Heroes returns

The mid-season première of Heroes kicks off tonight in America, with the BBC hopefully starting it up again in a couple of weeks. This is them getting fully into Volume 4, 'Fugitives', which as the name suggests sees them all on the run as they are hunted down by the government.

On paper, it does not sound terribly exciting with the cast having to go about their normal lives without drawing attention to themselves. Obviously it is not going to stay quiet for long. Although it would be extremely unlikely, more so than usual, if they were able to somehow ultimately take down the government. More than likely this block of episodes will see the heroes trying to lay low, but some sort of event/emergency will occur and they will be forced to save the day to avoid ending up on a massive guilt trip. The government could possibly try this technique to flush them out. Some big fights will ensue and they will probably broker some sort of deal so they all don't end up in prison. Or none of the above could occur, that's just what I think this volume will be like in my head.

But they really have to hit the ground running. The show took a lot of criticism, deservedly so, for the complete mess of Season 2 and while the first few and the last few episodes in the first batch of Season 3 before its break were good, it just dragged in the middle.

The show needs to cut down on the time travel big time. There is too much jumping about, it just mainly feels like a deus ex machina. Some killing would be nice too. As in making deaths actually stick. It's a running joke that pretty much all the cast has been killed and brought back to life. Which is terribly annoying and it also cheapens the effect of death as a plot device when you are expecting them to show up alive and well in a few episodes time. Personally I'd start the culling with Mohinder, Claire, Tracy & maybe Peter for starters, but that's just me.

I really hope they do more character driven episodes as well. They really haven't touched upon that since 'The Company Man' episode way back in Season 1, which is arguably their best ever episode. Simplifying or reducing the number of storylines would be nice as all too often it seemed like they were trying to fit too much into a single episode and lots of stuff got lost or missed out on the chance to be developed further.

Personally I feel that Heroes needs to hit this 'volume' out of the park to avoid cancellation. Ratings were declining in America and general interest in the show is probably at an all-time low. There is also the fact that it is one of the most costly shows to produce and in these dark economic times, the network may just decide enough is enough in an attempt to save a fair amount of cash. This could possibly be the last roll of the dice for Heroes and they need to come out all guns blazing. It really does feel like it's sink or swim time for this show.