As covered in yesterday’s Cultural News Bytes, the epic battle between Heroes and 24 kicked off last evening. For the purpose of covering this epic battle, I’m going to divide it into Three Rounds: Overall Quality, Ratings, and the OMGWTFBBQ Battle. Based on these criteria, a victor will be named.
Round One: Overall Quality
24 came out fighting: They moved effortless from panic in the streets of the suburbs, to the OMGWTFBBQ moment, to some Daddy Drama, and it was interspersed well with a subtle political movement. The terrorist plot is certainly nothing special at this point, and the entire Sandra Palmer Subplot is slowing the show down, but in the end the newly introduced family drama for Jack was absolutely spectacular.
On the other hand, Heroes immediately sucked the life out of its cliffhanger with a “Two Weeks Later” construct. While it works, it definitely doesn’t result in a great deal of excitement, and it showed. The episode revolved around the fallout from last fall’s actions, but there didn’t seem to be a drive heading forward from this point until the episode’s end. We got very little on Sylar, and everything else was kind of just in a fog. It needed to bring more to the table, in my mind.
Round Two: Ratings
“Heroes” (households: 8.6/13, #T4; adults 18-49: 6.5, #1)
“24” (households: 8.6/13, #T4; adults 18-49: 5.4, #3)
What does this all mean? Well, it means that Heroes drew slightly more viewers, as well as more viewers in the coveted 18-49 year old viewers. However, 24’s ratings were more or less identical to that of last year’s, and Heroes’ ratings held strong. In the end, this basically means that there were a whole lot more people watching TV last night than before. And that’s generally good, I’d say.
Round Three: OMGWTFBBQ
24 wasn’t too exciting…except for the revelation that there is a BAUER BROTHER. And he’s last season’s BAD GUY. And Jack CHOKED HIM WITH A PLASTIC BAG. COME ON!
Heroes had a rather charming line, referring to Nathan as “FLYING MAN”, but lacked a pivotal moment. It struggled to even reach OMG territory.
And the Winner, via Judge’s decision…
24 takes the victory quite handedly! It may have lost the ratings crown, but it held its own against the closest things to a breakout hit show amongst younger viewers this season, and simply had a better episode along with a superior OMGWTFBBQ moment. Better luck next time, Hiro!
Cultural Learnings 
No body can beat Jack
Some people see the glass as half full. Others see it as half empty. Jack Bauer see the glass as a deadly weapon.