Are ‘Heroes’ Fans Morons While ‘Lost’ Fans Are Smart?

Over on TV Guide’s Website, Heroes creator Tim Kring answers the question that we couldn’t stop asking after the show’s season finale last week: Why couldn’t Peter just fly away himself before blowing up? The unsatisfying answer, according to Kring, is that — as many theorized — Peter’s other powers were incapacitated during his spells of radioactive overload. “But the real explanation,” adds Kring, “is that we wanted Nathan to show up” for a final brotherly embrace.

This response is so retconnish that we sort of sympathize with Cinematic Happenings Under Development’s Devin Faraci, who lets loose on the movie Website with a scathing dismissal of Heroes and its fans. Claiming that Lost’s season finale was brave and exciting where Heroes’ played it safe, Faraci argues that Lost respects its audience’s intelligence far more than Heroes does:

The producers know that the fans of Lost – intelligent, literate people, mostly – love the sense of excitement that comes from having expectations challenged, not met. The crowd that loves Heroes is the same crowd Robert Zemeckis cuts his trailers for – the people who want to know exactly what they’re getting when they walk into a theater, the people who choose McDonalds over local food when traveling for that same reason. These people are the lowest common denominator, and Heroes shovels its shit into their happily gaping maws on a weekly basis.

We have frequently proclaimed that Heroes’ use of mini-arcs scattered through the season, and its devotion to resolving most of its major plot points by season’s end, have helped to make the show a more immediately satisfying TV-watching experience. On the other hand, Lost’s season finale was so thrilling that it single-handedly persuaded us to start watching the show again after over a year of ignoring it.

Are we, as Faraci claims, “fat-headed” to think a whole season of mostly satisfying episodes is preferable to a whole season of frustrating episodes leading up to one mind-blowing season-ender? We think it’s quite likely that by next February, we’ll once again be watching every episode of Heroes — and saving ourselves for the Lost finale.

Heroes Creator Solves Finale’s Biggest Mystery [TV Guide]
Damon Lindelof’s Message to Tim Kring? [CHUD]

Earlier: ‘Lost’: So Who Was That Dead Man?
‘Heroes’: The Return of Mohinder’s Theme-o-Matic Voice-over! Oh, and the Petrellis Blow Up