How Stupid is Mohinder?

Following my last post, can we please have Mohinder killed now. Nobody in the show frustrates me as much as he does. If we are going to start killing off people, my vote is to start with Mohinder. I'm convinced that Mohinder has the ability to always pick the wrong side.

We have now had three seasons of heroes. And in all three Mohinder has essentially picked the wrong side and done something stupid. In season one, he helps Sylar locate those with abilities. Even when he finally figures out Sylar is evil, he screws it up by not killing Sylar when he has the chance.

Season two, it gets worse. He again starts out with "good" intentions but somehow screws it up and starts working for the company he is trying to take down. He ends up shooting HRG and curing Sylar, giving him back his powers.

And now we have Mohinder, the villian. Once again he will choose the wrong side and align himself with Pinehurst. I mean seriously, through random dumb luck, you would expect someone with good intentions to come out on the right side at least once. I'm pretty tired of this character because I think he has been developed so weakly. It is a problem with the show in general, people do too many stupid things, but Mohinder takes it to another level. In my opinion, the show needs to clean this up, and it should start with Mohindher.

The Death of Maury Parkman

In last nights episode, Eris Quod Sum, we witness the the death of Maury Parkman. Maury Parkman, for all his faults, dies in an attempt to save his son, Matt. Maury was a key reason why Arthur Petrelli was able to return. And to demonstrate his gratitude, Arthur Petrelli dispatches of Maury with a flick of his hand. Is this guy evil or what?

What I like about the Maury's death, is that the show seems to be "cleaning up" the long list of characters with abilities. They have already killed off DL, Niki, Adam Monroe, Bob, Maury, and a few other minor characters. Not only have they killed off these characters but they also aren't using several others like Micah, Monica, and West.

I found the use of so many characters to be confusing at times. Worse than that, I believe that a show like this depends on character development and having too many characters is dilutive; it means less time to develop other more interesting characters.

So I hope that Heroes continues this trend. I prefer they focus on only a few core characters like Peter, Claire, Matt and Hiro and limit the growth of the cast as much as possible. And if they feel like killing off a few more characthers, Mohinder jumps to my mind, I'd be all for it.

Quick Thoughts on "Dying of the Light"

Show starts out with the truth about Ando and Hiro. Like I had stated in the earlier post, there was no way that Hiro actually stabbed Ando. Hiro is clearly on the "good" side and has been from the beginning

It moves on to Arthur Petrelli killing Adam Monroe in a demonstration of his powers. Arthur Petrelli has the ability to "suck" powers out of others. This is pretty interesting development and gives us insight on why he is able to instill so much fear in others. I for one hope that this ability will have its limits. I hope his powers are similar to the Parasite. He is only able to temporarily absorb the powers of others. Otherwise, we will run into the same problem we have with Sylar and Peter, characters becoming much too powerful.

I'm happy that they are bringing another Pre-cog back. I tend to think this makes the show much more interesting. The scene with him and Hiro was hilarious. I have selfish reasons for wanting another Pre-cog back on the show. The paintings provide me clues on what is going to happen next, and gives me my material to write this blog. For example, we are treated to the picture of the four villians this season. Three of them are easily recognizable. They are Arthur, Knox, and Flint. The other one is not as easily identifiable, and I believe has not been introduced as of yet.

Peter the bad guy and Sylar the good guy? What is going on with the world? Here we see the crux of this season's plot. Who are the real villians in this story?

Of course the Peter development with his father was rather predictable. As my girlfriend often says, Peter doesn't deserve his power. He is rather naive if not outright stupid, and that isn't a good quality for someone has powerful as Peter. It seems now that he has lost all his powers. In my opinion, this is a good thing. Like I stated earlier in this post and in another one, I never liked Peter being as powerful as he was. It creates problems with storytelling that are difficult to reconcile.

What is Mohinder's Power?

I've had a few people ask me what I think is going on with Mohinder. What powers does he really have? The best explanation I can come up with at this point is that he is becoming like a mutated Spider-Man.



We know he has enhanced speed, strength and agility. We also know he is able to climb on walls as shown in the first picture. We also know that he secretes some substance from his hands. He seems to use this substance to wrap up the people he attacks. He doesn't kill them though, he keeps them alive. This is very similar to what spiders do to their prey, paralyzing them but not killing them, preferring to keep them fresh for later.

At the very least, Mohinder is becoming more interesting. Mohinder has consistently been the most frustrating character in Heroes. Mohinder has been blind to almost everything around him and has walked the "Hero" line too closely. This sudden switch in Mohinder, at the very least, is causing him to be more interesting.

Quick Thoughts on "Angels and Monsters"

This episode further perpetuates a running theme that I have been following over the past year, Heroes characters walk a think gray line. The episode starts out with a monologue by Nathan who is trying to figure out if he is a hero or a villain. Much like everyone else, it isn't so black and white. Former heroes like Peter, Mohinder, and Hiro are on the wrong side of good and evil (although I'm not buying the Hiro thing quite yet. I'm sure we will discover not everything is as it seems when he stabs Ando) while the tradional villians of Angela and Sylar start lining up on the other side. HRG continues to walk the gray line, never clearly good or bad.

Under it all is a familiar theme. Things are being controlled by an unknown force. Like I stated in my last post, Arthur Petrelli is back. One thing is clear, people fear him. Maury Parkman fears him as does his wife, Angela. So is power, or his evil, must be truly something. More on that later. Also nice to see that my theory about Linderman being an illusion created by Maury Parkman was accurate. I knew that they wouldn't bring Linderman back to life, so the only logical conclusion was that he wasn't real.

Slowly but surely, we see the future as Parkman envisioned it and as Future Peter lived to be coming true. For some reason, Arthur Petrelli seems bent on giving powers to everyone. While I'm sure that future will never come to pass, the events leading up to it that would certainly be the basis for which this season's episodes will be based.

And can I say, I'm really think this puppet master character has some potential?

The Return of Arhtur Petrelli

The return of Arthur Petrelli seems imminent. In this weeks preview, we see a shocked Angela Petrelli confronting a "shocking return". The most logical choice at this point has to be Arthur. It was believed, since season 1, that Arthur Petrelli was dead. In fact, it was believed that he committed suicide.

However, the story of what actually happened has never really been told. It would be quite easy at this point to simply bring him back. I think this makes a lot of sense especially now considering all the drama swirling the Petrelli's. Angela is now head of the Company, Nathan is a U.S. Senator and looks to be asking his mother some tough questions, Peter turns into a "villian" in the future, and of course now we have Sylar. Or should I start calling him Gabriel?

Above is the picture of the man in the hospital bed. He definitely looks the age, build, and overall just similar to what we know Arthur Petrelli is supposed to look like. Refer back to the picture of the original 12. They also made a point to show the ring that Nathan was wearing. Pretty similar to the one that is on the finger of the man in the hospital bed. The two rings are below.


Now what his role will be is still somewhat of a mystery. I actually highly doubt that he will come back and make nice with Angela Petrelli. It seems, especially given the shocked look on her face, that his return will not be all that welcomed. I believe he is part of, if not directly responsible for, the plan to reunite the formula.

Under Linderman, the company experimented on people to give them powers. They gave them to Niki, Tracy, and Peter. We know that Arthur was a disciple of Linderman. He even volunteered his own son to undergo the experiment. Presumably, he would want to continue down that path. Given what we know of the "future" we know someone is working to create the formula. That someone is likely Arthur Petrelli.

Quick Thoughts on "I Am Become Death"

Now that's was a pretty good episode. Much better than the second season. Already we have some pretty exciting developments. Peter travels to the future only to find a world full with people with abilities. When he finds Sylar, he discovers that Sylar is his brother. But Sylar has turned to "Gabriel" and reformed.

Gabriel tells Peter about the horrible nature of his power. It causes a terrible hunger for power. Not unlike a vampire's thirst for blood. We see a full demonstration of this hunger as he attacks the one person he truly loves, Peter. So what will become of Peter? Will he become as evil as Sylar? Somehow I doubt it. I'm sure Peter will somehow overcome this just from the inherent goodness he has thus far demonstrated.

And how about that ending? We knew of course that Adam would make it back, but how he made it back is pretty interesting. Angela essentially saved him. I think, at this point, she is the one doing the manipulation. I'm not so sure Adam really is the key to the whole thing. I just think that Angela wanted to save Adam for her own evil purposes.

Will add some more in depth analysis throughout the week after I get a chance to fully digest it.

Nobody Knows about Angela's Power?

By the way, anyone notice how others, even within the company, don't realize Angela has a power. Noah confirmed it as much when he told her, "You know how it works. One of us, one of them". Of course he was referring to her as one of "us" which would be normal. And one of "them" as those with powers. She further supports this by calling Sylar one of "them".

I wonder why Noah would assume she doesn't have any powers? She must be hiding her abilities on purpose. Is the belief that not all the original 12 founders had powers? I have always assumed the opposite, that all of the original 12 founders had powers. But now it appears that not all of the original 12 have powers.

So why do you think Angela Petrelli is hiding her powers, even from those within the company?

Sylar Rebooted

Not going to write a full write up of Episode 3 "One of Us, One of Them" quite yet. Maybe this weekend if I can get to it before the new episode.

Instead, I'm going to talk about something I find interesting, albeit flawed, that the writers seem to have done with Sylar. It appears that Sylar has actually been "rebooted". The Shanti Virus seems to have wiped out all the abilities Sylar acquired save two, his original ability of Intuitive Aptitude and his most powerful ability, Telekinesis.

I have mixed feelings about this. First, I'm happy they toned down Sylar a little bit. This is the list of powers he has lost (there may be more, but these are documented)

• Ability to Freeze things
  
• Ability to Melt things
• Perfect Memory
• Acute Hearing
• Precognition
• Radiation

When you add these to the list of powers he has gained since then, Sylar was starting to become a little bit too powerful. I was particularly concerned about him having perfect memory, radiation, and precognition. Radiation and precognition is obviously pretty powerful. Perfect memory however may be the biggest lost. This might seriously be one of the more underestimated abilities.

Now his abilities only include

• Telekinesis
• Rapid Healing and invulnerability
  
• Turning things to Gold
• Clairsentience
• Sound Manipulation

So I'm happy about the toning down of his powers. Hopefully he doesn't gain too many more as I think Telekinesis by itself is pretty powerful. You add this to the Invulnerability and Sound Manipulation, and the fact that he is now infinitely rich, and well Sylar is pretty dangerous.

So what do you think of this "reboot"?

The Butterly Effect

A very interesting episode.

We find out that Claire's powers are evolving. In addition to being able to heal, she doesn't feel any pain. You add this to the fact that we now know, thanks to Sylar, that she can never die and we see that Claire's powers are evolving. The future Peter reveals that Sylar was never meant to get Claire's power. This will undoubtedly have a profound effect on the course of events. The question becomes how can Claire not die? What makes her so special? Clearly her brain functions differently than the others with abilities. She has evolved past the point where she needs her body attached to her head in order to survive.

We get a very interesting look into Angela Petrelli's power. Much like Peter's vision of the explosion in the third season, these visions probably set the foundation of the season. In her vision we see several characters who have seemingly met their end. These include Hiro, Parkman, HRG, and Peter. We also see Knox "kill" Claire by ripping her head off her body. The scene then cuts to four villians, Knox, Tracy, Maury Parkman, and Adam Monroe. Suddenly, behind Angela Petrelli, appears Sylar. On the surface, it is hard to read too much into the dream. I'm not sure it reveals that much about anything at this point other than a possible bad ending for some of the more beloved heroes.

Nathan is offered a Senate seat by a familar face. He also seems to be imagining the prescense of Linderman. He has a conversation with Future Peter who reveals himself and tells Nathan of the bleak future. Nathan accepts the Senate seat. We then see Tracy confronted by a reporter claiming she is Niki Sanders. She of course denies this, and then we find out the truth. Tracy has completely different powers than Niki, she has the ability to freeze people.

Sylar attempts to get the powers of several villians in Level 5. He is shot by HRG, but heals himself. As Sylar attempts to cut Elle's head open and steal her powers, she releases an explosive discharge, knocking Sylar unconscious and setting free the villians of Level 5. Angela Petrelli comes in and takes charge of the Company. She "releases" Elle from the company. This will no doubt come back to have a serious impact. Angela then drops the bomb. She tells Sylar that she is his mother. Whether we are to take that literally or figuratively at this point remains to be seen.

Small notes

• Parkman meets up with a man with the same power of Isaac, a man who can paint the future. The scene with the turtle is hilarious.
• HRG brings Claire's mother back to protect the family
• Only Peter can see Linderman. I believe this is the work of Maury Parkman
• Mohinder is being Mohinder. That is, he is doing stupid things to endager us all. He gains powers from the serum he develops, but it has nasty side-effects.
  

Still nothing too profound has come along yet. Not too much insight into exactly where the season will be going, but exciting nevertheless. Your thoughts?