The Art of Heroes

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The Art of Heroes

Throughout the story of Heroes, one of the main characters, Isaac Mendez, creates dozens of paintings, many of which are glimpses into the future created from his precognitive abilities. In addition, Mendez is a comic book artist, and when Hiro visits the future in the first couple of episodes, he buys one of Mendez's comics. However, all this art is not done by Santiago Cabrera, the actor who portrays Mendez. Rather, it is all done by famous comic book artist Tim Sale, whose collaborator, Jeph Loeb, is one of the show's writers. Among other things, Loeb and Sale are famous for Batman: The Long Halloween, which told the story of the serial killer who murdered very specific people only on major holidays, Spider-Man: Blue, about the tragic love between Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy, and an alternate version of Superman in Superman for All Seasons.

Mendez's art is crucial to the plot of the story, as it helps the characters figure out what their destinies are. From Mendez's art, Peter Petrelli figured out where Claire Bennet was so he could save her life. Using the story from Mendez's comic book, 9th Wonders!, which he picks up when he travels to the future, Hiro Nakamura realizes that he must travel to the United States with his friend Ando and what he must do there. The series 9th Wonders! itself is seen multiple times during the show, including as a series that young Micah Sanders reads and shows to his father. As such, Sale's artwork has become very famous to fans of the show.

An interesting thing to note is that Sale himself is colorblind, which is why much of his comic book work is in black, white, and gray or is only one color. To produce the art seen in Heroes, Sale draws pictures on standard comic book paper. He then gives the art to industry colorist and frequent collaborator Dave Stewart, who colors the art on his computer before handing in the completed product. The art is then enlarged and is used to create the actual props used in the television show.

Since Loeb and Sale's work is very popular, Sale's artwork is considered some of the best in the business. I myself am a fan of his work, especially how it works so well with the dark and mysterious worlds of both Batman and Heroes. In fact, when I first watched Heroes, I easily recognized his highly distinctive artwork on the cover of the issue of 9th Wonders, where Hiro is standing in the middle of New York City. I almost expected Hiro to make some joke about how the art looked familiar, since he demonstrated his knowledge of comic books with his references to Spider-Man and Kitty Pryde. I am also very glad that the writers picked a comic book artist to do the art. Heroes is and always has been a comic book story on television, and the more people in the industry who work on the show, the greater the ties are. The fact that Sale also does the art for the Heroes webcomic just makes things even better. It emphasizes the unity of the Heroes universe in a way that multiple artists could not hope to do.

Aenedis
Thu, 15 Jan 2009 03:06:52 +0000

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