Heroes to our rescue

By: RyneTate
Photography Editor

For those of us who don’t watch television ritually, it is challenging to break into the habit. Some of us come from backgrounds which incur a need for a single - like a movie or an album, sometimes just a song. Other people seek their entertainment in a daily fix, newspapers, comic strips, soap operas and even sensational news television programming - “Oprah,” anyone?

Well, there are others yet who enjoy storytelling - entertainment itself to be serialized. Comic book readers, reality television enthusiasts, video game junkies and readers of franchises like “Harry Potter,” “Eragon,” “Lord of the Rings” and “Star Wars” novels - we get our fix weekly, monthly, sometimes annually - but the wait is part of the fun.

The television program “Heroes” on NBC is a show which has several intertwined, heavily comic-book-influenced stories which are all ultimately leading up to a tremendous climax. Week after week, the show wows viewers with a ridiculous cliff-hanger prompting viewers to make up their own theories as to where the show is going.

The mysteries of the show bring back viewers every Monday night at 8 p.m., and roughly around 9 p.m., you will hear viewers screaming at the television about the unforeseen direction the show takes as the credits start to roll. It’s a show with homages to the “X-Men,” “Rising Stars,” the “Avengers,” the “Justice League of America” and some other great crime noir graphic novels a la “Watchmen, Ex Machina.”

The characters are mostly all gifted with powers they have inherited or been given by evolutionary mutations. These powers include spontaneous regeneration (Wolverine), flight (Superman), power absorption (Rogue, Mimic), Telekinesis (Jean Grey), vocal persuasion (Purple Man), technomancing (Mitchell Hundred), telepathy (Professor X), possession/multiple personas (Hulk, Sentry), precognition (Layla Miller) and time and space manipulation (Franklin Richards). These powers are obviously not unique, but comic book writers ought to be jealous of the delivery of a fluid story with great character development without the cheesy capes and weapons. These characters are ones to which audiences can relate, and ones they can easily fantasize about being - well, some of them are in trouble pretty often due to the nature of their powers.

This Monday, Dec. 4, viewers will lose a Hero as one is supposed to die just as the show takes a one-month hiatus until the new year. Who this character will be is up in the air, but if you are a new viewer you ought to check out iTunes store. The shows cost a nifty $2 apiece. From one comic enthusiast to a new “Heroes” enthusiast - enjoy!

Heroes artwork by Arjun Ahluwalia