Too much, too fast for overreaching 'Heroes'
Sometimes, only a true-blue friend tells you when you have food on your teeth.
And so the time has come to hold a mirror up to "Heroes," to show NBC and series creator Tim Kring that their smile isn't quite as pretty and inviting as they seem to think. It's too unflaggingly broad, and it's marred by a big chunk of something -- is that grandiosity? vanity? need? greed? -- lodged smack between the two front incisors.
As the fall TV season approaches, and we wonder which series will shame themselves, "Heroes" is looking increasingly like a prime suspect. Since the Monday night show is NBC's only newish non-reality hit, the network and Kring have spent the summer heaping tacky expansion gimmicks onto it with abandon. "Heroes" has been turned into a relentless and tiresome source of merchandising, casting, and spinoff hype -- hype about how the show will grow as a product, not media-generated hype about how good it is.
To me, it's as if NBC is pressing "Heroes" into child labor. The network is working the show like a mature blockbuster -- on the order of "CSI" or "Lost" -- too soon. Underneath all the great expectations, there is just a wee sci-fi TV series whose unformed back is carrying too much weight.
"Heroes" has great potential, based on much of its first season, to be special and enduring. But, like many new series, it still needs refining and tender loving care before it deserves to be turned into a synergistic linchpin. Its Emmy nomination this summer for outstanding drama series came too soon.
Every week, it seems, NBC releases yet another tidbit of obviously targeted casting news, to reach the cult- and comic-book-minded. The latest name is Kristen Bell (from "Veronica Mars"), who follows David Anders (from "Alias"), Nichelle Nichols (Uhura from "Star Trek"), Dominic Keating (from "Enterprise"), and many others onto the show.
Viewers who've watched the series loyally know that if there's one thing "Heroes" emphatically does not need, it's more characters. By May's abysmal season finale, the plot had sprawled too far and too wide to fit together satisfactorily, and the rules governing the many characters' magical abilities had become convoluted and random. The hour was busy, crowded, and empty all at the same time.
"Lost" tried the same trick in its second season, trying to open up the story to new viewers by adding new characters, and it failed miserably. Older fans wanted to see more of the original ensemble, and most of the newer faces did not entice. Now, "Lost" has wisely returned its focus back to its core group. With too many come-and-go characters such as Claude the invisible man, "Heroes" will only become more chaotic, and more diffuse.
The only benefit of "Heroes" overpopulation: More action figures to sell when they hit stores early next year.
NBC has also announced "Heroes: Origins," a six-episode spinoff series that will air during the "Heroes" mid-season hiatus. A spinoff series after a single season? How inflated is that?
The idea of "Origins" -- which former NBC chief Kevin Reilly requested as part of an effort to "bulk up" the NBC lineup -- makes me cringe. "Origins," whose premiere will be directed by Kevin Smith, will introduce a new character in each episode, and viewers will get to vote one of them onto "Heroes." In other words, while "Heroes" was NBC's only scripted series in the Nielsen top 25, the network will now tack reality-show stratagems onto it. Come on. Let the storytellers -- and not the viewers -- tell this story.
Along with the fall arrival of "Heroes" apparel, the "Heroes" magazine, "Heroes" trading cards, and, of course, the "Heroes" video game, we are about to get another burst of promotion with the beginning of the Nissan-sponsored "Heroes World Tour" next week. The tour, which will land cast members in London, Munich, Paris, Tokyo, and New York, will promote the DVD release of season one.
The tour comes only a few weeks after the show's huge presence at Comic-Con, where "Heroes" solidified its play for "Star Trek"-heads when news emerged that actor Zachary Quinto, Sylar from the NBC series, would play Spock in J.J. Abrams's "Star Trek" feature. With Nichols, George Takei (Sulu) and Keating in its cast, "Heroes" is going for the heart of geekland with very little subtlety.
These days, it's hard for networks -- particularly a hungry network like NBC -- not to succumb to instant gratification. Rather than waiting for "Heroes" to grow up, thereby risking that the show will lose its juice this year, NBC is "growing" "Heroes" as fast as possible. Alas, by the time "Heroes" returns on Sept. 24, it may have grown only tiresome.
Matthew Gilbert can be reached at gilbert @globe.com. For more on TV, visit boston .com/ae/tv/blog/. 