HTF REVIEW: Heroes - Season 1 (1 Viewer)

The Series

Bursting onto the television scene in September 2006, Heroes quickly established itself as a cult series. By the end of the season, it was the highest rated new series on broadcast television, and an enthusiastic NBC quickly renewed it for a second season. Undoubtedly the most talked about new drama series of the past year, Heroes featured a graphic novel come to life look and a cast of new characters unlike any ever seen on American television. Its amazing success was something of a surprise to many but a totally deserved one.

One of the most appealing aspects of the show is that the audience is never talked down to. Dozens of characters were introduced during the season, first in what appeared to be separate story arcs unconnected to the others but later slowly but surely merging into a connection that was altogether astounding to behold. And as the stories became more tightly interconnected and some favorite characters began dying, we became more drawn than ever into the show’s overall doomsday scenario. By the end of the season, the tension was truly unbearable, and the conclusion, while satisfying, contained the inevitable cliffhangers that all successful shows now end their seasons with.

The premise is rather simple on paper. A number of people from around the world become aware slowly that they possess abilities that make them different from the rest of the world. There is Hiro who can span space and time with his mind, political candidate Nathan who can fly and his brother Peter who can assume the abilities of those around him, teenaged Claire who is impervious to injury, Niki who has a deadly alter-ego, Matt who has telepathic powers, Isaac who can paint the future, Claude who can disappear at will, D.L. who can pass through solid structures, and a handful of others who come into and out of the story during the season. There are both an organization and individuals on the trails of these unusual people to either study, exploit, or consume them. What’s more, a season-long story arc involves New York City being destroyed by an exploding man and the frantic search for the man and a way to save the city (and the world) from immolation.

If the show has weaknesses, they are in some time-wasting subplots (Hiro and his friend Ando involved with a Las Vegas showgirl, Mohinder’s trip back to India) and in the uneven level of performance through its very profuse number of cast members. Masi Oka (Hiro), Adrian Pasdar (Nathan), Milo Ventimiglia (Peter), Greg Grunberg (Matt), Jack Coleman (Claire’s father), and Hayden Panettiere (Claire) do wonderfully expressive things with their characters infusing them with a humanity and believability that’s often striking. With the difficult role of Niki/Jessica, Ali Larter is less successful showing a more limited gallery of creative expression especially as Niki. Sendhil Ramamurthy as Mohinder, the narrator for many of the episodes as well as the geneticist trying to track down the “heroes” to warn them about the deadly Sylar, is also more strident than necessary. But as the shadowy Sylar, Zachary Quinto does exemplary work in making someone who’s very slight of build exude absolute power and evil.

Heroes is not known for celebrity stunt casting, but during the course of the season, such stars as Christopher Eccleston, George Takei, Eric Roberts, and Malcolm McDowell appeared to terrific effect imbuing their characters with the quirky kinds of surprises that have become the hallmark of this imaginative and addictive series. The fanciful direction and the towering special effects (simply remarkable on a TV-sized budget) are constantly amazing.

Here is the episode line-up for the shows of the first season across the seven discs with the number of bonus scenes available for the episode in italics. Episodes 12-23 all contain an accompanying commentary.

1 - Genesis (8)
2 - Don’t Look Back (4)
3 - One Giant Leap (2)
4 - Collision (2)
5 - Hiros (3)
6 - Better Halves (0)
7 - Nothing to Hide (8)
8 - Seven Minutes to Midnight (3)
9 - Homecoming (1)
10 - Six Months Ago (2)
11 - Fallout (1)
12 - Godsend (2)
13 - The Fix (1)
14 - Distractions (3)
15 - Run! (3)
16 - Unexpected (0)
17 - Company Man (3)
18 - Parasite (1)
19 - .07% (1)
20 - Five Years Gone (1)
21 - The Hard Part (0)
22 - Landslide (1)
23 - How to Stop an Exploding Man (0)

Video Quality

The series is broadcast on NBC in 1080i, and this down converted 480p transfer does the best it can in dealing with a variety of problems. The series does not possess one particular look. As it spans the globe, so, too, does the look of the image vary from the warm oranges of India to the steely blues of medical labs in Texas. There is sometimes heavy grain, and sometimes the image is silky smooth. Close-ups fare the best with superb sharpness and richly hued flesh tones that are sometimes highly reminiscent of the high definition broadcast. Medium shots and long shots, however, show much less detail, can feature crushed blacks and blooming whites, and can occasionally appear smeared. Pixelization is also present, and there is some occasional edge ringing though neither is a major problem.. Each episode has been divided into 4 chapters.

Audio Quality

The Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track is mainly directed toward the front channels in strong, clear, and rich tone, but also with sporadic good use of the LFE channel. Disappointingly, the rears aren’t used nearly to the extent one would expect in an action oriented series.

Special Features

Most episodes contain one or more bonus scenes (see episode listing above for the number of unaired scenes per episode). In some cases, the bonus scene involves only a line or two that’s been deleted from the scene as aired. In others, entire scenes or subplots have been discarded.

Beginning with episode 12, there are running commentaries for each of the episodes. Participants vary from episode to episode (sometimes participants change within a commentary as actors are called back to the set), and some are more successful than others in providing commentary. In some cases, the conversation gets so animated that one can’t discern everything that’s said as the speakers constantly talk over one another. The best commentaries don’t involve the actors at all but occur when the episode’s writer and director do the talking. Episode #17 features the best commentary due to the quality of the conversation. Understandably, the actors tend to praise everyone and everything and provide little in the way of a discerning eye about the production. For most of the commentaries, the participants don’t identify themselves until the very end of the track, so unless you have a good ear for recognizing voices, you’ll be guessing sometimes as to who’s sitting in the room talking.

The first disc contains the 73-minute unaired pilot episode of Heroes. It can be viewed either with or without commentary by series creator Tim Kring. The pilot is interesting for what was omitted: a terrorist subplot and the introduction of the Matt Parkman character (which was postponed until episode 2). Kring’s commentary is quite illuminating about the localities of the shoot, the network censorship, and the casting decisions that were made. This is by far the best bonus feature in the set.

Also ranking high among the bonus features is a mind-boggling little game called Matt’s Mind Reader (found on disc #5). By following the simple directions on the screen, the uncanny software can actually seem to read one’s mind as he arrives at a hero’s identity simply by doing some simple arithmetic. I played the game six times, and the software was right every time much to my complete surprise.

The remaining bonus features on disc 7 all cover aspects of the series that were important to its overall effect. All of the features are presented in non-anamorphic widescreen.

“Making Of” is a 9-minute featurette that covers the formulation of the series, the casting, and the initial reception to the show, especially when the unaired pilot was first shown at Comic Con.

“Special Effects” spends its 8½ minutes covering how the flying and freeze frame effects are created for the show. As there are far more effects than these throughout the series, this feature could have been expanded quite substantially and really only scratches the surface.

“The Stunts” shows us some preparation on a few of the more breathtaking stunts in some of the early episodes. This runs 10 minutes.

“Profile of Artist Tim Sale” is exactly that: an 11½-minute interview with the man behind the portrait and comic book contributions to the show.

“The Score” interviews the two composers and the audio engineer responsible for giving the show its very unique background music. This feature runs 9 minutes.

The set also includes previews of current or upcoming DVD releases (in either 4:3 or non-anamorphic widescreen): Friday Night Lights, Knocked Up, House, Las Vegas, The Office, 30 Rock, and Miami Vice, among others.

In Conclusion

More than any other show currently playing on broadcast television, Heroes most benefits from repeated viewings. The stories are so densely packed with characters and information that it’s nearly impossible to assimilate it all with one viewing. Fans of the series will also relish the generous number of deleted scenes and the bonuses included in this set which should make it a must buy for them. For fans of action and adventure fantasy, Heroes is certainly hard to beat.


Matt Hough
Charlotte, NC

I'll be picking this one up. Can't wait for season 2

Agreed. Mine's already on its way and should arrive tomorrow! I, too, can't wait for the second season to begin!

Has anyone seen the Heroes Deluxe Edition found at Target?What is the bonus content and how are the replicas?

Thanks,

Neil

The replicas were not included in the review copy sent by Universal. The 45 minutes of bonus features is listed in the review beginning with the "Making of" featurette and going through "The Score."

All copies of HEROES on both SD-DVD and HD-DVD have those features.

It costs about $7 more than the regular edition.

Neil

Thanks for the info. I was not aware of this at all.

I watched the unaired pilot and I'm impressed by how changing a few scenes really helped this show. The entire plot with Parkman and the terrorists
was terrible and it seemed like a super hero version of 24. Fortunately, the good elements were recycled into a much better story later in the season.

Here is a pic of the contents in the Target Deluxe Edition (taken by LKirven517 over at DVDTalk):



I couldn't leave anything to chance, so I picked up my set as soon as the doors were open this morning.

Oh my god, I'm SO jealous. We Canadians always get the shaft for stuff like this. DAMMIT!

Ah well, this show totally owns and I can't wait to get home to start in...

Does the Target 8-disc version have different interior package artwork from the regular 7-disc version? Perhaps someone could post a picture?

The image in posts above is for the Target version. The regular version should be like this image


The outer sleeve and box are quite different. It is hard to compare the inner images real closely, though.

Neil

As someone who has gone on record many times in the past to criticize Universal for some of the most gawd-awful DVD packaging in my library, I want to publicly commend them for the splendid job they did on the Heroes Target Exclusive Edition. This time around they pretty much got everything right and this is one of the nicest packages I have seen in a long time!

I've never seen an episode of the show and don't really know much about it; I'm actually glad because I've just rented the first few discs from Netflix and I can enjoy it fresh. That said...

Would it be better to watch the broadcast version of the pilot to start, or the unaired version?

If you only want to watch one, go with the broadcast version. If you're watching both, go broadcast first. The "Unaired Pilot" is more interesting for its alternate elements, and if it's your first Heroes experience, you won't know what's "alternate" and what's "real"!

Parts of the series will seem strange if you don't want the broadcast episode. You'd get TWO introductions for the same character if you went with the "UP" instead, and you'd see a subplot that never reappears. Again, it's fun to see, but solely as an alternate take on where the series could have gone...

Thanks, Colin, exactly the information I was hoping for!

Excellent review Matt. I would mention in there something about subtitles since there is no closed-captioning. I was surprised to find that subtitles were even on the deleted scenes.

I would disagree with you about Ali Larter's portrayal of Nikki and Jessica. I thought she was absolutely fantastic. The fact that she was able to switch from one to another and back and make it easy to tell them apart couldn't have been easy to do, especially when she did it without the benefit of a edit. I still remember one scene where she went back and forth between the two and was astounded at how efforlessly the switch seemed.

I am now kinda sad I didn't get the 8-disc Target set...oh well...

Anyway, this is a great show.

The show benefited from "Lost" in that the producers of "Heroes" (many of whom worked on "Lost" and "Alias") saw the mistakes that "Lost" made and avoided them.

That's not to say the show is "perfect," but they answer a lot of the questions and give a certain amount of closure in the first-season storyline.

The neat thing about the show is that there are all sorts of stories they could approach. It is like a comic book series (obviously), and it'll benefit from that structure in the long run.

They'll more easily be able to introduce new characters and plotlines as the story continues.

Universal's pretty good about that - on their DVDs, the supplements almost always come with subtitles...