No 30 Rock? Oh Well!

Well since 30 Rock is not on this week I went to another show instead and watched an episode I missed form Heroes. I watched it on NBC’s website so it still includes commercials. Something I have always noticed but never really though anything about was how almost every time the show returns from a commercial it is starting on another character’s story; this is unless there was some kind of cliffhanger before the break, which at times is wouldn’t always come back too. The writers for the show did a good job actually making every segment its own little TV show and taking those 15 minutes to give you the story of one of the characters. Two technical codes I notice a lot are the use of lighting for dramatic effect and the shot size for what type emotional response the creator wanted the audience to feel. In particular I was watching an episode in the 3rd season where the Heroes are being capture and sometimes tortured, so the lighting was very dark and depressing. On the other side in some newer episodes we see Claire at school and she is happy so the lighting is bright and gives an overall happy mood to the scene. When it comes to camera though I can only think of one thing, Sylar. Sylar being the main villain is out to obtain as many powers as he can by cutting the top of people’s heads off and examining their brain. So whenever he is doing this the camera pulls in to a close up of his face, smirking, and brings a great tension to the scene.