Heroes - various rumours about cancellation

[lathany]

Note: No spoilers (although actors still in it get mentioned).

I don't know who else is still watching this (other than floralaetifica and me), but there's a new set of rumours about season five.

About a week ago, the speculation was that a 12/13 episode series would be commissioned. Now, however, the rumour is that it's cancelled. The original source, as far as I can tell, is here.

What's the history of this?

• Heroes has dropped in rating every season from an average of roughly 15 million for the first season to 5 million in season four.
• After season four, various people, including Greg Grunberg (Matt Parkman) said that season four didn't wrap up the story properly and they expected a season five. (Ali Larter (Niki/Jessica) also said, towards the end of last month, she thought it would be renewed).
• The network (NBC) and the creator (Tim Kring) had reportedly discussed it more than once and various sites suggested that Kring was keen on a 12/13 episode season and that NBC were hinting this was OK with them (which surprised me as I thought 100 episodes was a magic number for syndication and Heroes doesn't hit that for another 22 episodes... but hey, I'm no expert on the USA TV industry).
• Then today this rumour has surfaced: that NBC are very happy with their new shows and would choose Chuck (which I've never seen) over Heroes for renewal (as both are "on the bubble", ie. NBC was unsure whether to renew or not).
• As part of this rumour, there is a suggestion that Heroes will be given a proper exit with some sort of two or four hour TV movie / mini-series. And, I guess, they might also consider the thirteen episodes at that point if one of their promising new shows doesn't deliver depending on when they make the arrangements for the finish (ie. the thirteen episode thing had already been suggested as being prepared to cover cancellation).
• One nice thing about today's news is that, apparently, NBC will confirm their schedule on Sunday (and it's published Monday). So I'll know for sure by Tuesday (UK time) at the latest.

I'm disappointed about this as I really hoped, particularly given all the earlier up-beat rumours, that it would be back. And, yes, it isn't as good as it used to be, but I still find it more watchable than pretty much anything else and I'm going to miss it. The one bright spot is the continuing rumours of some sort of resolution series/mini-series or movie. I don't want an end, but a prepared one beats the hell out of the too-many shows that didn't get one.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_kent/]

Seems to me that the main problem is that the writers want their cake and eat it. They want the narrative form of novels, with the long-term employment possibilities of serial fiction. They know the realities of the situation; whatever you get an order for, that's maybe the last you ever get and you should treat it as such. Write towards a conclusion each series, and find yourself a new plot for next season. How hard is that?

They've got this ludicrous idea in their heads, however, that it's required, or even plausible to write stories where, at the end of 22 episodes, you're only at the end of part one, and just starting to get interesting.

As far as The Mentalist goes, you could wrap it in five minutes. Just have someone finally get tired of his smug face and shoot him. He's completely on borrowed time as it is, on that score.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Write towards a conclusion each series, and find yourself a new plot for next season. How hard is that?

Well, it's probably not actually difficult, and obviously some series do that. That doesn't mean it's always desirable. It requires you to "resolve" everything every series (or half-series if you're supposed to account also for mid-season canning).

Actually, I was quite pleased that 24 did what you suggest. After 12 or so episodes it was lunchtime, the two main plots had been resolved, the series was plainly unimaginative shit, so I stopped watching and I don't feel I missed anything worthwhile. But I can't realistically expect all writers to plan for mediocrity. I'm glad I never watched Lost past episode 2, but I'm led to believe that people who like that sort of thing find it's the sort of thing they like.

If you're going to have a medium with the potential to tell a 100-hour story (or anyway to include a plot which starts at the beginning and finishes at the end), I don't think it's unreasonable for writers to sometimes try to tell that story. Even if there's a high chance of the audience or the execs getting bored, and turning it into an unfinished story, surely it's worth trying? I'm not a great fan of gigantic, sprawling novels, but I do acknowledge that the trilogy (or longer) exists as a medium and is well-liked. Would Lord of the Rings have been 6 better novels if Tolkien had tried to wrap each one up neatly and start the next one fresh? I mean, without assuming that for Tolkien to do that, he would have needed to be a far better author and would have written better books for that reason.

I guess maybe those TV writers should be doing soap opera, and avoid the economic demands of the series format that way.

Quite aside from high-falutin' ideas about the potential of the medium, though, it's expected that a TV series which will be re-commissioned should end on some kind of teaser, and one which won't, won't. So in that very market-driven sense, what the public asks the writers to do is impossible. If TV networks insist on making the decision once it's too late for the writers to react appropriately, then the execs, not the writers, are guaranteeing failure. I agree with bateleur that the end of Heroes just about stands as an end, but it's not a strong one. Had it been a strong ending, it probably would have been a weak series continuation. Doing both probably is hard.

In the case of The Mentalist, the show ends when Red John is identified and either wins or loses. So each series-finale has an option: that can happen, or it can not happen. If it happens, the show is left open, if it doesn't the show is tied up. It can't do both (although now I've said that, maybe they'll find a way to ruin my theory).

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Doing both probably is hard.

The Wire comes close: the ends of Seasons 1 and 2 could have been a full stop. 3 less so, and I haven't finished 4 yet. Then again, since there are "only" 60 episodes total I'm going to assume without proof that it wasn't subject to the usual network demand than a good series should leave itself open to run as many seasons as demanded. To be honest I'm faintly surprised that anyone in the US but HBO still manages to make drama series worth watching.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_kent/]

The thing is, I really don't think there *is* such a thing as a 100-hour story. Even the best series are like Harry Potter novels 4-7, bloated with irrelevance and hubris. I don't think there's a single one that couldn't have been done in eight per season.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

True. You can do The Iliad in a movie, and the complete works of Shakespeare in about the same time. And yes, the observation that 90% of everything is crap means that even for good things, 90% of *that* is pointless bloat.

But I don't mean a story that cannot be told in under 100 hours, I mean a story that you do take 100 hours over, with plenty of time for diversion along the way that is entertaining and worthwhile even though it isn't critical. In particular the problem with commissioning a series and never saying whether it's the end or not, is that you cannot have a show which, taken as a whole, develops towards some kind of conclusion. Hence you doom it to stop rather than finishing, because when you do can it, it's unfinished.

Thinking about long-running series of novels: Miss Marple / Bond / etc are totally episodic. Elric has a definite conclusion, but Moorcock has the cunning plan of publishing that and getting it out of the way, then spinning out the middle bits indefinitely. Conan Doyle tried to conclude Sherlock Holmes, and wasn't allowed to. Robert Jordan died. Zelazny returned to Amber for a much weaker second quintet. George RR Martin asymptotically approaches finished as the length of each installement tends to infinity. Rowling may be many bad things, and clearly could have used editing with a pair of shears, but she did at least finish the damn thing.

[lathany.livejournal.com]

Rowling may be many bad things, and clearly could have used editing with a pair of shears, but she did at least finish the damn thing.

Yes, I often give her a lot of credit for that. I'm so grateful I never started on Jordan.