I came across an interview with Heroes creator Tim Kring where he discusses the yet-to-be aired season 2 of Heroes with Lost creator Damon Lindelof. To preface, I have hated this past season (or half-season) of Heroes. There are too many characters and most of them are boring, whiny, or too stupid to make the show believable (even the guy with the Ph.D. seems ignorant to everything except his favorite hair products). In this interview, Lindelof asks Kring if he read the comic book, Rising Stars, as recommended. Kring responds:

The truth is I didn’t read it for a couple reasons. First and foremost, because this show deals in the arena of the super hero and comic book world, I didn’t want to be tempted or discouraged by other ideas out there. Very early on in the process, I went to see my friend [and comic book writer] Jeph Loeb for just this reason. I told him I was not well versed in this world and wanted him to steer me away from anything that was derivative or just out and out stealing. Unfortunately EVERYTHING I pitched to him had not only been done once, but many times in many ways. I literally went home that night convinced that I couldn’t touch this subject without reinventing the wheel at best, and outright plagiarism at worst.

So Kring wants to write a show about super heroes without ever reading a story about super heroes. Ignoring the fact that Rising Stars is a very good comic and relevant to Kring’s concept, you’d think he’d want to read it. Using the excuse that it’s been done before might explain how season 2 has become such a downfall in quality - quality Kring himself has apologized for.

Kring’s claim that’s he doesn’t want to steal anything fails since, even though he didn’t do it purposely, he’s already stolen everything from somewhere. All his characters take from existing characters and live in a world similar to many comic book worlds. But that’s not a bad thing. Shakespeare stole everything without qualm. He just made the stories he stole sound more beautiful.

A more modern example, South Park realized early on it could never be completely original, as the episode “Simpsons Already Did it” illustrates the Simpsons have done everything already. That doesn’t mean South Park writers stop watching cartoons. In fact, many of South Park’s best ideas come from lampooning or creating a homage to other cartoons and media, like “Cartoon Wars” attack on Family Guy and “The Return of the Lord of the Rings to the Two Towers” spoof of the One Ring being a porn video.

Kring might have learned storytelling techniques used in comic books - storytelling he is already trying to emulate on Heroes. Originality is hard to come by these days and usually is the result of mixing two or three unlike things together rather than coming up with something never seen before. Lost, for comparison, draws on various mythologies to offer a twist on the often-visited deserted island story. All the elements of Lost have been seen before: mysterious characters with dark pasts, unexplained phenomenon, mythological connections, unseen inhabitants. The uniqueness of Lost is how it brought all these elements together, drawing on comic books, books, TV shows, and movies to create something refreshing and new. For all Kring’s effort, Heroes might be intriguing, but it’s far from original.

Heroes might have been helped by a more learned creator. He might have found more creative uses for character’s super powers. Or he might have thought in longer term about his story arcs. He admits in the interview season 2 was only thought of in a broad sense. Or he simply might have found it fun to give a serious spoof to the comic book world by placing it in the “real world.” That, of course, has been done before, several times, best represented by Alan Moore’s Watchmen. Watchmen, of course, drew directly on other comics. Moore had considered using the Charlton Comics characters recently acquired by DC Comics, but decided against it because he wanted to kill several characters. He did, however, create parallel characters to Charlton Comics staples for his own use. Mark Gruenwald did a similar thing for his real world super-heroes in Squadron Supreme for Marvel Comics where all the characters were almost direct copies of DC Comics’ Justice League of America.

So, Kring, please take some advice and do your homework. It’s not hard homework. Just read some comic books. You’ve got an indefinite delay thanks to the writers strike to figure out how to make the next half-season rock. I enjoyed Heroes before and want to again.

From these comics, you’ll get ideas and you’ll want to use them. That’s a good thing. The first thing writers are taught is to read. That’s how you learn to write. You might be proud that you came up with a flying character all by yourself (I’ve never seen one of those before), but Heroes could be so much more. And I think reading some comics might help with that. Just look at Lindelof. He reads comics and writes Lost. That’s got to mean something.