Heroes - Season 1, Episode 23 - "How to Stop an Exploding Man"

I. AM. PISSED. OFF.

Oh, Tim Kring, how could you do this to me? How could you do this to us, your loyal fans, who have supported and followed this show since Day One? How could you end one of the best seasons of television ever with one of the single worst finales I've ever seen in my life? HOW COULD YOU DO THIS ME?

If you are a fellow Heroes watcher, than you have my deepest sympathies because no fan should have endure crap like this. Let's break it down:

STUFF I LIKED:
1. Hmmmmm. I actually have to think about this. Ok. Got one.
Good power uses. Every single hero used their power (well, not including those whose powers we don't know like Mama Petrelli, Charles Deveaux and Simone-- believe me, she'll be back). Nathan flew, Claire regenerated, Peter read minds, was invisible and blew up, Hiro teleported and time traveled (more on that later), Micah restarted the elevator, DL went through another wall, Nikki used her super strength to hit Sylar with a parking meter, and Molly located Sylar. Even if the rest of the episode sucked, at least no one is shy about using their abilities anymore.

2. Some cool new information was dropped on us. According to Molly, there is a villain even worse than Sylar on the horizon, a villain so powerful that when Molly thinks of him, he can "see" her. This has fantastic potential and is a great hook for the second season. Also, we learned that Charles Deveaux has some sort of ability (time travel? dream talking?), which should hopefully play out next season.

That's it. Time for the tirade.

STUFF THAT PISSED ME OFF:
1. SO many inconsistencies I don't even know where to begin. I think its easier to do them in list form.
a. Sylar-- He is powerful enough to kill dozens of heroes, and he has supersonic hearing, but Hiro is able to jog up to him and smite him with a samurai sword? HUH? Really?
b. In one scene, Hiro is able to teleport across a room, grab Ando, and teleport to Japan before Sylar can even turn his head. But when Sylar throws him in the final scene, he accidentally travels to 17th century Japan? Come on!
c. Where is the damn Haitian? He's around all season-long and then when all the shit goes down, he's nowhere to be found?
d. Isaac's comic book-- In one page of the book, Hiro is stabbing Sylar. This comes true. In another page, Ando is dead. This does not come true. How can it be both? Ando being alive or dead has no effect on whether Hiro succeeds?
e. In one scene, DL is collapsed on the ground with a bullet in his stomach, unable to move. Moments later, he's running around and then chillin outside with his wife and kid. Give me a break.
f. Last week, Candace alluded to the fact that she hides her true form because she is really fat and ugly. But when Nikki knocks her out, she reverts back into pretty Candace form, not into some behemoth dogface. If Kring and Co. try and pull some crap move in the future where Candace is not actually the pretty brunette, I will be more than pissed.

OTHER RANDOM THINGS THAT UPSET ME:
1. Veronica Mars- 2 hour finale. 24- 2 hour finale. Lost- 2 hour finale. Heroes - 63 lousy minutes.
2. Matt Parkman gets hit in the chest with like 5 bullets and he isn't dead?! I know he's best friends with Tim Kring, but that shouldn't matter! If you don't want him to die, don't shoot him with 5 bullets! Damn you and your nepotism, Kring! Damn you!
3. Mr. Bennet's name is Noah. Whoop dee frickin doo. Now I can die happy. Thanks, Kring, you giant ignoramus.
4. Sylar gets stabbed! But wait, he's not dead, don't worry. Oh no, DL got shot in the gut! Oh wait, he's not dead either. Holy moly! Matt Parkman got shot several times in the torso! Oh hang on. HE'S NOT DEAD EITHER. WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON???
5. If there's one more speech about love or family or hope on this show, I'm going to stop watching and instead, I'm going to watch Sesame Street, because at least on that show, they have musical numbers and giant puppets to accompany the saccharine cliches being rammed down my throat.
6. I'd like to quote a few lines for you here, to illustrate one of the most preposterous moments of this ludicrous show:
[The scene-- Kirby Plaza. Sylar has been temporarily defeated. Peter is about to explode. Claire is pointing a gun at him.]
Peter: Do it. Do it! You're the only one, Claire.
Claire (in tears): Tell me there's another way please!
Peter: Shoot me. There is no other way.
[Suddenly, Nathan flies in from night sky, landing in between his brother and daughter.]
Nathan: Yes there is, Claire.

Aaaand scene. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Does Nathan have supersonic hearing also? Or is this like the episode of Arrested Development where Tony Wonder just waits in the dumbwaiter for an hour until someone says the word "wonder"? Do they really think we're so stupid and so absorbed in this terrible finale that we won't notice someone finishing a conversation they could not possibly have heard? If I had Ted's power, I can assure my hands would be turning red right now.

7. I start a new paragraph here because I want to now discuss the most important disappointment of all. This finale was fecal matter, my friends. Pure feces. They spend the first 45 minutes wasting time, jerking us around until the last 5 minute showdown (think about it-- nothing happened in the first 45 minutes. Nothing.) And you know what? I could've forgiven them for that if they gave me the epic final battle we were all expecting and deserved. Save the cheerleader, save the world, right? Well, what the hell did Claire have to do with anything? Why didn't Peter even use a single power to stop Sylar? Why was the final showdown between the ultimate hero and the ultimate villain less exciting than an infomercial for the Magic Bullet? And think about this-- aside from Nathan flying Peter away (because for some reason, Peter couldn't do it himself), not one hero did anything that actually had to do with saving the world, and in the end, the evil villain got away.

And you know what? I could've even forgiven that if the preview for next season had been mindblowing, like we were all sure it would be. But then we get Hiro on some grassy knoll with a bunch of ancient samurai? As David Spade would say, "Really, Tim Kring? Really?"

Before I close, let me leave you with some info and questions about next season:
1. SPOILER ALERT-- As the laws of tv can tell you, if you don't see a character die on-screen, they aren't dead (We'll see how true this law is if Peter is still alive on Weeds). Plain and simple. And so, as you can all guess, Nathan isn't dead and has a contract for next season to prove it. What a load of garbage. Think about it-- in the episode before the finale, we had 3 deaths, but in the finale, not a single one. How lame can you get?
(If you don't believe me, check the latest Ask Ausiello. Thanks to Greg for the heads up.)
2. Speaking of people not dying, even though the name of the last Heroes graphic novel is "The Death of Hana Gittelman" (also known as Wireless for those of you keeping score at home), Hana "dies" but is still able to communicate through wireless communication. So that's a cop-out too.
3. Next season, we will find out what Sylar does to peoples' brains. We will also be introduced to the even worse than Sylar baddie to which Molly alluded.
4. What is Mama Petrelli's power? I must know!
5. What's the deal with Sylar and cockroaches? There was one in his cell when he was first captured by Noah Bennet and now there's one crawling on the manhole through which he escaped (which, by the way, makes me wonder: did none of the 8 other people standing around doing nothing notice a stabbed man drag himself several feet across the ground, open a manhole, and climb into a sewer? COME ON!)

As this blog can attest, Heroes was my favorite show of the year. But like a final exam, the finale is worth 50% of the final grade and this finale gets a D for being worse than the episode that preceded it, the worst episode of the season, and the most anti-climatic episode of tv I may have ever seen. When I average this grade with the rest of the episodes, the first season of Heroes, a season that had the potential to go down as one of the best first seasons of television ever, finishes with a respectable, but unremarkable B+

Pretty please, if you watched the finale, share your thoughts! Do you agree with me? Disagree? Let me know!

Stay tuned for posts on the VMars series finale and tonight's Lost season finale!