'Heroes Reborn' Review: "Under the Mask"

Sabrina Petrafesa ’18 /Emertainment Monthly Executive Publisher

Heroes Reborn “Under the Mask” opens with two Evos in a freezing cold wasteland working on Melina’s power with an ominous message of: “the world will need your powers soon.” Then we don’t see those two again for the rest of the episode. This is just one example of all the random plot holes and unanswered questions that are intended for viewers to keep watching, but really aren’t interesting enough to keep them from changing the channel. This entire episode is very slow and too much is going on.

In what must be the writers’ idea of dramatic irony, Zachary Levi’s character, who hunts and kills Evos with his wife, turns out to be an Evo himself. It’s almost predictable, but most definitely random. In the entirety of a two hour premiere there was no indication that something like this would happen… at all. With everything that’s happening and all the new characters being introduced in this show it feels like the writers don’t seem to know how to juggle so many characters and so many plot lines in one episode. The introduction of all of these characters should be more gradual. The writers have also chosen one of the most boring characters from the original cast to give the most screen time to: Noah Bennett (Jack Coleman). Coleman’s character in Heroes was only interesting because of his relationship with his daughter, but now that Claire (Hayden Panettiere) is gone his relationship is boring. The writers attempt to make him less boring is by pairing him with Quentin (Henry Zebrowski), the adorably dorky guy who is just looking for his Evo sister and knows absolutely nothing about what is happening. However, even though Quentin’s character is a highlight of the show, it’s not enough to make Noah’s search for his forgotten memories any more entertaining.

Most of the new characters are interesting enough, but they don’t get enough screen time. In an attempt to tie together all the plotlessness and characters, Renautas was introduced. This evil corporation is trying to out all Evos around the world by torturing an Evo to get information. Renautas is at the middle of everything, or so it seems. They’ve kidnapped Molly Walker (Francesca Eastwood) for their creepy “Cerebro-like” device and seem to be involved with the kidnapping or death of Miko’s father. Now Miko (Kiki Sukezane) is probably the most interesting character on the show and what we get to see of her is definitely not enough. Any girl whose father somehow had Hiro Nakamura’s (Masi Oka) sword in his  possession and can wield it perfectly is an interesting character. Her uncovered backstory needs to become a focus.

Heroes Reborn cannot capture its audience. What it needs to do is expand on the more interesting characters and bring in as much of its original cast in this season soon. Based on next episodes promo we’re finally going to see Hiro again and hopefully that will open the floodgates for more of the original cast. A show like this needs to fanlight because that is the only way that original viewers will want to continue watching. There is still some waiting to do to see if this show will get any better.

Episode Grade: C+