Heroes

NBC’s new series Heroes will pull you free of the seemingly inescapable grip of JJ Abrams’ Lost. Seriously – we can’t even remember what that silly show was about. It’s that good.

Heroes features a few recognisable faces, including Ali Larter and Mysterious Ways’ Adrian Pasdar, but a majority of the cast is recruited from the ranks of the unknown. Genetics, Darwinism and evolution serve as the foundations of the show, with most of the main characters ‘suffering’ from some sort of cellular mutation. The ways in which the symptoms of these mutations manifest however, is what will hook you in. For instance, schoolgirl Claire Bennet can spontaneously regenerate her body, making her almost invincible, while painter Isaac Mendez can draw the future – but only when he’s high on drugs.

Now, the idea of Heroes is hardly new. In fact, the basics are ripped straight from an X-Men comic (and even more so from Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski’s comic, Rising Stars) – but the treatment of the content is definitely original. Our heroes are not spandex-clad supermen and women, rather they’re ordinary people with reasonably ordinary lives. Mother Niki Sanders may have what appears to be super strength, but she also battles with Split Personality Disorder brought on by the stresses of her life. This mix of normal elements grounds the show in reality and stops it spinning completely into the realms of fantasy.

The plot is so completely absorbing that sponges the world round are dropping toasters into their bathtubs. From Claire’s father, the incongruous ‘Mr Bennet’ and his Haitian bodyguard who can wipe memories, to Mohinder Suresh, son of the murdered geneticist who discovered the signs of the mutations, and finally to Sylar, the insane killer who seems to target only those with powers… the number of players and schemers seems endless.

Reportedly, rather than produce the show episode by episode with nothing but a thin outline of where the plot will go, creator Tim Kring has planned out the entire series from beginning to end. So we shouldn’t have to worry about, oh, we don’t know, someone accidentally guessing the mystery of the series and the creators being forced to come up with something else on the fly.

So, if the meandering plot of Lost has dulled the pull of your magnetic anomaly, then you really have to check out Heroes. Just tune into Channel Seven at 8:30 on Wednesday nights and enjoy.