talk about viruses/act opposite Masi Oka. I will gratefully watch whatever it is.

Heroes comments:

• Less than 4 minutes into the episode and I'm already totally bored...
• Why does Claire and Hunter's big plan to disgrace the head cheerleader remind me of that movie with Winona Ryder and Christian Slater where they end up killing everyone?
• YEA! David punched Hiro in the back of the head! That's the best thing I've seen on Heroes since he punched Hiro in episode 1.
• Are "Wicked" and "Hairspray" still going to be playing on Broadway next June?
• So we "saved the world" and it just needs saved all over again? This is frustrating, but at least we've got something else to deal with than Japanese school boy crushes and taking down the head cheerleader...
• Opium stops Hiro from using his powers? Crafty, Sark, crafty.
• Oh, thank God! Sark is finally out of feudal Japan! And, even better, he seems to be the evilest of the evil! Score!
• Now what would have been awesome would be if Sark/Adam had turned out to be KB/Elle's dad! That would have been hilarious and weird (since there's no age difference) and they'd be the coolest evil team ever.
• Ohhhh, so in last season's finale, 'Peter was using all his powers to keep from exploding' therefore he couldn't fly by himself. Nice try at explaining the major logical gap 6 months later...
• This Latino twins storyline was still worthless four months ago.
• Yea, KB! Zap him!
• Can we go back to six years ago when David and Kristen got it on? That's what I want to see! Please!
• This Nikki personality disorder thing is actually pretty interesting. It doesn't explain the disappearing tattoo though. Maybe she just imagined it.
• The company shouldn't let their inmates fraternize with each other. It's a recipe for disaster.
• KB to Mohinder: "What's your super power? Punching bag?" Snap.
• Does Dweebs not mind that his daughter goes around acting like a little hussy?
• A show with David Anders and Kristen Bell as the first two actors listed in the credits should be so much better than this.

(photo: heroes-pictures.com)

Heroes Musings...

Random musings about a Heroes episode (does it really matter which one?):

• If the Heroes execs think that in a show down between Milo and Kristen Bell, the audience is going to root for Milo, they are extremely misguided.
• Whoa, Grunberg expecting Nathan to carry him and fly to Philadelphia is asking a heck of a lot.
• It's not good when the politician is more badass than the cop.
• Matt has to be reminded to read minds when he's looking for answers? For crying out loud...
• It's kind of a shame that Heroes can apparently only afford that one roof top set...it's getting a bit overused.
• Yep, Micah doesn't understand Nikki's power either.
• Despite being telekinetically transported into this prison, Matt still seems to think that he's in an actual real world prison...stupid.
• I do enjoy watching two of the Heroes beat the crap out of each other. Any two will do.
• Could David Anders have a smaller part on this show? Come on. Even KB isn't getting all that much.
• Micah's cousin says, "I'm just looking for some answers," and Mohinder shows up one minute later and says "I have some answers." Oh jeez.
• Milo needs to TONE DOWN THE FACIAL EXPRESSIONS.

Premiere Watch '07: Heroes

Hmm, I had a joke all prepared for tonight's episode of Heroes. I was going to say:

"Well, at least it was better than last year's finale...but, well, that's not saying much. Heck, today's episode of Days of Our Lives was better than last year's finale."

But, here we run into a problem: was tonight's episode better than last year's finale? And were either of them better than today's Days of Our Lives? Luckily for Heroes, today's DOOL was pretty darn bad.

Here are my two main complaints about Heroes (tonight, and in general, I suppose):

There is no dramatic structure to an episode of Heroes. It starts plotlines for 10 different people, then furthers them a little bit, then, instead of providing any sort of conclusion, it just starts plotlines for 5 other people and calls it a night. Dumb, dumb, dumb.

And it's sooooooo over-dramatic! Like, could Ando's facial expressions be any more over the top when Hiro's dad fell off the roof? Umm, yep, they could have been Peter's facial expressions when he found himself chained up in the Irish truck. Come the heck on, people! Tone it down a bit; you're not in a silent movie for crying out loud. And those Latino twins...oy vey. The scene of them talking while hiding in the doorway almost made me barf.

My praises for tonight's Heroes:

Well, they begin and end with David Anders. Wow, he's hot. Even when they make him wear that ridiculous Japanese feudal warrior outfit. It takes one hot boy to rock that outfit and not look completely ridiculous. I was extremely glad when Kensei and Hiro realized they both spoke English, because I was having a hard time keeping up with their rapid-fire Japanese while being horribly distracted by David's beauty. And I was also glad to have my favorite beautiful British rogue criminal back (well, kind of anyway). What I was not totally getting was why they decided to have Kensei turn into Jack Sparrow, but whatev. It could be worse, and it lead to by far the best moment of the night (and possibly the entire Heroes series) when:

David punched Hiro in the face!!!! Oh my gosh, I've been waiting so long for someone to punch Hiro in the face just to shut him up for a while. His constant cheerfulness has become so grating... Thank you, Kensei!

Other observations:

• Nathan's politician hair is ridiculous. Oops, I spoke too soon. His politician hair was no where near as bad as his new hairdo and beard! Yikes. He looks like the uni-bomber.
• Yeah, I wouldn't go hear Mohinder give a lecture either...
• Sorry, folks, Grunberg is still not badass. Elaborate NYPD training exercise they've got there, what with the immediate fake blood, etc. Umm, if all the "hostages" and "captors" were acting, wouldn't they both be thinking, "I'm acting"?
• Claire's grades are going to suffer if she can't raise her hand in class. Some teachers give a class participation grade. Not talking is going to make her stand out for being the weird blonde who never talks.
• Ando's hair is pretty awesome today.
• Great, a weird, recurring symbol. Because we so loved that on Alias and Kyle XY.
• Someone is taking out the older generation. That's fine by me. I can actually recommend some characters from the younger generations that I could do without too.
• Think there's any way that Mr. Bennet's career in the paper business can lead to a cross-over episode with Dunder Mifflin and The Office?
• Ha, the guy from "the company" who was on Dweebs (wow, that's a random reference) has the Midas touch! That's a fun power.
• He he. Grunberg's scared of a little girl. Like I said, he's so not badass.
• Oh, great, these Spanish-speaking kids mean more subtitles to read...fantastic.
• Where is the teacher supervision during Claire's gym class? And why didn't she put her hair in a pony tail to play badminton?
• There are 9 first generation people left. Ugh, this plotline is going to take forever.
• Maya's power is making people bleed out their eyes? That one sucks.
• Hunter from The Office a.k.a. "James Van Der Beek" a.k.a. West (seriously?) can fly. That's cool. I bet he could do a back tuck off that platform without hurting himself. My sister wonders if he's related to flying Nathan, and thus related to Claire. Wouldn't it be fantastic is Claire fell in love with another one of her relatives every season?
• Ok, it's official: no one in Hollywood can do an Irish accent without sounding ridiculous. At least no one on Heroes or Days of Our Lives anyway. I have no idea what just went on in that last scene but I was too distracted by trying to figure out why that one guy looked so familiar and by the accents (the one guy said "turd" instead of "third"....just saying).

Premiere Rating: 5.5* / 10

* 5 of those 5.5 points are for David Anders being ridiculously hot, which Heroes has nothing to do with. I'd give it a 10 just for David, but I don't think that's fair, so I'm setting the maximum number of points that any one actor can earn for a show at 5. Interestingly, if Kristen Bell had been in this episode, she could have earned it another 5 points and Heroes would have gotten a 10 despite being kind of a crappy hour of television.

Premiere Watch '07: Gossip Girl

Gossip Girl:

Well, you can't watch Gossip Girl without thinking about The O.C. At least I can't. But, to be fair, I can't do much of anything without thinking about The O.C. sooner or later. That's how much I love The O.C. Which means that any show gunning to be a replacement for my Newpsies is going to have a tough sell with me.

That said, Gossip Girl made a pretty valiant effort. There were, of course, some things I didn't like about it. Nate, for one. My sister nailed it when she said he's "too pretty and too whiny." I don't give a crap that he's "trapped" in his relationship with Blair. As far as I can tell, he deserves no better.

Blair also didn't do much for me. I wasn't initially impressed with Serena, but she grew on me. I thought Chuck was funny in a Cliff/Dick Casablancas/Cappie kind of way at first, but, no, that kid's just creepy. Somebody needs to learn that "no" means no.

Another complaint is that, in the pilot episode at least, Gossip Girl is not as funny as The O.C. was. Although technically the pilot of The O.C. wasn't all that hilarious either, with the exception of Seth Cohen, who turned the world upside down. Which leads me to...

Dan (I like Penn, his real name, better) is clearly the Seth of this show. He's the outsider who is not included in the cool crowd. The problem here is that I can't figure out why. Seth was not cut from the same clothe as the popular water polo players; he was obviously completely different and didn't fit in. But other than the fact that he's apparently not as wealthy as everyone else, Dan seems pretty much in line with the rest of the GG bunch. He's not all that weird and he's freaking gorgeous! The pay off of Serena possibly falling for Dan is a little cheapened if he's so obviously hot, isn't it?

Not that I'm complaining too much about Penn's hotness. I don't complain when someone who looks like a blend of Andy Roddick and James Franco appears on my TV screen. Or next to me in the line at Target. Or in a passing car. Or in my living room. Or anywhere.

Now, not surprisingly, a lot of what I liked about Gossip Girl reminded me of what I liked about The O.C. There was a party and a fight after all. That's one Josh Schwartz formula that goes a long way toward creating awesome television.

Another Josh Schwartz theme that surfaced in this episode was the recurring "main character staring out of the window of a moving vehicle" motif. I've documented well how much I love the scenes of Ryan in the car coming to Newport and Ryan in the car leaving Newport which bookended The O.C. pilot episode (and reoccurred in the Season 1 finale). That motif work just as well in GG with Serena nervously arriving on the train and then contentedly riding home in the cab. Josh Schwartz, I love the way you put together a pilot.

And, finally, Kristen Bell is a master of the voice over. Nobody can do snarky better than KB. Gossip Girl signs off, "You know you love me," and, yes, I really, really do.

Other random thoughts:

• I can't believe Serena's last name is van der Woodsen. That's such a mouthful.
• I wonder what the deal with Dan and Jenny's mom is. And I totally saw it coming that Rufus and Serena's mom used to date. I guess they're the Kirsten and Jimmy of Gossip Girl. I'm a little confused about the logistics of it all though. If I understood correctly, she cheated on him with Trent Ressner from Nine Inch Nails, so that was early to mid '90s probably. And Rufus still had time to marry someone else and have a kid who's about 17 now? I'm confused.
• These kids do know how to rock a school uniform. Teen Vogue would be proud.
• I guess child celebrities aren't the only ones who can get served in bars despite being underage.
• Nate's dad is a classy guy, what with whoring out his son to score a lucrative business deal and all...
• It looks like all the moms on this show are various forms of Julie Cooper.
• I'd feel so much better about life in general if The CW didn't use that Pussy Cat Doll as their spokesperson. It just drags up old, upsetting memories.
• Sometimes in life, it helps to be a good text messager.

Best lines:
Dan: "Save some trees, have a blog."
Dan: "What? When Prince Charming found Cinderella's glass slipper no one accused him of having a foot fetish! ...No, she doesn't know me, nobody knows me! "
Dan: "You'd really go out with some guy you don't know? "
Serena: "Well, you can't be worse than the guys I do know."
Dan: "This is a date? Oh, well maybe I should have worn my loafers then."
I know I'm probably reading too much into this, but the pilot made me think that Gossip Girl could totally be Chuck. At the end, he threatenly told Serena, "I know everything!" which is exactly what Gossip Girl likes to say. Hmm...
My Premiere Score: 7.5 / 10

Labor Day Round-Up: Greek and My Boys

Greek:
The ABC Family promo makers sure wanted us to think that a Cappie/Senator's Daughter hook-up was coming, but I think it's probably a good thing that didn't materialize. At least not yet. Their scenes together were cute though and I especially liked the background we got on Cappie. So, apparently, he is the result of somewhat irresponsible hippie parents. Things are beginning to make sense.

Best part by far of this episode though was the Rusty/Dale roommate war. Something about it just rang true to me and probably everyone else who has ever been involved in a passive-aggressive roommate battle. I loved it.

• Rusty's "Dale Tracker" was fantastic!
• I loved Dale's comment that his class on thermodynamics and heat transfer (or something like that) was a waste: "My little sister could teach that class!" He he.
• Rusty: "Dale canceled our cable after accidentally watching three minutes of the Dawson's Creek marathon."
• Passive aggressive roommate battles over milk. I've actually heard about one or two of those before :-)
• I would seriously not want to mess with Dale, but Rusty held his own. His bringing his most annoying friend (Beaver) over to hang out was especially well played.

Could I be beginning to love Clark Duke as much as I love Michael Cera? I love Michael an awful lot, so the bar is set rather high, but Clark grows in my estimation every week. And now that Ausiello is reporting that Clark is forming a band with Kristen Bell a.k.a. Veronica Mars? Well, it doesn't get much cooler than that.

My Boys:
I love anything with Michael Landes in it. He's adorable. My one problem is that his botanist character seems to enjoy using bug metaphors almost as much as P.J. likes using baseball metaphors. And if there is one thing this show does NOT need, it's more metaphors.

Wow, so next week P.J. has to pick her Italy date, and both Michael Landes and Jeremy Sisto are choices? That's fantastic. Sign me up for one of those "tough" decisions. Although, honestly, I'm still hoping she'll take Bobby. He's just so darn cute. (Oh, seriously, the best part of this episode was Bobby's suburb doppelganger! That was hilarious.)