Recap: Heroes: Shot! In the Name of Love?

For weeks, the good folks behind Heroes have been saying that there was a big episode coming up. “Someone Flies, Someone Dies.” We’ve heard it plenty of times, but what did it really mean? We already know that Nathan can fly and Peter can probably do it as well, so nothing new there. Plenty of people have died during the season, so what is that isn’t going to be anything new. If you want to talk about slogans, how about this one “Someone flies, someone dies, someone explains the crazy conspiracy that has only been hinted at so far, but we know is just under the surface and really is becoming frustrating not hearing about it and makes me want to eat pies.” What doe pies have to do with it? Nothing, I just needed something that rhymes with flies and dies. Well, the slogan may have sucked, but I thought that this latest episode was the complete opposite of suckage, bringing so much awesomage, I had to start making up words to explain.First, let’s start with the obsession. The narrator. He was gone again this week. They used the “previously on Heroes” introduction, which I like. But really, why can’t they just make up their mind? For my sanity, they need to do something.

We started this episode out with a hero who has played a very small part of the show up until now, Ed Sprague. Ed is the radioactive guy who Audrey Hanson (speaking of which, don’t you miss her and her “Previously on the L-word” wardrobe choices?) and the rest of the brain trust at the FBI though might have been Sylar at one point. The last time we saw Ed, he was practicing controlling his radioactive ability in the middle of the Nevada desert. We know that Ed is going to play a part in the story because it may be Peter that blows up, but Ed Sprague is the only person with that sort of power at the moment.

Anyway, Ed is still in the Nevada desert when he gets an IM. His Screen Name? TeddyBear616. That’s the kind of name you expect to see on “To Catch A Predator” and I half-expected Chris Hanson to walk out. Instead, Ed gets an message saying, “I know what they did to you”. Sounds like something he should be interested in, but he is getting these messages when he doesn’t have an Internet connection. How does that happen? Hana Gitelman makes it happen.

Who is Hana Gitelman? I’m told that if read the graphic novels at the official Heroes website on NBC, I would have a better idea. For now, I can tell you that she is quite the cutie, more than making up for the loss of Eden. As for her power? She can download various types of wireless transmissions including radio waves, satellite signals, and WiFi. She also likes black leather, which should make her a favorite of a lot of Heroes geeks who were too afraid to think dirty thoughts about Nikki for fear Jessica might come after them.

When Matt Parkman questioned Sprague, Ed talked about being abducted. There were two little marks on his neck, marks that have been showing up on a lot of the necks of some of our older Heroes. Hana says that she can find the people that did it to them, but she’s not looking for answers; she wants revenge. “I can find them,” she says, “and you can nuke them.”

Oooooh. Very very interesting.

Well, we know who they are going to be looking for. None other than HRG himself. I really do feel bad for HRG sometimes. He is trying to keep a semi-normal life, but he has to battle people like Sylar, the most dangerous man in the world right now who just happens to have a really creepy obsession with his daughter. If that wasn’t enough, he gets a call from Isaac.

When HRG makes it to New York, Isaac tells him that he thinks that Peter is going to be responsible for the destruction of New York, but he can’t really find him. The only thing he can come up with is some footprints in the water. When HRG tell him that Peter is invisible, Isaac says that is crazy talk. Really, isn’t it a little late for some of these heroes to be questioning some of the things people can do? First Ed Sprague, who is radioactive, wonders how Hana can download e-mails and IMs to her head, and now Isaac, who can paint the future, thinks it’s suddenly out of the realm of possibility for somebody to be invisible? Isaac illustrates comic books for a living, what happened to his imagination?

HRG decides that it is time for him to bring Peter in for a little talk, but before he leaves, he gives Isaac a gun, telling him that if gets the chance, he should “Save the world”.

So HRG does have a few people that are looking to help him out, unfortunately, he has the dumbass Mohinder Suresh working against him. Mohinder didn’t want to work with Mr. Bennet, and that is understandable, but I sure as hell wish he wasn’t so retarded. He’s running around with Sylar, looking for Heroes, and I really don’t want Mohinder to die because he does want to help, but on the other hand, he is SO STUPID. I can understand why he wouldn’t think “Sylar” the first time he saw Sylar as Zane Taylor, but after Eden was a plant, wouldn’t he be sort of worried about Zane Taylor? I guess he hasn’t lived in New York long enough to become jaded.

Anyway, Mohinder and Sylar are looking for their next Hero in Bozeman, MT, which is another sign that Mohinder is retarded. He’s been calling people all over the country and the first person he visits after finding Zane Taylor in Virginia Beach is in Montana? He has to drive through like 12 states to get there. Was there no other hero along the way? Also, it’s the middle of winter! If you are going to be driving around for now reason to Montana, wouldn’t it be just as easy to drive to sunny Florida, or sunny California, or Sunny Arizona, or Sunny ANYWHERE EXCEPT MONTANA?

Mohinder was drawn to Montana by a woman named Dale, who at first observation has nothing going for her other than being the least attractive hero to date. She works on cars, and when Mohinder and Sylar enter her garage, she is listening to rap music, not because she likes it, but because it drowns out the…and then she doesn’t finish. Dale knows that she doesn’t want anything to do with Mohinder, and tells him to go home. And that’s where Sylar comes in.

Mohinder brought along Sylar, errr, Zane in the hopes that he could demonstrate his ability. As we have learned from a lot of our Heroes, they often fear that they are alone in the world, and if anybody knows what they can do, they’ll be left out of society. When Sylar shows her that he can make metal disintegrate, Dale has a complete change of heart, and is almost relieved that she can finally tell somebody about her secret.

What’s Dale’s secret? She has super-hearing. She can hear rain from 40 miles away, and it used to drive her crazy until she learned how to control it. Now, her hearing is so finely tuned, she can use it to sense moods just by training herself to listen to a nearby heartbeat. She can already tell that Sylar is in a good mood because his heart is pounding. We know he is excited because he is about to gain another ability, but he says that he is just happy to see another person like him.

Mohinder wants to do some DNA tests, but since Dale is backed up with work, she says to come find her tomorrow morning. I had always wondered how Sylar was going to be able to kill heroes when Mohinder was around, and I guess I finally have it figured out. The writers will give him just enough time to be away from Mohinder that Mohinder’s dumb ass won’t figure out what is going on until it is too late. But really, Mohinder’s DNA test on Zane Taylor consisted of a cotton swab to the cheek. What is so different about his current DNA tests that require so much more time? And wouldn’t such tests require some scientific equipment? Is he planning on buying a “My First Southern Blot” at the Bozeman Toys ‘r’ Us?

Anyway, we should probably be getting updates on some of the other characters before I have an aneurism. First, there is Matt Parkman. He has been trying to figure out what to do with all the diamonds he took from the scene of the crime, and his wife is starting to ask a lot of questions. And the easiest way to get somebody to stop asking questions? Well, if she is a woman, you buy her something expensive. And although Matt didn’t technically buy the diamond ring he gave Janice, it is the thought that counts.

Unfortunately, Janice is getting a little plump in her pregnancy, and the ring doesn’t quite fit. It really is no big deal, but she is a bundle of hormones and it’s understandable why she is crying. But perhaps her tears weren’t just because her piggies are a little larger. After all, it does come with accompanying augmentation in breast size that most woman are happy to accept. Janice is worried because a man called. His name? Dr. Suresh. And he wants to talk about DNA. If Mohinder found Parkman, that means Sylar isn’t too far behind. Nooooo! Not Parkman! He’s such a lovable doofus. Can’t they just bring Eden back and kill her again?

Speaking of lovable doofuses, let’s not forget Hiro and Ando, who have become separated in the Nevada desert. Ando drove hope to Primm, which is your last chance to lose money in Nevada when you are on your way back to Los Angeles. Once there, it soon became obvious that their budding love wasn’t really budding, and for that matter it wasn’t love. Ando left his friend for a hot blonde that apparently liked how his smooth style matched his smooth-riding Nissan Versa.

Ando was led to believe that he rescued Hope from a bad man, but he finally saw that Hope is pretty bad herself. Inside that pink bag were thousands of casino chips. Her buddy at the gaming commission helped her steal them, and she wanted them for herself. Not that her friend was going to just let her steal from him and then skip town. He was currently on his way with Hiro in tow.

The gaming commission guy didn’t want to take Hiro, but when Hiro said he wouldn’t leave his friend. As funny and goofy as Hiro is, I think we all love how brave he is, even now when he doesn’t have any powers, he won’t let anything happen to his friend. On the ride there, the two guys start talking about partners. Gaming commission dude says they are worthless, but Hiro says a partner is there to keep you honest and true. When the other guy reminds Hiro that Ando has been nothing but trouble, Hiro sort of has a moment of crisis. Is Ando really bad for the mission? Isn’t it their destiny to save the world?

Hiro’s moral dilemma was cut short when the two of them finally arrived in Primm. It was going to be a happy reunion for Hiro and Ando, but the celebration was cut short by the gunfight between Hope and the Gaming Commission guy. I was really worried that somebody would die, and Ando did get shot, but it was in the arm. Almost right away, I figured that this would be the thing Hiro needed to break the mental block he has with his powers and save himself and Ando, but that didn’t happen.

Using a baggage cart for some cover, Hiro and Ando were able to get away from the shooting and managed to hide away underneath a tour bus. It wasn’t long before Hope found them, and she decided that she didn’t want to leave any witnesses. SHIT! I didn’t want Ando to die, would she just shoot both of them?

Well, Hope did shoot, but nothing happened. Actually, something happened, but then nothing happened. Confused? Don’t be. When the gun went off, the bullet came out. Hiro closed his eyes and was able to bend space and time. He reversed time, but not just for himself, but everybody involved. The bullet reversed, and went back into the gun. When time resumed, Hope was knocked back, and the two of them were safe. Gaming Commission guy came over to resume the fight, but the Nevada Police had finally made it to the scene and put an end to everything.

Maybe I was a little off on the whole time thing, but Hiro hadn’t displayed this power before. For example, when he first used the power, to save the little girl back in Japan, he was able to move her, but he couldn’t affect any of the other objects in space-time. Am I being a little anal about the whole thing? Yes, but be on the lookout if they decide to explain it or just let us wonder about it forever.

In Texas, things weren’t looking good for Sandra Bennet. At the end of the last episode, she lost her memory and couldn’t remember her daughter or even Mr. Muggles. Her memory suddenly returned, but then she collapsed in the kitchen. Claire called 9-1-1 and got her mom to the hospital and then called her father to let him know what happened.

HRG received the call, and at first he was a little busy, but decided to drop everything he was doing at the moment and fly back to Texas. He really does love his family, but it’s getting harder keep it all together. It seems like he’ll snap at any moment. He lost Sylar, his daughter is beginning to hate him, and now New York is going to blow up and he can’t do anything about, not that he isn’t trying.

HRG and The Eraser started tracking Peter soon after they bumped into Isaac. They immediately recognized Peter’s location in the painting as the Deveaux building. It sort of makes me think that HRG knew Mr. Richard Roundtree Deveaux or even Simone for some other reason. Then again, that is just speculation.

Mr. Bennet also realized that if Peter is invisible, it means an old friend is with him. That old friend is Claude, and he has been trying to teach Peter how to use all of his abilities. Peter has invisibility down, but it struggling with the rest. In an effort to get him to remember, Claude starts beating Peter over the head with a stick, hoping he’ll eventually get pissed enough to conjure up some sort of power.

Peter eventually digs up something to fight off Claude. Just as Claude is about to hit him over the head, he stares at the stick and it goes backward. That would be telekinesis. And the only person that Peter touched with telekinesis was Sylar, right? But Sylar only stole his telekinesis from somebody else, so that tells us a little bit of something about Peter’s power AND exactly how Sylar gets these powers.

Claude and Peter are really starting to make progress until HRG comes to the party. Although he gave Isaac a gun to save the world, HRG only wants to take Peter in. Whatever they do in those labs at Primatech, good or bad, there are people there trying to understand these Heroes. Some of their work might go to shady purposes, but some people have really been helped by learning to control their power. I also think HRG knows that if Peter can absorb powers, he might be able to take on Sylar. Think about it. In his dream (and I think that one of the people he has touched has pre-cognitive dreams as a power, either Simone or her dad) all of the Heroes were there in New York with him. What if he had absorbed all of their powers to fight Sylar, who has been absorbing plenty of his own, and then it just went out of control?

That’s a lot of what ifs, but I am very interested to see what happens. For now, HRG and The Eraser are on the roof. HRG tags Claude, but Peter is able to use his telekinesis to stop the tazer gun from hitting him. He throws Claude off the roof, jumps off himself, and lucky for the both of them, he is able to fly away. It’s right after that time that HRG gets his call from Claire.

At the hospital, Claire is talking to one of the doctors, who is trying to get an idea of what happened. The doctor floats the idea of domestic violence, but Claire denies it. However, she is so desperate to tell somebody about what her father is doing that she decided to tell the doctor the whole thing. She says that her father has a man that works for her that can make you forget things. There are so many things about Claire that make her seem so mature (no tits and ass jokes you perverts), but you can tell she is a kid. Why did she EVER think this doctor would believe her?

Of course the first thing the doctor says when she hears this is “I’ll discuss this with your father”, which is the LAST thing Claire wanted to hear. When HRG finally gets back, he says he wants to talk to Claire outside of the hospital room. When they are out in the hall, Claire finally breaks down. She doesn’t hold back her secrets and admits that she knows he tried to erase her mind.

At this point, HRG is about to break down, and it’s more than just the fact he is losing his relationship with his daughter. He knows that the more Claire knows, the more danger there is out there for her. He tells Claire about Sylar visiting the house and that her mom is the type of person who shouldn’t have to know about people like Sylar. Claire hears the explanation, and is not really satisfied, saying, “You don’t just get to say you are sorry and make it go away.”

So obviously things were going to hell in a hand basked (and I never really understood what that means), but in comparison to what was about to happen to poor Dale in Montana, everything else was going to be a walk in the park.

After Mohinder realized he would be in Montana for the evening, he checked himself and Sylar into a motel. Sylar got his own room, making it very convenient should he have to come up with an excuse to, I don’t know, kill Dale and eat her brain. Apparently, Mohinder is not comfortable enough with Zane Taylor to share a room with two beds with him, but yet it is fine to share with Zane the most important secret he has on earth.

Knowing that Zane is actually Sylar makes it even worse. Mohinder even admits that he was suspicious that the whole partnership might not work. But he wasn’t worried that there was another psycho out there that might be trying to kill him like they killed his father. No, he was worried that they would be arguing over the radio and whether to stop at McDonald’s, Burger King, or Wendy’s.

As Mohinder went to his room, he and Sylar did talk about what Mohinder’s goal was. Mohinder mentioned that he was working on an inhibitor, which could be considered a cure. Sylar was sort of upset about this because he doesn’t think Heroes are a virus or a plague. Mohinder countered by saying that some of these people may be too dangerous. Once again, Mohinder does not take the time to think that one of these people who could be dangerous with their powers is the guy who he just drove across country with and IS STANDING RIGHT NEXT TO HIM. Mohinder even talks about his dad being murdered, which I can’t really blame him for, but you know that Sylar so desperately wants to kill Mohinder, and this just makes him a few steps closer.

All of that chitchat was nice and everything, but Sylar had more important things to do that evening, starting with Dale’s death. He gets to the auto shop, and because Dale can hear so well, she knows that Sylar is coming. Unfortunately, that is about the only thing she was able to do. She asked about a sound in his heart that she never heard before, and he only had one thing to say, “Murder.”

The next day, Sylar and Mohinder pulled up to the garage, and Sylar was having some problems controlling his super hearing. As for Mohinder, he was having trouble controlling his breakfast. He walked in, saw the Dale without the top half of her head, and threw up. And in case there weren’t enough things to make him wonder about Sylar/Zane, Sylar/Zane convinced him not to call 9-1-1. Mohinder agrees, but realizes that Sylar must know who the Heroes are as well, and says that he has to start warning them. Hey Mohinder, take your own advice!

One of the people that Mohinder had to warn was Matt Parkman, but Matt was on a little bit of a mission of his own. First, he had to deal with his wife, who had just discovered that her ring was worth $40,000, which was much more than Matt could afford even if he was working and even if his friend did give him a wholesale deal. He eventually admitted where they came from, and decided to take them back right away.

And then the phone call came.

When Matt ran away, I thought it would be a warning from Mohinder, but instead it was from Matt Sprague, who introduced him to Hana, and convinced Matt to help them with their next mission. They know where the marks on their necks came from. Somebody had inserted a radioisotope transmitter into them. They only have the name of a guy named Bennet, and an idea. Matt resists, saying that he has to think about his family, but after he almost lost his job and his family because of these people, you know he was going go along.

So, we know that they are going to be going after HRG, but how are they going to go after him? Right in his home, actually. As Mr. Bennet and the rest of his family are brining his wife home from the hospital, Matt, Ed, and Hana ambush them. Claire had just talked about how she wants to stick around and protect her family from what her father might do. As Matt pointed a gun at the Bennet and said, “I am sure you have a lot of questions, we all do.” I think Claire might have finally realized what her father was trying to protect her from.

Hiro also had some difficult choices about protecting his best friend. After Ando got patched up, he told Hiro that he would have to drive for a little while, but Hiro had another idea. After seeing his friend get hurt, he decided not to put Ando through any more danger. Too many people have died already, and if he lost Ando, he wouldn’t be able to live with himself. It’s always difficult when a master and sidekick break up, and this was especially hard. Ando was always the skeptic, but soon started believing in Hiro’s mission, and you could tell it made him feel special to be included, even though he had no powers.

Watching Hiro leave Ando to take the bus back to Vegas (piloted by none other than Stan Lee, making this my favorite cameo of his since Mallrats) was hard, but I don’t think Ando is going to give up on Hiro that easily. These two are just such a great pair, and I think Hiro will realize the importance of a partner/sidekick. I mean really, why would he take the advice of a corrupt gaming commission officer over years of comic book knowledge? It just doesn’t make sense. I give this breakup two weeks tops.

And speaking of break up (I have always loved the “and speaking of” sequitur) it looked like Simone and Isaac were finally on the outs. She wanted to find Peter, but he was lying to her about what he knew. Part of the reason was because Isaac was jealous, but I think a bigger reason was that he knows that Peter might blow up and he’ll do anything to keep Simone away. I think he could have started off with something like painting a picture of Peter half way around the globe to throw her off, but that didn’t work.

Simone left, but Isaac had another visitor later that day. It was Peter, and he was PISSED. There were only a few people that knew where to find Peter, and Isaac was one of them. HRG and The Eraser completely freaked Claude. He said that they were the reason that he was always hiding, and so he disappeared again.

Peter, who has been upset that Isaac is trying to win back Simone, was not happy. Claude was the person who was helping him, and although he had helped Peter a lot, there was still a lot to learn. He blamed the loss of Claude on Isaac, and went to Isaac’s loft to get some answers.

Now I can easily see why both people have valid arguments. They both know HRG and The Eraser in different ways. Why would Claude refuse to help HRG? HRG got him clean and made him believe in his own abilities. Then again, why would Peter agree to help HRG? He had just been ambushed on the roof, and Claude has many bad things to say.

I thought there was some good acting in this episode, but this sequence was not part of it. Isaac and Peter started fighting in the apartment and maybe I just can’t take Milo seriously, but the “fight” reminded me of two kindergartners fighting over who was the paste-eating champion of the class. And if it wasn’t for the fact that time was running out and we still had yet to learn the “Someone dies” part of the new slogan, I would almost turned the television off. It was just that predictable, although it was interesting to hear Peter use the Sylar voice.

Isaac reaches for the gun, the struggle ensues. Isaac can’t see anything, but knows somebody is in the room. He hears a noise, starts firing, but of course it’s not Peter who he shot; it was Simone. She had just finished seeing Nathan, told him she was looking for Peter, and said that it might be time to blow the lid of this whole thing. That led me to believe that Nathan might actually plot to have Simone killed, because if she were to say anything his political challenges would only get that much more difficult. Instead, she is shot by unintentional gunfire from an ex-boyfriend.

So, Simone is dead. It sucks because she was hot, but she was not that important of a character, and to tell you the truth, it will be nice to see an end to the Isaac/Peter/Simone love triangle that was only convincing for the percentage of the population that thought Dustin Hoffman was in Star Wars.

Overall, I thought this was a great episode. I missed Nikki and DL, but I like how we had a lot more answers this week. Our perceptions of good vs. evil have always been changing throughout this show, and I really like how most of these people don’t have designed roles one way or the other. It definitely makes it a more interesting series.

What did you think of the episode?