Watching Heroes

I know it’s been a while (again) since I’ve updated.  I’m going to try to get all caught up today.   Let’s start with a roundup of all the big news from the last week or so:

JFX Online posted several photos of Zachary Quinto and Greg Grunberg from the set of Heroes on February 3rd.  In the photos it appeared that Sylar was sporting a gunshot would to the back of the head.  What does that mean for his character?

After rumors that she was spotted kissing Jesse McCartney, it seems that Hayden Panettiere and Milo Ventimiglia have gone their separate ways.  Several reports are popping up on the internet that the couple has split but, of course, remain friends.

HRG is blogging again!  Jack Coleman posted a blog about “A Clear and Present Danger” on February 10 and an “addendum” to that blog this morning.  You can check it all out at Television Without Pity.

Don’t forget to check out Greg Beeman’s blog each week as well.  Last week he gave us insight into "Trust and Blood" and I’m sure he’ll have another one up very soon.  Check it out at the Beaming Beeman.

EW’s Michael Ausiello has reassured us that Daphne is not dead - yet!  Even though she appeared to have been shot to death, he says we haven’t seen the last of Brea Grant.

In an interview with Access Hollywood from New York Comic Con, Milo Ventimiglia called some of the rumors of who might be leaving just "fairy tales."  You can see the entire video interview at the source.

Brea Grant has confirmed that she will be in Rob Zombie’s upcoming Halloween 2.

Jack Coleman recently spoke with John DeBella on Philadelphia’s MGK 102.9.  He chatted about what to expect from HRG and about the Super Bowl promo ads as well as his connection to Benjamin Franklin. Jack is always great in interviews so it’s a good listen.  Check it out at WMGK.com.

According to SpoilerTV, the title for episode 3.24 has been confirmed as "I am Sylar." 

By the way, if you’re following me on Twitter, you may have seen that my grandmother was in the ICU after complications from pacemaker surgery.  She is doing much better.  Her doctor says someone “up there” must be looking out for her.

The latest edition of The Beaming Beeman is up with the usual episode insight and behind-the-scenes photos.

There is an excellent article about James Kyson Lee at MochiMag.com. James talks about how he got started in showbiz.  Excellent read.

io9.com has published a list of 63 Reasons You Should Give Heroes One More Chance. Some of them are pretty clever.

Have you heard that Heroes alums Jayma Mays (Charlie) and Jessalyn Gilsig (Meredith) have both been cast in a new comedy for Fox?  Both ladies will star in Glee, an hourlong comedy that centers on Will, a thirtysomething Spanish teacher at an Ohio high school who has the daunting task of taking over the school’s glee club, which has become a heaven for outcasts.  The show has been picked up to series for next season. 

In this week’s Mega Buzz at TVGuide.com, they again address the question on whether Ali Larter and/or Hayden Panettiere are wanting to leave the show.  Their answer:  “One of the key Heroes dies at the end of this volume, so that would be an easy out. But Larter recently said she’s "100 percent part of Heroes" and Panettiere repped hard for the show at the Super Bowl. We all know actresses never lie. Also, we all know the fate of the world relies on the cheerleader, so why would NBC let her go?”

Also in that same Mega Buzz, Heroes (or more precisely, the Heroes Super Bowl promotion) was Matt Mittovich’s Mega Rave:  “I know many of you have derided them as cheesy, but I loved NBC’s Super Bowl promos involving the Heroes. The football game offered a great showcase for every character’s ability (e.g. Hiro freezing time to grab the ball), while the ‘Feelin’ Alright?’ sing-along (with stars of Chuck and Medium) was a blast, if only just to see Sylar look at us askew and bellow a few notes.”

Don’t forget to keep checking our Ratings and Reviews post.  I’m updating it as I find more reviews.  I just added another from io9.com this morning.

OK, here we go…

Here’s what we missed while I was busy out in Christmas Light Land:

Heroes will return from the mid-season break on Monday, February 2 to kick off Volume 4: Fugitives.

It’s Official:  Pushing Daisies is canceled and writer/producer Bryan Fuller is making a return to Heroes.  He has negotiated a 7 figure deal with Universal Media Studios to rejoin Heroes and develop new projects for the studio.  His return to Heroes could happen as early as episode 20.

Jack Coleman blogged after episode 11 and chatted a bit about stunts and stuntmen.  He also revealed that they are working on episode 17, currently titled “Cold Wars,” in which HRG and Parkman will be interrogated.

Of course Jack wasn’t the only one blogging about episode 11, Greg Beeman had a little to say about it as well.  He gave some insight on how the throat-slitting scene was filmed and provided some awesome pictures of all the “yucky wounds” from the episode.

Brea Grant spoke with SuperHero Profiles and confirmed that Daphne will be a part of Volume 4: Fugitives. She talks more about the Fugitive storyline and Daphne’s relationship with Matt Parkman.

Speaking of Daphne…want to know more about her past?  Check out this issue of the graphic novel.

Villain David H. Lawrence XVII (The Puppetmaster aka Doyle) will be making a return to Heroes.  He posted on his blog last week that he is filming episodes again, but didn’t reveal anything spoilery. David also Twitters so you can follow him there. 

E!’s Kristin says that despite many signs pointing to Elle’s death, there may be a cover-up at work, and she may well rise from the dead.  She also revealed that in Volume 4, Sylar will be tracking down information on his past, to see if what HRG said about the Petrellis not being his parents is true.

I’m a little behind after taking nearly a week off.  I have already “rounded up” the spoilers, and here’s a summary of the non-spoilery stories from the past few days.  I still owe you a recap and I’ll have that (hopefully) a little later today.

Masi Oka and Milo Ventimiglia interviewed each other for AOL’s “Outside the Box.” You can see the full interview at this link.

UK based Digital Spy gives their opinion on whether or not Heroes has lost its mojo.  Their verdict: No way!

Jimmy Jean-Louis talked with TV Guide about what we can expect from The Haitian’s upcoming storyline. He says that we will see a little bit of a backstory for his character and we will meet his brother.

Brea Grant did a live u-stream yesterday in which she answered questions that fans Twitter’d to her.  She also spoke with Comic News Insider and This Week in Geek recently. You can find links to those interviews on her blog.  That girl is everywhere!  (Remember you can follow Brea, Greg Grunberg and Me on Twitter if you are so inclined)

Kristen Bell talked with A.V. Club about Heroes, Veronica Mars, Fanboys and more.  She defends Heroes, saying that this season is “really good” and says she likes where they have taken her character.

In the latest edition of The Beaming Beeman, Greg Beeman interviews Heroes director Greg Yaitanes about episode 9. He, of course, has his usual behind-the-scenes photos up as well and, once again, Cristine Rose steals the show with the most awesome of photos:

Here’s the latest news from the world of Heroes:

Brea Grant has announced a live Twitter event. Twitter users can send her questions to be answered on a live broadcast on ustream.tv next Tuesday, November 18 at 7pm. You can find out all the details on Brea’s blog.

BuddyTV’s John Kubicek has some interesting theories about inherited powers vs. synthetic powers and how they might be handed down from one generation to the next. Check it out.

Jack Coleman has a new entry over at The HRG Files. He reveals that episode 3.17, “Cold Wars,” will be a huge episode for HRG (along the lines of “Company Man” and “Cautionary Tales”) and speaks a little about why “Villains” was one of his favorite episodes.

Ratings were not so great this week.  The series hit an all-time low with only 7.83 million viewers and earning a 3.6/8.  Though it placed 3rd in it’s timeslot, it was still #1 with the 18-34 demographic.

In Greg Beeman’s latest blog, he talks about “Villains” writer Rob Fresco and he chats with the head of the Heroes makeup department, Lori Madrigal. And of course, he has the brilliant photos as usual.  Here’s my favorite of the week called, “Don’t Mess With the Queen”:

Comic Book Resources has done an excellent rebuttle to the Entertainment Weekly story suggesting that Heroes is broken, pointing out that some of their “fixes” are actually contradictory.  Nice work CBR.

Heroes Wiki recently spoke with Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine, the actor who portrays Usutu, the African precog painter in season 3.  He chats about his current role as Usutu as well as the part he played in the unaired pilot.

Chris Brogan has a great interview with Brea Grant in which she talks about her huge online presence and how important that is to her.  She also chats a little about co-star Greg Grunberg.

Another photo-heavy issue of The Beaming Beeman is up. Make sure you give it a look!

Jack Coleman is also blogging again over at The HRG Files, after taking a week off.  This week’s post is a lovefest for his co-stars - TV Wife, Ashley Crowe; his daughter’s bio-mom, Jessalyn Gilsig; TV daughter, Hayden Panettiere; and Puppet Master David H. Lawrence XVII.

There’s a new podcast in town. The List is a new podcast based in the UK (and apparently the only podcast based in the UK).  Kirsty Walker and Kevin Beaumont host the show which is available at www.endofshow.com/thelist .  It will also be coming to iTunes soon.

Did you see Zachary Quinto presenting at the National Television Awards in London yesterday?  He was the presenter for the Outstanding Drama Performance Award, which went to David Tennant of Doctor Who. By the way, in his acceptance speech, Tennant announced he is leaving the show at the end of 2009.  You can see Zach, and Tennant’s speech, here.  I should have some photos from the ceremony to post in a little while.

Don’t forget to enter our Prize A Day Giveaway today.  Today’s prize is a copy of Heroes Official Magazine #5.

Don’t forget about our 2nd Blogiversary Giveaway.  You could win an autographed copy of Milo Ventimiglia’s comic book, “Rest.”

Our friends at Heroes 360 Clues are also having a contest this week.  They have several copies the Sprint Heroes Comic from Comic-Con to give away and all you need to do to enter is answer some easy trivia questions. 

iF Magazine has interviews posted with both Masi Oka and Milo Ventimiglia.

Greg Beeman is back with insight into episode 6 and his usual photographic awesomeness.

Wired.com calls on Heroes to drop the dead weight if the show wants to survive.

BuddyTV’s John Kubicek is fed up with Hiro’s stupidity this season. I have to agree with John. I keep hoping Maury Parkman is lurking in the background making Hiro do stupid things. 

First of all Happy Birthday to Brea Grant who plays Daphne aka The Speedster. Brea is 27 today. If you get a chance stop by her blog and wish her a happy birthday!

Greg Beeman’s latest blog is all about the newest addition to the directing staff at Heroes, Anthony Hemingway, and how they came to the special effects we saw from Vortex in episode 5.  My favorite part, as usual, is the photos though.  Here are my faves from this week (click to enlarge):

Jack Coleman was also busy blogging after this weeks episode.  He also talks about the filming of the Vortex scenes, working with Zachary Quinto and about what a silly job this acting thing is. If you’re not reading Jack’s blog, you’re really missing out!

MTV Movies Blog has our first good look at Zachary Quinto as Spock. A few production stills have been released and in one of them, he looks more like Sylar as a Vulcan gone bad…though you must admit his Spock look is spot on!  Zach and co-star Chris Pine are also featured on the cover of the Entertainment Weekly which has a big write-up on Star Trek.

Speaking of ZQ, he has done an interview in which he gives us a little insight into what Sylar is all about:  "He is in great conflict within himself and you get to see different shades of his character, some a little less threatening than others, but that darkness and evil that he serves have a great power over him and I don’t know if that power is surmountable."

And finally, E! Online’s Kristin goes over those spoilers she gave us on Tuesday in this video.  It’s not what she says that’s interesting though. It’s the snippets from behind-the-scenes that caught my eye.  You see Nathan, Peter and The Haitian in what looks to be Haiti. I’m sure those go right along with those photos we posted back in September, which were supposed to be from episode 11, "The Eclipse."  Thanks to Matej for the video.

Check out part 2 of Jack Coleman’s chat with BuddyTV.  He addresses Claude’s return, how long Sylar and HRG will be partners and whether or not he would like to see Noah Bennet get a power.

StarWars.com talked with Milo Ventimiglia about his love of Star Wars and the light saber fan films that he and his partners made, which opened up the Star Wars panel at Comic-Con.

Masi Oka chatted with the Australian site, Adelaide Now. He doesn’t really say anything that hasn’t been said before, but Masi fans might want to check it out.

Heroes Magazine is giving away a season two original script signed by the cast. Also up for grabs, five season two DVD box sets, and ten boxes of Heroes volume two trading cards.  To enter, visit Titan Magazines.

EW’s Michael Ausiello had this tidbit in his latest “Ask Ausiello" column: “The show has a problem…The problem concerns a kid named David. He’s teenage angst incarnate and he’ll be featured in at least three episodes of the "Fugitives" arc. Casting is under way. “

The ODI posted this casting update for the upcoming webisodes:  [OMINOUS MAN] Between 35 and 45, physically and vocally imposing…CO-STAR. OPEN TO ALL ETHNICITIES. ACTOR MUST BE AVAILABLE THURS. OCT. 9, 2008

The latest edition of The Beaming Beeman is short but sweet.  Sweet in that it has tons of photos of course.  Here’s one of my favorites (though there are some great cast candids). It’s the actors on rigs for the “frozen time scene” from episode 3:

Masi Oka talked to The TV Addict about the critical backlash concerning Season 2, his new nemesis Daphne and many other aspects of Hiro.  You can find the interview at TheTVAddict.com.

Masi also talked to Comic Book Resources.  He said the future where Hiro saw himself being killed by Ando may have been "misunderstood."   You can also find interviews with Masi at MovieWeb and iFMagazine.

Tim Kring has been named "Master of Sci-Fi" by TV Week writer Josef Adalian.

The latest installment of The Beaming Beeman features and interview with writer Joe Pokaski as well as information on how they re-worked a few scenes in episode 3.03 to save money.  He revealed that the woman making the exchange with The Haitian is actually Sendhil Ramamurthy’s real-life wife, Olga Sosnovska.  The blog also, of course, features Greg Beeman’s awesome behind-the-scenes photos.

A casting call has gone out for a Webisode character.  ESTABAN is an athletic hispanic male, age 21.  He will be Santiago’s friend and teammate.

Zachary Quinto talked to Crave Online about Sylar. He described him as being very conflicted this season and talked a bit about whether Sylar will go good or become more evil.

For all you Trekkies, Zach also did an interview with SFX about his upcoming role as Spock. TrekWeb.com has a few excerpts in which Zach says he felt no pressure from the 40 year history of Spock and created his own version for the movie.

Angela Petrelli continues her domination of the internet with a new TV Guide interview.  Angela’s portrayer, Cristine Rose, talks about the newest member of her family and how she interpreted Angela. She also reveals that we will see her in scenes with Malcolm McDowell and Robert Forster, who will play Arthur Petrelli.

And speaking of Cristine, check out this video interview and the accompanying article from BuddyTV:

Heroes executive producer Greg Beeman has posted two blogs, one for each of the episodes that aired as part of last night’s premiere.

In the first he talks to Allan Arkush about how Heroes is different from other shows.  They also discuss their favorite parts of the premiere, which Arkush directed.  Here are some of my favorite exchanges from the interview:

GB: I heard that when they screened the episode at Comic-Con a fan or two fainted during that scene [Sylar exploring Claire’s brain] and had to be taken away.
AA: I heard that too. And as a director, that’s a good feeling.

…

GB: Anything you’re disappointed with?
AA: That we had to lose the Sylar/Mr. Muggles scene. The big growl down.
GB: Could you explain what that was?
AA; I came up with a scene for the moment when Claire was in the closet and Sylar was outside the door, where Mr. Muggles shows up and growls at Sylar barring the path – he’s trying to protect Claire. Sylar raises his finger, the way he always does when he’s going to take off the top of someone’s head. So, you started to get worried if Mr. Muggles is going to be Okay. And then, Sylar flicks his finger – and Mr. Muggles shoots backwards out the doggie door. Oh well, it’ll be a great DVD extra.
GB: I know… I loved that scene. Why did it go?
AA: Partly for time – the show was long. And partly because some people thought it was too goofy and funny… Story of my life.
GB: Well, take it from me, I think they were wrong!
AA: Thank you. I think so too.

His second blog gives details on how they filmed the scene in which Claire is stepping in front of the train.  It’s always very interesting to find out how these things are done.  He has storyboards and photos to go along with it.  He also talks about the Elle vs Sylar scene, and the scene with Mohinder hanging from the rafters.

Beeman also posted some awesome photos as always.  Here are a few:

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More and more Heroes related articles are popping up on the web today so I’m going to give you a quick roundup:

• The Watcher has posted 13 Things You Need to Know About the Season Premiere of Heroes. She is pretty hard on the show but does like Jack Coleman and Cristine Rose quite a bit.
• The OWI talked to the always witty Greg Beeman and has the interview posted now for your reading pleasure.
• Dreyesbo gave me a heads up about 3 new articles posted at IGN.  There is an interview with Brea Grant, an interview with Milo Ventimiglia and a slightly spoilery review of the premiere.
• Hayden Panettiere has confirmed that she will be an Emmy presenter on Sunday night. Thanks to The ODI!
• Zap2It talked to Zachary Quinto about what it’s like to be Sylar.  They’ve also got an interview with Tim Kring.
• OK! Magazine asked Cristine Rose about her resemblance to Sarah Palin. See what she had to say!
• Metro.co.uk has a small article with a few quotes from Zachary Quinto.  No new info but ZQ fans will enjoy it!

And that’s just a sampling.  There are many, many more articles gracing the world wide web today.  If you see an interesting one, drop me a note and let me know!

You know it is time for Heroes when director/producer Greg Beeman stars blogging again!  The Beaming Beeman always gives us a great perspective on the show and has the most awesome photos ever!  Here’s a snippet of what Greg had to say, along with a few of his pix.

In this volume a key new idea is introduced into the mythology – an idea which will divide our characters. They will be divided not just by “Hero” and “Villain” but also by the radical new idea of — well… I can’t say. Watch September 22 to find out!

The last season ended with much acclaim and despair as both Niki Sanders and Nathan Petrelli were apparently killed. If you’ve watched the promos or seen the numerous promotional billboards then you’ve seen Adrian Pasdar and Ali Larter in them. But let me assure you – at least one of those characters is definitely dead and gone.

The cast has been very excited and happy this year. All of them have great stuff to do this year, and a few have whole new powers, storylines and/or characters to play. (Again I can’t say much – just watch!)
The Petrelli brothers are re-united for a big story arc. Matt Parkman goes on a great adventure where he meets a new prophet (and eventually develops a new power.) Someone new takes over the company. And Claire’s father (HRG) gets perhaps the most surprising new partner you can imagine.

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Last night, the cast of Heroes taped the Countdown to the Premiere special which will air in the hour preceding the 2 hour Season 3 premiere. The party was held at Edison lounge in L.A. We’ve got photos of the red carpet and a few from inside the party as well. It looks like everyone came out except for my BFF Greg Grunberg. (Grunny, where were you?)

Ali Larter

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Remember a few months back when Greg Beeman posted that blog with photos of all the characters drinking “Slusho” brand drinks? He said, “The next group of photos falls into the ‘don’t ask/don’t tell’ category…Their cultural significance will become clear in the coming months, so…pay attention.” Then later, we saw Elle (Kristen Bell) slurping on a “Slusho” in her car as she spied on Claire and her family. Silly me, I thought I was grasping the significance of Slusho by catching the name on Elle’s cup. There’s a little more to it than that. (more…)