Wolf Gnards

Hiro Meter: -4

The episode might have seemed tame, but quite a bit of Asian damage was done in Chapter 5 of Heroes. I mean Hiro was pretty much in a hospital bed eating ice cream for an hour, but more than enough can go wrong eating ice cream. Hiro had negative 4 Asian points, or 2 Ken Jeongs worth of Asian stereotypes.

Here’s the rundown of Heroes Chapter 5:
1. Hiro Needs Peter’s Help: -3… Powerful white man on a quest to save poor helpless Hiro. Nothing good about this scenario.
2. Helps Deaf Girl: +1… Helps Emma deal with her powers. It’d be more points if she saw Hiro as anything but a Beanie Baby, but, of course, she already only has eyes for Peter.
3. But he Helps her with an Afternoon Special: -1… Hiro saves the day with an amateur magic act and a children’s talent show… yes, that’s what actually happened. Other story lines get throwing knives and shot gun blasts, Hiro gets a very special moment from Saved by the Bell.
4. Disappears Again: -1… Not really a bad thing, but we all saw this coming. We all knew that Hiro was going to accidentally teleport before he could get help. And that’s the problem, NBC has brainwashed us to be accepting of Hiro abuse. At this point a real curve to the plot line would have been Hiro actually getting better.