I reject reality and substitute my own!

Because I can’t let go of Heroes yet. Oh, it’s probably my New Year’s resolution to kick that unhealthy habit, but it’d be best if Heroes just went away and I could do the pick-and-choose that I am sadly used to, as a Highlander fan. Where the “canon” is so inconsistent you cannot respect it all at once, so the movies and the series and whatever they made are merely suggestions, pieces of a puzzle that you take to build your own version in your head.

The problem with having the thing you love in your head means it gets harder for you to talk with other fans. Somehow, you have to negotate a common… fanon? And this might be how AU fanfiction is born. Only not, because they get written for shows that are still good and make sense.

Ah, Heroes. I have a lot of respect for the characters and the storylines, the themes and directions in Season 1 and 2. This is why I can’t respect Season 3. I want to use this opportunity to ramble about how things might have or could have or should have developed after Season 2, taking into account – not what the writers want want WANT for a storyline, but how the characters might actually react.

Elle

It’s funny that whenever people talk about the new characters in Season 2, they forget Bob. They mention Monica, Maya, Elle, Adam, West, Caitlin, Yaeko and Alejandro, but they forget Bob, even though he had a prominent role.

Maybe it is because as much as you try, you cannot complain bout Bob. He’s a great character, a lot of fun, hard to see through, and he is well-integrated in a lot of characters’ storylines. But you also cannot fangirl him because he isn’t hot.

A while ago I wrote that I had read someone’s opinion that “Elle’s storyline was better than Maya’s”. I disagreed with that statement, and still do, because Elle never had her own storyline, but only appeared in the storylines of other characters: Peter, Mohinder, Claire, HRG – popular Season 1 characters.

Popularity

Sneaking a peek at TWoP’s Heroes forums is dull and usually frustrating.

You want to know why Elle’s storyline “worked” while Maya’s “didn’t work”?

Elle never had her own. Elle was part of Peter’s storyline, then part of the HRG/Mohinder drama: she was with the Company storylines, the most interesting stuff this season, and she was never actually required to carry her own storyline all by herself.

It’s always more fun to watch a character interact with other characters, especially a variety. All characters who, early in their storylines, were in an isolated position, especially when they were also faced with serious problems and therefore did not display an unusually comic or cheerful attitudes towards life (unlike Monica), were unpopular with fans. Mohinder, Matt, Niki, now Maya.

But if you introduced these characters differently, they wouldn’t be themselves anymore. Niki’s family situation might not always have been exciting to watch, but it is what makes this character. Mohinder’s isolation made a lot of sense when it was exactly this that gave birth to his dynamic with Sylar. And without her horrifying ability and without being traumatized by it, why would Maya ever even have to travel to the USA to find Mohinder? Without the crap she went through, what impact would her arrival in NYC make, emotionally?