What We All Can Learn From NBC’s Heroes’ Suckitude

NBC’s Heroes is awful. Just awful. So why do I still watch? Because a) I am evidently a masochist who is quickly trying to kill my brain cells and b) I still have hope that it will return to it’s former glory. That hope may very well be misguided.

The show is so uninteresting that rather than pay attention, I find myself pondering why exactly it has gotten so bad. I have come up with a few reasons, and think there are some great business lessons in there we can all learn from. Even if you have never watched Heroes (and if not, I suggest watching season 1 and then pretending the show got cancelled at that point), you can still learn from their (bad) example.

Start Strong

Season 1 of Heroes was one of the best things ever on TV, and I was sucked in instantly. It stayed excellent right up until the end.

Season 2 started and it, well, was kind of awful. “But that’s ok!” I justified. “There was a writer’s strike! And a lot of shows have a ‘sophomore slump.’ It’ll get better.”

Then season 3 hit. It started a little better than season 2, but quickly stank up the joint.

Season 4, so far, has been pretty bad too. *sigh*

So why do I keep watching? Because season 1 was soooooo good. I keep remembering what it was, wanting it to be that, hoping that one day it will. My hope is wearing thin now, but it has carried me through over 2 seasons worth of episodes.

On the flip side, there have been other new shows that I was excited to start watching, such as Fox’s Fringe, which did not grab me and so I gave up. I have now heard that Fringe is quite good, but I have long since let go of my desire to watch it.

The Business Lesson: First Impressions Matter. If a customer or prospect has a great first experience they may forgive a bad second or third experience. This is not to say that if you knock it out of the park the first time that you can coast. But if you start strong you earn trust and loyalty.

Move Forward

My biggest pet peeve with Heroes now is that nothing happens! Not only does practically nothing happen between the start of an episode and the end, but it seems like they rehash the same basic stories year after year.

Hiro screwed up the past! Peter is angsty about his powers! Seiler is ridiculously powerful but has forgotten who he is! Someone accidentally saw Claire use her powers!

Has there been a season where these things haven’t happened? It’s no fun watching small variations on the same story year after year after year.

The Business Lesson: Keep growing The world is constantly changing and evolving. If you are doing the same things now that you were doing five years ago, guess what? You’re being left behind. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel every year, but constant growth improvement should be a top priority.

(P.S. Astute readers will recognize this as the Yes, And principle I talk about…)

Don’t Lose Trust

You know, season 4 may not be the worst thing ever. I wonder, if this week’s episode had been shown in season 1, would I feel much better about it?

But Heroes has been bad for so long now that an “average” episode is not going to make me come back around. At this point, I need something mind blowingly stellar to make me a Heroes believer again.

The Business Lesson: Reputation Matters If you develop a bad rep, justified or not, simply returning back “average status quo” service won’t cut it. Regaining lost trust is much harder than gaining and maintaining it in the first place. The first thing is to obviously not do anything that could hurt your reputation. The second thing, if something has gone wrong, is to remember that you must go above and beyond what you would ordinarily do.

Understand BOTH Your Current and Past Success

When Heroes started, it drew people in by introducing characters and slowly revealing their powers – to both the characters and the viewers. Back then, it made for compelling television. By the end of season 1 though, everyone knew what their powers were and they were working to stop the end of the world. Great stuff.

The problem is that the Heroes team assumed that what made the show work was the slowly paced character and power revel. It was, but only at the beginning. By the end of season 1, what made the show work was the interesting story and the characters we had come to know and love.

When season 2 started, the show once again returned to slowly revealing characters and powers. That sucked. And was boring.

This season seems to be doing the same thing! It’s a superhero show, and your main characters have had years to come to terms with their powers. Let’s start doing something interesting!

Instead it has taken five episodes to finally learn that one new character can destroy things with a cello. This could not have been explained in the opening 2 minutes of the first episode…?

The Business Lesson: Be Honest, and Stop Living in the Past Just because something in your business worked a few years ago doesn’t mean it will still work today. Be brutally honest about what’s working (today), what’s not working (today), and what your customers really care about (today).

Be Likeable

This may be the main reason Heroes has become unwatchable. There is one likeable character on the whole show. Maybe two. And this is on an ensemble show! The rest are either angsty, annoying, or just boring. Many are all three.

How can you have a TV show where all the main characters, the protagonists, are unlikable? Even Gregory House on Fox’s House is more likeable – and his whole character us based around being unlikable!

When this happens, you can sometimes keep watching a show while rooting for the bad guys. Sadly, Heroes’ villains are just as unlikable. *sigh*

The Business Lesson: Be Likeable Simple lesson. People like to do business with people they know, like, and trust. Be nice. Get rapport. Build relationships. And for the love of God, don’t be angsty, annoying, or boring.

Will I keep watching Heroes? Probably, for a few more episodes at least (I have trouble letting go of shows. It’s my curse…) But it is so sad to me how far this show has fallen. My only hope is that we all can learn from their bad example…

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