Tonight’s episode of ‘Heroes,’ titled “Parasite” was chock full of twists and turns… and guns! It seemed like almost everyone was either pointing a gun at someone or being pointed at by one. All of the build-up episodes from earlier this season are finally paying off as the characters collide. Unfortunately it looks like we’ll have to wait until the end of April to see where all of this is going.
Suresh finally caught on to Sylar’s game. Unbeknownst to Sylar (and the viewers), Mohinder found out that Zane’s body was found in his apartment. Using drugged tea, Mohinder incapacitated Sylar and hooked him up to an IV, which delivered a drug that numbed the part of his brain that allows him to control his powers. When Sylar woke up, Mohinder pointed a gun at him. Sylar started talking about Mohinder’s father and how they formed a father/son relationship when they were working together. This was enough to keep Mohinder from pulling the trigger, at least for the time being.
Later, he tells Sylar that the reason he’s keeping him alive is so that he can get fluid from his spine to do some more tests. He extracts the fluid and it proves useful in helping him work on his formula. Unfortunately for Mohinder, while he was working, Sylar managed to stop his IV and regain his powers. When Mohinder goes to shoot Sylar, the bullet freezes in mid-air. Sylar gets up and moves towards Mohinder. Later, Peter arrives at Mohinder’s apartment to find him bloody and pinned to the ceiling. Sylar re-introduces himself to Peter, pins him against the wall and slices his head open. The last thing we see is that annoying lock of Peter’s hair fall to the floor.
HRG remembers Claire but has no memory of anything that happened after he left his house. Thompson questions him about this but its no use. Matt, who is still held captive a Primatech confirms that HRG is telling the truth. Mr. Bennet returns home and prepares to leave to find Claire. His wife turns some music on so they can’t be heard and tells him that before he had his memory wiped he told her everything. She shows him a note that he wrote to himself telling him not to look for Claire. He’s relieved to finally be able to talk to his wife about things and to learn that, though Claire is gone, she’s probably safe as long as Primatech doesn’t find out that they helped her escape.
HRG gets a call from Isaac about Simone. Peter told Nathan what happened and Nathan called the cops. HRG and fellow Primatech employee, Candice, show up just in time to convince the cops that Simone is alive and well. Candice has the Mystique-like ability of taking on the form of other people. When the cops see a perfectly healthy Simone, they leave. HRG tells Isaac that they’ll clean up the Simone-mess and as far as anyone else knows, she is off traveling Europe indefinitely. After they leave, Isaac becomes so distraught at the loss of the woman he loved (and killed) that he dives into his heroine stash. Fueled by the drug, he paints furiously. When his eyes clear he sees that he’s painted himself. In the painting, he’s lying on the ground, a look of shock on his face with the top of his head sliced off. This is an image that is familiar to us as it is how Hiro found Isaac when he first jumped to New York City (during his brief trip to the future in the first episode).
When HRG returns to the motel where he and his wife are living, he goes to talk to his wife again. He tells her how glad he is that he can finally be honest with her and that she’s not mad at him for all of the lies. Before they can finish their conversation, the phone rings and Mrs. Bennet picks up. She talks briefly and says they should do it now. Just then, Thompson shows up. Mrs. Bennet transforms into Candice (no idea where the real Mrs. Bennet went). Looks like HRG’s been found out though it doesn’t change much as he still doesn’t know where Claire or the Haitian went.
Nathan has been working with the FBI to take down Linderman. Linderman invited him out to Vegas for “business.” Nathan arrives in Vegas and runs into Hiro, who is there trying to find a way in to get his sword. Nathan convinces the Casino security guys to let Hiro in to deliver a painting. Hiro goes off to the curator’s lab.
After delivering the torn and scotch-taped painting to the man, he asks him to go get the delivery slip. When he’s gone, Hiro searches the database for his sword. He finds it the computer and a drawer high up on the wall pops open. Hiro pushes the ladder over to get it but the curator returns and pushes the security alarm. Luckily for Hiro, Ando has either been working at the Casino as a security guard or more likely, just hanging around the place, dressed as one. He is the first guard to arrive and knocks the curator out with a tazer. Hiro gets the sword down and teleports himself and Ando away just as the rest of the guards show up.
When they reappear, they’re in New York City. They look around and see a demolished city. Hiro realizes that they are in the future and that he failed to stop the explosion.
Meanwhile, Jessica, who is still pretending to be Nikki in front of Micah and D.L., heads to Linderman’s casino to help him deal with Nathan. She finds the FBI men who were listening to Nathan’s wire and kills them. She tracks down Nathan in his room but by then, it seems Nikki was able to take over. She tells Nathan that the FBI guys are dead and that he has to knock her out and then go kill Linderman. A bit confused, Nathan complies and punches Nikki/Jessica in the head.
He finds Linderman in the casino kitchen. Linderman is a white-haired, bearded old man who likes to cook. For a man with a reputation of crime, murder and manipulation, he comes off as rather friendly. He prattles on about food and people liking to eat when they’re happy. Eventually Nathan makes his move and pulls his gun on him. Linderman remains calm and tells Nathan that if he shoots him, he’ll also die too (assuming from the security guards that would burst through the door once the gunshot was heard). He then goes on to tell him about how he knows he can fly, knows about Peter and about Claire. Linderman, whose name has gotten dropped by half the characters in the show at one point or another, knows about everyone and everything, it seems. He then goes on to calmly (I need to stress that because at no point did Linderman ever seem scared of Nathan) tell him that he’ll see to it that he wins the election and in two years, he could be in the White House with a shot at the presidency.
Nathan doesn’t shoot him. He lets Linderman walk away.
Claire and the Haitian are about to head out of the country. She’s sad because she realizes she’s leaving her whole world behind and now has to assume the identity of a Canadian named Vivian. She decides to ditch the Haitian at the airport and head to New York to find Peter, the only person she feels she can really trust. When she arrives at the Petrelli house, her paternal grandmother and the Haitian, who managed to beat Claire to her destination, greet her. Mrs. Petrelli wastes no time introducing herself to Claire and telling her that she’s just as stubborn as her father.
So much happened in this episode. Going from last weeks episode, which focused entirely on the Bennet household, to this one which was like a whirlwind or characters and storylines, I can’t decide which episode was better. On one hand, getting to see what is going on with everyone and enjoying the overall plot progression is very exciting. And on the other hand, I sort of liked last week’s episode because it took time away from everything to dig a bit deeper into the mind of just one character.
So do you think Peter will die? With his ability to heal himself, we can hope that he will be able to get it together and use his powers before Sylar has the chance to remove his brain. Almost all of the main characters ended up in New York by the end of the episode and the promos for the new episodes (which wont start up again until the end of April) strongly suggested that the save-the-world portion of the season would be upon us then. Hopefully Hiro, with his powers now fully restored due to obtaining the sword, will be able to make up for lost time (no pun intended there) by putting his abilities to good use.
