YMMV / Alphas

• Awesome Music: The theme song.
• Complete Monster: Preacher Jonah Englin, blinded by a religious purpose, using his powers to induce a stupor on everyone he can reach under the pretense of "feeling the divine light" and saving them from the darkness of the world, despite people dying over and over from withdrawl, he continues to stand his ground and consider his gift to people divine. He forces Dr Rosen to treat his followers but forbids medicine that counter his influence, showing his true colors and employing the rethoric that is the world killing them, not him. After driving his own father into a mass suicide at their church as a child, Englin grows up and continues to preach as if he was chosen by god to spread his word when he is in reality a glorified drug pusher who inadvertly kills his own (unknowing) clients. Incapable of feeling regret and absolutely no redeeming qualities, he forces the hand of Dr. Rosen to the point of getting shot by him while trying to set his compound on fire, planning another mass suicide, for he prefers to belive his gift is paradise than anything else.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Gary may be the least prominent core character but was easily the most popular character in the series due to his cool power, many funny moments and quotes, and for Ryan Cartwright's great depiction of a high functioning autistic adult.
  • Gadgeteer Genius and Mama Bear Skylar is probably the most popular recurring cast member by far, and being played by Summer Glau sure helped.
  • Tactical team leader Nathan Clay is never the team's main DOD counterpart, but he rivals or surpasses his superiors in popularity due to his Character Development and tendency to be The Cavalry in an effective way.
  • Agnes Walker, an Affably Evil Blessed with Suck Evil Genius played by Kandyse McClure, is one of the best-liked one-shot Red Flag members.
• Fanfic Fuel: Since the team is already established and fighting Red Flag in the pilot (having already met people like Skylar and Marcus), it's interesting to speculate about their unseen earlier adventures.
• Fanon Discontinuity: More than a few fans like to disregard Dani getting Killed Off for Real, both due to the devastating effect this has on the main characters and how it makes it harder to like her killer.
• Fridge Horror: Anna's DDoS attack on Gary was the equivalent of tasing his brain. No wonder he collapsed in sheer agony. If you pay attention to the screen, it was actually a Sensory Overload that she performed. Still Fridge Horror, but much worse because imagine what he deals with daily. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people every day use phones, laptops, TVs, and other such devices that he can detect and still function with minimal harm. Yet one laptop instantaneously caused worse pain than a satellite dish did over a couple days. It's the difference between living half a mile from the airport for 10 years, or standing on the runway right behind a 747 as it takes off. The former is annoying, but bearable; the latter, not so much.
• Les Yay: In "When Push Comes to Shove," Nina (Laura Mennell) uses her power to mentally force Rachel (Azita Ghanizada) to make out with her. Although it seems to be less about this than overloading Rachel's senses to incapacitate her.
• Magnificent Bastard: Stanton Parish is an immortal Alpha who intends to create a civil war between Alphas and regular humans, believing his own kind to be in danger from the latter. Parish breaks out all but two inmates of Building Seven, without anybody but the main characters knowing he's involved. He has a lady hypnotize and brainwash anyone in his organization down to the lowest minion to ensure complete loyalty. He lectures the stupid guards as he escapes from custody, and then almost steals psychic's powers. He's had his counterpart's daughter spying for him since before he even knew he existed. When people finally become aware of his existence, after they foiled a terrorist attack of his that would have murdered an entire city Parish hijacks the counter-measures the heroes put in place, and manipulates it so that by defending themselves he can launch an attack that would kill off all non-Alpha humans in the country for what he feels is for the ultimate benefit of the greater good, with the only regular human he intends to survive being Dr. Lee Rosen, who Parish genuinely respects and believes will lead the Alphas into a golden age.
• Moe
  • Gary has his moments, due to his penchant for hilarious comments and his doomed Dating Catwoman relationship with another autistic individual who works for Red Flag.
  • Rachel, due to her Sensory Overload powers and difficulty being assertive.
• Paranoia Fuel: So much of it! In just the first episode: The next time you answer your phone, you could end up brainwashed into killing someone. A random stranger can convince you to do anything she wants with just a few words and a little eye contact. A seemingly harmless autistic person can actually be reading all of your texts and e-mails right now.
• Retroactive Recognition: In Anger Management, the Alpha thought to be causing bursts of unsuppressed rage is, ironically, none other than Tatiana Maslany, the She-Hulk.
• Special Effects Failure: Though the show does an admirable job depicting the speedster Alpha alongside the normal-speed regulars, it drops the ball when Rosen is speaking to him at the office. The two are on-screen side by side, and the speedster is clearly not really in the shot with Rosen, an effect not helped by the fact that the Super-Speed effect is being achieved by fast-forwarding his half of the scene slightly.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Griffin— the Bounty Hunter with Perception Filter powers— and Affably Evil Red Flag mind reader Agnes Walker have plenty of fans who wish they'd been in more than one episode apiece.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The Shared Universe with Warehouse 13 and Eureka, in several ways:
  • All three series have their own Story Arcs that have far-reaching consequences, which could've had interesting effects on each other's arcs. They're rarely, if ever, mentioned.
  • Warehouse 13's characters include Steve, a Living Lie Detector; Pete, who has Spider-Sense; Myka, who has Photographic Memory; Leena, who has Aura Vision; and Claudia, a Gadgeteer Genius. Which Warehouse 13 character crosses over? Dr. Vanessa, the completely ordinary side-character, whose sole appearance was only a cameo that only served to establish the shared universe. Especially odd in that Steve was introduced to Warehouse 13 the same day that Alphas premiered, practically foreshadowing a future crossover.
  • No crossover with Eureka ever happened.

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