Blu-ray Movie Reviews

The theme of the fourth and final season of Heroes is "Redemption." Our surviving Heroes mourn the passing of fallen friends and face a dangerous new foe (Robert Knepper), a carnival operator with a plan to gather those with special abilities and seek retribution against humanity.

Oh how the mighty have fallen. The first season of Heroes was a critical and commercial success with an interesting premise, entertaining storylines, and compelling and likable characters. Unfortunately, the show lost its mojo along with its audience over the following three years. Maybe I'm a glutton for punishment, but I hung in there until the end hoping to recapture the magic of its first season, but sadly it never came. The writers didn't seem to have a long-term strategy they were following and went off on too many tangents. The fourth season showed some promise, but once again the show focused too much attention on Claire (Hayden Panettiere) and her relationship with her father (Jack Coleman) at the expense of the more interesting characters such as Hiro (Masi Oka) and Ando (James Kyson-Lee).

Video Highlights

• AVC/1080p encode on a BD-50 discs
• Shifting contrast
• Inconsistent black levels
• Occasional video noise
• Adequate detail
• Bold color palette

Audio Highlights

• DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack
• Intelligible dialog
• Expansive front soundstage
• Inconsistent surround effects
• Sporadically strong LFE

The A/V quality mimics the previous three seasons with its inconsistencies so don't expect much of an improvement.

Bonus Materials

• Numerous featurettes
• Deleted and extended scenes
• Episode specific cast and crew commentaries
• U-Control with PIP and Hero Connections
• BD-Live and pocket BLU enabled
• My Scenes

I held out hope that the return of Bryan Fuller to the writing team would improve the show, but it didn't happen. I'll miss some of the characters, particularly Hiro, but NBC did the right thing in not renewing it for a fifth season.

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Release Date: August 3, 2010
Studio: Universal

Movie: 5/10
Picture: 6/10
Sound: 8/10

Review System

Source
Oppo BDP-83 Blu-ray player

Display
JVC DLA-RS1 projector
Stewart FireHawk screen (76.5" wide, 16:9)

Electronics
Onkyo Pro PR-SC885 pre/pro
Anthem PVA-7 power amplifier
Panamax M5400PM power conditioner

Speakers
M&K S-150s (L, C, R)
M&K SS-150s (LS, RS, SBL, SBR)
SVS PC-Ultra subwoofer

Cables
Monoprice HDMI cables (source to pre/pro)
Best Deal analog-audio cables
PureLink HDC Fiber Optic HDMI Cable System (15 meters) from pre/pro to projector

Acoustical treatments from GIK Acoustics