That's A Lot of Information to Get in a Double Episode

Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, let me start this post off with an apology. I was traveling for work during the week with poor internet access and as such did not have time to take notes and post. I apologize. On the bright side, I'm going to spend the rest of this rainy afternoon catching up on posts, so if you don't wind up reading this until Monday, you'll have a lot to keep you busy. That being said, let's dive in with the first show I missed: Heroes.

Quite frankly, I'm glad that I didn't watch Heroes until this morning, because there is a hell of a lot of stuff to talk about and dissect. I'll start very broadly and say that overall I liked, but didn't love the episode. It felt to me like the producers were quickly trying to tie up a number of last season's plot lines while simultaneously trying to set in motion a whole new set of stories, which translates in an episode that feels a bit uneven, but still entertains. I will say that I think the episode got stronger as it went on, which bodes well for the future. Now to get more specific.

Future Peter, Current Peter, and Time Travel
Ok, so Future Peter shot Nathan to prevent him from telling the world about the existence of those with powers, thus preventing the creation of the future that Future Peter came from, which would mean that by shooting him, Future Peter effectively ended his own existence, thus making it impossible for him to have existed in the first place, which should mean Nathan never got shot, right? As you can see, time paradoxes confuse the shit out of me, so I will table my disbelief for the rest of the discussion. Additionally, Future Peter takes Current Peter and puts him in the body of one the "villains" (more on them later), to hide him and keep him safe, which begs the question: what happened to the villain?

Furthermore, Mama Petrelli is very aware that Future Peter has been trying to pose as her son, and thus keeps yelling at him to get back to his own timeline, since his presence is having a "Butterfly Effect" which is screwing with the timeline. (Those of you who are pop culture savants will remember the 2004 film of the same name starring Ashton Kutcher dealing with similar time-related problems. For those of you who need an overview of what the Butterfly Effect entails, click here). So basically to summarize, Future Peter, in the hopes of setting everything right, has actually (potentially) fucked things up even worse.

Claire, Sylar, and the Meaning of Being Human
In the other main plot, Sylar pays Claire a visit to attempt to steal her powers. I'm going to be honest, most of this plot reminded of the movie Scream, with Claire running around the house with a knife trying to escape the serial killer stalking her. Eventually he gets to her and opens her brain, and this, boys and girls, is where things start to get interesting. We finally get to see how Sylar gets powers, and it does not, unfortunately involve him eating people's brains. It does, however, align closely with his former past as a watchmaker: Sylar needs to see/feel the neural connections in people's brains so that he can rearrange his own neural network to mimic the powers. The fact that his victims had to die as a result was an inconvenient coincidence. Since Claire can regenerate, she doesn't have to die. (Btw, how creepy was it watching Sylar put Claire's hair back on her? Ewww.) Unfortunately, Sylar's little research into her brain has someone affected Claire's ability to feel pain, which she said was the only thing that made her feel human. (If you're interested on another, very different show's take on pain and being human, see the season 3 Grey's Anatomy episode "Sometime's a Fantasy"--it was the one with Abigail Breslin. Good stuff). Claire seems to feel violated in the worst way, and spends the rest of the episode looking for a purpose, something to do so that she can feel again. Future Peter refuses to teach her how to fight, and HRG refuses to let her become his partner, but I think Claire is going to find in a teacher in her birth mother, who will be staying with her and the family to protect them while HRG is away. Let me just say that I am so happy to Jessalyn Gilsig back on TV. I think she's a wonderful actress and deserves a show of her own sometime soon. Networks, are you listening?

Spider-Suresh, Wonder Twin, and Playing God
Now this is where I started to get confused. Sylar is stealing powers by looking at people's brains, but Suresh says that he could give people powers by injecting them with some kind of hormone that will transform them, meaning that......well I'm not sure. So from what I remember from AP Bio, genes code for proteins which do everything else in the body. Proteins in turn produce those hormones, which then make stuff happen internally (I think this is why Mohinder referenced the 'Flight or Fight' response). But then if you inject the hormones into a person without powers, what happens to them when the hormones break down? Don't they just go back to being normal? I think that may be what we started to see at the end of the episode. But my question is, how do we reconcile that with Sylar's brain thing? I would like to see that explained.

Back to the story, Suresh uses Wonder Twin Maya (who's accent has totally changed by the way, don't think I didn't notice, show) to isolate the hormones that produce powers, and then proceeds to inject himself with them to turn himself into Spider-Suresh. Maya at first was all "oh no, don't do that, it's evil" but then after seeing Spider-Suresh with his shirt off became all "Oh baby take me now." I'm still in favor of getting Maya off this show, since I never liked her and there are too many other characters to deal with.

Nathan Finds God
After coming back to life after being shot (presumably because of the blood transfusion he got from Peter last season), Nathan becomes a huge believer in miracles and thinks that people with powers are angels from God, and that now they must stay quiet about their powers since the general populace shouldn't know about the "angels." Nathan also seems to have gone schizophrenic, since he begins talking to Linderman, who died at the end of season 1. For a while I thought maybe someone had revived Linderman, but in the end he turns out merely to be a figment of Nathan's imagination (I think). This does not bode well for Nathan given his new job, which leads me to.....

Crazy Bitch Has Got Another Fucking Personality
Let me start out by saying I like Ali Larter. She seems like a nice lady, and fairly decent actress, especially given all of the crackpot things people keep doing with her character. Apparently Niki now goes by the name Tracy Strauss, and she's now a political advisor (and bedfellow) to the Governor of NY. Which makes me say: WTF? How did she go from dying in a burning building to becoming a political aide to the governor in a time span of what seems like about one week? Unless she's not actually Niki and it's a case of identical strangers. That I would almost buy, but if she is supposed to be Niki? Really? WTF? Niki/Tracy convinces the governor that he should appoint Nathan to the empty Senate seat, because apparently that's what you do with schizophrenic politicians who are recovering from being shot. Whatever. On her way to NY to meet with Nathan, she's accosted by a reporter who draws a connection between the "K Street Ice Queen" and the "stripper from Vegas" (Niki). Niki/Tracy warns him not to publish the story or else she would destroy him. The reporter doesn't listen and asks "The Ice Queen" for a statement one more time. This makes Niki/Tracey mad, which leads her to turn the guy into a block of ice which shatters, killing him without leaving any evidence. Did you pick up on how he kept calling her ice queen and then her power was ice? That was clever, show, so clever.....not. The ice power is a possible explanation for how Tracy could be Niki, but quite frankly I hope she's not, because this whole multiple personality thing is played out. Maybe she's Niki's long lost twin. That would be preferable.

Mama Petrelli's in Charge Now. Oh Fuck.
We learn alot about Mama Petrelli in this episode. First off, her power is seeing the future in dreams. Not a bad one, I must admit. She's also hell bent on getting Future Peter back to the future, after having a vision of all of the Heroes dying down in Level 5 at the hands of Niki/Tracey, Adam Monroe, Bob Parkman (Matt's Dad), and one of the villains who escaped when Sylar invaded the Company's HQ. After Elle's dad is killed by Sylar, she also becomes head of the Company and is tasked with tracking the villains down. She fires Elle (I hope that is not the last we see of Kristen Bell, especially after her awesome electric fit knocked Sylar out). Oh and yeah, apparently she's SYLAR'S MOTHER!!! W? T? F? This feels like a jump the shark moment folks, but I'm definitely willing to see how it plays out.

Hiro is going to have to save the......YAWN
Hiro is now head of his father's company, but is bored and wants to get back to world saving. Guess what happens? That's right folks, a deus ex machina in the form of the Nakamura family laywer with a MESSAGE FROM THE GRAVE from Lieutant Sulu telling Hiro not to open the secret safe. After Hiro opens the secret safe, he finds another DVD from Sulu telling him to guard one half of some secret world-ending formula or else. Approximately two seconds later, a little blonde speedster runs in steals the formula and (supposedly) our hearts as well, although I'm not really a fan since this Hiro thing is starting to get old. Anyway, Hiro decides that he must travel to the future to see the effects of whatever that formula thing was so that he can figure out how to stop it. In the future, Future Hiro gets killed by a Future Ando with powers seconds before it looks like the world blows up. Yeah. Been there, done that. Hiro then spends the rest of the episode being mean to Ando and trying to track Blondie down. It was boring.

Parkman is in the African Desert
Future Peter sends Parkman to a desert in Africa. He wanders around until an African tribesman who's got some good quips finds him and makes him walk. That's literally all the happened.

We've got a new picture
So in the scenes with Parkman and Mohinder, we see a painting of the world splitting in two (with the split looking a lot like the Heroes symbol...coincidence I think not). I think we're going to be seeing a lot more of that thing as time goes on, but fuck if I know what it means.


And so boys and girls, as we can see a lot of shit happened and I have no idea what it means, but I will keep watching to find out. I'll leave you with some quotes:



"You can always give it to me. I'm extremely interested in money." --Ando. Hah.

"Are you goonna eat it?" "Eat your brain? Claire that's digusting."--Claire and Sylar

"You don't pay me for sex, governor, I give that for free." Tracy/Niki

"What are you doing?" "What does it look like? Trying to get hit by a train!"--Peter and Claire

"You come from America. You know Britney Spears?"--African dude.

"No service here. Should have gone with Sprint."-African dude.

Breaking News: Heroes Update to Follow Later This Week

My analysis of the two hour season premiere of Heroes will follow later this week, as I'm now taking a class on Monday nights and I could not stay awake to watch it and the other two shows I've already blogged about. Apologies. I promise I'll make it up to you.

Heroes? Villains? Does anyone still care?

So during my many hours of Olympic watching, in addition to seeing commercials for that god-awful Kath & Kim, I've also seen the "They're villains, Claire" commercial for Heroes an inordinate amount of times. I loved Heroes when it first started and I thought the first season was great, but now these commercials can barely get me excited, and I'm not really sure why. Let's hypothesize:

1) Season 2 sucked so bad that no matter how good 3 may be, its too late to bring me back. Hmm, perhaps, but in retrospect the only parts of Season 2 that I absolutely hated were the Wonder Twins storyline, and on the flip side, Season 2 had KRISTEN BELL and I think I've made very clear how I feel about her. (And in case you're new to our club, WE LOOOOOOOVE KRISTEN BELL. Got it? Good.) Let's keep going.

2) Too much time has passed. This one is a pretty good bet. Heroes, with its intricate and dense mythology, needs a highly-engaged fan base. The problem with the last original episode having aired in December is that that fan base has moved on, not having had any new story, both on TV and in other media, to keep them addicted. They found new stuff to satisfy they're superhero fix, which brings me to my third point.

3) The Dark Knight is a much better meditation on the concept of heroes and villains than Heroes will ever be. I think this is the right answer. There's a reason why the Dark Knight is about to become the second highest grossing movie of all time, namely that it is a timeless work of art that makes the concept of "hero" and "villain" murky and indistinct and leaves the audience with something very real and very big to ponder over. I'm not sure that this show, which did struggle a bit creatively, can even come close to matching that task. Case in point: the trailer for season 3 (see below) asks the viewer to pick sides, whereas TDK leaves the viewer feeling as if there are no sides.

Heroes probably would have been able to avoid these comparisons if it was tackling a different storyline, but given the direction of the story this season, I think people are going to watch a few episodes and realize that it just can't compete. I hope I'm wrong, and please tell me if you think I am, but I'd bet that Heroes is going to become another casualty of the writer's strike, which is unfortunate, but not unexpected.

Picking Up Steam

I'm glad I waited until this morning to write this post, because it gave me the opportunity to have a nice, insightful conversation with one of my friends about what's been going on with this show lately. I think some poor choices were certainly made early on in the season (which fyi Tim Kring has apologized for), but I think it's still going to take some time for people to get back on aboard. That being said, I think the last two episodes have gone a long way to making that happen. That and the fact that Kristen Bell is smoking hot. Yeah.

I think the main reason last night's episode was much better is that (a) we're starting to move towards the resolution of the virus/old heroes dying plots which means (b) our characters are starting to cross paths again. The Bennet family is preparing to flee since Mr. Bennett can't deal with the fact that Claire has a boyfriend and is making friends at school (albeit by faking her own death to make another girl look stupid and thus exposing herself, but who's keeping track?) Mr. Bennett is not without reason, though, as Bob, Mohinder, and Veronica Mars (ok, I'll call her Elle from here on out) are hot on their trail. Mohinder wants to find Claire so he can save Niki from the virus, although I think we would be better off letting Crazy just pass on, because frankly I'm sick of her. Bob, on the other hand, is out to get rid of Mr. Bennett. Apparently we can only have one middle-aged, glasses-wearing white guy on this show. The three want to set a trap for Bennett which involves Elle shooting lighting, which is never a bad thing. Claire's boyfriend West, who has recently figured out that he was abducted by Mr. Bennett as a child, confronts him but then offers his help when Claire is in danger. One might say he wants to "play the hero." (Wop, wop) When the two are confronted by Elle and Mohinder, some quick work on their part allows them to take Elle hostage and use her as collateral to get Claire back. And given that we've all seen Isaac's paintings, we know how this plays out: Bennett gets shot in the eye and dies. End scene.....wait, it's not over? No it's not: Mohinder uses some of the blood Bob collected from Claire to revive Bennett, who wakes up in a company holding cell in shock and says 'Holy ---," just like his daughter did a year ago in the medical examiner's office. Nice touch, show, nice touch.

In the B-plot, Hiro can't deal with his father's death, so he decides to go back in time to stop it, but instead Papa Nakamura teaches him that just because one can change time, one shouldn't. This would have been a useful lesson four episodes ago when Hiro was still acting idiotically in Japan. And in the C-plot, Parkman realizes that not only that he can hear other people's thoughts but he call also transmit mental commands to them as well. He uses this newfound ability to interrogate Mama Petrelli as to why Adam/Kensei is killing all the old-people (they locked him up, and oh, p.s. he's immortal) and the identity of the unknown woman in the old Heroes photograph (her name is Victoria Pratt, and she will eventually played by Joanna Cassidy, who was in lots of things but whom I can only remember as the boss from Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead).

Noticeably and welcomely absent from this episode were the Wonder Twins, whom I can only hope are dead in the desert somewhere. Seriously.

Ok, that's it for this week. I'd like to hear thoughts about the way people feel about Heroes lately, since I'm beginning to get way too biased to be objective (although you have to give me props for cutting down on the Kristen Bell rhetoric-although you should all know that she is the Best. Actress. Ever.)

I Did Warn You.....

YESSS!!!!! That's all I have to say......well, that's the start of what I have to say. I'm going to start with a little story. Last summer, I was interning in D.C. without very much to do or people to do it with. While working, I used to play this game where I would trade quotes from TV shows with a friend from school. It was mostly Alias, Friends, and Grey's Anatomy, but I accidentally dropped one in from this other show on UPN. The show was called Veronica Mars. My friend was surprised, b/c she didn't know I watched the show (which I didn't). So that weekend, I picked up Season 1. I finished it in 3 days. Season 2 hadn't been released yet, so I tried to download as many episodes as possible until I got the DVDs. Once I had gotten through all the DVDs, I eagerly awaited the season 3 premiere. Most of my friends made fun of me, because I, a 21-year old heterosexual male, had become obsessed (that is not an exaggeration) with a show about a teenage girl detective.

Did their mockery bother me? No. Why? Because Veronica Mars, or VM, as I affectionately call it, is about so much more than a teenage girl detective. It's about class issues, the resurrection of the 40s noir movie as a TV show, teenage sex, rape, the death of your best friend, coping with an alcoholic parent, dealing with the mean kids in school, growing up, being who you are and accepting it. In a word, VM was perfection. It was smartly written and directed and acted. The cast was pitch-perfect. At the center of all this perfection? You guessed it--Kristen Bell. I can still remember the moment in the pilot when I knew that I was hooked. It happens early on in the episode, when VM is asleep on her desk and the teacher asks her a question about some quote and what she thinks it means. Without missing a beat, Veronica replies with a smile,"Life's a bitch until you die." I can remember thinking, "Ah if only she was real." That's when I knew VM would join my pantheon of favorite shows, which is no small feat since I watch a lot of TV. I eagerly watched every episode, relishing in the snark and sympathizing with the sadness. Kristen Bell played Veronica perfectly--just the right mix of steely sarcasm with occasional vulnerability. I still cannot fathom how she or the show never received an Emmy nomination. When VM ended, I think a little part of me died with it. I checked the entertainment pages every day, hoping that somehow, someway, the CW would have a change heart and bring it back. It didn't. I wrote a nasty e-mail to Dawn Ostroff lamenting her poor, poor decision making (which still seems pretty poor given how bad Life is Wild is doing). I got no response. I took refuge in ice cream and the DVDs. It was sad.

A few months later I found out Kristen Bell would be joining the cast of Heroes. I was thrilled. After watching the episode, I still am. One thing to know though: Elle (her character on Heroes) is no Veronica. I think it's a testament to Kristen Bell's chops that she could make me forget about Veronica and focus completely on this new character. And I have to tell you, Elle is one scary girl. She's hardened and cold, with no warm fuzzy center. She can sweet talk people, just like Veronica, but she is much quicker to drop the act and get annoyed. And certainly don't annoy her, or you might wind up electrocuted and dead. Just like the poor Irish girl's brother. Elle definitely works for the company and apparently so does her "Daddy." I am intrigued and I definitely want to see what else happens. But lets be honest, I would watch an hour of Kristen Bell reading the dictionary if it meant I got to see her on TV.

A bunch of other stuff happened tonight, which I'll address in a separate update, but for now I'll go to bed knowing that all is right again in TV land, at least until the impending writing strike screws it all up again.

Blah-blah, Ha-ha. No seriously, ha-ha.

Hello, friends. First, let me apologize for not keeping up with my updates. I've been a lazy man. I will do better in the future. Scouts honor.

So, another week, another new HIMYM. I didn't think last week's episode was particularly funny, so I don't feel so bad about not recapping. This week, on the other hand, was very funny. The basic premise: Ted meets a (crazy) girl on the Internet, and while introducing her to his friends, the audience gets treated to a bunch of flashbacks about how the gang all met each other. The highlights:

• Barney's Hot-Crazy Scale. I think that is the most useful tool to use in evaluating relationship prospects. I will make use of it in the future.
• Blah-blah, aka Ted's date. She definitely fits into the bat-shit crazy category. I loved how she kept trying to pick fights with Robin.
  
• The word repetition. Robin said no 16 times when asked if she and Barney were dating. Ted said "Lily, c'mon," three or four times when trying to convince Lily they had kissed. Lily said no 5 or 6 times when refusing to believe they had kissed. I just put myself to sleep by making funny moments sound horribly boring.
• The sandwich metaphor. That's one of the more creative ways I've seen people talk about pot on TV.
  
• Ted knowing sign language. It's just a cool little fun fact that adds depth to the character, and we all know how much I love character depth.
  
• Lily wearing flannel in college. I know we've seen that before but I still think its funny. It's a nice time period detail.

Thing I didn't like:

• Lilly and Ted supposedly having made out. It reminded way too much of the Friends episode where Chandler and Rachel supposedly kissed when they were in college and we flashback to it. I know this show is supposed to be the new Friends (or at least that's what some people say) but I think it's original enough to come up with its own plotlines, thank you very much.

Ok, I think that's all I have to say about that tonight. I will be back later with a nice long update about Heroes and the appearance of a certain actress who I may have mentioned before.

Come Fly With Me

Ok, so I had another lost weekend, hence the lack of updates. I will be rolling those that I missed into this week's updates. Also, I think I'm going to move away from recapping the entire plot each time and instead just highlight my likes and dislikes, if that's ok with all you. Sound good? Good.

Ok, so let's talk about Heroes. We've got a lot of ground to cover, so stay with me. Let's start with Claire and Mr. Bennett, since their story received attention both last week and this week. When last we left our indestructible cheerleader, she had been caught cutting off her toe by her Flying Stalker. She spent most of the last episode trying to tell FS that he simply saw her giving herself a pedicure. FS obviously knows that she's lying and tries to restart the whole lizard evolution discussion in class, severely pissing Claire off. Dude, if you like the girl, don't call her a freak in front of the entire class. She won't respond well. After much back and forth, FS picks up her up and flies her away to the beach where they totally make out and FS reveals that he was abducted as a child.......by a man in GLASSES. Cue ominous music. This week, Claire acts like a teenager and lies to her parents to go on a date with FS, who takes her to the top of the Hollywood Sign. Nice. She doesn't really feel that comfortable with him, because her dad doesn't want her dating (he thinks the Company will get to her), but FS gives her a nice line about letting go, convinces her to jump off the sign (not as suicidal as it sounds), and then flies down and catches her. Double nice. They make out again. When Claire gets home after curfew, she lies to her father and tells him that she had tried out for the cheerleading and that "cheerleading" makes her feel good and is important to her. Hehe, that's what they all say.

Peter has to help the Irish guys steal a bunch of money in order to get the box with his memories back and we find out that he can do a bunch of stuff that he maybe couldn't do before.

Hiro's still in the past being awesome and sending notes to Ando through his sword.

DL is definitely dead and Niki/Crazy leaves Micah in New Orleans with DL's family while she goes off to the Company to get cured. DL's family includes Monica (I think that's her name), who can see something on TV and replicate it. She goes all badass wrestler on some guy trying to rob her burger joint, which is awesome. Her little brother convinces Micah to rig the TV to get free pay-per-view which is eh. And Grandma, she's UHURA, people, UH-fricking-URA. (For those of you that have never seen Star Trek, you can't appreciate why this is so important, so boo you).

Mama Petrelli confesses to killing Papa Nakamura, b/c she thinks that will save her life. Sorry, try again. Parkman enlists Nathan's help to figure out who's really responsible and Nathan shows him the picture of the older generation of Heroes, which includes Mama and Papa Petrelli, Papa Nakamura, Linderman, Mr. Devaux, and MATT'S DAD, who turns out to be the BIG BAD who's been tormenting Molly. WTF? I know, I know.

Sylar gets whisked away to the jungles of Mexico, by Candace (the one who change reality remember, and who actually looks like a frumpy middle-aged woman, fyi) with no recollection of what happened to him or any of his powers. He kills Candace, but he still can't make anything happen. So he's goes wandering off into the jungle and eventually winds up on a road where's discovered by the wonder twins, Maya and Alejandro, but as I could really care less about their story line and creepy eye-bleeding power, I'm not spending anymore time discussing it. They're either going to kill Sylar or Sylar will kill them, so that's that for now.

Ok, I think that catches us all up. Next week it looks like we're going to find out what Peter's been up to. Apparently it involves a perky blond teenage detective with an aptitude for snark. What? I'm conflating shows? Damn. Ok so KRISTEN BELL, I repeat, KRISTEN BELL, of the prematurely cancelled Veronica Mars, joins the cast next week as a Hero with ties to Peter. As you can guess by previous allusions, I'm absolutely in love with Kristen Bell and the thought of her coming back to series TV gives me goosebumps. I'll forewarn you that next week's recap will be mostly about her. If you love her as much as I do, then we both have something to look forward to. See you next week.



KRISTEN BELL!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! (Ok, I'm really going now.)

Breaking News

Hi all. Due to severe time constraints this week, I won't be writing an update for Heroes. I just can't do it and keep up with watching and writing about everything else. I'll cover this week's events as part of next week's update. Apologies.

This Little Piggy Went to Market, This Little Piggy Stayed Home, This Little Piggy Got Cut Off But Completely Regrew Itself

Oh Heroes, the ways in which you keep me watching. The week's episode, entitled "Lizards," slowed things down a bit from last week, but given how much was packed into the last episode, I certainly welcomed the change. The brief rundown:

Claire gets all excited in science class when her teacher talks about certain animals having the ability to regrow lost appendages and starts talking and asking question and drawing attention to herself in the way her father doesn't want her to. Some of this attention comes from new "friend" West, a.k.a. The Flying Stalker. Flying Stalker gets totally turned on by Claire's interest in genetics and starts telling her about some book written by this Indian doctor, blah, blah, blah, you've heard this before. Claire pretends like she doesn't care at all (even though she does) and leaves abruptly only to find her car stolen. She tells her father (H.R.G. as most online writers refer to him) and then starts whining about how she can't hide who she is, blah, blah, we've heard this too. Then at the end of the episode she cuts off her pinkie toe to see if it'll regrow (which it does and its REALLY FREAKING COOL). Flying Stalker watches her through the window and sees what happens and flies away when she realizes that he's there. She runs outside to confront him but only find Papa Suresh's book in the driveway. She looks from side-to-side to try to fins him, but she should be paying attention to the dog, who's barking up at the sky b/c Flying Stalker, well, flew away.

Mohinder gets his first assignment, which is to go to Haiti to find some guy who contracted the virus. Hmm, I wonder who it could be? (I was actually very disappointed in myself for not realizing earlier that it must be the Haitian last season). Mohinder gives him some of his magic blood and the guy recovers, then promptly wipes Mohinder's memory and flees before Mo can bring him back to the big bad Company. Instead, he goes to visit H.R.G., which was what Mohinder and H.R.G. wanted anyway. Why, you ask? Because H.R.G. needs to track down some of Issac Mendez's (the guy who could paint the future and who died at the end of last season) paintings which show a bunch of people dead, supposedly all of the old people who started the company (Papa Nakamura, who is dead already, and Mama Petrelli, who seems to be next).

Speaking of Mama Petrelli, she's a suspect in Nakamura's death and gets brought down to the police station to answer some questions from newly-minted Detective Parkman, who uses his telepathic powers to listen on Mrs. Petrelli's thoughts. He gets promptly thought-scolded and Mrs. Petrelli decides that now would be a good time for a lawyer. Left alone in the questioning room, she gets attacked by something (I don't know what but I hope its the BIG BAD as I want to see who or what it is ) but survives.

Hiro is still stuck in 1671 trying to make Takezo Kensei a Hiro, I mean hero, and is facing some resistance because the guy's basically a giant douche. Hiro decides to take matters into his own hands and dress up as Kensei himself and confront the baddies who are attacking the pretty swordmaker's daughter. He rocks and the girl begins to fall for him, although Hiro knows its Kensei who's supposed to get her. He goes back to Kensei, who seems to like the idea of the girl falling for him and decides to help. The problem is that as soon as Kensei walks out of his hiding place he gets hit with a couple arrows from the baddies and dies. Wait, did I say dies? I mean briefly passes out but then goes all indestructible cheerleader and heals himself. Not much of a problem after all.

Peter is still in Ireland not knowing who he is. He fights some guys in bar, shows of his electric powers again (where did they come from?), then gets blackmailed into helping his captor steal something else to make up for the missing iPods from last week. How do they blackmail him? with a box that is supposedly full of information about who he is. Yeah.

Last but not least, wonder twins Maya and Alejandro are still trying to get to the U.S. so they can get help for Maya, who apparently kills people by secreting black goo from her eyes, the only remedy for which is her brother, who can make it go away. Yeah, I don't really get and she looks really creepy with the goo.

(Exhale) Ok, I think that's everything. There's so much going on with this show that it takes quite a bit of mental gymnastics to keep it all straight. Things I liked:

• Claire telling her dad she'll promise to always keep her new car locked. Seriously, she didn't lock it? Guess her common sense isn't indestructible (I know that doesn't really work as a joke, but at least I'm trying, right?)
• Apparently Mama Petrelli and Papa Nakamura did little bow-chicka-wow-wow back in the day.
• The dog Mr. Muggles watching the dog show intently and then barking when the channel was changed. I appreciate this b/c I used to put Teletubbies on for my dog and I swear that show was like Valium b/c it was the only thing that could shut him up.

One thing I didn't like: the new "slogan" for the next few episodes, "What's in the box?" or whatever it was. "Are you on the list?" was ok, and obviously "Save the Cheerleader, Save the World" became a pop-culture phenomenon in its own right, but I think the show is good enough to not need such gimmicky advertising. No Micah or Niki this week, but the promos make it seem like they'll be back next week. And let's not forget, Kristen Bell makes her Heroes debut in t-minus 19 days. That's it for this week.

IT'S BAAAAACK!

I realize this update is a day later than expected, but since I have to write these posts at work, this is the best I can do. (For those of you interested, my computer has officially died. It will not boot up. The screen will not turn on. I hate Dell.)

Ok, now to the important stuff. First off, I'd like to start with a disclaimer: I'm genetically predisposed to liking Heroes. Growing up I loved X-Men and Spider Man (I dressed up as Wolverine one Halloween), and like any normal person, I wish I too would develop some power to help me escape the mundanity (is that a word? Well it is now) of everyday life. As such, I tend to be more forgiving when Heroes gets a little stinky than other people will (reference Season 1 finale, although even I find it hard to defend those final scenes). Fortunately for me, though, Monday night's episode was AWE-some with a capital A-W-E.

Personally, I love it when shows jump into the future so you have to guess what happened to your favorite characters in the interim (e.g., the two year jump on Alias, although that storyline wound up being very poorly executed). I think it makes watching TV just that much more fun and can provide hours of endless discussion when you've run out of important things to talk about with your friends. So to recap all of the changes: The Bennetts are now the Butlers and live in California instead of Texas. Claire is no longer a cheerleader and her dad works for a copy place instead of a paper company. Claire makes friends with some kid who keeps asking if she's an alien or a robot, which he really has no right to do since he's neither (He can fly though). Nathan grew a beard and got drunk and certainly does not seem to have anything to do with Congress. Mohinder and Parkman are roommates trying to take of little girl Molly (the one who can instantly tell you where a person is) and bring down the mysterious company, which we found out was started by the original generation of Heroes, including Nathan and Peter's mom and Hiro's dad. Speaking of Hiro's dad, he gets pushed off the Devereaux building by a mysterious person from his past who also seems to be targeting Mrs. Petrelli as well (They both got ripped pictures of themselves with the little Heroes symbol scrawled over their faces). As for Hiro himself, he's back in 17th century Japan discovering that his hero Takezo Kensei is neither Japanese nor a hero and really just a big jerk and that in order to put history right he's going to have to do the heroic stuff himself. We're also introduced to new characters Maya and Alejandro (I think that's his name), who are on the run and trying to figure out how to control Maya's power (apparently is something to do with killing people and making thwm bleed out of their eyes......creepy). Ok, I think that's everything, right? What I'm missing something? Oh, yeah, Peter's ALIVE in Ireland with no memory of who he is and shooting electricity out of his hands, which, last time I checked was NOT one of his many powers. Also, he's got a cool looking necklace with the Heroes symbol on it.

Whooo, ok, time for a breather. Ready? Now some random thoughts:

• It's good that Claire's made a new "friend" (I say "friend" because it's completely obvious that they're going to be more than friends very soon), but I'm a little disappointed that his power is flying. We've already seen Nathan fly, and unless this is another one of his illegitimate children (which would make the scenario I just described instantly gross), I think they could have come up with another power.
• The scene where Claire calls Nathan: so sad. If I were Nathan, I'd be happy that my illegitimate daughter whom I tried to send to Europe so my real family wouldn't find out about her still wanted to talk to me, because it seems none of my other family members want to.
• So Molly's having creepy dreams about the Big Bad (I love calling unknown villains Big Bads. It's like talking about monsters from under the bed from childhood). I wonder when we're actually going to get to see this guy.
• People we didn't see this week: Niki, Micah, and DL (although I'm pretty sure DL is dead), Sylar, and......well I'm sure there's someone else, but there are so many characters on this show that I probably won't remember who it is until I see them next week.

So, I think I'll leave on that note. I'm really excited to see where the show goes this season, especially since Kristen Bell will be joining the cast in three weeks time (I'll have more on why that's so important to me when the time comes). I'll be back later in the week with more on the Grey's Anatomy premiere and a quick rundown of which new shows are worth watching.