Gay TV Recap: Superhero's jig is up

Posted by

on August 31, 2007

*-*-SPOILERS-*-*

Last night's penultimate episode of the hilariously illogical, curiously camp and always unpredictable Sci-Fi Channel reality show Who Wants to Be a Superhero? was ... well, illogical, camp and unpredictable. The challenges were more opaque than usual, which is what perhaps resulted in the ultimate ousting of the show's gay hero, Parthenon.

It's disappointing to see Parth get the gold-glittered boot after his very first time in the bottom three and even more disappointing that we won't have a gay hero in the finale, but let's face it: he did kind of blow those first two challenges, and more importantly, his impromptu jig lacked spirit. And we can't have a superhero who can't pull some jazz hands when the situation demands.

This episode was all about cracking codes, something that the heroes were not too terribly good at, for the most part, especially when it came to finding the hidden challenges within the challenges. The first code-crack involved a classroom full of fourth-graders, whom the heroes had to enlist to answer some questions in order to decipher a coded message. Of course, the real challenge here was in seeing if the heroes could relate to kids.

Hyper Strike was a big hit, which is unsurprising since the guy does somersaults for a living (not that there's anything wrong with that). Hygena and Defuser seemed to get along well enough, but Parthenon went into Bank Branch Manager Def Con 4 managing style with his kids, which didn't endear him at all. Now, Parthenon has always performed at the top of the superhero class, and won several challenges. He's smart. He's got good problem-solving skills. But he's a bit iffy in the people skills department, at least within the boundaries of this competition, and he does seem to place finishing the job above anything else both in terms of the kids and in what we're about to see.

After having to work with the kids on questions about superconductors and what-not (!?), they have to go to a public park, where they receive instructions from Stan Lee. Only it isn't Stan Lee ... it's EVIL STAN LEE!! Remember how Doctor Black Party stole Stan's pencil and used DNA from it to clone an Evil Stan? Well, he's using him to send phony instructions to the heroes. Interestingly, new Evil Stan looks just like regular Stan, right down to the tinted glasses and I've-been-sitting-at-this-fricking-desk-for-200-years posture, but his voice is even more monotone.

Evil Stan makes the heroes do all kinds of stupid stuff that gets increasingly dangerous, including sending Hygena out to stop traffic (um, the on-set insurance rep must have been smoking crack in an alley at that point). But Parthenon actually makes the biggest goof in the challenge when he takes a cane from a person crossing the street and, under Stan's orders, takes it to the other side of the street, does a dance, and leaves it on a trash can.

Let me repeat that: HE TOOK A WALKING CANE FROM A PERSON, TOOK IT ACROSS A BUSY STREET, DANCED A JIG, AND LEFT IT ON A TRASH CAN.

I was pretty shocked to see this, to be honest. But as with the kids, Parthenon was blinded by finishing the task and didn't stop to think that leaving a person with difficulties walking in the precarious position of having to play human Frogger to get their cane back maaaaaaaaybe wasn't the heroic thing to do.

The heroes then get trapped in a shipping container and have to get out. Parthenon actually takes the lead here and his ideas work, but his management style again isn't the best, and the other heroes are a bit annoyed by him. At this point I realize that it's not looking good, and I can feel already that this will be my last recap for this show. I cry softly into my Mallowmar.

Sure enough, when it comes time for the elimination, it's clear that Parthenon's fate is sealed when Slightly Less-Evil Stan shares with the heroes that the kids were asked after their electromagnetic physics social which superhero they liked best, and Parth had the lowest score. Actually, he didn't get a single vote. Ouch!

Parthenon seems shocked by this, and notes that he has nieces and nephews that he's very close with. I'm actually very glad that they kept this in, as the unfortunate stereotype that gay men hate kids is one that is pushed all too often. So Parthenon doesn't hate kids, and he has good rapport with the kids in his life. It's just strangers' kids that he treats like new recruits at an AmWay training session.

And with that, Parthenon is called onto the red box for the first time and sent home. Did he deserve it? Well, from the first two challenges this week, probably. But Hygena has been in the bottom three almost every week at this point and she also underperformed in the first two challenges, although her rapport with the kids was much better. As with last season, it's pretty obvious that the show kind of picks and chooses who they want to go when and rationalizes accordingly, so it's hard to take any of these eliminations too seriously.

It's sad to see Parthenon go, because I tuned in to this show mostly to see his Boy Scout pluck and goofy-but-determined expression. Unabashedly, unapologetically out from the get-go, Dan Williams brought the show a smart, virtuous, and heroic gay man for fans everywhere to look up to, gay or straight. And for that, Parthenon, you'll always be a superhero to us.