By Eric Kohn

If the first season of NBC’s “Heroes” felt like “Lost” 2.0, the early episodes of its second year suggest Comic Book 101. Creator Tim Kring took the ABC drama’s high tension hooks—serialized narratives, enigmatic sci-fi plot twists—and went one step further by offering the audience some answers. Now that there’s no doubting the show’s central phenomena is that most of the characters have evolved into mutants, which empowers them with disparate abilities, the parallels to a half-century of superhero characters has begun.

If you can get over the obvious parallels to a famous X-Men storyline presented by the hero-attacking virus that cosmically enlightened narrator and rogue scientist Mohinder Suresh (Sendhil Ramamurthy) discusses in the premiere, then everything derivative about the swirling developments comes across as a whole lot of well-intentioned nudges and winks.

The goofy exploits of ecstatic time traveler Hiro (Masi Oka) in the 16th century play out like a grungy “Knight in King Arthur’s Court” knock-off, while astute mindreader and efficient NYPD investigator Matt Parkman (Greg Grunberg) channels the best of television’s pulp-derived policemen in the season’s central murder mystery (rest in peace, Mr. Sulu). Ex-cheerleader and invincible teen hero Claire (Hayden Pannettiere) flounders in hiding while her faithful adoptive father (Jack Coleman) hilariously struggles with a boring paper job straight out of Dunder Mifflin. Former politico-turned-flying man Nathan (Adrian Pasdar) spouted a beard and turned to booze (not unlike the future fate of Jack in the season three finale of “Lost”). Meanwhile, his power-absorbing brother Peter (Milo Ventimiglia) wound up an amnesiac and in the hands of criminals, his expression one of continuous shock over all the cool super shit he can do—sort of like Jason in The Bourne Identity, when his hitman skills kick in before his memory. 

The point is, get over it: “Heroes” isn’t trying to be original. It’s a steaming cauldron of elements from the fringe components of pop culture, combining bite-sized drama and rollercoaster thrills to keep audiences distracted and content. As such, the show qualifies as purebred American entertainment.