I'm going to get my major complaint with this episode out of the way first. Is there a hero out there with the power to get people on a supersonic jet from Vegas or Odessa, Texas, and then to New York? Because it happened twice in this episode: Thompson (Bennett's boss) and Nathan Petrelli. Now you might say, "Well, Phil, you're watching a show about a man who can fly, a cheerleader who can regenerate, and an office worker who can move through time. Why question this?" Here's the reason. When a show starts, there is a contract between the show and the viewer. The show says, "Here's our world. Here are the rules in our world. We won't break them." So Heroes has established itself in our world where certain rules exist. Like getting to the airport an hour before hand and other things. So having someone in Vegas and then seemingly minutes later with no explanation is jarring and takes me personally out of the show. Even one sentence of dialogue... "Nathan, how did you get here so fast?" "Mr. Linderman had me flown back on his private jet." That would solve it. Ok, complaint over.
Onto the show. Already loving the Bennett, Parkman, Ted (Watch out... Radioactive Man!) combination. I loved Bennett communicating with Parkman in the OWI (Organization without Initials) cells. I also loved Parkman making fun of Bennett for being middle management in OWI. Also did you notice that the three of them were in the diner where Hiro and Ando met Charlie?
Linderman. He has powers too which you knew if you read the online comic during the hiatus. But now we see the concrete of his plan. He wants the bomb so that the Heroes can take over and then Petrelli can get into the Oval Office. And he considers the loss of .07% of the world's population an acceptable loss. Interesting too that he said that he'd worked with other heroes before and something didn't work out there. It looked like Nathan was going to refuse him outright, but he seemed to really like that picture of himself in the White House. Which he opened with the piece of glass from Peter's head. Symbolic? I think so.
Peter, of course, took that shard to his head, and I thought that the little battle between Sylar and Peter was pretty cool. I really hope there's a big confrontation between the two of them before the end. And this is when I knew the "death" that we'd seen in the preview was so fake. Good thing Claire was there to pull out the shard and wake her uncle up.
Claire is in such a weird spot now. She's found her real dad, who seems to love her (or the idea of her) but she's getting pushed aside again. I don't think she's really going to go to Paris. She has to be in the City when the bomb goes off. Hmmm, Bennett's going to NY, not knowing that's where Claire is. I'm sure there will be a reunion of some sort soon.
Mohinder... was he in the episode? Ok, yeah, he kind of was. Nice job knocking Sylar out, professor. Why didn't you hook him back up to the medicine and crank up the dosage?
Jessiki, DL, and Micah. Bad form, illusionist Candice! Not cool and the coming smackdown that Jessiki will lay upon you will be of Biblical proportions (Old Testament, most likely). And why does Linderman need Micah. What's happened to his plan that he needs a technopath for?
Hiro and Ando. IN THE FUTUUUUUUUUURE! Ok, they didn't have much this week. Next week, it looks huge for them. As long is Hiro doesn't cause a space time continuum rip by being so close to his future self. Nice of Ando to draw his gun in that final scene too to try and protect his friend.
And finally. Isaac. Here's where the questions get interesting. Isaac could paint the future. And apparently the future in Heroes is unalterable. Now, it doesn't always play out exactly how we think it will, such as with Hiro and the dinosaur, but it seems like whatever he's painted happens. Now, he painted the bomb going off, and Hiro saw the bomb going off. Which seems to mean that the bomb is going to go off, which would seem to make everything that the season has been about, including "Save the Cheerleader, Save the World" has been in vain. Unless saving the world doesn't involve stopping the bomb, which would seem to play into Linderman's plans... So the question is are we dealing with a Greek tragedy kind of situation where trying to stop the future actually brings it about? Will all the work that the Heroes have put into trying to stop it bring it about? Does that include Isaac's attempt to figure out how to stop Sylar? And how will Sylar having Isaac's power play into all of this now?
And next week...
For one thing, I'm a little surprised the writers went this way. It seems like there's so much story left that to spend part of it in the future is a bit of a waste. But with that being said... here's what I see in the preview.
- Some kind of eternal flame. Remembering the victims of the bomb?
- A couple of quick shots of someone fighting in what looks like a government building. I think it's Peter.
- Peter yelling at Jessiki that he was the bomb.
- Soldiers pointing guns at someone. Possibly Peter who runs through a door. I guess he met with DL at some point. And I think the soldier holding the pistol and standing behind the soldiers is Parkman.
- Nathan obviously as President and telling a brunette Claire that he's the most special person there is. Nathan is not the nice guy here.
- Peter and Jessiki macking on each other?!? Oh crap, does Peter get a split personality or just super strength?
- More shots of Peter doing Hero-y stuff, then a TV shot of Sylar and the caption "America Remembers."
- Mohinder in an incredibly bad wig telling Nathan that something he's talking about is genocide. Killing the people with powers? And then Nathan looking pretty ticked off. And then asking if Mohinder is with him.
- Interestingly, no shots of Hiro and Ando in the preview, which I assume is the catalyst for doing a show 5 years in the future.
8 comments:
I absolutely loved it. It was worth the wait for me.
But, man, you may be the biggest geek friend I have :D
Regarding creative license: you need to read Ken Levine's blog. He was one of the writers for Cheers and he did a couple of entries on the subject earlier this week. Go to his blog and scroll down to the Monday entries.
http://kenlevine.blogspot.com/
I don't disagree with Levine, but I would say that Cheers and Heroes reach two different audiences. And the Heroes audience tends to nitpick things like how people get places so quickly. Sitcoms and dramas are very different animals.
Did you read down to the entry before the one on Cheers?
Oh, I did. But I think my point still stands, even more so in the Sci-Fi arena where nitpicking is an art form.
Thanks for geeking, Phil! I love it and can't wait to see what happens!
By the way, I'm totally with you on the "Why didn't you hook him back up to the medicine and crank up the dosage?" comment.
What's the talk about Mama Petrelli's gift? Do we know or are there theories?
Phil, I had the same thought when Nathan walked in the house from his visit in Vegas. I'm with you on the creative license thing. I've struggled with it mightily on 24. There are just some things you have to let go of because of the nature of that show. Jack Bauer can get anywhere in LA in 10 minutes.
As far as the story, I'm skeptical of this 5 years in the future thing. I wonder what it will do to the storylines. I wouldn't think you'd want to project where you were going like that if you were assuming you would be on the air for a few seasons.
I did notice that Bennett was in the same diner as Charlie. I also thought the fight with Peter and Sylar was good, and could have been better, but rather hook Sylar up to the medicene, I wonder why Mohinder didn't just take him out -even though he's part of the main storyline. I also wonder why some of Sylar's "stolen" abilities rarely show up, except for the telekinesis. He needs to melt some appliance or show some effect of his super hearing. I just think if they're going to show that Peter and Sylar are antitheses of each other, he needs to exhibit more of his powers. Finally on Sylar, when he was with Isaac, he sounded like he used whats-her-name's power of persuasion (I've already forgotten her name) with the whole echoed voice thing. I thought when she killed herself she prevented him from stealing it. Of course, we never really have seen how Sylar gets the powers - it seems to point to taking/eating the brain?
On Hiro, when he walked in Isaac's apartment in the future, he saw all the "timeline" on the events. It seems to point that Hiro in the future is doing what present Hiro said before going in the apartment - that they need to figure out where they made mistakes and go back and fix them. I imagine future Hiro is obsessed with doing just that. I'm interested in how saving the cheerleader saves the world (as future Hiro told Peter, maybe trying to fix a mistake) as it's obvious it doesn't stop the explosion.
Jeff, this week's online comic suggests that Future Hiro did make some changes. I'm not sure how that all works out though.
Elizabeth, the general speculation is that Mama Petrelli has a power, but people aren't sure what it could be, since there's been no hints of it yet (at least none that people have been able to ascertain).
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