As far as the other episodes this season, I cannot say I would pick this over many others. For starters, there’s something about Vanessa that kind of bothers me. All in all, I am alright with their decision to boot her out. Although, I thought it was a little… odd to begin with her and Samuel’s storyline, what with milkshakes and all, I thought it was a nice, soft kind of approach, especially on Samuel’s part. Of course, he just tends to give off those creepy vibes as a person. It’s natural, so I thought it was a near fail when it came to him being all cute and boyish. Still, I was fairly alright with the way they went along. And the ending kind of defined Samuel as a villain, which started out questionable at the beginning of the volume, and made it’s way to be pretty clear. So, one down!

Second, Claire and Sylar. Um, being 100% honest, I thought they could have made that a little more… I don’t know, solid. I thought with the promo the week before “Oh, great, we’re taking this approach? HONESTLY?!” But as I was watching I kind of thought “Hmm, yeah, I guess they could squeeze in some of this.” As it progressed, and after the BIG MOMENT, they just dropped it. Of course, they kept the overall theme, until the very end. Like you said, he does need to decide what he wants instead of keep changing it up. That could get confusing. I thought it would have been better for them to have a stronger moment. Not “OMG let’s make out!” kind of thing, but I would have liked something else, perhaps for shock value.

Finally, the Hiro-thing. Now, during the commercial for the episode, I thought they could go two ways: screw it up and make it look bad, or make it a very interesting subplot. I LOVED having Adam back. Such a humorous man, it was satisfying to seem him once again. I was not much of a fan of Hiro’s dad, though, but I found it quite interesting with the way they played it out. I mean, I would have liked to see Charlie, but I understand that she was… gone. Part of that is probably due to the fact that Jayma Mays is busy with Glee, and she let go of Heroes. All the same, Adam and Sylar in one room equals a very nicely done moment. I wish they could have done more together in earlier volumes.

Overall, not the most disappointing I had ever seen. If I had been writing this, I would change a few things.

I don’t think Sylar would have killed people so easily if he knew this information before. We know he’s slaughtered at least a hundred people. One reason he’s been able to do that all this time is because he never cared about anyone. This thought of dying alone changes things.

The idea makes sense now, but it doesn’t apply to everything that happened in the past.

Plus, Sylar being unable to kill Samuel because of this fear really doesn’t make any sense. Sylar has had emotional lows before and they’ve never affected his abilities. And even if they did, he doesn’t have close ties with Samuel. I could see this happening with Lydia, maybe. But his powers just halting when it’s not even someone he cares about? Doesn’t add up.

The “Hunger” *could* have been a good idea, but they overlooked it too fast for me to consider it.
Pros :
- It was also briefly mentionned by Sylar himself on a message he left to Chandra. “I can’t fight it; I DON’T WANT TO” (emphasis on the “I don’t want to”).
- Peter killed IABD-Nathan and almost Angela because of it.
Cons :
- Arthur was immuned to it when he took Peter’s abilities ?
- Apparently meeting Elle was enough for Sylar to fight it (?) but it resurfaces because of his jalousy (?) or when he sees emoTrevor’s lame ability (?)
- Sylathan/Amnesiac-Sylar/Neo-Sylar/emoSylar apparently don’t have to deal with it (?)
Are we supposed to consider the Hunger serisously after all ?

Speaking as a Peter fan, don’t even get me started on Sylar being any kind of Empath, technically or not.

As for what Claire saw I’ve wondered if Samuel was nearby to manipulate that.