Heroes has become one of my favorite shows recently. NBC made a wise choice when they decided to make the previous episodes available on their website. I missed the first few, but was able to catch up fairly quickly thanks to the online episodes. I missed the first 3 episode of 24 season one, which all of my friends love but, as a result, I still to this day have never watched it once. This really isn’t a post about Heroes per se. Or 24 or the benefits of online episodes. Its about the Cheerleader. Even if you have never watched Heroes I’m sure you’ve heard of the cheerleader. For weeks earlier in the season, NBC was running the Heroes promo which repeated over and over again in a dramatic whisper “Save the cheerleader, save the world.”

The Cheerleader, a.k.a. Claire Bennet, is played by Hayden Panettiere. Despite her numerous previous credits, I really just never noticed her before Heroes. But now I can’t go anywhere without seeing her face. Lets take this weekend for example. As I’ve mentioned on occasion, my kids watch the Disney Channel frequently. On comes the Cinderella III music video, and who do you think is singing the theme song? You guessed it, the Cheerleader. On several other channels the same morning I saw her in commercials hocking acne cream. Oh look, who’s that licking the Stanley Cup, Hayden Panettiere!

It was too cold here to go out to play, so I took my daughter over to Blockbuster to rent a movie. There staring back at me from the shelf was the Cheerleader again. This time, it was some teen/pre-teen movie I had never heard of Bring It On: All or Nothing. I quickly steered my daughter down the aisle. We ended up with Disney’s Ice Princess again (really should just buy it). An inspiring tale of a girl who’s desire to ice skate over comes the challenges created for her by her Mom’s (Joan Cusack) dreams of Harvard and her ethically challenged skate coach (Kim Cattrall). Its actually not a bad kids movie, at least the first four or five times you see it. Oh and I forgot to mention the popular ice skater-girl who befriends the poor heroine of this film. Funny I had never noticed before this weekend that she was played by Hayden Panettiere! Ahhhh!

Its not that I’m not a big fan of Hayden Panettiere, she’s pretty hot (and yes its OK for me to say that now that she’s over 18) and I love Heroes, and I love her character on Heroes but, there is such a think as media over-saturation. It’s almost like reverse celebrity stalking. I guess I just hadn’t realized that Claire’s super power was the ability to appear as if by magic everytime you turn on the TV. Oh my God now there’s even a picture of her on my blog. I’m scared…