Heroes is back, and they’ve promised us quite a bit in the final five episodes of the season. The question is, can this show deliver where many others have disappointed? This episode features characters involved in multiple plots, so lets start with the one that is currently standalone:
Primatech Paper
The Unlikely Team of Parkman, Sprague and H.R.G. break out of Primatech’s “Death Row” and make plans to head to New York. We see that H.R.G. has an idea of how Ted can use his powers by having him emit an EMP, which is an aftereffect of a nuclear explosion and shows that there is more to his powers than simply blowing up. The three figure out that Linderman is involved in this, but determine that destroying Primatech’s tracking device is more important. The tracking device? In New York, of course. The likelihood of getting rid of the tracker coinciding with New York blowing up just increased in my mind.
Linderman
In the beginning Linderman was simply an unseen mob boss. But as we see more of the character, we find that he’s more and more like Ozymandias from Watchmen – and if you haven’t read this comic, you NEED to do so. Or at least bug Matt Morrison about it (and btw, check out his theory on where this storyline is going). Somewhat in concert with his revealed healing power, he wants to “heal” the world by blowing up part of New York and then presumably helping to rule over it with Nathan Petrelli as his president. But to do that, he needs to make sure that Nathan becomes a congressman. And to do that, he may need to fix the election.
Enter Micah Sanders. We know Micah has some level of techno-manipulation, and doing something like rigging the computers that tabulate votes would be child’s play to him. I liked the use of Candice here, but it was somewhat strange that Micah didn’t pick up that this wasn’t his mom. He’d previously been able to distinguish between Niki and Jessica, so I wonder if this was an oversight.
The Petrellis
Was there any real doubt that Peter would live? The question, really, was whether Sylar would “absorb” his powers or not. As it turns out, it was “not” as Mohinder actually proved himself to be somewhat useful in rescuing a clinically dead Peter from Sylar’s clutches. This does raise some interesting questions about his powers though. His mimicked powers seem to be available only one at a time (similar to Ultra Boy of the Legion of Super-Heroes), but does the regeneration kick in by default?
We know now that Angela Petrelli has some sort of power, and some connection to Linderman (the online comics tell us that her husband served in Vietnam with Linderman). But what we don’t know is her role in all of this. Obviously, she’s working to get Nathan elected, but is this because she’s a mother or because she’s in league with Linderman?
Finally, Nathan’s quite the ass, isn’t he?
Isaac and Sylar
This is the death that we all expected. I don’t think that anyone’s surprised here, since they hung this one on us early on. And as more and more of Isaac’s paintings came true, it was apparent that his death at the hands of Sylar was coming. The truth is, his story was pretty much done and with the sketchbook in the hands of the courier and his power now mimicked by both Peter and Sylar they can use his precognitive powers in future storylines.
Five Years Later
I suppose it was almost obligatory to do this. A show based upon comic books needed to have it’s version of “Days of Future Past”, where we’re treated to a dark version of future events. This is all meant to take place next episode, but for now Hiro meets Future Hiro (who apparently has taken styling lessons from Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto) in Isaac’s studio, where we see several news clippings used for…?
Overall, I have to say that Heroes has not yet disappointed me with how the season is turning out. We’re staying in the future for the next episode. Stay tuned!
The List
Claire Bennet – Regeneration
Gabriel “Sylar” Gray – Can “see” and “fix” things
D.L. Hawkins – Becomes intangible
Isaac Mendez (d) – Precognition
Hiro Nakamura – Time manipulation/teleportation
Matt Parkman – Telepath (receiving only)
Nathan Petrelli – Flight
Peter Petrelli – Power mimic
Micah Sanders – Techno-manipulation
Niki Sanders – Superhuman strength
Candice Wilmer – Creates illusions
Charlie Andrews (d) – Eidetic memory
Claude “Raines” – Invisibility
Brian Davis (d) – Telekinetic
Sarah “Eden McCain” Ellis (d) – Persuasion
Hana “Samantha” Gitelman a.k.a. Wireless – Techno-telepath (?)
Meredith Gordon – Pyrokinetic
The Haitian – Removes memories
Sanjog Iyer – Dreamwalker
Linderman – Healing ability
Angela Petrelli – Unknown
Dale Smither (d) – Super-Hearing
Ted Sprague – Radioactive
Zane Taylor (d) – Molecular Destabilization (?)
James Walker (d) – Freezing power
