TVSquad

The Saturn Award nominations are in, and many popular sci-fi and fantasy shows made the cut. Returning favorites like Lost, Heroes, and Dexter were recognized by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Films, as were newcomers Pushing Daisies and Journeyman.

With seven nominations, Lost is ahead of Dexter and Heroes, which received five and four nominations, respectively. Heroes was the big winner last year, taking home awards for Best Network Series as well as acting awards for Masi Oka and Hayden Panettiere. Both actors received nominations this year, along with co-star Greg Grunberg.

(S02E11) When Kristin offered up the chance to review the Fall (Season?) Finale of Heroes, I couldn't resist stepping in to help. While this episode lived up to a lot of the promises of the season, much like last season's finale, it may have been a little lighter on the action than you'd want. There are a lot of big changes for a lot of the characters and yes, the promised "hero" death. We get resolutions on the virus plot, the Sylar/Mya journey, Hiro's quest to stop Adam, the Bennet situation, and in the end, there's enough to entice us to come back for more. It's all here and let me tell you, if Kristin was yawning and checking her watch through the last episode, there wasn't time this week. This episode is absolutely jam-packed from start to finish. "Volume Two" wraps, and as with last year we get a teaser of Volume Three. But we'll get to all of that after the jump.

(S02E10) For the second to last episode of the season, I found tonight's show a bit slow. It had it's cool parts--I even have dedicated a section to them at the bottom of the post--but I looked at my watch a lot throughout the episode.

Overall, I think Heroes has come a long way since the beginning of the season. I think many Heroes viewers are just spoiled from the novelty and plot twists of the first season so they are critical when stories/characters aren't up to snuff.

But, that said, I am looking forward to the season finale. As the ads keep saying, "It all comes down to this."

(S02E09) "You've gone native. Are you kidding me?" Noah Bennet to Mohinder Suresh.

Just when you thought Mohinder couldn't get any stupider, he goes and shoots Noah Bennet in the eye. He is really in too deep with this company. And lately, he is making Matt Parkman look like a genius. (Wait, did Parkman just make me say that? Dumb joke, I know.) More on this after the jump because it basically took up the whole episode.

But before I go through all the storylines for this week, let me just say that I was so relieved that those ridiculous mascara-plague twins were absent from this week's Heroes. And just so I don't get too excited about it, I put a picture of them in the post to remind me that they are still on the show. (However, they are the vehicle to get the devilish Sylar back in the states so I suppose I forgive them on some level.)

I have to admit that I don't really get why so many Heroes fans are up in arms about this second season. I've heard everything from "sophomore slump" to "it has jumped the shark" to "it sucks!" and I don't agree with any of those viewpoints.

Has it been the intense, oh-my-God look how this episode ended in another cliffhanger thrill ride of the first season? No, but I think that's more a case of how the last season ended and how they had to set up this new season, with new plots and new heroes and old heroes in new situations. And I think that the show really kicked into gear with Monday's fantastic installment.

Fans of Heroes who want to know more about the happenings behind the scenes rejoice! YouTube user buckshotwon has loads of clips of behind the scenes of everything Heroes. By "everything" I mean from behind the scenes when shooting the show, to what happened before/during/after award shows and the World Tour!

I'm sure you are wondering who this mysterious buckshotwon is? Well, he is none other than Heroes' Adrian Pasdar (he plays Nathan Petrelli). As he puts it on his YouTube page, Pasdar offers "random snapshots of the way [he sees] the world." But what will interest Heroes fans is that the cast seems to love being part of his clips (see "Grunny Goes Nuts!" after the jump for an example); therefore, you can expect funny performances and some cool footage from the sets (check the "Primatech" clip).

NBC had a special event on the set of Heroes today to announce that they're going global ... literally. The cast and creators will be traveling to at least seven major cities to promote the first season of the show in places it hasn't premiered yet. Although according to Tim Kring it's been watched (sometimes illegally, *gasp*) worldwide over the internet. Cities confirmed so far are: Toyko, Hong Kong, Singapore, Munich, Paris, London, and New York. We're fairly sure they've heard of it in New York City, call us crazy.

Nissan will be sponsoring the tour, which will also be going green in an effort to "reduce the carbon footprint," Kring said, although he wasn't quite sure how, since jets and cars eat are on the forefront of global polluting. Maybe they can bike around Europe? That'd be a nice special feature on next season's DVD. Greg Grunberg, who plays the mind-reading Matt Parkman, said he was visiting Paris with his wife recently, and the show hasn't even premiered on the air there. However, he had people coming up to him left and right who recognized him from seeing the show on their computers. Sacrebleu!

Obviously I mean the actor, David Anders. But wouldn't it be beyond cool to see the character of Sark show up on Heroes? Maybe he got some sort of power from being so close to all that Rambaldi business. Maybe he can have the power to impersonate anyone's voice exactly (Anders is actually from Oregon but does a British accent perfectly).

Kristin over on E! is reporting that Anders is under negotiations to join the NBC hit this fall. He would play a new character named Kane (Isabelle has details on the character here), though there are no other details about the character. Of course, it's not a done deal, but it would be fantastic if this actually happened.

[via TV Tattle]

In preparation for the much-hyped Heroes finale, which is spread out over three episodes, Entertainment Weekly offer five different covers which are said to contain clues for the upcoming spectacular installments of the series. "Each of Entertainment Weekly's five Heroes covers is packed with references and teasers to the finale episodes of the season," reveals the magazine when describing this covers special. EW.com even invites fans to come back in the coming days/weeks for more information about each cover.

The long break for Heroes is nearly over, and to get people excited, NBC has released two video clips. This one is simply a scene between Mr. Bennett and Thompson as Thompson tries new tactics to find out where Claire is. This other scene reveals a new hero, so if you don't like spoilers, don't watch it!

And if you're new to this whole Heroes thing or just have a lot of time on your hands, you can watch the first 18 episodes of Heroes online for free. NBC is streaming the entire season so far with "limited interruption" from various sponsors.

Heroes returns April 23rd.

Ever wanted to get a hold of one of Isaac's paintings? If so, you'll be happy to hear that NBC has decided to auction some of the paintings seen on Heroes and made by renowned graphic illustrator Tim Sale.

Vivi Zigler, Executive Vice President NBC Digital Entertainment and New Media, announced in a press release that NBC was proud of this event as it would not only allow fans a chance to own a piece of the hit show but also benefit the Epilepsy Foundation. This foundation was chosen because Heroes' cast member Greg Grunberg is highly involved with it since his son Jake suffers from epilepsy.

This press tour hasn't exactly been good for my already-expanded waistline. Between the meals each network serves the critics and the snacks the hotel sends up on a daily basis, I seem to just graze all day long (by the way, the Ritz-Carlton has one of the best $15 cheeseburgers I've ever had. Of course, anywhere else, the burger would be $8. Still good though).

Case in point: NBC provided candy bins for the critics, giving them a chance to create to-go bags of various sugary snacks. Through all the afternoon press conferences -- for The Apprentice, the Grease reality show, Andy Barker, PI, and Raines, I absent-mindedly grabbed from the bag because, to be honest, outside of those great Rosie digs by Donald Trump, not much went on (even the Andy Barker session wasn't all that interesting, despite the presence of Andy Richter and Conan O'Brien).

But the Heroes session that closed the afternoon? That one made me take notice.

Yesterday we told you about the controversy surrounding the change that NBC was making to the character of Zach, Claire's friend on Heroes that seemed to be gay. Now, creator Tim Kring has sent an e-mail to the web site that posted a long piece about the controversy that we linked to yesterday.

You can read his full e-mail at the link above, but it seems that he's saying that they did try to make the character gay, but that they didn't want to pursue that any further after some discussions with NBC execs. He says it was "too complicated behind the scenes to push this issue further," which I think is interesting. Some of the comments after the article show that some people are ticked off at this decision, especially if they have some plot where Zach's sexual orientation is changed because of the memory wipe he experienced in the fall finale. I can't imagine that happening. It's my guess that they'll just simply not mention anything he has said to Claire before or any other hints to Zach being gay and just leave it at that.

It's hard to say how long Thomas Dekker will stay with the show, since he has signed on to play John Connor in the Terminator series next fall.

[via TV Tattle]

Here's an interesting little tidbit from the world of Heroes: it looks like NBC has changed their mind about Zach.

It certainly looked to fans like Zach (Thomas Dekker) was gay, for four reasons: one, when Claire's nasty cheerleader friend made a remark about Zach, he said something to Claire along the lines of "I'm comfortable with who I am." Two, NBC's recap of that episode says he is. Three, the character's MySpace page lists his orientation as "not sure." And four, creator Tim Kring talked about the character being gay (and what happened with an NBC exec) in this interview.

So people are wondering: did NBC change the orientation of the character? Did Dekker? Did the writers change it? Here I was going to say "oh, it doesn't really matter if he's straight or gay," and if this was real life it wouldn't, but if someone actually changed his orientation for some reason (or reasons) on a TV show, that's worth talking about.

[via Pop Candy]

To support Greg Grunberg's Pediatric Epilepsy Project, the cast of Heroes has each drawn his or her own character for an online auction. Bidding has begun and will conclude in approximately twenty days. I have to say that Hayden Panettiere gets extra points for using more than one colored marker in her rendering of Claire Bennet and Milo Ventimiglia managed to add a little perspective to his drawing of Peter Petrelli.

This isn't the first time television stars have contributed their handiwork to the Pediatric Epilepsy Project, which directly supports UCLA's Pediatric Neurology Department. You can also purchase hand-painted cards by such celebrities as Jennifer Garner, David Schwimmer, Ryan Seacrest, Teri Hatcher, Sean Hayes and Sarah Jessica Parker.