Writer: Jon Brown
Director: Ben Gregor
The penultimate episode continues the Spaced mini-reunion (after last week's Mark Heap appearance) with Julia Deakin and Clive Russell playing the famous superhero parents of Sarah/Electroclash (Claire Keelan). While I've enjoyed the development of Claire and Alex/The Hotness (Nicholas Burns) recently, No Heroics' jokes are still too caustic for my taste. But, you take what you can with this sitcom…
Uncharacteristically, the most successful subplot belongs to Claire and Alex this week. Here, they pretend they're still in a relationship, because it pleases Claire to upset her disapproving father Barry. A nice level of comedy is maintained as Alex does his best to irritate and frustrate his potential in-laws at The Fortress, as Barry takes sanctuary with Devlin/Excelsor at the bar (Patrick Baladi) to mastermind an immature prank…
Meanwhile, Don/Timebomb (James Lance) attends a therapy group for troubled superheroes and generally disrupts the session with his candid opinions and quasi-psychology. The notion of a support group for superheroes is quite an obvious one, but there's still some comedy to be mined here -- but Saxondale did the same joke weekly, with greater success. The funniest thing about this subplot was the visual of primary-coloured "capes" sitting around in a circle with sombre expressions -- particularly from the overweight Praying Mantis (Tony Way).
Elsewhere, Jenny/She-Force (Rebekah Staton) tires of her superhero lifestyle and takes a job as regular office worker, attracting the attention of a male colleague. Unfortunately, unlucky-in-love Jenny soon realizes her admirer is a self-confessed "capist" who can't help telling disparaging "jokes" about superheroes…
Staton is as lovable as ever, and the idea that prejudice extends to superheroes in this parallel universe was quite interesting. Indeed, the episode misses a trick in not exploring that avenue. Imagine a world where prejudice is directed at people who are clearly "superior" to regular people. How would that work exactly? Is it all based on jealousy? I was disappointed we didn't get to attend one of the mentioned anti-cape rallies, too.
Actually, one of my overriding thoughts about No Heroics is how it contains a few good ideas, but never takes them to the obvious next level. It has the gritty, sexually-tinged, mordant humour down to a tea -- but everytime something fairly clever or controversial presents itself, it's not equipped or willing to carry it through. A whole episode using anti-superhero sentiment as an allegory for racial fear could have been clever, insightful and very funny -- but it's not long before we're chasing an easy laugh as Alex shits his trousers.
Overall, "Origin, Tonic" deserves credit for delivering a worthwhile storyline for Sarah and Alex (helped by the ever reliable Deakin and Russell), and there were moments in Don and Jenny's side plots that made me chuckle. I still find it hard to really love this series, but it sometimes throws a spark of life your way.
16 October 2008
ITV2, 10.30pm
Cast: Alex/The Hotness (Nicholas Burns), Sarah/Electroclash (Claire Keelan), Don/Timebomb (James Lance), Jenny/She-Force (Rebekah Staton), Devlin/Excelsor (Patrick Baladi), Clive Russell (Barry), Julia Deakin (Sarah's Mum), Simon/Thundermonkey (Jim Howick), Steve Spiers (Norse Dave) & Tony Way (Praying Mantis)
Photo: 
