Overview:
Via flashbacks, we learn that the American government once organized a research facility for people with abilities, and that Angela’s family was brought there and studied by Chandra Suresh. After a prophetic dream about an imminent massacre at the facility, Angela escapes with Bob, Linderman and Charles Deveaux. In the present, we learn that Angela’s weather-controlling sister, Alice, has survived all these years and been living in the facility’s bomb shelter. Having learned the truth about what happened at Coyote Sands, Alice disappears, and Angela turns to creating a new Petrelli-led Company. Which will probably be complicated by the fact that Sylar has morphed into Nathan and taken his place as senator.
Review:
I need to say, before we even start this review, that I went into this episode with high hopes and a lot of expectations. We waited a long time for a flashback episode that addressed the origins of The Company, and we waited almost as long for an episode that explored Angela’s past.
On paper, this episode had everything it needed to be outstanding. We see factions of the ElderSupers coming together, we see the beginning of a covert government branch researching people with abilities, and we see Angela coming to terms with the grief of her family’s death. With all of that in mind, there’s no reason why this shouldn’t have been an exceptional flashback episode; one that — like others — surprised us, enlightened us and challenged our assumptions.
What we get instead isn’t so much surprising or enlightening as it is mystifying. The episode leaves potential for future flashback episodes to tap into, but despite some intriguing details and several exceptional performances, we’re left with an episode that’s dragged down by an inconsistent backstory and an incoherent plot.
We pick up where last week’s episode left off, with Nathan, Peter, Noah and Claire continuing to unearth skeletons at Coyote Sands and working through the night and into day. Which would say a lot about their determination to uncover the truth if there were any truth to be gleaned from it. Sadly, as Peter wonders — and as will become apparent — there’s really very little reason for them to be digging at all.
Peter approaches Angela and voices what the audience is also wondering — where her never-before-mentioned sister came from and why everyone except Angela is shoveling dirt for answers. Angela responds by recalling a vivid flashback of her arrival at Coyote Sands in 1961, and while this is somewhat insightful for us, it raises the issue of narrative perspective. It’s never clear whether any of the flashbacks offer any insight to the other characters.
Superb set work, and superb location work, to the point where I couldn’t tell whether any of this was digitally enhanced or whether the whole thing was real scenery. And despite some anachronistic portions of dialogue, there’s no denying that the episode’s visual authenticity was perfect. The 60s-era buses, the clothes, the suitcases, the hairstyles and the props were all spot on.
We meet Angela’s parents. Or at least the back of them. There’s more than enough to criticize when it comes to the show underutilizing the ElderSupers, but it would have been great to learn anything about Mama and Papa Shaw. Did they both have abilities? Were they afraid of Angela’s ability? Did they know that Alice had an ability? None of those are crucial questions, but this will likely be the only occasion we have to find out, and it’s disappointing that we learn next to nothing about Angela’s upbringing.
Less disappointing is the considerable amount of screen time devoted to Alexa Nikolas’s Young Angela, who, by all accounts, carries this episode like a pro.
Phenomenal casting, on every level. The physical resemblance is uncanny, to the point where you’re completely fooled by the likeness. It’s helped by the physical attributes; the eyes and lips are similar, the facial build is the same, and even the inquisitive stare and good-natured smile are consistent between the past and present-day scenes.
Beyond the physical attributes, the casting department deserves enormous praise for finding an actress who’s as likable and compelling to watch as Cristine Rose, and who brings the same incredible intensity and emotional depth to her scenes that Rose brings every week. As difficult to buy into as parts of the plot might be, I never for a moment doubted that this was Angela. From start to finish, Alexa Nikolas owns every scene she appears in, and she owns the character she plays.
Chandra was equally well cast, with Ravi Kapoor bringing the warm spirit and twinkle of the eye that Erick Avari brought in the first season, as well as the same expressive curiosity and endearing open-mindedness.
In this instance, it would be easier to appreciate the casting if Chandra’s role at Coyote Sands didn’t so blatantly undermine his character arc over the course of the series. It’s easy enough to buy that he was Haitian-whammied and shipped back to India after this project, but on a number of levels, this is where plotholes begin to emerge. Given that Mohinder will later uncover a Coyote Sands ID card among Chandra’s paperwork, one has to wonder how extensive the memory-wipe was, and what Chandra must have thought when he discovered this ID card. It’s also dismaying to think that what Chandra later considered to be fringe-theory research into people with abilities was in fact part of research he’d conducted decades earlier and which he had no recollection of.
As with so much of this episode, it’s not impossible, but it’s hokey. It also undermines Chandra’s nobility at the start of the series, to the point where you’re now less inclined to sympathize with him — the guy who courageously pushed forward with groundbreaking ideas — and more inclined to pity him — the fool who was retreading ground he’d unwittingly covered decades earlier.
And this is where we get bogged down with the details, because it’s not even clear what kind of ground Young Chandra is covering. Coyote Sands is ostensibly a relocation center, but its exact purpose is never established. Were people brought there to be studied? To be killed? Or to be studied and then killed? Was the research intended to harness special abilities or eliminate them?
Given the smiles on everyone’s faces when they arrive at Coyote Sands — and given Angela’s delusions about being cured of her ability — it’s not even clear whether people were brought here against their will or whether they volunteered. What’s also never made clear is who organized this project and how they contacted the research subjects. Chandra seems to be the figurehead for the operation, but the gist is that an entire branch of the government was dedicated to funding and running Coyote Sands, and that they had some way to identify at least several hundred people with abilities.
Now, here’s why all of this amounts to more than nitpicking: these are details that were rightly answered in the present-day story. We know that Chandra used the Human Genome Project to locate people with abilities. We know that Goon Squad Central uses DNA samples from a national database after exhausting the names provided by Nathan and by The Company’s files. We know what The Company’s mission statement was while it was running. We know what Željko is trying to achieve at Building 26.
The reason it’s so hard to become engrossed in this backstory is because, on a number of levels, it doesn’t make sense. Even if we can buy that Chandra was researching special abilities years before he realized it, it’s very hard to buy his involvement in a project when the project’s means and motives are unclear, and when the existence of the project itself is unclear.
Anyway, putting Zimmerman on the project was a nice nod to continuity. I didn’t see a huge resemblance between this guy and the guy we later meet, but the idea that The Company recruited the same doctors and scientists who pioneered research into their abilities is believable.
Angela and Alice are assigned a separate barrack to their parents, and at this point you’d be forgiven for wondering if their parents were even at Coyote Sands, because from hereon out Angela’s more or less taking care of Alice. Again, not a huge complaint in the grand scheme of things, but a detail that nags.
We’re introduced to several younger versions of the ElderSupers, with varying levels of success.
Papa Deveaux was another example of great casting, with Edwin Hodge exuding the same outgoing charm and sturdy confidence that emanated from Roundtree in the first season. It was surprising to see how naturally he slipped into the role of the group’s leader and decision-maker, but if you figure that Linderman only developed a clear vision after meeting Adam, and that Papa Deveaux took a back seat as his health began to deteriorate, it just about flies.
Linderman was one of the weaker casting choices. The physical resemblance between Casey Kringlen and McDowell is there, but between the woeful accent, the lack of charisma and the minimal role the character plays in the episode, I never completely bought that this was the same guy who ended up bankrolling The Company’s employees and running an empire. You could argue that, based on the graphic novels, Linderman’s experiences in Vietnam and his partnership with Arthur informed who he became. But beyond the name and the ability, I struggled to see the connection between this guy and the guy we later meet in the Corinthian.
Bob was again a great physical likeness, and the geeky awkwardness that H. Michael Kroner brings to the role is remarkably consistent with Tobolowsky’s when we meet him in Season Two. This is a similar case to Linderman, in that it’s hard to judge the likeness when the character is limited to a smattering of lines. But based on the little we saw of him, it’s easy enough to believe that this guy would become the character we know.
What’s puzzling about all of this again comes down to the plot. We know that Angela’s happy to be at Coyote Sands because she thinks her nightmares will be removed. But we never find out why anyone else is at Coyote Sands. When Deveaux reveals that he, Bob and Linderman have abilities, it seems as if Angela’s genuinely surprised. So whether everyone’s under the impression that they’re the only ones at Coyote Sands with abilities — or whether it’s simply a taboo topic which no one’s willing to discuss — is something that’s never addressed. Like many parts of the plot, it’s left to conjecture. And here you hopefully see one of my major issues with this episode, because it’s a crucial part of the premise: the characters are visiting a research facility without knowing why any of them are there.
Moving on…
One part of this episode that’s very well established is the bond between Angela and Alice.
Alice never made an impression on me one way or another. Laura Marano and Diana Scarwid both play her well, but the character essentially exists to serve Angela’s character arc, and I was never interested in Alice herself as much as the way she evokes a maternal instinct in Angela. When Angela scolds Alice for packing toys and books instead of clothes, we get an idea of the way their aloof parents have more or less left Angela to take care of Alice. Which probably says more about the parents than it does about Angela, but suggests where Angela’s self-sufficiency and resourcefulness started.
Angela: “The doctor told Mom and Dad that this place is gonna make my nightmares go away.”
Alice: “No more screaming?”
Probably something that can be conveyed through dialogue as effectively as it can on-screen, but there’s a part of this exchange that reinforces how extensively this episode cheated us. It was billed as the beginning of the story. What becomes apparent as the episode goes on is that there are vast amounts of backstory long before this: the ElderSupers we meet here have already discovered their abilities, most of them have already adjusted to their abilities, and three of them have already banded together. As intriguing as it is to watch Angela use her dreams to guide her actions, it’s disappointing that her initial shock and disbelief over her ability remains unexplored.
We return to the present day.
Angela: “I’ve been dreaming about my sister, Alice. That doesn’t make sense, but my dreams often don’t. They’re open to interpretation, they’re confusing. But I think I have to see her for myself. I have to find her body, find a piece of clothing, something — anything — to give her a proper burial.”
Functional dialogue, in the sense that it outlines why Angela wants to unearth the skeletons in the ground. Weak dialogue, in the sense that it leaves us wondering how Angela planned to identify a particular set of bones as her sister’s; it’s later established that hundreds of supers were buried here, and any number of them could have been wearing the same garments that Alice wore when she was buried.
Angela: “How do you think The Company was formed? It started here with a vow to never let this happen again. We destroyed files, erased memories. We blackmailed, we killed — anything to keep our existence secret. And it worked.”
One of the few moments that proves genuinely insightful, because it establishes that The Company’s goal — above and beyond research, protection or containment — was anonymity. Unfortunately, like much of the plot, it comes riddled with problems. Based on the files that survive and the fact that someone knows enough to name the present-day operation “Building 26,” the implication is that officials within the government are still very much aware of the superpowered population. So, in effect, the existence of people with abilities hasn’t been kept secret, and The Company’s approach hasn’t worked.
Angela: “It’s time to go back to the old methods.”
Claire: “You mean erasing people’s memories and killing?”
Angela: “It’s a necessary evil.”
Great dialogue in a great portion of the scene, because it sets up every character’s standpoint: Angela and Noah’s affinity for reprehensible actions in order to serve a greater good; Claire’s objection to methods in an organization she so recently wanted to join; and Peter’s refusal to accept any loss of life no matter what the motive.
We cut to March 1961. Linderman observes Angela’s scar from a bicycle accident and works the Be-Healed Whammy. Nice way to demonstrate his ability, and a precursor to Linderman eventually healing Angela’s memories. With hindsight, you have to wonder why Linderman didn’t use his ability to heal everyone at Coyote Sands, or at least Angela’s parents and her presumed-dead sister. But then, that would have involved returning to Coyote Sands, and it’s never even made clear whether Angela returned to be certain her family was dead.
Deveaux: “This place is one big science experiment, and we’re the rats.”
Angela: “You’re wrong. They’re going to help us.”
Bob: “She’s right. We’re freaks. They’re gonna make us normal.”
Good dialogue, because it helps to establish who these characters are. Angela’s stance is naïve and idealistic to the point of obstinacy … which is to say she’s essentially Peter before this volume. Deveaux cuts through the charade and sees the situation for what it is, putting it into its historical context and comparing it to World War II internment camps … which sets up Deveaux’s shrewd perception, and demonstrates why he could easily have become one of The Company’s leading figures. It’s also consistent with the guy who was blunt to a fault on his death bed while Peter was taking care of him.
Bob is the odd one out; the insecure nerd who wants to blend with everyone else. It’s consistent with the guy who lacked any real vision when he later took over The Company, but surprising for a guy whose ability is one of the most enviable on the show. And we don’t even get a mention of his ability in this episode.
Angela warns the ElderSupers not to trust Chandra, which is a fair warning in light of what later goes down, and one of the more plausible (and, shockingly, rewarding) details that are slipped into the backstory. Given the ElderSupers’ experience with Papa Suresh, it’s interesting to consider how Angela must have felt when Mohinder brought her Peter’s corpse in “.07%,” and how Bob must have felt about working with Mohinder throughout the second season.
Alice: “My feet are cold, Banana.”
Angela: “That’s what you get for not bringing any socks. I’ll find you some.”
Cute, funny, and an amusing nod to the sock fetish. If the reference had stopped here, it would have been delightful. If only it had stopped here.
Angela strokes Alice’s hair. It’s a nice detail in itself, but also one that ties in very elegantly with the way she stroked Peter’s hair in “Exposed.” And in an episode that butchers so many parts of the show’s continuity, it’s nice to see one moment that’s both consistent and subtly underplayed.
Beautifully shot. Sweet, heartwarming, and very much in keeping with the fairytale motif. There are moments like this that make me want to be kinder to this episode; moments that convey how much care and hard work went into crafting and realizing it. Which makes it even more saddening when you realize how disproportionate these beautiful moments are to the litany of bizarre scenarios and inconsistent plot developments.
The camera swoops behind Angela and reveals Claire in the present. Claire says she wants “some alone time” with her grandmother, and this is so hilarious …
… that it even elicits raised eyebrows from Angela. And although I’m never quite sure if Angela has a sense of humor, this is evidence that Cristine most definitely does.
Angela to Claire: “I wish I had had half of your strength. You’ve courage and self-confidence. You’ve overcome all those nagging self-doubts.”
^ ^ Actual dialogue!
Oh, Angela. If only you knew what we’ve had to endure.
Claire: “Maybe sometimes. Not always. Not ever, really. Actually, I’m a whiny brat who wanted to be an agent so badly that I nearly got my moms killed. And even though Dad came to our rescue, I told Mom what a lying scumbag he was, and she kicked him out of the house. But now I’m sick of this agent business, and I want everything to get back to normal. So everybody had better snap to it, ’cause I’m not getting any younger… or much older, come to think of it.”
OK, I might have embellished a little there. But not much.
Kidding aside, there’s something to be said for the way the relationship between Angela and Claire has grown since they met, and even since they discussed colleges at the start of the volume. In all likelihood, a lot of that’s down to Angela’s anxiety and self-flagellation for the way she abandoned Alice. But her admiration for Claire — grossly misplaced as it may be — is touching.
Alice clearly isn’t as moved, because she chooses this moment to bring a tornado to Coyote Sands.
It turns out that while this grandmother/granddaughter bonding session was taking place, Peter got enough of a lead on Nathan to fly to the Coyote Sands Café and settle down with a cup of coffee. I can’t decide if that’s because Peter’s a faster flyer or because Nathan got distracted along the way. Either way, Peter’s level stare at his brother …
… is one of a handful of moments in this volume when Milo brings his A-game. He’s working with great material, but the way this scene plays out — with Peter staring at his brother so hard that Nathan’s forced to spend the majority of the scene looking downwards — underlines how angry Peter still is. In turn, it’s what makes his willingness to forgive Nathan before the episode is over so difficult to accept.
The backstory to Nathan swindling Peter and usurping tickets to that game was nicely worked in. You have to wonder where Angela’s prophetic dreams were when Peter needed them, because if she could see Chandra quoting Einstein, I’m sure she could see whether Peter needed to pick the tickets to the playoffs or the World Series. But then, that would have robbed Peter of his inferiority complex, and we wouldn’t now be hearing him call Nathan on his cowardice for running away and telling him he’s inherently selfish. Which, in light of certain inescapable moments of selfless heroism, has got to hurt Nathan at least a little. But like most scenes between the brothers, it rings true because it’s well conceived, well written and well played.
Noah stumbles through the storm and gets thwacked over the head by a random prop. Then, as near as I can tell, the show pays tribute to every horror movie in which a victim was dragged away from the camera kicking and screaming. Given that the person getting dragged is a badass like Noah, and given that the person doing the dragging was recently a mutated bug, I’m inclined to take it as self-parody.
This, however, is not as extraneous as an entire scene in which Noah recaps everything we already knew about Coyote Sands and Angela’s connection to it, nor is it as hilarious as Noah trying to read Mohinder’s file on the Shaw sisters in the middle of a full-blown tornado. The show needed to incorporate Mohinder into the story somehow, but this seemed like a ponderous way to do it.
We flashback to Chandra asking Angela to tell him about her dreams. Realizing that her answers are being recorded, Angela wisely refrains from describing her initial nightmares of the Apocalypse. Instead, she tells Chandra he’s going to kill everyone at Coyote Sands.
Chandra brandishes a syringe the size of a small dagger and tells Angela that it “won’t hurt a bit.” Funny, if exasperating for the ambiguity, because it’s unclear whether this injection was intended for testing, for removal of an ability or for terminating the subject. Again, the problem is partly the plot itself and partly the crucial questions it raises without answering. We have no idea who Chandra was working for and what their agenda was. Consequently, our inclination to trust Chandra is based more on familiarity with the character than with a lucid storyline.
In the present, Angela disappears into the storm and leaves Coyote Sands peaceful enough for Mohinder to deliver the episode’s first Scene of Meaningful Reflection.
To be fair, Sendhil runs with it and delivers a solid performance. On the one hand, Chandra’s association with a corrupt organization makes for a dramatic reveal and a chance for Mohinder to emote. On the other hand, it undermines Chandra’s entire character arc. Instead of a pioneering scientist who endured ridicule because he was sure he was close to a breakthrough, Chandra’s been rewritten as a tool for a covert government organization whose memory was wiped so that he’d slowly retread the same ground he’d already covered in 1961. In turn, instead of an intrepid son who overcame his doubt and resolved to finish what his father began, Mohinder’s been rewritten as a tool by proxy, perpetuating his father’s attempt to discover abilities which, as we now learn, Chandra knew about nearly 50 years earlier. It’s tragic, but for the wrong reasons. We’re less inclined to sympathize with Chandra and Mohinder than we are to pity them for their cluelessness.
Noah recalls the time he and Chandra met and notes that Mohinder has no idea what Chandra’s intentions were, essentially making my point for me. Chandra comes across as very much the well-intentioned humanitarian among a covert organization, but whether that’s actually the case is debatable. Which would usually point to credible ambiguity, but in an episode in which so many questions are unanswered and where it’s hard to know who to root for, all we’re left with when it comes to Chandra is idle speculation.
We move onto Scene of Meaningful Reflection #2, in which Mohinder concludes that “we’re destined to repeat our parents’ mistakes.” Which is true insofar as Mohinder has used people as guinea pigs (most notably Nathan, although that’s never alluded to here beyond a resentful glare). But it also renders everything Noah said in the previous scene useless, making me wonder why the show bothered to include it if Mohinder was going to ignore everything Noah said.
The reference to Peter and Mohinder meeting “a long time ago” was a nice way to bring their arc full circle, but given that this camaraderie has since been plagued by Mohinder nearly injecting Peter with a lethal strain of The Formula and Peter threatening to shoot Mohinder, it doesn’t feel like a reconciliation so much as an oversimplification. Similarly, Mohinder telling Peter that he can avoid their elders’ pitfalls on account of never experiencing their fear, pain and anger seems to overlook everything Peter went through over the past three seasons: discovering his brother’s treachery, losing his girlfriend in an alternate future, watching a kid get killed and 200,000 people get nuked, discovering the full extent of his parents’ lunacy, and finally running for his life and ranting at God for His indifference. To say that Peter hasn’t experienced the same fear, pain and anger as the ElderSupers is to undermine Peter’s character arc over the course of the series.
Mohinder: “I have to believe that there is hope for redemption.”
Perhaps that should read, “I have to believe that there is hope for Redemption.” If the show ever came up with a meaningful pun, this is it.
We move onto Scene of Meaningful Reflection #3, in which Claire recalls movie night and wonders if life will ever return to normal. It’s a well-performed scene, with Hayden selling the characters’ weariness and emotional numbness with appropriate feeling.
Visually, the idea that Claire now has two fathers to turn to is nicely conveyed, and the way she expresses her longing for a life that’s long forgotten is well written. I’d point out that Claire helped to bring her old life to an end when she persuaded Sandra to kick Noah out of the house, but since this episode focuses on everyone’s regrets, it’s one of the few details that can easily be inferred.
The problem is this is the third in a series of monologues designed to evoke our sympathy, and at this point the episode begins to feel formulaic and repetitive. Individually, each of these scenes was effective. Collectively, the scenes cancel themselves out, they slow the pace of the episode down, and they underline how contrived and sentimental the episode was in places.
The show breaks out of its rut by flashing back to May 1961. The ElderSupers base their escape plan on Angela’s dreams, which is an early hint of Angela’s importance to The Company’s strategic thinking. That said, it’s also evidence of the idiocy behind the ElderSupers’ thinking, because Deveaux had no reason to think Alice would slow them down. Alice was more unhappy than anyone at Coyote Sands, she wasn’t so young that she’d tire from running, and based on what we see in this episode, it’s reasonable to think she’d provide invaluable climatic aid to help the ElderSupers escape. Angela’s decision to lie to and abandon her sister feels like it’s a necessary step for the plot instead of a logical development for the story.
Angela lies to her sister’s face, and as much as I know it should be moving when Angela hurts the sister she loves to do what she thinks is right, this is the moment I stopped sympathizing with the character. Not only does Angela lie without good reason; she exploits Alice’s naivete by telling her she dreamed that Alice needs to stay put. Which is a subtle way to hint at Angela’s emerging manipulative streak, but when it lacks coherent reasoning, it’s hard to root for the character, especially when we cut to the present day …
… and discover that Angela’s bald-faced lie has led to Alice’s self-imposed isolation for nearly 50 years.
Diana Scarwid plays the role superbly, with enough quirky innocence that you can believe the character has been trapped with a child’s mentality all her life. The idea that she’d remain on her own in a bomb shelter for several decades strains credibility, but based on her reference to stealing food and clothes, the gist seems to be that Alice wandered out to civilization when she needed supplies and that she voluntarily returned to the shelter in an effort to limit the damage she could cause. Based on Alice’s fear of her own ability, coupled with her obedience to the sister who’s to all intents and purposes a surrogate mother, the set-up was established well enough for it to almost be believable. I say almost, because however the show spins it, five decades of voluntary isolation is inevitably a tough sell.
Cristine plays the reunion with feeling, to the point where you want to overlook the premise and enjoy both the acting and the emotion behind it. This is, after all, what the rewritten backstory and contrived plot was leading up to, and this is where we’re expected to appreciate that in spite of Angela’s lifelong affinity for manipulation and deceit, she always cared for her sister and always hated herself for abandoning her. And it would be affecting if it weren’t for the fact that there was no good reason for Angela to abandon Alice in the first place.
We flashback to May 1961, when the ElderSupers convened at the same café in which Peter disparaged Nathan for his spinelessness. Angela’s failure to convince the authorities about a covert research facility was a nice touch. It reemphasizes why Angela gave up on telling the truth and resorted to lies, and it suggests why Angela lost all faith in the authorities’ ability to protect anyone.
It’s a moment on the show that should have been iconic. Members of the ElderSuper clan coming together, depending on each other and planning how they’re going to survive.
Instead, you’re left wondering where three-quarters of this faction came from, how they got here, and above all what their unofficial leader’s ability actually is.
Deveaux invites Angela to dance, observing that she loves the song on the radio and giving a cryptic smile to explain himself. Telepathy, or just a good guess? You decide.
They dance, and as strange as the circumstances leading up to it might be, it’s one of the show’s more romantic moments. No prophetic dreams and no saccharine speeches, just two actors with believable chemistry dancing, and the tragedy of historical implications bringing the moment to an abrupt conclusion.
Deveaux tells everyone in the café to “pretend like this never happened.” There’s a deep rumbling sound effect, and we’re left to speculate about whether the show just ditched our astral projection theory and turned Papa Deveaux into a Parkman-whammying mind-pusher. Which would be cool, if it weren’t for the fact that it’s called the Parkman Whammy for a reason, and if it weren’t for the fact that there’ve been two characters by the name of Parkman WITH THE EXACT SAME ABILITY.
It’s disappointing that we don’t find out for certain, but the prospect of the show giving two of the ElderSupers near-identical abilities isn’t just disappointing — it’s repetitive and unoriginal. It’s easy to imagine how useful the ability would have been under the circumstances, but when Maury and Matt already have variations of the same ability, you have to wonder why anyone on the show would think it’d be fun to assign the same ability to a third character.
We learn that Alice was about to be injected with the Giant Syringe of Unknown Intent, that she caused a freak storm at Coyote Sands and that all hell broke loose shortly after.
Chandra resorts to slapping a young girl, probably hoping to knock some sense into her but instead irrevocably vilifying himself. After this, you’re forced to consider how many times Chandra resorted to slapping Shanti, flogging Mohinder and beating his wife. And I’m not even sure I’m exaggerating here, because the ramifications to a moment as small as this are immense.
Papa Shaw resurfaces. Not long enough to get a word of dialogue, but long enough to demonstrate a deflective ability before getting shot. With hindsight, knowing that Linderman could have healed Angela’s parents and that Deveaux could have Parkman-whammied the guards into looking the other way, I can’t help thinking it’s another part of the plot that doesn’t add up. We skip from the ElderSupers at the café in 1961 to Angela and Alice at the shelter in the present, and it’s never made clear whether the group even returned to Coyote Sands to look for survivors.
Intriguing, not least because it’s an indication that the present-day operation was named by someone who knows about this initial project. Whether that’s Željko, the president or any number of officials who Deveaux failed to Parkman-whammy into forgetfulness is — like so many other details in this episode — unclear. There’s unarguably a coolness factor in seeing the sign 50 years earlier, but if you pause to ask how and why Nathan’s base of operations was given the same code, the coolness erodes and leaves a muddled concept. Was President Worf aware of this project? Was he ready for someone like Nathan to show up with information on the superpowered population? Has a covert branch of the government been researching special abilities all this time, and is Nathan just the face for an operation to apprehend the ones who are making headlines? Or is it just a detail that was inserted into the set for the sake of the coolness factor, and are we not meant to read into it at all? You decide.
We return to the present day.
Nicely performed, and a nice way to convey that the bond between the sisters transcends the years of separation and regret.
Angela tells her sister it’s time “to go home,” which seems optimistic when Angela’s on the run from agents who’ve probably got Petrelli Castle on 24-hour surveillance and are waiting to pounce on her the moment she goes near it, but OK. It’s not as bad as the show now clobbering us over the head with a sledgehammer-sized anvil to explain that, yes, ANGELA STEALS SOCKS AS A REMINDER OF HER SISTER.
This is what puzzles me more than anything about this episode; the way it introduces us to a relocation center and a covert government organization but tells us nothing about them; the way it reveals Papa Deveaux’s ability but never clarifies what that ability is; the way it indicates that Nathan’s current operation goes back decades but never expands on the idea; and the way it then, amid all of the half-baked and unexplained ideas, opts to spell out that Angela’s sock fetish is because of her sister.
Alice is incredulous, though of course for different reasons. She reassures Angela that her wasted existence in a bomb shelter isn’t her sister’s fault. Which, duh, but Angela earns herself a *PING!* Dumb As Award for failing to end the discussion there and instead insisting that it really is her fault for lying to Alice and abandoning Alice and failing to return to rescue Alice and Oh. My. God, does Angela not realize that this is only going to provoke a deranged superpowered hermit into going berserk? Apparently not.
Not content with having pissed off her sister enough, Angela decides she can calm Alice down by explaining that while she was holed up in a bomb shelter and scavenging for food, Angela was getting married and building a life and living in a mansion and creating a family and giving Alice a genetically-blessed nephew and an only-occasionally-obnoxious grandchild … and since they’re the ones who make life worth living, don’t be upset, Alice!
And … Alice responds by disappearing into the desert.
And … that’s pretty much the end of that storyline.
I guess that was about as effective a way as any to cap off such an incoherent plot.
The silver lining …
… is this haunting shot. Which, coupled with an in-joke involving a reel of footage filmed by cameraman “Lieberman,” emphasizes that in spite of an abysmal plot, the visual side of this episode was as stellar as ever.
Again, superbly shot, and an elegant way to reinforce how alone Angela feels in spite of the family she’s with.
We flashback one last time to the café, where Angela outlines their mission for the next forty-something years:
“We’re going to form a group … a company. And it’s going to protect people like us.”
You can see how, at the eleventh hour, the show is trying like hell to make this a solid episode. Between the superb visuals and Alexa Nikolas selling the heck out of Angela’s resolve, I desperately wanted to look past the episode’s flaws and appreciate what was, in the end, a heartfelt story about a group of teenagers who overcame adversity and took it upon themselves to make a difference.
But then you try to reconcile this with details from both the show’s on-screen backstory and the backstory provided by the graphic novels: how Angela would meet Arthur and marry him within three years of this tragedy; how Linderman would meet Arthur in Vietnam and then visit him without the slightest indication that he knew Angela; how they’d arbitrarily mindwipe and re-recruit Zimmerman while relegating Chandra to laughing-stock status; how eventually Adam would show up to bring these four together with Papa Sulu, Maury, Victoria and The Ones Who Were There To Look Pretty; how the leadership role would shift between members until it was impossible to tell if there was any hierarchy; and how the initial mission statement — to protect people with abilities — would morph into nuking New York and developing power-suppressing viruses and power-inducing formulas.
If the above makes sense to you, this episode was a success. If it doesn’t, this episode achieved very little besides showing us that Angela had a rough childhood and that we should feel bad for her.
Nathan approaches Angela at the café and tells her she’s “gotta let go” of her guilt.
And in spite of the character’s arc over the course of this volume, it’s delivered with a straight face.
Noah resolves to earn his family’s forgiveness.
And Claire, in spite of indirectly getting her father kicked out of the house and causing the rift in the family, couldn’t be happier to hear it.
And the guy who orchestrated the incarceration, torture and murder of numerous individuals resolves to “take ownership” for his mistakes and gives this episode’s conclusion the uplifting tone it’s trying so desperately to achieve.
Let’s eat!
Or … yeah, check please.
Sylar resembles a mechanical version of Nathan at a press conference. And I know I should point out that Sylar would have needed to make direct contact with Nathan in order to impersonate him, but after the catalogue of plotholes throughout this episode, I’m going to waive this final one and assume that Sylar either obtained a sample of Nathan’s DNA or fished one of Nathan’s coffee cups out of the garbage.
Angela couldn’t be more thrilled to see this artful deception unfolding before her. Whether that’s because she dreamed it and knows it’ll all turn out OK or because she’s just happy to see her boy on TV is debatable. The important thing is she’s happy, and after this episode, someone should be.
Heroes has demonstrated that it’s capable of crafting remarkable flashback episodes. Episodes that fill the blanks and episodes that delve deep into the character arcs. This isn’t one of those episodes. It doesn’t fill in a lot of blanks and it doesn’t delve especially deeply into the character arcs. And in the end, it’s neither insightful nor informative. It’s barely entertaining. Which is a harsh thing to say, and believe me when I say I agonized over this review, more so than any other this season. But in the end I have to go with my gut, and my gut tells me this was by far the weakest episode of the volume, and a strong contender for the weakest episode of the season. Which, when you consider that an ElderSuper flashback should have been a guaranteed win, is staggering.
There are merits if you look hard enough for them. Strong performances, particularly from Alexa Nikolas as Young Angela; beautiful set work by Ruth Ammon; outstanding photography by Charlie Lieberman; exquisite direction by Adam Kane. But ultimately, the episode fails to be memorable on account of a poorly crafted story which took extensive liberties with the show’s backstory. The ElderSupers we meet in this episode are criminally underutilized, Chandra’s history is rewritten, the agenda behind Coyote Sands and Building 26 is introduced without ever being developed, and there are plotholes running rampantly throughout the hour.
Above all, the episode that was billed as a deep exploration of Angela’s history yields very little information to change our perception of the character. We learn that she’s gone from being an optimist to a pragmatist, that she endured enormous hardship because of her ability, that she suffered a terrible loss and that it inspired the creation of The Company.
But then, to paraphrase Peter in this episode, that’s something we could have learned over a conversation. The show devoted an episode to exploring Angela’s past and the formation of The Company, and what we learn is so vague and so devoid of any logical rationale that, by the end of it, we’ve learned very little that we didn’t already know, and very little that we couldn’t have inferred.
Disappointing, and hopefully an anomaly in an otherwise outstanding volume.
2.5 out of 5
First!!!!! Good review. I didn’t like the episode much either. I didn’t think it was that bad, but it seemed out of place. I’m hoping “I am Sylar” is better.
Great review. You’ve hit the nail on the head. This ep. demonstrates that Fuller really is only there for damage control on existing scripts. I seriously doubt we would have gotten this if he’d been in on the writing from the start.
I also noticed we’re back on the Noah-Claire merry-go-round. After three years, you’d think that Noah’s job being to minimize damage wouldn’t have been the revelation it appeared to be for her.
First one, awesome, excellent review, Otto, it feels good to know to know that if an episode isn´t good, you the the reviews for it are.
I´m sorry you didn´t like this one, this should have been a torture for you to give it a 2.5 out of 5. I still don´t know what to feel about this one, i never liked the retconning idea and it feels like that this episode was just to establish why Angela´s the way she is, whick i guess that was the point, and that it was put into a volume, or storyline that didn´t belong. I doubt that we are going to see this storyline coming back, and thats probably the best.
God bless the casting directors, which really amazes me the most here.
Deveaux tells everyone in the café to “pretend like this never happened.” There’s a deep rumbling sound effect, and we’re left to speculate about whether the show just ditched our astral projection theory and turned Papa Deveaux into a Parkman-whammying mind-pusher. Which would be cool, if it weren’t for the fact that it’s called the Parkman Whammy for a reason, and if it weren’t for the fact that there’ve been two characters by the name of Parkman WITH THE EXACT SAME ABILITY.
It’s disappointing that we don’t find out for certain, but the prospect of the show giving two of the ElderSupers near-identical abilities isn’t just disappointing — it’s repetitive and unoriginal. It’s easy to imagine how useful the ability would have been under the circumstances, but when Maury and Matt already have variations of the same ability, you have to wonder why anyone on the show would think it’d be fun to assign the same ability to a third character.
that´s what really pissed me off the most, its not just repetitive, disappointing and unoriginal, it felt to me like a spit in the face to Matt and Moury´s Character Arcs, a complete fault of respect to both characters. And also because now the Peter-Charles scenes in 1×23 doesn´t make sense, so, unless that was some kind of Parkman-whammy effect, which i´m willing to buy, only because it would make Matt even more awesome.
The complete lack of respect the Show has on Internal Consistency is worrying me, because they feel they have to destroy several parts of the show´s backstory and rewrite characters just to make the current plot sense, there isn´t a continuity supervisor or something like that?
Anyway, awesome review, Otto, sorry if i sound like a broken record but it´s true. Peace Out.
I must agree this episode was disappointing, especially because Angela is just about my favorite character. There were redeeming moments, so it wasn’t like the writers weren’t trying, but it just didn’t come together like it should have. Although I must admit to some extent that I thought the socks thing was kind of cute. I think they should have left Alice dead, her being alive doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but I will give them some credit for at least attempting to explain how she got food and such. If this were last volume, they would have left that out too. If there is some Angela/Charles shipper cult they were certainly pleased with the dancing scene, which I myself thought was nice.
Overall I thought you were a little bit harsh. The episode wasn’t OMG-Amazing!!! but I thought it deserved a 3. I can see your opinion though. This episode should have been OMG-Amazing!!! because it was it was a Company Founder flashback for crying out loud. But to call it one of the weakest of the season? Surely something from volume three was worse. “I Am Become Death” anybody? I can’t remember being even remotely impressed with that episode.
“In turn, it’s what makes his willingness to forgive Nathan before the episode is over so difficult to accept.”
^ I didn’t see it so much a forgiveness and more of a mutual understanding. I think Peter still has some resentment there. Why shouldn’t he? He’s pretty entitled to it in this case.
“I wish I had had half of your strength. You’ve courage and self-confidence. You’ve overcome all those nagging self-doubts.”
^ Yuck. More Claire worship. Angela kind of did the same thing in “A Clear And Present Danger”. Maybe Angela has some odd, misplaced Claire admiration? I don’t why, but it seems like she does. Longings for her teenage years to redo her mistakes perhaps? I thought the scene where she leaves Alice for no reason was kind of like Claire recklessly trying to be a Company agent, both were pretty half-baked and selfish while trying to do good.
Not very relevant to the episode itself, but the title “Redemption” has Nathan written all over it with red sharpie. Who else could “Redemption” refer too? I can’t see Mohinder’s redemption as being important enough to name the title after. I guess it could possibly mean Matt trying to reconnect with his family, but that doesn’t seem right either. If Nathan is killed by Sylar this volume I think a more appropriate title would be “Revenge”, for Peter anyway.
P.S. - Is this Angela’s first Dumb As Award?
Otto
Long-time reader, commenting for the first time.
While I agree with you that this is by far one of the weaker episodes of the volume, I did enjoy it a little more than you. A couple of points, or perhaps odd interpretations:
The digging ended up being pointless and Angela’s explanation about why they were digging was really flimsy. But I thought this actually served a larger purpose as a hard example of the pitfalls of relying on those dreams. Angela, for all her calm demeanor and planning, is actually flying by the seat of her pants based on her dreams and her own interpretations of them. To me, it underscores why the company didn’t work out.
Maybe I was misreading the way Alice was written, but my thought was she was a little slow mentally (maybe they were just trying to write her younger than she looked), and that’s why young Angela felt she would slow them down and why she was became a hermit after her trauma.
I think the fact that Peter is able to overcome the fact that he is still so clearly angry and forgive Nathan so they can work together, is both real and plays to the strength of Peter’s heart and willingness to put family first. It’s also a sign that, despite his willingness to forgive Nathan as he has in the past, that relationship has changed forever and Peter will no longer be dazzled by Nathan’s BS.
I guess I also give Claire more benefit of the doubt than you do at this point. I still find the rollercoaster of what she wants out of life and how she feels about her fathers and family to be realistic given that she’s still just a teenaged girl — at least in the show’s time line.
I do completely agree about the Mohinder/Chandra arc. In fact, this episode would have been much better served without Chandra or Mohinder being tied to Coyote Sands. It just felt like the show had hit a dead end with Moheinder and decided to throw him into this storyline.
Overall, though, I agree with the bulk of your review. It didn’t fall completely flat to me, but a wasted opportunity for so much more.
Otto,
I couldn’t agree more with your assessment of this episode. That being said, I won’t retread much of what you already touched on, but instead highlight an underlying annoyance that has continued to grow throughout an otherwise outstanding volume. I’m tired of seeing new supers introduced and then quickly discarded without much resolution, or every providing much more than a contrived attempt to advance the plot. Aquaboy, Nuke, Papa Gray, Alice. Spectacular performances notwithstanding because I’d categorize Papa Gray’s introduction as an annoyance only because he was one and done, a tragic treatment of a remarkable actor as he was one of the most compelling features this volume.
I’ll tell you where I think this is all going though. Call me crazy, but I think Sylar successfully goes nuclear on Washington, killing the President, VP, and everyone in line to take office leading up to Nathan. Sylar then kills Nathan, and takes over as Commander and Chief. No way the explosives strapped to Matt’s chest would have have caused the mushroom cloud depicted in his painting.
Wow, 2.5.
It is sad that an episode with so much promise, turned out so disappointing.
It was underwhelming. I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t LOVE it either and I was expecting to LOVE it.
I think Alice’s story may have worked better if she were younger, 8 or 9, instead of 13.
Linderman didn’t need to be here at all, but I don’t think him being involved invalidates the comic. Arthur and Linderman only knew each other by their codenames up until they met again and had a conversation. It’s plausible Linderman and Angela didn’t keep track of each other. Based on the comic, he never saw her.
As for Peter and Nathan, Peter still seems upset. He didn’t really answer when Nathan asked if he meant that. I was hoping for more of a reconciliation between them, but, yet again, the empathic character gets shortchanged in that department … unless there is more in the next episode. And what does Nathan have to forgive Peter for?
On to the positives … Cristine Rose rocks (as usual). Charles was great, even if his power was a bit of a disappointment. I liked the scenes with Peter and Mohinder and Peter protecting his Mom (sorry, I’m a sucker for that) and holding her hand in the cafe.
Unfortunately, with my dislike of the shape shifting, I’m not looking forward to the last two episodes.
I did enjoy reading your review and definitely agree with how it was shot and a few other things you mention. Actually, I’m anticipating your reviews more than the actual episodes. Keep up the good work.
Well, for one good review, Otto
Know I’m going to stick with the policy of “to each its own” because I didn’t think this episode for me was a 2.5 out of 5. I think maybe it was because I thought that 2 other episodes, “Villains” and “Cold Wars” were worse. “Villains” for me was a slap in the face with the retconning and wrong timelines, specially considering they got it right with “Six Months Ago”. I gave that one a 0.5 out of 5 and just because of what you pointed in your review of superb camerawork and brilliant shots. “Cold Wars” was a disappointment for me in the way that it had a “been there, done that” touch and also reaffirmed my “second time’s no charm” approach to the episode. The biggest problem may have been that it revealed nothing, considering how “Company Man” revealed plenty of info back then. It just seemed that they wanted to REPEAT Company Man without the same character depth and resonance. I gave that one a 2 out of 5.
Now for what I thought about this episode. I, for one, enjoyed it. Maybe it was because I didn’t analyze it like you did in the review. I liked the idea, despite being vaguely explained. I liked seeing the young characters in the flashback as the actors were spot on. Linderman put me off though. And despite the vagueness I liked the idea of history repeating itself. But like you said, Otto, more explanation or exploration could have helped a lot.
The performances were excellent, and that really shined when I considered the 2 things I loved from the episode: The sister bonding between Angela and Alice and an exceptional performance from Alexa Nikolas. As sometimes some relationships in Heroes have been generic or conveniently placed, I felt for these 2 as it made me feel the same way as I feel for my younger brother and sister. I liked the chemistry between the young and old versions. I still think of how it could have helped more if we had actually heard of Alice a longer time ago instead of revealing it just 2 episodes ago. But to nod it with the sock stealing was the coup for me. I LOVED THAT. Because it justified the stealings. It was wonderful.
And Alexa Nikolas. WOW. I was sold with her. Maybe because I found her pretty moving and by the way GORGEOUS. It made me appreciate Angela more. And made me appreciate the casting directors. Applause there. The likeness of all the young ones were amazing. Now I’m convinced of the production values of the show when it comes to flashbacks.
But then there are the negatives. While I actually didn’t find a LOT like you did by analizing, I have to admit that despite great production value and performance, it could have been more. Since the entirety of “Generations” I wanted an early Company flashback. And despite four of the members being here, it didn’t actually feel like this was truly intended to be the REAL Company flashback. It was more the “Personal Angela” flashback. But I see the potential here. They could keep working on and do one completely devoted to the Company forming up, as in this episode they mentioned the form up by episode’s end. Which leaves open to ANOTHER flashback I’m crossing my fingers that could happen in the future.
In your review I see your point. You were HIGHLY hyped for this episode. It didn’t live up to what were you expecting. I get it. But to me I went through it with an open mind, not interested in nitpicking the plot, accept it for what it is and enjoy it. And to me I didn’t actually found it a Retcon as I had expected. It justified Chandra when they say they mind whiped almost everyone. I just kept it simple. And enjoyed what you enjoyed. It didn’t reveal anything crucial or mind blowing. It tried to justify Alice existence. And in a way, I was more of a transitional way to bring the Petrellis together and make them even more likable to me than before. For that, I forgive the half baked story. There’s still potential for another one though that could really focus on the Company early years as they all came up together. With Bryan Fuller stating that “Redemption” will somewhat explored “the missing 9″ it could also work for origin. So there’s more opportunuty here.
It’s sad that you didn’t like it Otto. But to each its own. You give this one a 2.5. I give it a 4. I still have found this entire streak as great as most of Vol. 1. I still hope that the season ends up in a high note continuing this streak so that there’s more hope for Season 4. “I am Sylar” and “An Invisible Thread” have high promise. So I’m still with high hopes for the last 2 weeks.
Anyway, good review as always Otto. Keep up.
P.S. : Despite for being somewhat weak episode for you, this volume has had bigger downers. For me “Cold Wars” was the downer. Also “Exposed” wasn’t a really good episode too. But for contender for weakest episode of the season goes to most of Volume 3 episodes, like “The Eclipse pt. 1-2″, “I am become Death”, and perhaps the biggest offender of the series, “Villains”
I’m relieved. I was afraid to come in here to hear you saying how great this episode was. Once again, you talk sense, because this episode sucked. Hell, I’ll say it: it was wack.
Positives:
Spot on performances by Cristine & Milo.
Good choice of music and scenery. Set designers deserve a round of applause.
And…that’s it. Really.
Negatives (and there are many)
Chandra. I don’t have enough space to say what went wrong here. What were they thinking? Honestly, at times I think the writers just make it up as they go along; they don’t research the past episodes to make sure these plots make sense. If he got away after Alice snapped, did they do a mind wipe on him? What persuaded him to study evolved humans later on? Such a massive ret-con, and one they’re going to end up paying for during Redemption.
Alice. You took the words out of my mouth. She was nothing more than a catalyst for them to go to Coyote Sands. If the writers insisted on bringing her in, they should have split up the episode in 2 parts and focused more on the Company’s beginning, like the episode was supposed to. The entire episode could have (and should have) been done without her. She brings no meaning to the story, besides making Angela feel guilty, and considering her past actions, Angela has enough guilt to last her another 50 years. Alice is crazy, and not even the good kind, just the kind that sucks.
And are we supposed to believe that Alice is that naive to spend the next 50 years of her life in a desert because Angela told her to? Um, no. Either she’s mentally slow, or she’s flat out stupid. After the first, oh, 20 years, she should have known something was wrong. Why not look for her sister? Seriously, what an idiot. If she’s the next big bad, then the show is in serious trouble.
The complete lack of Linderman & Bob. Was really looking forward to this. Besides the atrocious acting of mini-Linderman, why bring them there if you give them nothing to do? Despite being jerks, Linderman and Bob were some colorful characters, particularly Bob. Their appearance was nothing more than a cameo and raised viewer’s hopes for nothing.
Claire was annoying again, with her “me, me, me” speech. I don’t need to into depth, you know what I mean. And I actually re-wound the part when Angela told her how much “strength” she had. I thought I had heard wrong.
Bad dialogue. And this is something the writers are not guilty of. “It was a different time, Kennedy was president and we were all patriots.” You’ve gotta be kidding me. That has to be the most generic thing I’ve heard on this show, and coming from Angela, who’s anything but…wow, that was disappointing.
Truly, what a waste. This could have been one of the best episodes of the season and ended up being one of the worst, at least in Fugitives. 2/5.
Can’t even give it a half.
Alfredo, good call on the “I am Become Death!” Okay, that episode I was seriously laughing at how weird and badly written the show had become. Remember deranged Mohinder darting around in a hood?
Anyway, I wouldn’t be bringing up horrible memories without a point, the point being: 2.5 is pretty harsh, Otto. I seem to remember you giving some truly godawful episodes from Season 2 a 2.5. I understand being disappointed with the episode. And I agree with most of the points you made. Chandra’s involvement in the project undermines the character, the goals and methods of the operation were never explained, there’s no logical reason for Angela to leave Alice behind and make her family dig graves. The show picks all the wrong moments to get specific in this episode. Vague hinting at the sock stealing would have been excellent, but instead the idea is whacked over our heads. On the other hand, I really wouldn’t have minded Charles’ power being whacked over our heads. I would have even accepted contrived dialogue (”So, what exactly can you do, Charlie?” “Well, Angie, I actually have…”) if they would just EXPLAIN THE FREAKING THING. Aargh.
Most importantly, not much new information is really established. But that was true of Cold Wars too. I agree that the flashback episodes are not as revealing as they used to be and have way more inconsistencies. The show could have done better, but the truth is, when you make a flashback episode at a point when we know very little about the characters, it’s easy to be shocking, revealing, etc. without running into inconsistencies. Prior to “Company Man”, what did we really know about HRG? Making a flashback episode after 3 volumes have already been completed is much harder.
So I understand how you feel, Otto, but I think your rating may be just within the context of the phenomenal last episodes we’ve had (and Season 1) rather than within the context of the whole show. Come on, no Cyborg Noah or Claire the Selfish Brat! No inexplicable painting the future! No purple flags! No stick of French bread fighting! We’ve seen worse. Like, A LOT worse.
My biggest problem with the episode was more personal. It really bugged me how Nathan never really apologizes for what he’s done…and they LET HIM GET AWAY WITH THAT??? AAAARGH! He admits he messed up and let it get out of hand, but he never apologizes for his intentions in the first place, or for backstabbing Peter by offering a hug and reconciliation and then shooting him with a dart.
I do want to defend Angela, though, against the Dumb As award. I know it was stupid to tell Alice the truth and risk a huge storm, but I think Angela, like HRG, is trying to be more honest with the people she loves. She’s trying to regain her ideals, to think more with her heart and less with her head. It’s character development, in a way.
But despite my disagreements, I loved reading your review as always Otto!
Fantastic review. Disappointing episode. Ugh. Guess that hot streaks only last so long, eh?
I found the flashbacks entertaining, personally, because I’m pretty forgiving when it comes to egregious retconning and obnoxiously complex and unnecessary twists, but everything that was present-day was just vulgar. The Claire-worship left a bad taste in my mouth.
“Pray to whatever gods you hold, gentlemen,” that the next two eps are Fuller-esque. This is the only thing that can save this show.
Sigh. Well, hell. I really, really tried to like this episode. I was still trying right up until I read your review (though you mustn’t blame yourself!). You pointed out everything that bothered me about the episode, and then some.
First and foremost, beyond any of the little plot holes, off characterization, and occasionally cheesy dialogue, I reacted to this episode pretty much the same way I reacted to Hiro and Ando’s side trip to India: Why??? Seriously…Why? What’s going on with the show’s precogs that they keep having dreams and visions that send everyone off on these pointless little jaunts? Angela flat out tells us that she’s dreaming of her sister and must find her, posthaste. But I still don’t get it. Why Alice? Why now? If Alice was just a foil for Angela, a motivation or a conscience to get her to tell everyone about what happened at Coyote Sands…well, okay, but why actually go there? The ONLY thing at that facility we learned that Angela didn’t already know was that Alice was alive. Well, we had a glimmer of that from the PRECOGNITIVE DREAMS indicating she was, er, alive. What purpose does her (adult) character serve to the story? Surely TPTB didn’t invoke her merely to have her DorothyGale into the sunset? It’s the exact same thing that happened with Parkman’s vision sending Hiro to India to stop a stranger’s marriage and save a, thus far, anonymous baby. No sense and no connection at all, unless they plan to bring these characters back at some other, hopefully this time unforeseen, crucial moment. Okay, enough of that…
Pointless Plot Point Two: Wassup with Chandra? Are the writers so desperate to keep Mohinder connected to this storyline that they would retcon the Sureshes to this frankly unbelievable extent? I hope there’s something super juicy on that reel of film, because otherwise, WTF?
Continuity Pet Peeve: Am I the only one who was bothered by the relative ages of the Elder Supes vis-a-vis Chandra and Zimmerman? I’m way past old enough to know that, once you reach a certain age, we’re all adults, here. However, present-day Chandra and Zimmerman just didn’t look 10 to 15 years older than Charles, Angela and Arthur, and certainly not Linderman, unless Daniel had been living life in the HOV lane all those years. That really bugged me throughout the entire episode.
I thought the Bldg 26 thing was just a coolness factor, personally. But if it caused that much confusion in other viewers, that tactic obviously fell flat.
Good stuff:
I thought you were right about Alexa; she rocked and totally channeled Angela/Christine. Most excellent. Edwin Hodge was also very good. Unusually assertive and powerful character for a young, African-American man of that period, but considering the unique circumstances, the incongruity was perfect, and totally meshed with Roundtree’s portrayal.
I’m always happy to see Diana Scarwig; she’s an underused and under appreciated actress. I suspect Fuller’s hand, there. (Duh.) She played the crazy really well. I hope we actually do get to see more of her, and that she wasn’t just a one-issue plot device. A plausible reappearance would do much to redeem some of the issues we both had with this episode, as well.
Visually, the episode was terrific. Loved the B&W flashbacks; I thought they added real texture to the story and the visuals.
Although it’s pushing the bounds of credulity, I did like the family dinner in the diner, particularly because they all acknowledged that they ARE family, including Noah, which must feel like a little bit of a blessing, albeit mixed, for him right now. (I’d've been much, much happier with all the Petrelli Cumbayahs if Peter had managed to land just one good one on that obnoxiously square jaw of Nathan’s, however.)
Now a question: Was it just me, or did young Alice already seem just a skotch…off? One makes allowances for the naivete of littler girls in the early ’60s, but still. She seemed a shade unbalanced, maybe even borderline autistic or something. I understand she was a young girl in weird and frightening circumstances, but she still just seemed a little off-kilter to me. Did you get any of that at all, or am I judging Alice too harshly?
Well, that’s enough for now. A disappointment overall, and a little discouraging as we head into the final episodes of this Volume, but it still had some shining moments.
Take care.
Great review as always.
I also tried to like the episode, but when the best parts for me were the history nods and my boyfriend sitting next to me saying, “HRG and Nathan would make a really good gay couple,” then there is something seriously wrong. Trying to think of things that didn’t bother me was giving me a headache so I quit. Its like they destroyed every bit of the Heroes timeline and all I’ve been trying to do lately is trying to figure out how they might be able to save it. Again, nothing but a huge headache. I can do nothing but hope that the next two episodes will be nothing but flat out AMAZING!!
I hate Claire worship. They need to have Sylar torture her more.
I have to disagree. I don’t think you even have to assume that papa Suresh got Parkman Whammied. To me it seems reasonable that he continued on with his research for years and years afterwords, which would have become more crucial when Shanti got sick. I also think that the family dynamics workd really nicely, and I loved seeing Claire reconcile with both parents at once. I loved seeing the flash backs, and hope to see more.
But you do have to assume he got mindwiped. If Chandra wasn’t mindwiped then the plotholes are even bigger. His story so far has been him convinced that there may be these special individuals out there, he just hasn’t found them and he can’t convince people to believe him. Remember him meeting Sylar and being so excited that he might have found his first person with an ability, only to be disappointed and begin to doubt himself after nothing seemed to be there. His entire attitude wasn’t “I’ve seen these people, I worked in a government project to study them, they’re just trying to cover it up!” It was, “I’m researching ground breaking new ideas about evolved humans, no one has ever heard of them before and no one will believe me.” He was trying to prove his hypothesis, not re-reveal something he’d seen before.
^ ^ This was my take on it too. I can’t see how Chandra’s arc in “Six Months Ago” would work if he hadn’t lost his memories of Coyote Sands.
Great review, as always.
Unfortunately, I share the disapointment on the episode. The things with the “plotholes”, that aren’t really holes since it would take like a sentence to explain each, is that lots of them seem to add up in this episode. And if after only seeing once each episode, even I can see them, that can’t be good. To me, this one goes with “I am become death” and “The Eclipse” as disapointing. Unfortunately, even great acting didn’t save it for me. But at least, the 2 remaining episodes (who look like a 2 part season finale) are getting my hopes up. I just hope 1961 didn’t kill the momentum it had.
Same opinion as nearly everyone on Chandra/Mohinder.
SuperElders : only Charles was a bit developped, and yet I don’t know what to think about another Parkman-Whammier, if he is one. Except that they were SuperElders, I don’t see why they brought up Linderman, who is dead, and Bob, whose whole family is dead (as far as we know). It’s just like Mohinder standing in the background for the whole volume.
Introducing Alice for just one episode just feels forced, but oh well. Like PapaLuthor, she could be back at some point, so why not…
Claire-praising : I prefer when people tell her that she is stupid, or a brat. But well she’s got less annoying
Like you said, the one good point it brings is potential for a future flashback on ealry years of the company, if they ever get a chance/decide to do it. It would be nice to see the evolution of those 4 characters in the early stages of the company, and how Angela’s dreams shaped it. How they changed at the point that Angela and Lindermann wanted to release a virus, then with letting Peter boom. Or even how Bob ended up torturing his own kid; Actually, this isn’t surprising if he used to see everybody with abilities as freak; but Angela didn’t end up experimenting on Peter (or maybe it is just luck that he didn’t manifest any ability untill S1) so I’d love to see those compared.
One thing I don’t understand is the whole “the Company was corrupt” which was once mentionned by HRG at some point.
Angela: “It’s time to go back to the old methods.”
Claire: “You mean erasing people’s memories and killing?”
Angela: “It’s a necessary evil.”
I suppose “torturing” and “experimenting” are implied, but doesn’t seem to me that the methods changed at all through the years. For HRG, the matter is obviously that they went after Claire. The only difference is that some people get passes, while other don’t, which fundamentally is unfair. And on Petrelli(+HRG)-Company 2.0, I’m more or less entertained to see how it could be any different from the first Company. At least, if you kill people, you do it as a family business. Yay!
Well really looking forward to the last episodes so
I love this episode. It gave a history of how the company was formed. I love the flash backs and am very happy to see peter now more involve on the episode. For some time, he barely appears on an episode for 10 minutes.
The ending was great with sylar being as Nathan.It tells me there is hope for heroes in the future.
Hi! … you took the words out of my mouth …seriously! I could not have reviewed it any better/differently. …After having watched episodes written by Oliver Grigsby and Bryan Fuller, I must say I wasn’t surprised to learn that THIS episode was written by Aron Coleite… btw - Grigsby and Fuller write interesting, absorbing, emotionally fulfilling, humorous, ‘makes sense’ episodes …steller to be exact…going back and reviewing Coleite’s and Pokaski’s writing makes me realize that there is a lot to be desired, imo .. oh, Armus and Foster are also excellent writers, whose skill draws you in and satisfies….Otto, thanks again for a fine review ..I twittered it … hope that’s ok =)
Sheindie, thanks, you’re welcome, and twitter away…
I usually agree with most of your reviews, but on this one I have to completely disagree. Most of your qualms with the episode seem to stem from what you expected the story to be, not that the story itself was wrong. I think it was clear that the people coming to Coyote Sands didn’t see anything wrong with it and thought they were there to be helped with “whatever was wrong with them”, as it’s also perfectly clear that Chandra thought he was there to help and was fascinated by the findings he could get; like Mohinder he thought he was there for the greater good, so they were making a parallel with just how easily Mohinder has been manipulated and therefore repeating the mistakes of his father; this in no way invalidates Chandra’s character the way we know him. The whole “Building 26″ shot did NOT mean that the CURRENT building 26 was named after it, it’s simply a parallel foreshadowing what is happening in the present, back then Building 26 was simply the lab, period. The writers have stated time and time again that Linderman CANNOT heal someone who’s already dead, so saying Linderman could’ve healed everyone does not apply. While Alice exiling herself to that bunker for 50 years is a bit of a stretch, you’re not taking into account just how much mental damaged she suffered the night her parents and everyone in Coyote Sands was killed in front of her eyes, she was traumatized, and clearly not right in the head after that. Angela making everyone dig out bones was a way for her to try to interpret her dream; she was absolutely sure Alice was dead, so her interpretation of the dream was that she needed to find her to obtain her answers, and the only place she assumed she could find her was in one of the graves. Peter forgiving Nathan does not seem far fetched given the circumstances, you’re basically applying what YOU would do, and you would probably not forgive Nathan, well, Peter would, period. As for Alice’s relevance or not, I think you shouldn’t focus on whether she had immediate significance, but in the fact that there is a rather pissed off weather witch out there who might come back any day now with a vengeance. As for the final scene, it was unfair of you not to praise Adrian Pasdar’s excellent performance as “Sylar playing Nathan”, the nuance and detail is perfect. And yes, we get it, you hate Claire and it doesn’t matter WHAT the character says you’ll always say she’s being self-centered and everything she says you’ll immediately dismiss. Complaining about them explaining the socks once again shows how extraordinarily biased this review is; we all know you find Angela’s sock stealing awesome, and explaining it ruined it for you, well, I thought it was very heartbreaking to find out the true reason behind it.
I’m not saying the episode was perfect, it was not what I expected either, but it certainly wasn’t bad, and in fact it was very informative and gave an enormous piece of the puzzle and tied tons of loose ends, and yes, it created more questions, but that’s what the show should do. I love your reviews and always look forward to them and I find them accurate and fun to read, but this week you definitely dropped the ball with a review that not only borders on nitpicking it goes FAR beyond it.
Sylar fan, welcome, and thank you.
Raissa, word on the limit to Fuller’s ability to rescue the story at such a late stage. I’d say this episode would have still happened even if he’d been with the show all along, but it would have been along different (and probably better) lines.
On the return of the Claire/Noah merry-go-round: yeah, here we go again…
Sergio, thank you, and your praise will never sound like a broken record.
“I´m sorry you didn´t like this one, this should have been a torture for you to give it a 2.5 out of 5.”
It did suck to have to be so harsh when the show’s been on such an amazing roll.
“… i never liked the retconning idea and it feels like that this episode was just to establish why Angela´s the way she is, whick i guess that was the point…”
That was my take on it too, and that’s my main problem with the episode, because I don’t think it even managed to achieve that particularly well.
With the Peter/Charles dream in 1.23, I’m wondering if it could be a sign that Peter absorbed Charles’s ability and never knew he had it. We know that Matt and Maury create mental landscapes, so could it be that when Peter was going into superpower-overload, his system pulled out Charles’s ability? It wouldn’t explain whether it was time-travel or a dream that took him back to the rooftop, but it would cover how Peter slotted himself into the scene and how Charles got a read on a second Peter. Or not. I’m grasping at straws here. Anyone have any theories?
Leigh, I’m with you on the socks reveal, it was cute, I just wish it hadn’t been labored so heavyhandedly. One oblique reference would have been enough.
“This episode should have been OMG-Amazing!!! because it was it was a Company Founder flashback for crying out loud.”
That was my feeling exactly. I wonder if that’s partly why this episode felt like such a disappointment; that, and the overall quality throughout this volume.
“But to call it one of the weakest of the season? Surely something from volume three was worse. “I Am Become Death” anybody?”
I got more than enough grief for eviscerating that one, but yeah, this wasn’t a whole lot better.
Good point about Peter and Nathan’s mutual understanding. I took the “stronger together than we are apart” line as a sign of reconciliation, but I agree, there’s got to be some resentment on Peter’s part that hasn’t gone away.
With Angela’s admiration for Claire, I wonder if it’s her way of taking care of Claire the way she wished her parents would have taken care of her and Alice. I think one thing this episode got right was Young Angela’s inner strength and resourcefulness, but perhaps the distance between Angela and her parents explains why Angela is so eager to bond with a granddaughter who reminds her of herself.
Re: Nathan and Redemption: yeah, I saw Mohinder’s “redemption even for Nathan” line as a hint that Nathan will stick around. I hope so, even if, in a way, I think it would be fitting for the guy to be killed off at the end of this volume.
“P.S. - Is this Angela’s first Dumb As Award?”
It’s not. I gave her one for the phone call to Nathan in 3.14.
Mark T, welcome, and thanks so much for reading. Great point about Angela’s dreams being an unreliable source of information. I had the same thought, although in light of the vivid dreams over the past few episodes — the escape from the car in 3.20, the Einstein quote in the flashback, etc. — it seems kind of arbitrary that on this occasion, Angela’s ability ~*conveniently*~ didn’t provide her with more information.
Alice’s mental state: your guess is as good as mine. I agree with Susan’s point that perhaps Alice should have been younger. My feeling is she was written as too clueless or too dependent on a parent figure, but I never got the impression that she was intentionally portrayed as mentally impaired.
Word on Peter’s forgiveness having a shade of skepticism. Hopefully that’s a starting point for a new character arc, or at least a new dynamic between the brothers.
“… this episode would have been much better served without Chandra or Mohinder being tied to Coyote Sands.”
OK, interesting. My feeling was that it was a neat idea but that it was almost an episode in itself. I was leaning more towards ditching the ElderSuper portion of the episode to focus on Angela’s family and Chandra’s involvement in the project. But, yeah, either way, streamlining the episode would have helped it.
Jonathan, great point about one-time characters functioning as plot devices. I hadn’t noticed it until you mentioned it, but you’re right.
“I’ll tell you where I think this is all going though. Call me crazy, but I think Sylar successfully goes nuclear on Washington, killing the President, VP, and everyone in line to take office leading up to Nathan. Sylar then kills Nathan, and takes over as Commander and Chief.”
^ ^ Very cool indeed. Now THAT would demonstrate balls and push the story forward. Kinda horrific for the terrorist/infiltration connotations, but it would make for great drama.
Susan,
“Wow, 2.5.
It is sad that an episode with so much promise, turned out so disappointing.”
I’m oddly relieved to hear you say that. I was worried that ripping into a Petrelli-centric episode would incur your wrath.
“It was underwhelming. I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t LOVE it either and I was expecting to LOVE it.”
^ ^ My response exactly.
Valid point about the code names in “War Buddies,” but I’d still say the continuity is tenuous. I take your point that Linderman and Angela might have drifted apart and that he might not have known who she’d married — or that she’d married at all. But I got the impression that these four members of The Company were a close-knit group for the next 15 years, and that Adam’s role was to bring these four together with the others rather than to reunite members who’d already met.
The other GN continuity issue I had here was Linderman’s demeanor: the gist is that he manifested his ability when saving his mom, and that his parents’ fear of him is what drove him away from home. So he left home hating his ability … and then showed up at Coyote Sands behaving like a “cocky upstart,” or at least a guy who’s comfortable using his ability to heal scars from bicycle accidents … and then we see him in Vietnam, a withdrawn introvert who only uses his ability when it’s life or death. I just can’t see the consistency in the character arc there. I know there could be plenty that happened inbetween to explain that shift in perspective, but it seems very hokey.
“I liked the scenes with Peter and Mohinder and Peter protecting his Mom (sorry, I’m a sucker for that) and holding her hand in the cafe.”
I liked that last one a lot too.
Alfredo, I’m glad you liked the episode. I agree, the bond between the sisters was very nicely done, and I liked the idea behind the socks reveal, even if the execution didn’t work for me.
I hear what you’re saying about enjoying the story without the analysis, but honestly, even before I started digging into the details, my gut feeling was that this episode had failed. Taking the scenes apart just reinforced that feeling. Which sucks, because with the episodes in this volume, it’s usually been the opposite: they became even more awesome with close analysis as the nuances and subtleties jumped out.
Valid points about “Villains” and “Cold Wars.” I enjoyed them because I could see what they were trying to accomplish in spite of their flaws. I got what they were trying to say and the story they were trying to tell. With this one, I couldn’t get a read on what it wanted to say. I got to the end of it and I didn’t feel like I understood Angela any more than I did at the end of “Into Asylum.” I didn’t feel like we understood The Company any more than we did sometime in the second season. There were all kinds of details we found out about Angela’s history and The Company’s formation, but I don’t think any of them changed our overall impression of either Angela or The Company. That might be why I see this a little differently from you. “Villains” changed my impression of Linderman and Meredith, and “Cold Wars” changed my impression of HRG and Angela.
“… it didn’t actually feel like this was truly intended to be the REAL Company flashback. It was more the “Personal Angela” flashback.”
^ ^ This, exactly. And I think that’s why it ended up so muddled, because it seemed like the episode was trying to be (a) an Angela flashback/character exploration, (b) a Company flashback to establish the organization’s formation, and (c) a set-up for the finale. I don’t think any amount of fine-tuning or reworking could have made that much material cohesive. I think it should have been carved into separate episodes that came earlier in the season.
“I still hope that the season ends up in a high note continuing this streak so that there’s more hope for Season 4. “I am Sylar” and “An Invisible Thread” have high promise.”
Absolutely.
Brie, “wack” says it all.
Re: Chandra: “at times I think the writers just make it up as they go along.”
It seems like that was definitely the case here.
Re: Alice: “If the writers insisted on bringing her in, they should have split up the episode in 2 parts and focused more on the Company’s beginning, like the episode was supposed to.”
Yeah, this was my feeling too. A two-parter at a point when the show didn’t need to sustain the central plot leading into the finale, and a chance to fully flesh out the new characters and details in the story.
“And are we supposed to believe that Alice is that naive to spend the next 50 years of her life in a desert because Angela told her to?”
This didn’t bug me quite as much as it bugged eveyone else. I can sorta buy that if Alice was traumatized — by the loss of her sister, and by the memory of her family and every super at Coyote Sands getting thrown into a ditch — she’d retreat into a mental state that enabled her to cope. So, as absurd as it is that she spent forty-something years in a bomb shelter when she could have wandered back to civilization, it struck me as if the tragedy she witnessed trapped her in a certain state of mind.
Clarkie, welcome, and yes, I remember Mohinder and his hoodie with a fond smile…
“2.5 is pretty harsh, Otto. I seem to remember you giving some truly godawful episodes from Season 2 a 2.5.”
Some of those were unfairly maligned!
“The show could have done better, but the truth is, when you make a flashback episode at a point when we know very little about the characters, it’s easy to be shocking, revealing, etc. without running into inconsistencies. Prior to ‘Company Man’, what did we really know about HRG? Making a flashback episode after 3 volumes have already been completed is much harder.”
Fair point, and I agree that as the backstory expands the inconsistencies become more inevitable. I think the counter-argument is that the show should make sure that at least the crucial details have been thought out ahead of time. Lost pulls off infinitely more complex character arcs and storylines every week, its current season is operating with a similar time-span (as in, it involves events decades earlier synching up with events in the present), and the majority of it fits together seamlessly. And, sure, in this case characters like HRG and Angela began as peripheral players and their backstories were embellished as their popularity grew. But Chandra’s backstory and The Company’s formation are two things that should have been well conceived from the start. I’m not sure the show has a valid excuse with, “Oh, we only thought of this later and we’ve been telling the story for three seasons, there are bound to be hiccups.”
“Come on, no Cyborg Noah or Claire the Selfish Brat! No inexplicable painting the future! No purple flags! No stick of French bread fighting! We’ve seen worse. Like, A LOT worse.”
Oh, absolutely. But even in the episodes that featured those awful instances you mention, there was usually an underlying idea. Here, I’m not sure what that idea was, and I’m not sure what the episode was trying to express. On a functional level, it moves the plot along: the Petrellis reconcile, the prospect of Company 2.0 is introduced, Sylar becomes Nathan, etc. But when it comes to the flashbacks and to Angela’s character arc, I’m not sure what we were intended to take away from the episode. That’s where I felt it failed, above and beyond the specifics.
Siege, thank you.
“Guess that hot streaks only last so long, eh?”
Sad but true. They’ll get it back next week. One miss doesn’t ruin the volume, but it’s the fact that the miss coincided with this episode that hurts, at least for me. This is the episode where you just want to say, “How on earth did they mess that one up?”
Kevin,
“I really, really tried to like this episode.”
I’m right there with you, buddy…
Your post sums up everything that was wrong with the Alice storyline, but this:
“Surely TPTB didn’t invoke her merely to have her DorothyGale into the sunset?”
… is exactly my problem. The idea seems to have been to offer Angela some kind of closure and the chance to put her past behind her, but if Alice is still alive, crazed and dangerous, does it really put Angela’s mistake to rest? It doesn’t seem like the arc has been resolved, which is why I agree with everyone who said it’s worth coming back to it again at some point.
Word on the age issue: I would have said Zimmerman was the oldest, that Linderman and Deveaux wouldn’t have been far behind, and that Chandra would have been about the same age as Bob.
“I did like the family dinner in the diner, particularly because they all acknowledged that they ARE family, including Noah, which must feel like a little bit of a blessing, albeit mixed, for him right now.”
Yeah, I really liked that too.
LeeAnna, thanks.
“Trying to think of things that didn’t bother me was giving me a headache so I quit.”
I know what you mean…
Pas, thank you.
“To me, this one goes with “I am become death” and “The Eclipse” as disapointing.”
Sounds about right.
With Bob turning Elle into a Company lab rat, I’m guessing there must be a chunk of his backstory that we’re missing. Based on everything he witnessed here, there’s got to be something that drastically changed his perspective to explain why he’d end up exploiting her ability that way. Any theories?
“And on Petrelli(+HRG)-Company 2.0, I’m more or less entertained to see how it could be any different from the first Company. At least, if you kill people, you do it as a family business. Yay!”
Yeah, this was my issue. That the family is essentially sanctioning capture, incarceration and violation of human rights if it’s in their perception of everyone’s best interests. And that they’re under the impression that if it’s an operation run by a family then it’ll somehow have a more rigidly humane code of conduct. I just can’t buy it. How long would it be before this new company resorted to the same system the old one used?
It turns out that while this grandmother/granddaughter bonding session was taking place, Peter got enough of a lead on Nathan to fly to the Coyote Sands Café and settle down with a cup of coffee. I can’t decide if that’s because Peter’s a faster flyer or because Nathan got distracted along the way. Either way, Peter’s level stare at his brother is one of a handful of moments in this volume when Milo brings his A-game. He’s working with great material, but the way this scene plays out — with Peter staring at his brother so hard that Nathan’s forced to spend the majority of the scene looking downwards — underlines how angry Peter still is. In turn, it’s what makes his willingness to forgive Nathan before the episode is over so difficult to accept.
I’m so glad you touch on this because the Milo and Adrian usually bring the A-Game and even more so when they are together. I do like the fact that Peter is able to level Nathan with just that unforgiving glare and it really worksgiven why Peter is so angry. One thing I was alittle disappointed that Peter didn’t ask was why Claire got a free pass and he didn’t. Given it might have come off a bit childish but I think it’s a legitimant question. I know we found out why Claire got her free pass but it would be equally interesting to know why Peter didn’t.
Regarding the baseball ticket thing–if Peter went to Game 6 of that NLCS, he has nothing to complain about. That was an epic, monumental game.
hey AD remember in the beginning of the volume nathan asked peter to be on his side and peter said piss off I think that is why no free pass for peter
Oh, Darn. I wish I’d gotten here a bit early and beaten Otto to the reply punch. Hopefully he’ll come back.
Gosh, I’m torn. Really torn. I disagree with the 2.5 for sure (would have been a 3 for me), and I think Otto’s too harsh on a lot of stuff, but I’m nowhere near as forgiving as the poster Mrcaliche above and realize that it was a badly flawed episode.
I guess that I just don’t think it’s a fatally flawed one.
Assuming that Deveaux’s power is a Parkman-whammy is a huge leap. My first thought was more that it was a variation of the Haitian’s memory-wipe. Which would explain a lot. It’s less disappointing if you look at it that way and explains a lot of the Chandra mess.
I’m also going to hope that Mohinder reviewing that reel will mitigate a lot of the Chandra retconning–it would HAVE to, wouldn’t it?
And I really don’t understand the Claire-bashing. Everyone, including Otto, seems to be doing it. She was my favorite character from the get-go and, except for her horrible derailment and near-assassination in Season 2, remains my favorite character in many ways. I thought she had some terrific moments in Volume 3 and, except for betraying Noah and breaking up the family (which, believe it or not, DID have some motivation behind it) her actions throughout Volume 4 have been pretty freakin’ awesome. I’m all up for Claire-worship. Heck, the producers and the network know that Hayden is what’s bringing in the young male demographic. Perhaps the Claire worship comes as a directive from network suits to make sure that they don’t lose Hayden, especially if they’ve lost Ali (which is unclear at this point). If that’s true, it’s meddling, but it’s meddling for the right reasons.
On the company history–here’s how I reconcile the continuity. What was portrayed here was merely an idea–the germ of the formation of something. Perhaps the four drifted apart with only vague notions of what they would do when they were old enough to do it. It took the advent of Adam Monroe to bring things to fulfillment–that’s how I see it. The only thing that rubs me wrong is Linderman’s demeanor here. Totally clashes with his portrayal in the “War Buddies” GNs and EVEN with Arthur’s toady in “Villains.” I think another ElderSuper should have been used instead of Linderman. Kaito??? Now THAT would have been awesome, given the WWII Japanese internment camp subtext. I could buy that Kaito was an immigrant (hence his excellent English) as a child and that he returned to Japan post-war to start Yamagato Industries. I dunno, maybe that’s a stretch, but I would have preferred to see Young Kaito to Young Linderman simply because of the continuity issues Linderman’s presence presents (hey, how’s THAT for articulation and near homophones!)
For the record, I think the show’s worst episode EVER was 2.3 (Kindred). Did you give that one a 2? I seem to recall the Niki-centered “Better Halves” from S1 also earning a 2, but I’m not sure. I’d like to make a list of all Otto’s reviews and rank them by score. Maybe I’ll do that, just for curiosity’s sake.
I meant post-1961, not post-war. I didn’t want to imply that Kaito, who probably wouldn’t have been alive in the 1940s, was at an actual internment camp. I just think the subtext would have been awesome.
Sorry for the triple post, but—-given what we’ve seen (say in 2.1, anyone?) wouldn’t a romantic subtext between Angela and Kaito been more affecting than one between Angela and Deveaux?
I know I REALLY shouldn’t go there, but the romantic subtext here–and Tawny Cypress’s light complexion–took me to evil thoughts of Peter sleeping with his half-sister. Yeah, EWWW, but my mind went there and I’m very, very sorry for it.
You know you are not the first person to say that Simone might be Peter’s half sister. Chilling to be sure but intriguing given Angela and Charles’s chemistry.
On the company history–here’s how I reconcile the continuity. What was portrayed here was merely an idea–the germ of the formation of something. Perhaps the four drifted apart with only vague notions of what they would do when they were old enough to do it. It took the advent of Adam Monroe to bring things to fulfillment–that’s how I see it.
That was how I viewed it also which was why I didn’t get too up in arms about the real company formation happening until 1968. I don’t think the kids had the resources to put together that kind of operation until later in life anyway, even with Bob’s ability.
OK, I’m breaking all protocol and quadruple posting here. I’ve compiled all of Otto’s ratings for every episode. Here they are, in order of quality, and within each ranking, in chronological order:
5: S1–Don’t Look Back, Collision, Seven Minutes to Midnight, Homecoming, Fallout, Distractions, Company Man, Five Years Gone, Landslide. S2–Cautionary Tales. S3Villains–Our Father. S3Fugitives–Cold Wars, Shades of Gray, Cold Snap.
4.5: S1–Nothing to Hide, Unexpected. S2–Out of Time. S3Villains–One of Us One of Them, Angels and Monsters, Villains. S3Fugitives–Clear and Present Danger, Exposed, Turn and Face the Strange.
4: S1–Genesis, Six Months Ago, Parasite, How to Stop an Exploding Man. S2–The Kindness of Strangers, The Line, Four Months Ago, Powerless. S3Villains–The Butterfly Effect, Dying of the Light, It’s Coming, Dual. S3Fugitives–Trust and Blood, Into Asylum.
3.5: S1–One Giant Leap, Hiros, Godsend, The Fix, Run!, .07%, The Hard Part. S2–Four Months Later, Lizards, Fight or Flight. S3Villains–Eris Quod Sum, The Eclipse Part 2. S3Fugitives–Building 26.
3: S1–Better Halves. S3Villains–The Second Coming, I Am Become Death.
2.5: S2–Truth and Consequences. S3Villains–The Eclipse Part 1. S3Fugitives–1961.
2: S2–Kindred.
Observations:
The only 2 is the show’s worst ever episode.
Nothing below a 3 in Season 1
Most 5s in Season 1
Only 1 5 each in volumes 2 and 3
A straight 3 is a surprisingly uncommon score
I believe a couple of 5s to be unwarranted–Distractions is now not a S1 episode that really stands out for me. Cold Wars I would have never given a 5. And I’ve become very much a non-fan of FYG. I kind of hate that episode in retrospect.
The most underscored episode I’d have to say is the 3.5 for Godsend (wasn’t that the first review you ever wrote?) That episode was very highly anticipated, and as good as many episodes to which you have given 4s. If Distractions was a 5, Godsend wasn’t a 3.5.
A couple of comments about what I said above–if anybody is freaked out and thinks I’m terrible for my mind going to Peter/Simone incest I have to ask how that’s any worse than all the Paire shipping still going on?
Also, one thing I did want to say about this episode was: Damn strike. I’ve no doubt that the planned 1977 episode from the scrapped second half of Season 2 would have been significantly better than was 1961.
I’ve no doubt ‘1977′ would be a better episode, too. However, I also think ‘1961′ and ‘1977′ are both canon. 210 always bugged me a little because it seemed flimsy that The Company founders had a falling out THE SAME YEAR that they formed The Company. It’d make more sense if they slowly came together between 1961 and 1977, first forming ‘Primatech’ and then forming ‘The Company’ as we know it. Heck, seems likely that Angela and co took a back seat as the Arthur’s and Kaito’s came around.
And it strikes me that ‘1977′ is an episode more fitting with a ‘Redemption’ theme. This episode was showing ‘Primatech’ forming through adversity - ‘1977′ seems to be more of a ‘what NOT to do’ construct.
^ ^ Dude, this was awesome of you. Thanks so much for putting it together. How much do I owe you?
Very interesting reading. I can usually recall the scores I gave most of them, but it’s strange — and cool — to see it laid out like this.
“Distractions” — it had Claude pushing Peter off the Deveaux rooftop, it had the Nathan-as-Claire’s-daddy reveal, it had Sylar playing a southern-accented Primatech delivery guy, it had Mr. Muggles chewing shoelaces, and above all, it had THE PAPA SULU GROWL. What’s not to love?
Re: “Cold Wars.” Hah! I’ve pretty much accepted that I’m the only one who loved that episode.
“Godsend” wasn’t the first episode to be reviewed (the reviews were all written in correct order once I’d signed up for the gig), but it was the first to be posted once HeroSite went live.
Ian, count me in with the If Only… camp when it comes to “1977.” With the exact date the ElderSupers came together, I wonder whether it’s possible that Bob’s “30 years ago” reference in 2.01 was meant to be taken less literally. We know the characters — and the show — like to round numbers up and down, hence Adam being “400″ years old. So, when Bob said The Company formed 30 years ago, perhaps it’s not such a stretch to think they came together in the early 70s instead of in 1977. My take on it was always that it was Linderman and Arthur’s partnership after “War Buddies” that put the whole thing into motion, and that Adam was really just the “glue” that brought the rest of the members together.
“Valid points about “Villains” and “Cold Wars.” I enjoyed them because I could see what they were trying to accomplish in spite of their flaws” : Exactly my opinion.
“With Bob turning Elle into a Company lab rat, I’m guessing there must be a chunk of his backstory that we’re missing. Based on everything he witnessed here, there’s got to be something that drastically changed his perspective to explain why he’d end up exploiting her ability that way. Any theories?”
Not really a theory, but I’d love to know when MamaBishop died (and why not who she was). Like if her death caused little Elle to manifest her ability, or at least making it go berserk, leading to to Bob making her a lab rat. Or worse, if she accidentaly killed her Mama when the ability first manifested or went berserk. That could more or less explain why Bob never (at least from what we’ve seen) treated her like his daughter and even worst than a regular agent; and why he basicly blames her because he had to raise her, and for things that she could have hardly avoided, like Sylar getting away while she tried to chase him (not assigned) with a bullet in the arm.
Just something that comes to my mind, but as much as I loved Elle, my guess is we will never know for sure, unless someone with some kind of resurection ability appears. And if that happens please let Fuller handle it (I think he has some experience with shows bringing dead people back to life, but maybe it’s just an impression).
Since I already wonder how an episode with Bob getting one sentence led to me to posting that, I can hardly see the subject being brought up, even in GNs; and I’d rather see a Company flashback focus on … the Company. They still have plenty of alive characters with potential storylines, so I guess I’ll have to live with it.
“Yeah, this was my issue. That the family is essentially sanctioning capture, incarceration and violation of human rights if it’s in their perception of everyone’s best interests. And that they’re under the impression that if it’s an operation run by a family then it’ll somehow have a more rigidly humane code of conduct. I just can’t buy it. How long would it be before this new company resorted to the same system the old one used?”
Well, people okay with “necessary evil” in the “family” are Angela, HRG, and more or less Nathan. That leaves us with Peter (if he doesn’t turn into future less optimistic IABD Peter) and Claire being the voices of the moral compass. Ultimately, I can’t beleive that it won’t end up like the old Company system. The fact is that there are evil people that need to be stopped, and even with the precog dreams, there has to be someone to do the dirty work, and I doubt Flying-Nathan, Underpowered-Peter, a Cheerleader and HRG (as badass as he is) can stop someone like Sylar if he doesn’t make a stupid mistake. Even the Haitian showed to have limits in inhibiting powered people. And about financing C2.0, I doubt Bob left a gigantic pile of gold somewhere with a map leading to it (actually that could keep Hiro busy if they want him on a lame storyline again ^^), so it would be fun to see where they’d find funds.
Even if it’s a family business, there is no way a new Company can be successful if they’re on their own. So for the moment, let’s just see if it happens.
I’m not for the Claire-Bashing, but I’m tired of the in-show-omnipresent Claire praising (that’s a difference ^^) while the whole volume 3 portrayed a selfish brat (I think even Fuller in an interview called her whiny and worst ^^). But I think everybody agrees that she got better during this whole volume, and that there were good reasons for her to be a fan favorite during the 2 first seasons.
Done.
Positive: Older Alice looked like the crazy cat lady on the Simpsons. Anyone else catch that?
i do
this episode left me unsatisfied. and you nailed just why
i think this episode was one of the best and it beats a lot of the ones inseason 3 , but still great review
also, I kinda wish that they had just left angela’s story alone. I liked her better as some mysterious figure. Like they said in the previous episode - we shouldn’t ask about coyote sands, because we wont like what we find.
Wow - tough room.
I loved the episode. Only nagging aspect was the Chandra stuff, but seeing as Mohinder has a film container for ‘Project Icarus’ I’m pretty sure we’ll be getting some more backstory soon. As for the Elders… maybe it’s just me following the Graphic Novels, but the stuff matches up well. If anything, Linderman’s backstory makes more sense. He doesn’t agree with what the army is doing in ‘War Buddies’, and one gets the sense that maybe the intial ‘Company’ stuff drove Linderman to want to redeem himself through healing the sick… even if he’s not entirely enamoured with their actions.
As for Chartles - good stuff. Mostly because I’ve always suspected he was an Empathic Mimic, so rationalised that Telepathy is one power of many. Like he told Peter, he knows a thing or two about love.
I’m not saying it was terrible, I just wish it had been a different storyline so near the end of the volume. I didn’t mean to come across as so harsh
I was a bit disappointed in this episode as I have been with alot of the episodes lately, none of them have really stood out to Me. I am really tired of this lame ability peter has, how many episdoes is he going to just fly around? In the first season peter was a counter-balance to sylars ability stealing, someone powerful enough to actually put up a fight. If peter and sylar were to fight right now, peter would be dead in about 10 secs, that is if sylar didnt toy with him first. I recently re-watches “Dual” and you can clearly see that peter starts to fly before he ever touches nathan, now whither this was because they hadnt figured out what peters ability was or poor writing, I dont know. I also dont know why if they were going to limit peter to one ability at a time, why not let him have an ability of someone they have killed off, so that gift is still around, instead of once more being in nathans shadow.
Yeah, the flying one-at-a-time Peter is getting very old. I understand the need for limitations, but enough already, I agree.
I agree completely. You managed to summarize my opinion better than I could put into words. It’s a shame. Cristine Rose was amazing as always, and Alexa Nikolas was perfect casting. And Edwin Hodge was amazing as Papa D. Can you imagine how different the show would be if Angela went with Papa D, instead of Arthur Petrelli?
Lost pulls off infinitely more complex character arcs and storylines every week, its current season is operating with a similar time-span (as in, it involves events decades earlier synching up with events in the present), and the majority of it fits together seamlessly.
While I understand people wanting to compare Heroes to Lost, I think it is unfair. Lost is a better show, but that’s mainly due to having showrunners that actually know what they have to accomplish by the end of the series and how much time they have to do it.
With Heroes, maybe if Bryan Fuller had never left or, better yet, ended up running it, it would have deeper, more cohesive stories with some continuity thrown in.
AD,
“… Milo and Adrian usually bring the A-Game and even more so when they are together.”
I’ve noticed the same thing. It always struck me as if AP could bounce ideas and get solid performances out of any of the cast, but he seems to raise MP’s performance whenever they have scenes together, and I think that will become even move evident now that the dynamic between the brothers has changed.
t.c.,
“remember in the beginning of the volume nathan asked peter to be on his side and peter said piss off I think that is why no free pass for peter”
I agree, that’s the most likely explanation. One other possibility is that Nathan didn’t know Peter was limited to only one ability after 3.13, hence “What can you do?” in 3.14. So, if he assumed Peter was still the multi-powered Superman he’d been for the first two-and-a-half volumes, it makes sense that he’d consider Peter the most dangerous and the most urgent priority to capture and incapacitate. Cold-hearted, but in light of Peter exploding in 1.23, perhaps understandable.
KellyH,
“I disagree with the 2.5 for sure (would have been a 3 for me), and I think Otto’s too harsh on a lot of stuff…”
That’s fair.
With Deveaux’s ability, I leaned towards the Parkman Whammy when we got (1) implied mind-reading and (2) implied mind-control. I like Ian’s theory that Deveaux’s an empath, and of course YMMV, but it seemed like the Parkman Whammy was where the show wanted us to go. If it isn’t, I think the clues — right down to the sound effect when Deveaux told everyone in the cafe to “forget” — were very misleading.
Does everyone think the film reel will be mentioned again? It’d be cool if it was, but I kinda took it as an open-ended “Don’t give up on finding the truth, Mohinder!” moment, and as an in-joke for Lieberman. I’d be impressed if it turned out to be a turning point for Mohinder’s arc. That would at least justify Chandra’s role (and the subsequent retcon) in this episode.
“I really don’t understand the Claire-bashing.”
Angela disappears in a freak storm at a site where hundreds of graves are being unearthed. Everyone panics, especially the sons who worry they’ve lost their mom. And Claire … wants to talk about movie night and her career options. I’m sorry, but come on. She’s had some great moments in this volume, I agree, but there are serious issues with the way she’s being portrayed.
“… the producers and the network know that Hayden is what’s bringing in the young male demographic.”
I dunno… Between Brea Grant, Ali Larter and Jessalyn Gilsig, I think there’s been plenty of eye candy this season.
Totally agree with your take on The Company, but I think there’s room for speculation. The way the final flashback to the cafe played out — with Deveaux telling Angela they didn’t need to be afraid, and Angela pretty much saying, “This is my dream, this is how it’s gonna go down…” — I got the impression that they stuck together after that.
Kaito would have been a GREAT choice for this episode, I agree. I’m tempted to disagree with the age issue you mention; I’d say Kaito was in his late sixties when he died, so he could very easily have been born in the early 1940s.
Angela/Deveaux: the chemistry was there, between both the past versions of the characters in this episode and between the present-day characters in 1.23. In this instance, I’ll happily throw continuity out the window for it. But based on the mounting evidence, it seems like Angela hooked up with several of the ElderSupers over the years.
Peter and Simone being related — well, that would explain a LOT…
Pas, great point about Mama Bishop. Like you, I’d be curious to know how and when she died, but also whether she had an ability. One possible explanation for Bob’s rigorous testing is that Elle wasn’t born with her ability. It’s possible that her testing phase coincided with The Company’s development of synthetic abilities, hence Bob putting aside his feelings to establish how successful the formula was.
“Since I already wonder how an episode with Bob getting one sentence led to me to posting that, I can hardly see the subject being brought up…”
Ah, but that goes to show how intriguing the character and the story are. To me, that justifies the focus, either on the show or in the GNs, as you say.
Deanna, Alvaro, Caitlin, thank you.
Ian,
“Wow - tough room.”
Not at all! I can’t emphasize enough how much I *want* someone to change my mind about this episode. But in spite of some great points people have put forward in its defense, I’m sorry, I’m still not seeing it.
Re: Linderman: yeah, valid point, we know he was against violence and torture, and that the formation of The Company, Vietnam, Arthur and Adam might all have changed his perspective. But between the on- and off-screen canon, you have a shift from homeless and alienated to bicycle-scar-healing free spirit to bookish introvert to disillusioned and despondent to visionary. It doesn’t feel coherent to me. It seems to me that the show and the GNs have almost depicted two separate character arcs. He’s a very complex character, I guess.
Well - the problem is he’s dead. So are Charles, Bob, Kaito, Maury and Victoria. So all backstory has to be from Angela’s perspective. Which means we get these guys fully-formed from her POV. Ideally, they’d do more GN backstory (and I think it’s possible for them to connect the dots re: Linderman), but I think they’re holding that stuff for the main show… or at least for actors to potentially play.
At any rate, it’s cool dude. I post on AICN about Heroes, so it’s refreshing to have someone articulately state why they weren’t keen on an episode. Beats the ‘HEROES SUX 4 LIFE’ rhetoric there.
“Ah, but that goes to show how intriguing the character and the story are. To me, that justifies the focus, either on the show or in the GNs, as you say.”
Yup. Maybe letting things open to speculation is a good thing. Personally, I think they overexplained Angela’s socket thing, which killed it a bit :). That’s a dumb example but still.
Didn’t think of Elle having a synthetic ability, which would explain the heavy experimenting. My point was that on screen and in the GNs, we’ve seen Bob pretty much treat her like garbage and it didn’t look like they were close and there has to be an explaination for that. The fact that she did try to get his approval, even after learning she used to be a Haitian-whammied guinea pig, makes it even sadder.
One thing I really missed is the arcs intersection, which was kinda absent of V3. Seems like a KirbyPlaza-esque reunion is gonna happen in the finale so I won’t complain. “They are all connected”, I just hope not incest-connected… That would be kinda gross. The worst I can think of is Sylar and Claire making immortal babies that would never grow up…
Oh - And you’re not alone, I loved “Cold Wars”
On Building 26… would it be a reference to the characters of Number 2 and Number 6, in Patrick McGoohan’s serial The Prisoner? There are parallels between The Company and The Village, particularly with regard to kidnapping, incarceration, experimentation, secrecy, and escape attempts. Given that The Prisoner is set at the other end of the sixties, and the hints in that series of multiple Villages with varying agendas, the concentration camp could make for a subtle crossover story… except, the Heroes scriptwriters don’t strike me as being in the “subversive surrealness” camp.
Still no airdate for Volume 4 down here, might have to buy the season 3 DVD set instead.
“Angela disappears in a freak storm at a site where hundreds of graves are being unearthed. Everyone panics, especially the sons who worry they’ve lost their mom. And Claire … wants to talk about movie night and her career options. I’m sorry, but come on. She’s had some great moments in this volume, I agree, but there are serious issues with the way she’s being portrayed.”
^ I don’t think that was so much Claire trying to be selfish as the scene was out of place. I didn’t dislike this scene, I just thought they put it in at a completely inappropriate time.
I’m going to rant about Sylar for a minute okay? First off, I think the show has gone over the edge with their apparent Sylar obsession. Shape-shifting was the final marker for me in the Sylar-has-gotten-too-powerful argument. Think about it. He could stay president for decades just waiting for someone to get elected, kill them, and impersonate tham. “But wait!” you say to yourself, “Sylar doesn’t have their life’s knowledge, so it would never work!”. “Don’t worry” says Tim Kring, “We gave Sylar the clairsenistence power from Bridget a long time ago–that way Sylar can keep up this charade for as long as he wants too! And he’s immortal! And he doesn’t even have to kill people to get powers! And he can randomly teleport anywhere he wants to at any given time with no explanation! Isn’t that just wonderful?! Because we know how much you viewers love Sylar to pieces and would be heartbroken to see him go. We even thought of this clever way to keep Sylar in the show if his Zach Quinto’s ‘Star Trek’ career takes off–Adrian Pasdar will play Sylar-posing-as-Nathan for as long as we feel like! It’s a totally new and original idea we didn’t use in an extremely popular Season One episode!”…I’ll stop there. Do you see my point?
Oh, yeah. I’ve been giving that rant since Sylar woke up with Candice 2.0.
At least someone agrees with me. When I read message boards all anyone can say is that “The 5YG scenario sounds so cool.” or “Sylar’s my favorite character — if it weren’t for him I would stop watching the show.” It’s infuriating. Don’t they see Sylar has no suspense anymore? He can get whatever he wants whenever he wants it and there’s virtually nothing that can stop him. The only major thing he’s missing at this point is telepathy. I’d even go so far as to say the writers favor Sylar over certain other characters — well not as much as Claire, but still
With Sylar, perhaps it’s not so much about suspense as it is retention of a recognizable face. Part of the show’s reasoning is probably brand recognition. Casual viewers immediately associate certain characters with the show: the Japanese comic-book nerd, the invulnerable cheerleader, and (sadly, I guess) the mwa-ha-ha villain who enjoys ripping people’s heads open to steal their powers. Perhaps, from TPTBs’ standpoint, losing Sylar would be like jettisoning the parachutes. When they’re losing viewers at such an alarming rate, they probably feel like they have to play to their strengths, and in their minds, Sylar probably seems like one of their strengths because people immediately identify him with the show.
I can understand that reasoning, Otto, but howsabout powering him down a little bit/ They all but neutered Peter and, while I realize that villains are usually straight-up more powerful than heroes, taking a little wind out of Sylar’s sails would make him much more interesting.
The reason this doesn’t bug me as much as everyone else is because I can’t see it sticking. There has to be some kind of caveat available to the writers; Sylar loses his abilities (again), or gets stranded on an island, or gets teleported back to the Dark Ages.
If there isn’t a caveat like that in store for him then Sylar will end up with a monopoly on special abilities, which no one — the characters or the show’s writers — would be able to contain. I can’t believe the show would intentionally increase his power if they didn’t have an idea on how to curb it, so I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
t.c.,
“remember in the beginning of the volume nathan asked peter to be on his side and peter said piss off I think that is why no free pass for peter”
I agree, that’s the most likely explanation. One other possibility is that Nathan didn’t know Peter was limited to only one ability after 3.13, hence “What can you do?” in 3.14. So, if he assumed Peter was still the multi-powered Superman he’d been for the first two-and-a-half volumes, it makes sense that he’d consider Peter the most dangerous and the most urgent priority to capture and incapacitate. Cold-hearted, but in light of Peter exploding in 1.23, perhaps understandable.
I just wonder how sincere Nathan was with that offer of protection. There’s little doubt in my mind that a lot of what Nathan talked about to Tracy (earlier in the Volume) and what he said to HRG was directly related to Peter. There seemed to be a bit of wistfulness when he talked about getting rid of the abilities and living out what was left of their lives. To me, that sounds like he was figuring on going back to how they were, well not exactly, but as close to how it was before their powers manifested. Nathan knows Peter wants to help people, but has (or had) what can be an unstable ability. He knows Peter didn’t want to burn him when he exploded. Heck, a big motivation for Nathan rescuing him at that time was so Peter wouldn’t be responsible for all the death he would have caused. That is something I’m pretty sure Peter would not have been able to live with.
In comparing the two government-run operations, at least in 1961 it looked like the people were “rounded up” voluntarily. There was no kidnapping and drugging to get them to Coyote Sands … unless they were given an offer they couldn’t refuse.
Susan, just a small thought on this:
“‘Lost’ is a better show, but that’s mainly due to having showrunners that actually know what they have to accomplish by the end of the series and how much time they have to do it.”
I agree, but I wonder why that couldn’t be the case here — with or without Fuller — and why Kring & Co have often said there’s no clear endgame for the show. I get what they mean in a broad sense — that there’s no island to escape, no central obstacle to overcome and no single destination to reach. But in a way, as rocky as this season has been at times, I think it captured what the show’s core premise is all about. I think several of the story arcs this season are finale-worthy if they’re well developed and well handled: a new, more compassionate version of The Company; a cure for abilities if people want (or need) to be cured; the potential for medical breakthroughs using research from these abilities. I’ve always been slightly puzzled when TPTBs say there’s no clear finish line, because I think several of the ideas this season point to a very suitable place to stop. So, on that topic, my vote would be for the show to set an end date and craft a story arc with a suitable conclusion.
Re: the Peter/Nathan scene in 3.14: “I just wonder how sincere Nathan was with that offer of protection.”
I wondered the same thing, but my impression was that Nathan planned to grab Peter all along. The meeting at the mansion was recon, because Nathan needed to know what he’d be up against when he and HRG tasered Peter at his apartment. I think that was a classic instance of Nathan’s subterfuge.
On the rest of your post — word. And I’m not sure if it was your intention, but you articulated perfectly why (to me, at least) Nathan’s motives this season have been comprehensible. As much of a jerk as he’s been for the way he went about it, Nathan was trying to give his brother a chance for a life free of superpower drama. To me, that’s the irony and the tragedy of the story in this volume: that Nathan thought he had to capture and incarcerate Peter in order to liberate him.
Ian, re: Linderman:
“Well - the problem is he’s dead. So are Charles, Bob, Kaito, Maury and Victoria. So all backstory has to be from Angela’s perspective. Which means we get these guys fully-formed from her POV.”
I wonder what the solution to this would be, because I can’t believe that’s the only thing standing in the show’s way. I don’t think we necessarily need to be limited to one character’s perspective, or to a dream or a time-travel concept. That was one of the few things that bugged me about “Villains”; that we didn’t need the Mystery Goop premise to provide a framework for the flashback. For Linderman or Adam (among others), I think the flashback would be compelling enough for the show to go with an omniscient narrative without us asking why.
Pas,
“Maybe letting things open to speculation is a good thing.”
Absolutely. I’d say perhaps Bob and Elle’s backstory isn’t compelling enough to justify its own flashback, but it would definitely make for a superb GN, and there’d probably be plenty of ways to make it relevant to the current volume.
Point taken re: Bob’s relationship with Elle. One possible theory: we saw in this episode that Angela’s dreams can predict events 10, 15 or 20 years down the line. Could it be that Angela at some point dreamed what would happen to either The Company or the superpowered population after the current crop of ElderSupers died? She might have seen how essential it is to maintain an organization that monitors and [air quotes] “controls” [/airquotes] the superpowered population. So, could it be that Bob was applying a kind of “tough love” because he expected Elle to be one of The Company’s leading figures once he and the rest of the ElderSupers were dead? He needed to push her as hard as he could because he needed her to be strong enough to survive everything the ElderSupers survived.
Myrystyr, I always feel so bad when you mention not being able to see the show soon enough, but I really appreciate you still taking the time to read and post.
Great theory on the show’s nod to The Prisoner with Building 26. Very possible. I’m starting to wonder if Building 26 might be this volume’s equivalent of the helix symbol; the recurring motif that shows up in random places and brings a weird kind of continuity.
“Absolutely. I’d say perhaps Bob and Elle’s backstory isn’t compelling enough to justify its own flashback, but it would definitely make for a superb GN, and there’d probably be plenty of ways to make it relevant to the current volume.”
I agree absolutely. Elle and Bob always were peripheral characters, which totally justifies the little development they had. I’m probably an exception, but if I’m more thrilled about a dead character than let’s say Mohinder/Matt/Hiro/Claire, that can’t be a good sign considering some of the development those characters had in V3.
Maybe it’s a stupid question to ask, but do anyone feel that there are “too much” writers? There’s gotta be like 15 or something (and it seems Kring brought with him 3/4 of them), and even without discussing their talent (I couldn’t anyway), I can’t help thinking that if they were less, the continuity would go naturally more smoothly. As an example, “Villains” was the first ep written by Fresco (thanks Heroeswiki), which could partly explain the continuity/characterisation issues that were raised. That said I can’t beleive someone isn’t there to worry about continuity.
Finally the writers strike (and what followed): I enjoyed V3, and the concept was interesting. I know the writers probably had other projects going when they learnt Heroes wouldn’t be back after the strike, but I can’t beleive how, with a time gap that big, how “Villains” ended up as a mess at some point. Unfortunately, “Villains” I think could (some would say should) have been way better.
As an example, if anyone here watches “House”, I think the 2 part season finale that followed the strike were the 2 most fantastic episodes they ever did/will ever do. Don’t get me wrong, I’m just talking quality-wise, and I know Heroes and House aren’t really comparable.
Again, I’m probably not the good person to talk about it, since I know nothing about writing and all, those are just some thoughts going in my head.
The problem is that, every flashback episode has been present character led. 110 was set up by Hiro; 117 was Noah’s flashbacks; 208 was Peter’s memory; 308 was Hiro’s vision quest… and so on. I know that we saw things that they couldn’t, but the show was clearly setting up that the events were triggered by something.
Snag with a Linderman flashback is that it has no modern day counterpart. We’d be seeing it, and there wouldn’t be consequence. It’d be ‘wow, that’s cool… but what does it mean?’
Now in saying that - I’d be 100% for an Elders mini-series. Or a flat-out series. It’s just that, within the confines of Heroes, the flashbacks have to be anchored to the present. Devoting an hour to Linderman or Adam is cool - but if it doesn’t correlate with the present then it’s only working on a visceral level.
Pas,
“I’m probably an exception, but if I’m more thrilled about a dead character than let’s say Mohinder/Matt/Hiro/Claire, that can’t be a good sign considering some of the development those characters had in V3.”
You’re definitely not the only one.
Re: continuity: as far as I know the show still has a Script and Continuity Supervisor. It could be that the position dissolved with the recent downsizing, but the job is usually to ensure consistency within an episode (clothes and hair are consistent from one scene to the next, a character who was crying in one scene has bloodshot eyes in the next, etc.), and within the larger story arc (so a character who was angry at another character in one episode would still have issues with them in the next). I would have guessed that job also involves researching specific factual details, but I could be wrong.
Ian,
“Snag with a Linderman flashback is that it has no modern day counterpart.”
Stop me when it gets too absurd or too clichéd: Linderman Jr. finds Dad’s journal, and we flashback to the main events in Linderman’s life; a PA at the Corinthian is tasked with delivering a message to Angela — there’s a selection of prophetic paintings which she needs to see, and they’ll reveal all kinds of details about Linderman’s life (cue flashback); Linderman leaves the Petrelli boys a video that says, “Hey, kids! I’m dead, Papa Petrelli’s dead, but there’s stuff you need to know, so here are a few happy memories I’d like to share with you…”
Point being, there are ways to get at those flashbacks, and I can’t believe TPTBs haven’t at least considered them.
I think they have too many writers and too many characters. But, those aren’t the underlying problems. The underlying problem is that they wrote S1 with a plan and didn’t have the time or, I’m sorry to say it, talent to adapt the plan from S2 on. If they had, they would’ve found a way to balance production goals with fan hopes more coherently. In short, they got caught in their own success. They’re screwed, and we’re screwed. S4, whatever form it takes, will be about damage control and saving face.
Given the quality of most of V4, that assessment seems overly harsh.
What also plays into this is Kring’s original intention of having a new cast each season. The show runner wasn’t prepared to continue on with the cast we came to love and appreciate.
I’d say that S2 (Generations+Exodus) originally had a nice plan. The storytelling was interesting, but the problem was probably the execution (Too much Maya, Hiro in Japan and Peter in Ireland lasting too long).
That said I agree with that problem for “Villains” and maybe I’m repeating myself, but with the huge gap between the end of S2 and the begining of S3, I’m disapointed that they couldn’t come up with a plan for the volume (ie admitting they didn’t know where they were going with Sylar for a while), or at least avoid the little inconsistencies that were pointed out.
I am nicely surprised by the quality of V4 so far. The only real problem I’ve seen so far is Hiro in India (and some disapointment for 1961). Sylar having too much screentime (at the expense of other characters) for arcs going nowhere is just my personal opinion (and some other people’s) and I already had a problem with it in V3. But since most of people seem to love Sylar, if it keeps the show alive, I’ll just live with it.
I’d say the show bleeded as much viewer as it could, and it’s mostly the loyal fan base remaining now and I understand the “keeping Sylar around as a familiar face” problem to keep viewers in. That’s the reason why Claire will probably stay until the end, even if most of the other characters end up dead or on the sidelines.
Since the 2 remainings episodes look promising, it could somehow hover some more viewers, which could give a chance for an hypothetical S4 for a new start. And let’s hope it’s better planned than V3 if it happens.
Quality is relative. Yes, many of the individual eps. have rocked. But, the overall storylines are predicated on Volume 3, despite what they say about self-containment. So, if Volume 3 wasn’t your cup of tea, Volume 4 is a mixed blessing at best.
Oh, here’s something that is happening way too often … important scenes that were CUT from a previous episode, show up in the previously. How often do people pay attention to the previously?
This time it was involving Mohinder and the superintendent.
Mohinder: “My Father started writing the government …”
Superintendent: “It was around the time the nightmares kicked in”
Based on this dialogue, I’d say it’s possible Chandra only got those files after he arrived in New York. TPTB may say coming back to America “triggered” the nightmares which were probably about what happened at Coyote Sands and Chandra started to look into it.
Good point.
Otto - if they could make that a logical extension of the series, excellent. I’d certainly never pass up any Linderman backstory, I just think it needs a connective point beyond ‘we’re taking an hour out. Enjoy.’
Pas,
In terms of narrative potential, S2 was my favorite. But, I’m a sucker for immortals and period flashbacks. That’s one of the things that upset me. They took story elements that should have been automatic wins, imo, and they managed to botch them.
Same here. The potential and the big plan in S2 were definitively there (Generations+Exodus at least). I’d say the problem is how they handled the time spent on the different storylines.
- If they didn’t spend more than the time of an entire episode to Maya crying (twice was enough, then she could just be the taxi for Sylar untill she had more importance);
- If Hiro didn’t stay that long in Feudal Japan and if Peter wasn’t dumb enough to stay 6 episodes in Ireland;
I think it would have felt way less slow paced (which was the main problem, not the storytelling itself).
Ironically, I think Monica and Elle, with much less screentime (more appropriate screentime) than Maya, integrated way better than her in the storytelling, which makes it kind of a kick in the balls that Adam and Elle died, Monica just disapeared and Maya still hanged around longer than both. Ultimately, they did a good job with getting rid of S2 relics…
S2 was hampered by the fact that it was cut in half. Adam and Maya, I’m positive, would have gained more import in the story. And ‘1977′ would have ruled.
Raissa,
“The underlying problem is that they wrote S1 with a plan and didn’t have the time or, I’m sorry to say it, talent to adapt the plan from S2 on.”
I agree, but this volume strikes me as a turning point in that respect. It seems to be following a very carefully thought out plan. That’s why (at least for me) the final two episodes of this season and the early episodes of next season are so promising. It feels as if the majority of the volume has been working towards a coherent end to the current story, but there are also creative springboards for almost every character that could be developed next season. I’d say that whatever “Show Bible” Kring mentioned at the end of Season Two took effect in the back half of this season.
All of that said, a scary thought re: the Sylar debate: I wonder how much of Sylar’s character arc in Volume Three could be removed without affecting his storyline in Volume Four at all. There are abilities he acquired in Volume Three which he never uses, there are characters he killed whose deaths have had no ramifications whatsoever, and the Sylar Petrelli arc has barely been mentioned in this volume (which, at least for my part, yay).
Claire’s regeneration and the lie detector have come in use, and certain details would have needed to be tweaked (someone else might have needed to kill Arthur, for example), but it’s kind of disturbing to think how much screen time the show devoted to the character and how little it resonates with the ongoing story arcs. If you contrast that with Sandra, Angela or Daphne — who had relatively little screen time by comparison and who all managed to do a lot more with that limited screen time — I think it’s hard to explain why the show thought it was such a focal point for the volume. Hopefully the final two episodes of the season will justify that focus, because brand recognition only goes so far.
Susan, re: the Previouslies: I wondered the same thing. Only explanation I could think of is that they’re compiled before the preceding episode has been edited. Which, on a logistical level, is probably unavoidable for the show, but I agree, there’s something misleading — and somehow something sloppy — about supplying unseen footage in a recap that’s intended to refresh our memories. Especially when it’s footage like this, which could have helped to explain some of the plotholes in this episode.
Ian,
“‘1977′ would have ruled.”
There’s not enough “word” I can add to this, but I wonder how “1961″ will affect anyone’s perspective on the way “1977″ would have turned out. I would have been curious to see how “1977″ overcame some of the pitfalls a lot of us felt “1961″ suffered from. One of my issues with this episode was that even at this early stage, it felt like we were joining the story mid-stream. Angela had already manifested her ability; three of the four ElderSupers were already friends, they’d already discovered one another’s abilities and they’d adjusted to the truth about what they could do. I wonder if that sense of missing backstory would have been even more distinct if our earliest glimpse of the characters was 16 years after this. The whole Chandra storyline wouldn’t have been an issue, but there might have been just as many unanswered questions when it came to how the ElderSupers met, which sub-factions had already emerged and what the dynamic between the group was.
If the flashback had also involved even more ElderSupers than we got in “1961,” I wonder whether the lack of screen time afforded to each character would have been even more frustrating for us. I think if “1961″ demonstrated one thing, it’s that the ElderSuper flashbacks are multi-episode arc material.
If Heroes ratings were at S1 level, I could see them pitching an ElderSuper series in its own right. I agree with you that they’d struggle with future one-off eps, but arguably that’s what the GN material SHOULD be for. Or even web-i-sodes. If they got really creative, I’m sure they could even tell the Elder backstory in a six ep mini-series.
I think it’s hard to explain why the show thought it was such a focal point for the volume. Hopefully the final two episodes of the season will justify that focus, because brand recognition only goes so far.
That is a scary thought. Of course, also yay. So, I’m torn.
i didnt think charles was using a “parkman whammy”, i figured it was more like eden mccain’s “do what i say” ability. is that the same thing? and was linderman able to heal other people’s injuries? or was he able to reanimate the dead?