Lost was so great because even though what was happening was insane and shark jumping you still felt totally invested because of how well written the characters were and how cool the world was set up. That's how I felt anyway.
No Right Answer: Show that Jumped the Shark the Most
- Thread starter Firefilm
- Start date
Not even a contest, Lost jumped the shark so regularly there was a ramp set up just for them... kinda the point though, and before the shitty ending it almost worked in the show's favor.
And I liked Heroes right up until the end, sure it certainly had problems, but it was still a live-action superhero series, and it had great moments, a few interesting characters and in some ways, seemed like it was paying tribute to comic books with how it played out.
And I liked Heroes right up until the end, sure it certainly had problems, but it was still a live-action superhero series, and it had great moments, a few interesting characters and in some ways, seemed like it was paying tribute to comic books with how it played out.
No, you're not. I loved Heroes, and I have all the seasons on DVD (apart from the fourth, which I've never seen, because it never aired in New Zealand, and I didn't even know it existed until late last year). I'll admit the Third season was really hard to get into, going into sub-plots that I couldn't care about at all, and it took way too long to develop any real momentum, and several characters disappeared and never returned (remember the girl who could imitate anyone she sees?). They killed off Adam, and he was my favourite villain, and his and Hiro's reuniting was really disappointing. I couldn't have cared less about Sylar's parents, and his creepy turning-into-my-mum thing was way too weird. And I really loved the future episode where everyone had powers, and Claire was a total baddass, and Peter was the bad guy, but then we never saw more than that. I still loved it though, because cinematically it was beautiful, and the actors were all phenomenal.Roroshi14 said:
Lost on the other hand...bloody hell. When the island became a living thing that could shift in time, that's when all hope for any and all TV shows was lost. The only thing I'm looking forward to is a new show with Daniel Radcliffe in it. Everything else is mediocre.
Well, here's the thing I should perhaps have made clearer:Kapol said:
Taken on its own in isolation, Season 1 of Heroes was quite possibly the best superhero television show ever made. Just about every criticism I made of everything that came after wasn't true in Season 1. Characters had arcs and development; they were relatable, and some of the plot developments had real resonance: the estrangement between the brothers, the internal struggle of choosing between ambition and doing the right thing, discovering that against all prior expectations you were intended to play a central role in important events.
More, it was possible to ask basic questions of the plot and expect to have them answered: Why was it important to "save the cheerleader"? Why could one of the brothers sometimes fly, and sometimes not? What was the nature of the doom that was facing New York?
By Season 2, things like suggesting that causing a future timeline someone had been left stranded in to cease to exist was "rescuing them" or someone who could regenerate just knowing that being decapitated would mean their death just kind of breezed on by. Characters moved backwards, and writer Kring would later make comments to the press that things like romance "just weren't a good fit for the show" (ignoring that romance could be a good fit for the show if a) we believed the characters had a reason to be romantically involved abd b) none of those so involved appeared to be sociopaths).
While some may dispute this, I'd argue that Lost, by comparison, was actually pretty even in quality throughout its run. Certainly it had its ups and downs and its share of arbitrary plot twists, but arguably its failing was not that it got worse but that the questions established from the beginning were sometimes answered questionably and other times answered not at all. Lost made people ask questions; the expectations that those questions had good answers may have been let down, but arguably that's as much the problem of the expectations themselves as the writing.
Lost was basically one long, six year story. Heroes was a different story each season with some of the same characters, none of which measured up to the first, and most of which degraded the elements that made that first season work.
Again, that makes it sound more like it's the worse of the two shows, or the more disappointing. But I don't think that really qualifies as jumping the shark more. It sounds like, from season 2 onwards, it just got bad more than anything. But I don't know for sure.Callate said:
I personally despise the use of idioms like "jump the shark", mostly because like other similar phrases it's become a go-to tool for people on the internet to bludgeon whatever show, movie, etc. in a post-experience manner. And while I'm certainly guilty of this myself, people that do this have such a strong presence on the Internet that it's becoming exhausting to me.
Also, best derailment metaphor ever.
Also, who's Gary Mitchell?
Also, best derailment metaphor ever.
Also, who's Gary Mitchell?
Lost never appealed to me. Even early on I could tell it was a "mystery for the sake of mystery" show, and I've honestly come to hate that because they're always writing out of their ass with no coherent plan even episode to episode. It's not always bad, but I feel we get more "The Events" and fewer 4400s.
Heroes, ugh now this hurts. I actually took a while to warm to the show, faded off midseason, then came back with a full vengeance. Then things got goofy. There's a lot of talk about what went wrong, however blaming the writer's strike isn't one of them. If they had a good idea, they could have picked up where they'd left off and used the original plan of the virus getting out. However fans had been jumping ship like they'd found out they were on the Titanic. The most common complaint was lost momentum, which I always took as people expected this show to be the x-men. I was never under that opinion, and felt the show was supposed to be about the "everyday" heroes like single moms and EMTs that just happen to have superpowers. The show went the other way trying for more action based, and failing pretty hard, due in no small part to contrivacies to keep characters around, or ideas very comic booky like lost identical siblings, evil future mes, and whatever the hell they were thinking with Sylar. By books 4 and 5, even the mysteries that had originated in the show had given up and while they were good ideas, nothing was well pulled off, and always felt rushed.
Heroes, ugh now this hurts. I actually took a while to warm to the show, faded off midseason, then came back with a full vengeance. Then things got goofy. There's a lot of talk about what went wrong, however blaming the writer's strike isn't one of them. If they had a good idea, they could have picked up where they'd left off and used the original plan of the virus getting out. However fans had been jumping ship like they'd found out they were on the Titanic. The most common complaint was lost momentum, which I always took as people expected this show to be the x-men. I was never under that opinion, and felt the show was supposed to be about the "everyday" heroes like single moms and EMTs that just happen to have superpowers. The show went the other way trying for more action based, and failing pretty hard, due in no small part to contrivacies to keep characters around, or ideas very comic booky like lost identical siblings, evil future mes, and whatever the hell they were thinking with Sylar. By books 4 and 5, even the mysteries that had originated in the show had given up and while they were good ideas, nothing was well pulled off, and always felt rushed.
I'll take your Heroes season 2 and raise you Dark Angel season 2. That shark went into orbit. How do you screw up Pretender + Batman? Well they did.
All the interesting antagonists in the first season? Dead! Paralyzed friend creating interesting tension between himself and his super-soldier friend? Give him legs! Add an annoying werewolf that makes Jar Jar and Scrappy Doo tolerable!
All the interesting antagonists in the first season? Dead! Paralyzed friend creating interesting tension between himself and his super-soldier friend? Give him legs! Add an annoying werewolf that makes Jar Jar and Scrappy Doo tolerable!
They point out people can't let go of Lost, but did so easily of Heroes. Y'know, Benedict Arnold's betrayal hurt so much because he was an awesome general. I'm sure, like Heroes, there were less greats that also betrayed us and we forget them as they were meh.Assassin Xaero said:
Lost really was great. They gave us a terrific quantum physics idea for the last two seasons, promised all along that these (and everyone is supposed to know this entire thread is about spoilers, so, this follows!) guys were NOT dead, then, let the whole time travel quantum physics idea be irrelevant and, yeah, the Lost Alts were actually in the after life.
As someone put it better, it is like they gave us an intriguing concept that hooked us in and then explained, "oh, well, this is just a weird magic happy place where weird stuff happens." Unacceptable.
Before I even knew the shows these guys would fight over, I picked Lost for the shark jumper of this generation. Heroes never really got going. Lost did.. and really got lost by the end.
The thing about Lost was everyone said "purgatory, they are all dead". The writers said no, its something different and original. An it turns out it was purgatory, what every one said way back in series one. Complete waste of a good show. Not so much it jumped the shark as filled the many episodes with pointless stuff that wasnt important to the overall plot and characters. Especially when you get to the ending, it makes a lot of the previous series pointless.
24. Now i love 24, but after the last series its good they stopped there. It becomes difficult to come up with new stuff and not redoing things from previous series.
Xfiles.....now theres a show that jumped the shark. Just kept adding more complications an weirdness to there "mythos" as the series went on. Still love the earlier series.
24. Now i love 24, but after the last series its good they stopped there. It becomes difficult to come up with new stuff and not redoing things from previous series.
Xfiles.....now theres a show that jumped the shark. Just kept adding more complications an weirdness to there "mythos" as the series went on. Still love the earlier series.
I can pin-point the exact moment in Heroes when I just felt 'this is shite, why am I watching this'? Not just that, but I could actually see a shark jump out of my desk, over my screen, do a little dance, and then dive back in the water.
For those that do remember it, that moment when the boy that could fly says to the cheerleader 'I won't let you fall'. It took me a weak to clean up all the puke that resulted from that.
Not that I've ever seen Twilight, but I could hardly imagine even that being that bad.
For those that do remember it, that moment when the boy that could fly says to the cheerleader 'I won't let you fall'. It took me a weak to clean up all the puke that resulted from that.
Not that I've ever seen Twilight, but I could hardly imagine even that being that bad.