First off, I’m about to talk about the premiere of the second season of Heroes. If you don’t want to know anything about it and can’t be bothered to watch it on Monday night, then you should stop reading now.

Introduction

Okay, now that that’s out of the way let’s start with what this episode of Heroes had in common with the first season premiere of Heroes…

They both involved train wrecks.

In season one, Claire Bennet walks through fire to save a man from a burning train wreck.

In season two, the premiere is the train wreck.

Seriously, I don’t know how something so good could be ripped apart so quickly. This episode feels like one of the lesser sci-fi channel tv shows that come along every other week.

Let’s go over each plotline and how completely screwed it up it really was, shall we?

The Bennets

First and worst, there are the Bennets — I’m sorry, the Butlers. They’ve relocated to California where they’ve taken to living as a sitcom family with bad jokes.

What happened to big bad mysterious HRG?! Now he works at a Kinkos and has become a cartoon of his former self.

And Claire? Now she’s an outcast and flirting with a really strange looking boy who can fly. Maybe they didn’t get the memo, but Nathan Petrelli can already fly and he’s Claire’s dad. So these two are probably related.

Seriously, though, I realize that there are a finite set of superpowers in the world, but must we duplicate them so soon? And why can he fly better than Nathan? And why hasn’t anyone gotten Flash-style super speed yet?

The Petrellis

The interesting thing about this storyline is that we learn that the heroes can have secondary mutations. This is a staple of the X-Men universe but there has been no indication of such a phenomenon in the Heroes universe until now.

That’s right, I speak of Nathan Petrelli’s secondary mutation of accelerated hair growth. I’m not sure the benefits of such a mutation, but it does allow one to grow a completely outlandish crazy-man beard that the Amish would give their left eye for — in the span of only four months.

Also, the brother that Nathan never cared about is missing for reasons unexplained and now he’s overly distraught about it. At least his mom is still an emotionless demon.

Turns out Peter is still alive too, which is implausible but cool. His hair has been cut and that’s an improvement in my book.

Mohinder “My father’s ri-search” Suresh

Other than his yawneriffic opening monologue, Mohinder’s storyline isn’t all that bad. He’s selling some more genetic Heroes science and the remnants of the company that we thought was Linderman’s is interested in hiring him.

And the dude recruiting him can turn stuff into gold. That’s actually kinda nifty.

It’s also refreshing that Mohinder is acting in a rational manner and has this deep dark plan involving the infiltration of the company.

The Honduras Twins

What I learned from this storyline is that Spanish is yellow and Japanese is white.

In season 1, Nikki ripped a dude in half. In season 2, some whiny Honduras chick makes peoples’ eyes bleed. Not as cool.

Hiro

I was concerned that the time travel would just convolute the plot. Thus far, it’s not doing that so for that I’m grateful.

Unfortunately, the whole story is a rehashed cliche that I’ve seen a dozen times. Man goes back in time, man messes up the timeline, man fixes the timeline. /yawn

At least the dude who plays Kensai is moderately entertaining.

Sulu and Ando

I’m not sure why Ando turned into a puppy dog gopher with the biggest hair in the world, but at least this plotline sets up a whodunit for the rest of the season.

Parkman

Finally, something worth watching. We learn the man took four bullets to the chest, recovered, and made NYC detective in only four months. A little bit unbelievable, but at least we get to see him use his powers in cool ways.

There is some weirdness in the implied living arrangements with Mohinder and Molly, but at least Grunberg has decent chemistry with Molly and is a likable fella. For my money, this was the best plotline of the episode and was woefully under-emphasized.

Conclusion

Kring and company better shape up or ship out. There are a couple of menacing plotlines that could be interesting this season, but if the show doesn’t get some better story-telling and some of the edge back, it’s doomed to be a failure.

At this rate, I’m going to have my Monday nights free soon.

EW has a post up reviewing each and every episode of the first season of Heroes.

Not only is it insightful to see what they thought of the show, it’s also a great way to get your memory back about what exactly happened last season.

It’s especially good to read about the first few episodes where all of the greatness was still building up.

The fact that they list the ‘best moment’ from every episode is also a nice touch.

On a personal note, I’m trying desperately to finish re-watching season one before season two starts on Monday. I have 13 episodes to go.

The only way to pull this off is with a marathon this weekend.

NBC really should have released the DVD set sooner. It was a little bit too close to the beginning of the second season for my tastes.

So I’ve been slogging through the first season of Heroes on DVD just to watch all the deleted scenes and special features before the new season starts on September 24.

Watching it for the second time in a more compressed schedule really helps one to see the overall story and direction of the show. Sudden course changes and character modifications are far more evident when watched this way.

When Heroes started it was a great show. By the end of its first season, I’d say it was only a good show.

So when did it go wrong? I wouldn’t have been able to pinpoint it if not for my current watching of the season.

It clearly went from great to good when Hiro met Charlie.

Before this time, the show was full of suspense and awesomeness.

It kept itself moderately consistent with its own internal logic and wowed us every week with something new and exciting.

The buildup of the meeting of all of these heroes was something to be overjoyed at the prospect of.

There was just no way it wasn’t going to be great when it culminated in the saving of the cheerleader.

But then the 8th episode was aired — “Seven Minutes to Midnight.”

Most notably in this episode we see that Hiro has inexplicably chosen to drive through Texas to get to New York from Las Vegas. Not even airplanes take such stupid routes.

Then he meets Charlie who explains that she has just learned Japanese from a book that was given to her on her birthday a few weeks ago — a book that we learn was given to her by Hiro when he goes back in time to try to save her from zombie death at the hands of Sylar.

Only, she doesn’t recognize him. So she has a Japanese book she got from Hiro but Hiro hasn’t gone back in time yet so she doesn’t remember him, yet she has the book!?

As great of an addition as Masi Oka is to the cast of Heroes, time travel is a dangerous thing. Few writers have done it correctly, and Tim Kring proved that he can’t do it correctly.

After this episode, the world was shattered. Things that were beginning to make sense no longer made sense. There was never sufficient explanation for Hiro’s powers and where exactly the whole time traveling thing started and stopped.

It was as if Kring realized that he had created a character so powerful that fans could always argue that nothing was at stake (something goes wrong, just send Hiro back to fix it). So in an effort to show that Hiro had limits to his powers, he introduced the Charlie plotline.

Problem is he sucked it up and turned a great show into only a good one.

I’ll keep watching Heroes, but I’ll miss those first 7 episodes when it was all so perfect and the only thing to complain about was Mohinder being a whiny baby.

I recently picked up the newly minted Heroes boxed set and finally got a chance to watch the ‘Tim Kring cut.’ This version of the original pilot is a 72 minute extravaganza of how the show was supposed to go if Tim had his way.

I don’t intend to spoil anything here, but there will be indications of what characters and plot lines are in the pilot and may be slightly different from what was aired. If you don’t like that sort of thing, stop reading after the image.

In a nutshell, the episode is worth watching but this is definitely a case of the powers that be keeping a writer well in check. The aired episode was leaps and bounds better than this cut. If I had watched this cut instead of the aired pilot, my interest in Heroes may not have been as compelling.

One of the most interesting things about this extended cut is the inclusion of a couple of characters that we weren’t introduced to until much later in the season. Most notably is Matt Parkman who has a pretty huge role and is introduced as a much more integral part to the whole story.

Other characters (such as DL) are at least talked about more, even leading to a scene with Micah that wasn’t in the show at all. This is pretty interesting as it does give some insight into the characters. For example, a long held belief of the fan community is that Parkman is a diagnosed dyslexic. It was never confirmed in the show but there were certainly hints.

In this cut, his dyslexia is talked about openly giving the viewer a bit more insight into his character. With his character, it’s also interesting given his power. As someone who has a hard time processing information in the written form, there is irony in him suddenly being deluged with others’ thoughts.

There’s also an entire plot line that disappeared completely from the aired story line. It alludes to what exactly caused that train crash that Claire saved a guy from. If the subplot had stayed in, I don’t think Ted Sprague would have ever been introduced to the story.

I also laughed at some of the casting. Some of the characters that we meet in later episodes are in this pilot played by different actors. This makes the episode feel very surreal.

On another note, Linderman is referred to a whole lot more and his ties with some of the characters aren’t kept secret as they are in the official storyline. (Does anyone else find it funny that a powerful guy who is introduced first as loaning large sums of money to people has the name ‘Lender Man’?)

Most interesting of all may be how this pilot would have led to a completely different season of Heroes than the one we grew to love. Some of the plotlines and characters would have necessarily had to have gone different directions, making for a wholly different story.

Overall, it was an insightful look into the creation process of a series. It gives the viewer a good sense of not only what goes into making a tv show, but what goes into changing it to make the best television.

This version of the pilot isn’t as good as what was aired, and the parts that were cut were mostly deserving. For anyone who even has the slightest inclination of being a Heroes fanboy, though, this episode’s for you.

In just one month, Heroes will start its second season. The first season consumed me, so I’m both excited and wary of the second season.

On the one hand it could be every bit as good as the first season, but on the other it could be a huge letdown. Frankly, the whole thing with Hiro going back to feudal Japan borders on silly so I hope they keep that in check.

In Heroes news, we at least get some fresh eye candy for the show this season. Actresses Kristen Bell and Janel Parrish are both slated to join the cast.

Kristen Bell is known for her work on Veronica Mars, while Janel Parrish isn’t known for much of anything. Either way, they’re both purdy.

Other exciting Heroes news about the upcoming season is that Kevin Smith will be handling writing and directing duties for at least one episode of the origins spin-off.

I’m excited about Kevin Smith’s involvement. Although television will limit some of his humor, I expect that his script will be extremely smart and witty.

By the time the show premiers I’ll be watching it in glorious HD with beautiful FiOS. I can’t wait!