Fallen ‘Heroes’: Jeph Loeb and Jesse Alexander are fired
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The last time I saw Jeph Loeb was when I moderated a panel he was on at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books in April. I remember I asked about his show, ‘Heroes,’ being faced with ‘a crossroads’ moment in both its loss of audience and urgency, and he scowled at the mere mention of such a notion. So why am I thinking of that on this November morning?
Here’s the scoop from Cynthia Littleton of Variety:
Big shakeup on the staff of NBC’s ‘Heroes’ came down on Sunday with the axing of co-exec producers Jesse Alexander and Jeph Loeb. Both scribe-producers had been with the show since its first season and were known to have led the day-to-day production operation under the direction of creator/exec producer Tim Kring. ‘Heroes,’ produced by Universal Media Studios, has struggled in the ratings its third season. It’s understood that Alexander and Loeb were let go because of Peacock execs’ frustration with the creative direction of the show. The show is also said to have been grappling with hefty budget overruns this season that are going well beyond its already sizable $4 million per-seg pricetag. Reps for NBC and UMS declined comment.
The show that was once NBC’s strongest scripted series really lost its way, and a lot of casual fans just threw their hands up in the air and reached for the remote. This feels like the beginning of the end. Why did it happen? I thought Matt Roush of TV Guide had a good point last week when he expressed his ‘Heroes’ fatigue: ‘The reality of the situation is that there aren’t a lot of people, even critics, who want to work that hard at watching a show like this. I take notes as I watch many shows, but I don’t expect anyone else to. ‘Heroes’ has become needlessly overstuffed, which isn’t the same as complex.’
-- Geoff Boucher
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