Think The Boys and Invincible Are Bold? Heroes Did It First

Let’s be honest: there isn’t a whole lot of genuine hope floating around TV lately—especially if you’re into superhero shows. The big hits right now are all about how much worse things could get if people with superpowers decided to run things (spoiler: it’s bad). If you’re the type who wants good guys to win and believes it might actually matter, it’s easy to feel like you wandered into a cynical alternate universe and got stuck there.

Look at The Boys. This show spins up a world where superheroes are globally famous—but when you peel back the curtain, you mostly find power-mad nutjobs whose idea of 'saving the world' is making sure they stay on top. Sure, there are jokes, but really it’s dark, violent, and not subtle about thinking the system is corrupt to the core. It's all so relevant that it hits a little too close to home if you keep up with headlines. Invincible—the animated one—more or less doubles down on the same themes with extra blood and trauma for good measure.

But before all the superheroes got this gritty, there was Heroes. Yeah, I’m talking about the 2006 NBC show with the tagline everyone quoted for like five years: "Save the cheerleader, save the world."

Superpowers Without the Cynicism

When Heroes first came out, its whole vibe was basically the opposite of what we get now. The premise? Ordinary people all over the world wake up to discover they’ve got special abilities—thanks, in part, to a plot-convenient solar eclipse. Instead of leaning into the 'absolute power corrupts absolutely' stuff, the show was...well, weirdly optimistic.

The cast pulled people in: Milo Ventimiglia played the sensitive nurse with a big destiny, Zachary Quinto turned up as the villain you loved to hate, and Hayden Panettiere—possibly at her best—was Claire, the high school cheerleader who literally can’t die. Not 'oh, she’s tough to kill,' but more like 'she falls off buildings, heals from everything, and somehow just keeps going.' She spends a good chunk of season one processing how weird and isolating that is, basically summing up the show’s theme: even if the world is ending, you can still try to save it (and maybe yourself in the process).

"Save the cheerleader, save the world."

That line, if you haven’t heard it shouted at a convention or meme’d on the internet, is more than just a catchphrase. It’s the entire first season in a nutshell, and the emotional core is Claire herself. There’s actually some academic writing out there reading her as a metaphor for American resilience, but you don’t have to squint that hard: she’s tough, a little lost, and definitely endures more than her share of trauma—yet she’s still at the heart of the show’s belief that things could get better. (Fun fact: there are more than a few college essays on this, but trust me, you don’t need to read them to get the point.)

Heroes Isn’t All Sunshine

Now, I know what you’re thinking: Heroes probably sounds cheesier than a motivational cat poster. Not quite. The show has its dark side (character deaths, betrayals, world-ending threats, you name it), plus some plotting that would give any comic book a run for its money in terms of twists for the sake of twists. On top of that, even the undying characters get pretty roughed up, emotionally and physically, along the way.

But here's the twist in tone: for all the disaster looming, there’s always at least a small glimmer of hope—even when things go off the rails (and, full disclosure, the show eventually does). The main difference from what we’re getting now? These heroes, for all their flaws, mostly want to do the right thing, and the writers let them try.

Who’s Who in the Original Cast?

• Hayden Panettiere as Claire Bennett, the regenerating cheerleader (and, yes, total linchpin of season one)
• Milo Ventimiglia as Peter Petrelli, a nurse who picks up other people’s powers
• Zachary Quinto as Sylar, the villain who can steal powers—and is creepy in literally every scene
• Masi Oka as Hiro Nakamura, a fan-favorite office worker who learns he can bend space and time
• Other regulars: Ali Larter, Greg Grunberg, Sendhil Ramamurthy, Adrian Pasdar, and a rotating crew of superpowered allies and enemies

So if you’re burned out on nihilism (or just want to see where the darker superhero trend didn’t start), Heroes is like a time capsule from a period when superhero TV thought hope could actually win the day. Nearly 20 years later, the show is still around to stream on Amazon and a bunch of other platforms. Is it perfect? No. Is it maybe good for your soul to watch? Honestly, yes.