Heroes/Lost: Which Kind of Geek Are You?

Heroes=Mac;Lost=PC

I usually try to stay out of these Lost/Heroes debates. I watch both, have watched both from the beginning. But I had to comment about your geek analysis.

I am definitely in the Heroes camp. However, I prefer LoTR (all 3 books plus the Hobbit, AND the extended edition movies) to X-men, I played Myst obsessively (8 hours straight one very late night), and I lived for the X-files episodes when Cancer Man or the black oil made an appearance.

So I think your analysis is flawed. I love love love mythology driven stories, be them film or books. The problem with Lost, and the reason why it has moved down to around 5 or 6 of my must-see shows is that it has lost its own mythology. It began with a Dharma initiative, a supernaturally mysterious island, and unexplainable "miracle healings" and it's turned into a show about a bunch of rather boring psychopaths who get their fun by kidnapping and tormenting people, and an even more boring "love triangle" between 3 people I don't even particularly like anymore. I don't want easy answers, or even immediate answers, but I am tired of stories and details getting dropped because the writers seem bored with them, or don't know where to go with them (Walt/Michael, black smoke monster, Lostzilla, the fact that there was big huge electromagnetic pulse at the end of last season..and exactly HOW did Locke/Eko/Desmond survive the hatch imploding??).

Heroes hasn't been on nearly long enough to crown it the better of the two shows--we'll see where it goes in its second season. But at least I have confidence that the writers actually know where they are going with the multiple storylines. I wish I could say the same thing about Abrams.

Robin, fair enough. For my part, I use a Mac. Them's fightin' words, C. Brown.

Not to rehash my point, but I would argue that Heroes offers a clearer sense of where it is going because it is not going nearly as far. Like an HBO series--I made this point last week, and it is probably getting boring--Lost sets up so many threads that they cannot practically hit on each every episode, or even every few. I don't think that amounts to dropping them (there was a reference to the pulse and its effects in "Not in Portland," no?). But I will admit I am going on faith to some extent. Insert Locke reference here.

Anyway, I know I'm _way_ oversimplifying this. It's not like one show has to be bad for the other to be good. But that's the fun of it, right?

James,

But I use a Mac too and I'm in the Heroes camp!

The two shows are not mutually exclusive. I love both for different reasons. I get both on Itunes and watch both more often then I will readily admit! We viewers are not necessarily as simplistic in our tastes as this article paints us!

Jen C...WELL Said!!!!!!!

This is silly, both shows rule over 97% of stuff on network TV, they are on different nights, and they cover different themes and are paced differently! So whats the issue!

Watch em both and enjoy or go watch CSI Billings, MT!!!

and U2 AND Radiohead are lame!

The two shows definitely don't need to be mutually exclusive. Most of the people I know that got into Lost are now also very much into Heroes.

I do think there is something to be said, though, about how they both engender a slightly different source material. Heroes comes from comicbooks and does it very well, in my opinion. Lost has a slightly different flavor, but gets more complicated in its plot threads.

Fah. Eitherway... Watch both. Support good serialized shows.

Love it! I too like both shows, but am not into comic books or mythology per se.

U2-Radiohead was the perfect example. i like heroes but its too straightforward for me. its like a summer popcorn flick.. watch it, enjoy it and forget about it.

Now i know lost is getting on peoples nerves, but i personally still have faith in it. the quality of the show hasnt dropped, its just that the people cant seem to digest the fact that there are too many loose threads hanging around. but if u take time to look around u'll notice its all part of the plan (as of yet)..

Heroes: like drinking beer during a football game
Lost: enjoying your favorite wine while taking time to appreciate your surroundings.

If anyone has ever listened to the podcasts of Carleton Cuse and Damon Lindelof, Lost's executive producers, you would know that they are aware of all the concerns for all the plot threads still out there and they will be answered... all of them. Heroes is the show with all the buzz going for it right now, and to a certain degree I do enjoy it, but it's nowhere near the quality of Lost.

btw, I'm a Mac user, LOTR devotee, and never really played a video game I fell in love with. And I prefer Boo Berry to Count Chocula.

hullo. i am a fan of both heroes and lost, and am an amateur graphic novellist. i actually preferred twin peaks to x-files, but that is neither here nor there. i think both stories have their own mythologies, just like LOTR and X-Men each have their own "universes." i find it interesting too that there are similarities between characters and situations on Heroes and Lost. Time travel, regeneration, unethical human experimentation, crazy twist endings. Not to mention both shows have (recovered) tortured heroin addicts.

that's my two cents:)

Heroes = U2
Lost = RUSH