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hermionesviolinWeeks ago, Kring talked to Entertainment Weekly about what they've done wrong in Heroes S2, and I forgot to post about this bit I didn't like.
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just_katarin comments on the Maya and Alejandro storyline: "here is the story being presented to us: The Latinos are literally a plague and they want to come to the United States. The only way to save the United States from being infected by the plague of the Latinos is to kill them."
My geography is shameful; it never occurred to me that their flight path made no sense geographically.
I went on to HeroesWiki.com and compiled a travel-line:
1. "Four Months Ago..." (2.08 ) places their initial power activation at Alejandro's wedding in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
1a. Maya flees and Alejandro finds her at a convent in Zulia, Venezuela -- which, okay, is directly south of DR (DR being part of an island, btw) across the Caribbean.
2. The graphic novel (#51) places them hitching somewhere, terminating in San Cristóbal, Honduras.
2a. To get between Venezuela and Honduras, they would have had to pass through: Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua.
3. "Lizards" (2.02) places them in Guatemala near the Mexican border.
4. They are then "somewhere in Mexico" for a lot of episodes.
4a. And cross the border into Texas ("The Line" -- 2.06).
comics #57: Team Building Exercise
"Them" should be abbreviated " 'em" not " 'um." *rolls eyes*
I like the continuity of having Ivan mention onscreen his and Noah's first case ("the liquid man") and then getting the actual story in the comics.
I'll grant Noah's hands-on-ness, but "We wouldn't want them having all the fun"?
voiceover:
"When you're trying to capture a cat, you need a hint of subtlety, lest you scare the cat into realizing it's in fact, a lion.
When dealing with powers, any number of things can go wrong. This is why you need to control the environment as much as possible.
["Your job, Marteen, is to take away his exit options."]
Most of these people aren't exactly trained. Unsure of exactly what they are capable of.
They revert back to normal human responses. Someone fires a gun at you, you run the opposite way.
Even if your body can mimic the density of water -- splashing someone out of fear and reacting to a ball of fire or a hail of bullets is a different story.
These types of situations are invaluable for us.
We learn about their inability to see themselves as something more than human. For the most part, these anomalies fear themselves as much as they fear us.
So when they are given the choice of fight or flight, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, we know they choose flight.
Knowing this, we can set the cage so they fly right into it."
The "revert back to normal human responses" also helps explain Peter's behavior when Elle's after him the first time ("Four Months Ago"). I've seen various commentaries asking why he didn't turn invisible and/or fly, for example, and not gonna lie, it didn't even occur to me for him to do so -- apparently both Peter and I "revert back to normal human responses."
#58: Quarantine
Meh. Are we gonna meet Howard Lemay in the tv show?
On Sunday, I was noticing the signs in the space CWM uses (from the group that uses the space before us) and how much they talk about "Shanti," which someone (Trevanna?) said probably meant "peace" or something. Which is a perfectly legit name for a kid, and obviously the virus just gets named for the first known carrier, but it is a little weird/interesting to have that as the name of this virus that nearly obliterates humanity.
#59: Man on Fire
Meh. Someone on![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
bobthehaitian commented, "We'll killed him off, but we still want to use him for the tearjerker factor!"
Lyle: "What are you talking about, Claire? Dad does not abduct people."
I hadn't realized until that moment that while I've been thinking of Mr. Bennet as being honest with his family since... I'm not sure exactly what point last season since it all blurs somewhat, but some point anyway... but it wouldn't really make sense for him to tell Lyle the whole truth about what he used to do.
Claire: "No matter what I do, this is never gonna end, is it, Dad? We'll always be running."
I was alternately creeped out and validating when Noah picked up the duct tape. It didn't actually occur to me until "Mr. Bishop from the Board of Education, about the Debbie incident" showed up that, duh, we saw early in S1 that both Mohinder and Sylar were tracking "specials" through newspaper clippings so of course The Company would be doing the same. So I actually thought he was overreacting in insisting they leave, but I felt that if they really were in imminent danger from the Company (as he seemed to believe they were) then he was justified in overriding Claire because he was saving her from a far worse danger than being tied up and dumped in the backseat of the family car -- which, okay, sounds really awful when I actually say it, but on a macro level... being abducted by her own family is far less horrendous than being abducted by The Company, right?
I like that "Cautionary Tales" written on a standing stone in a graveyard.
Ando: "Now go back up there. Honor your father."
Hiro: "No. To eulogize him is to admit he is gone. And I'm not ready to let him go."
Hiro's walking off the podium threw me because I'm used to thinking of Japanese culture as one where people do what is expected of them, what is right and proper; so I'm not sure if I'm being racist in my simplistic understanding of Japanese culture or if the writers are having Hiro act excessively American-ish.
Is there a reason Hiro comes back to our present moment? (I mean an in-story reason, obviously.) Is the idea that a comparable number of weeks passed in ancient Japan? Though I still don't really understand how that would work. Does your body say, "I've aged four months, thus we will return to your timeline four months after we left"? Wouldn't the default be to return to the exact moment at which you left? I understand why the writers do it this way, but it's still annoying.
Angela: "So you think one of us sent these?"
Kaito: "Yes. For the pain we have caused. The people we have killed. There is no end to our suffering."
Does that sticky note name "Bob" as "Robert Bishop"? [Later in the episode confirms yes.]
Matt: "How'd you sleep?"
Molly (brightly): "On my pillow!"
Oh, children :)
Dude, Matt, the mistake was in pushing Molly to find the one guy she was truly scared of. There's no foreseeable problem with letting her find the remaining people in the picture. You're overcompensating due to your guilt.
Matt to Molly: "Help me put the Nightmare Man behind us, so we can get back to normal."
Dear show, why you gotta keep making Matt creepy? His reading of his wife's mind incessantly after his powers first manifested was creepy enough, now you got him mind-controlling Molly? I know the first time he didn't mean to and the second time he was just testing to make sure his interpretation of what had happened was correct, but still... CREEPY. At least he looks creeped out at the breakfast table, thinking about what he's done and its implications.
Matt [thinking]: "Just do it, okay? For me?"
Molly [aloud] "Okay, I'll do it for you. Back to normal."
Was that inflection intentional? 'Cause that sounds like she's being his proxy -- like "Okay, you can't do thus-and-such, so I'll do it for you" (which, okay, as the episode progresses we do see him using his powers like whoa).
+
I liked Claire writing "sorry" in stones on West's flight path to school.
I'm amused that he thinks she's a Company spy given that like half of fandom had/has been thinking he was a Company spy.
Claire: "But I'm not going with them. I'm staying here because of you."
Except that West really doesn't deserve that at all. I understand her desire to not up and leave again, but because of West? Especially since last episode we saw him totally rejecting her (understandably, given that he'd just found out that the man who abducted him was her father and she knew this and she didn't tell him).
Matt on hold with the FBI: "Some of that interdepartmental cooperation I've been hearing so much about on the news."
Matt: "Some kind of organization, back in the 70s."
boss cop: "Like a disco?"
What kind of stupid line is that?
[I started watching in realtime, but then I got an important phonecall, so I finished online the next day. They have closed-captioning now. As a sidebar. Interesting.] http://www.nbc.com/Heroes/video/episodes.shtml
Props to Noah for actually telling Sandra the truth about his history with West.
Sandra: "Honestly, I don't know why I'm not getting in the car with the kids and leaving you."
Sandra [on the painting of HRG "dead"]: "Is that...?"
Noah: "Claire's right. It's all about me."
Sandra: "The man with the gun -- is he gonna shoot you?"
Noah: "Believe me, I've considered it. But Suresh is one of the good guys."
Sandra: "And you think West has something to do with it?"
Noah: "I don't know, but he's the reason Claire won't leave town, and I need to talk to him."
[me, speculating: So Elle kills Noah long-distance and Claire huddles with West in grief?]
Noah: "It's all falling apart. I really need you now." [holds her hand]
Sandra [pulls her hand away] "I'm gonna... take Lyle to school."
Noah to Mohinder: "Is Molly well enough to use her ability? I need to track down a boy, and I don't have time to run all over Costa Verde."
[me: So I suppose looking at the school he attends given that it's a schoolday would be too easy?]
Elle: "Do you know what happens when you change your plans midstream?"
Mohinder: "No."
Elle: "Neither do I. Because we don't do it."
Mohinder: "Let me put it this way. We do it my way, or I blow the whistle right now. Tell Bennet everything."
Mohinder is asked whether he doesn't think Noah would... I forget what exactly, probably turn on him like he did his mentor Ivan... and Mohinder says no.
Elle: "He's adorable. Can I keep him?"
This is gonna get old if it keeps up, but in this scene I can see Elle being all "oh, your optimistic naivete is adorable."
Kaito (to Angela): "I sought redemption, by helping Hiro fulfill his destiny to save the world. How did you help your son?"
Which, super ouch, since she believes one son dead, and her other son's turned into an alcoholic (Nathan is out of the hospital at this point, right? -- oh, he must be, since Adam's now at large and he escapes with Peter, during which he heals Nathan).
Kaito (to Hiro): "We have the power of gods. That does not mean we can play God."
me: "We"!!! We still have no idea what Kaito's power is (was), but I love the reminder that he does (did) have one.
Hiro: "No. You are being stubborn."
Kaito: "And you are letting your emotions cloud your judgement."
Hiro: "You felt this way once. I was young, but I remember. In fact... I will show you."
Noah: "I can't just wait around. He goes to school with Claire -- I know where that is."
Wow, was West hovering waiting for HRG to leave the house? I'm impressed. And I wasn't expecting West to go after him like that at all, so I was generally impressed that they pulled off a surprise (okay, mildly so at least) plot twist like that.
West: "You know I don't have super-strength. I can't hold on forever."
Noah: "She never even mentioned you existed. You hear me? She lied to me. So I'm guessing she thinks you're pretty important."
I liked that Bennet found out Mohinder had turned on him with the location lie (Mohinder says Verbeena and Palm, and we pan to the street signs of Ocean and 4th where Noah and West are).
Bob calls Claire "Miss Bennet" and she bolts.
Mohinder: "Have you killed many people?"
Elle: "How is that any of your business?"
Mohinder: "I guess it's not."
Mohinder: "I'm here to ask you to give us Claire. We need her blood."
Noah: "You've gone native."
[me: That's just such a squicky phrase.]
Noah: "Are you kidding me?"
Mohinder: "She'll be returned to you safe, unharmed. You have my word."
Noah: "No offense, Mohinder, but your word isn't what it used to be."
Mohinder: "Claire is very important to the work we're doing. She can save lives."
Noah: " 'The work we're doing.' You sound like me ten years ago."
[coming on the heels of Sandra's distrust of Noah and the things he did with the Company]
Noah: "This is what they do; they indoctrinate you. I couldn't have been more clear about this when you agreed to go in."
Mohinder: "They're not who you think they are."
Noah: "They are not getting Claire."
Mohinder: "I have to do what I think is right. Start driving. [cocks gun] Please."
Claire sees the painting! Score!
Claire: "Dad was right, I messed up and they found us. We gotta go."
Sandra: "Go where?"
I had a moment of terror that The Company somehow had The Haitian working for them again and had mindwiped Mrs. Bennet.
Noah: "So who's your partner?"
Mohinder: "Excuse me?"
Noah: "Company policy. One of them, one of us. So who's yours?"
West swoop-attacks Elle! I did not see that coming at all.
Noah: "You lie to me, betray me, come after my daughter. How did you think it was gonna end?"
West: "Mr. Butler... what are you doing?"
[closes trigger]
Noah: "No one's taking my little girl!" [kicks Mohinder]
Okay, it does ring a little false that West's all shocked that HRG's a willing murderer given that he knows HRG abducted him and experimented on him -- and Claire tells Mr. Bennet that when West saw him, she'd never seen anyone look so terrified. But I do like that West is horrified and this restrains Mr. Bennet. Though yes I'm moral-grey ends-justify-means girl, so I do actually support the idea that there are gonna be things that look bad and you'd rather people not know about but which are worth doing anyway, but still.
Noah: "It's okay. We're gonna get her back. [...] I've got collateral."
Sandra: "What do you mean, collateral?"
West: "Hi, Mrs. Butler! It's good to, uh, see you again."
Sandra: [watches West carry a blonde girl]
Noah: "Did you pack Mr. Muggles' doggy bath?"
Yes, I admit I was somewhat charmed by West there.
Noah: "I need to speak to your father."
Elle: "What do you think this is, my first day?"
Does she not notice the metal, and the water? She must know how electricity works (if for no other reason than that it makes sense to learn how one's own power works).
Noah: "Stings like a bitch, doesn't it?"
I know Elle's a sociopathic sadist, but I still feel a little uncomfortable that I feel like I'm supposed to cheer for her getting electrocuted.
+
Noah: "I know all about your ability, Elle."
Elle: "You don't know anything about me."
[me: He said he knows how your ability works, not that he's an expert in your psychological background.]
Noah: "I was there. When your father first brought you in. You were a normal girl. Unicorns and rainbows. And then they started the testing. The human brain isn't built to take that much electricity. [deadpan] You poor girl."
Elle: "My father would never let that happen."
Noah: "Your father was leading the charge."
Elle: "I don't remember any of that."
[me: Well, duh.]
Noah: "No memories, huh? Kind of like someone took them away? Why do you think I never let the Company anywhere near Claire? I didn't want her to become you. Now I need to talk to your father. To arrange a trade. Claire for you."
Elle: "What if he doesn't want to make a deal?"
Noah: "You'd be surprised what a father would do for his daughter."
[me: This is kind of ironic, that he's just insisted to her that her father "led the charge" to perform painful experiments on her -- which is interesting given that another poster reminded me that Bob actually is a "special," we just never see any of that after that one meeting with Mohinder -- and then wiped her memories of it, and now he's saying yes he'll put getting her back over bigger Company plans.]
Bob: "Elle, where are you?"
Noah: "You touch my daughter and I'll kill yours. And then kill you."
Bob: "Noah?"
Noah: "We'll be at the Imperial Beach Parking Lot in two hours."
Claire tells Bob they can take her blood, and I recall previous LJ discussions about how we saw back in S1 Claire's desire to use her ability to help people.
Claire: "Let me talk to him. He'll listen to me."
Bob: "He's not big on the listening. And once he sets his mind, it's stuck. Which is why we gave you to him in the first place. We thought he would be loyal to the end. Turns out we were right."
Dude, Hiro, what does bringing your father back to your mother's funeral prove? In theory you could go back in time and prevent lots of people's deaths, but that doesn't mean you should. I thought you learned that from Charlie -- you told Ando there were some things too big for you to control or something.
Hiro: "Your father paints his own name red as a promise to join your mother. It will stay that way until he does."
[...]
young-Hiro: "No! I must stop it. I am a hero!"
Hiro: "Some things even Takezo Kensei cannot change."
[...]
young-Hiro: "But I must honor him."
Hiro: "Listen to him. Learn from his lessons. Strength, responsibility, and justice."
I really liked that Hiro came to realize he was being "childish" but that also we see the emotion in Kaito's eyes and I for one got the impression that he was realizing just how painful his death would be for Hiro and sympathizing with his desire to avert this.
Noah: "It's too dangerous."
West: "Exactly! And I'm the quickest way to get Claire out of there."
Sandra: "They say girls tend to find boys just like their dads."
Noah: "Because he can fly?"
Sandra: "No, her real dad."
[me: Yeah, I clearly keep forgetting that Nathan's actually her biological father.]
Sandra: "You. All he cares about is protecting her."
Noah [hands Sandra the gun] "If anything happens..."
Sandra: "Nothing is gonna happen, except you bringing Claire back."
And Hiro and Kaito teleport back to the roof at nighttime.
Hiro: "Please give my love to Mother."
me: *woobies*
Hiro doesn't stay to see who kills his dad?
The killer shows up, Ando returns, and freeze.
Hiro: "You were right, Ando. I can't save him. But I can learn who killed him."
Oh man, I should have totally guessed Adam since they purposely had Matt mention that it was all the people in the photo plus some guy named Adam Monroe.
+
Angela: "I knew your father when he could do it. I'm even less impressed with you."
Does she have a power that helps her block mindreading, or did she just get very very practiced at it? I imagine the latter (especially since Angela Petrelli would want to minimize all vulnerabilities.).
Angela: "The truth is that our generation mortgaged our souls to protect yours. Show a little respect for that. Get over your Daddy issues and leave us be."
Matt: "But Adam is still out there, and this woman is on his list."
Angela: "All she wants is to be left alone. I made her a promise. If you take this secret from me, you're not just like your father [delicately wipes her bloody nose, extending her bloody fingers toward him as she rests her hand on the table] you are him."
LOVE the blood imagery.
Noah and West and Elle are out on the beach and Elle's just tied up, but she's dressed regular, she could totally shock them right now. I get that they can't exactly truss her around in a bathtub, but wouldn't they at least want to keep her soaking wet? She doesn't exactly seem the type to say, "Okay, we made a deal, I'll stick to my end wholly." There's no risk to her if she kills Noah and West. Bob wants Noah dead anyway, and they can draw Claire's blood without her consent (Elle can electrocute her into unconsciousness).
Hehe, father-boyfriend bonding over first cars.
Noah: "No matter what I do, we'll always be running. But if you die, Bob, the Company dies with you."
Mohinder shoots Noah in the eye, and West flies away with Claire, like he promised her father.
But dude, there's no way you killed off Jack Coleman.
+
Claire: "The last thing I really said to my dad was, 'I hate you.' "
West: "You didn't mean it."
Claire: "No, I did. I keep playing it over and over, how I'll never get a chance to take it back."
When this time Hiro said "I refuse to eulogize him, to eulogize him is to admit that he is gone," I knew he was gonna do the "he lives on" thing.
Interesting sequence of moments as we listen to the "eulogy."
Highlights:
Elle in the car looks like she distrusts her father.
Matt got the name of the woman in the photo: Victoria Pratt
Hiro: "Every hand I extend in kindness is his hand. And every blow that I strike for justice is his fist."
Eric had mentioned that no one really dies, which bothered him 'cause the promos had been all "zomg someone dies," so I totally called that Noah got healed with Claire's blood.
***
I became really fond of West, and I suspect that other people are right that we're supposed to think of him as a good guy now and let that erase all his creepy stalkeriness and mistreatment of Claire and suchlike from his early episodes, which is definitely problematic. I want to like him, though. I don't like disliking the people I'm watching on my tv screen (or movie screen or reading in a book).
I am impressed at how much honesty there was.
I really really do not like this turning Matt into a dark guy. (Other people have mentioned that in last season's future-jump we saw him working for Homeland Security, and not only did he do that creepy stuff with his wife but he took the bag of diamonds from the crime scene, so we've seen plenty of evidence of less-than-saintliness on his part. And I do think he really believes he's big picture helping, though I also don't think the other cop and Angela are wrong to point out his daddy issues. -- Sidebar: He locked his father inside his father's own mind, so the guy's eventually gonna starve to death, no? 'Cause he's basically in a coma. I don't think Matt thought of this, and I doubt the writers have or will either, but it just occurred to me.)
oyceter has rage, pointing out stuff I hadn't noticed like "Two women/girls in bondage being traded off by groups of white men." -- I mean, obviously I watched that scene, but I hadn't thought about it quite that way before. I think in part I feel like we've been shown Elle and Claire in active roles (even if whether they have "agency" is arguably suspect), so I didn't immediately see them as being victimized. I felt like the issue was protecting your family.
I left this episode feeling, on the whole, strongly positive about the episode, but the criticisms other people raise bear thinking about as well.
YOUNG LOVE STINKS Kring regrets sticking Claire (Hayden Panettiere) with a super-dud boyfriend and forcing Hiro to moon over a cutesy princess. ''I've seen more convincing romances on TV,'' he admits. ''In retrospect, I don't think romance is a natural fit for us.''I'm offended by Yaeko being posited as "cutesy."
just_katarin comments on the Maya and Alejandro storyline: "here is the story being presented to us: The Latinos are literally a plague and they want to come to the United States. The only way to save the United States from being infected by the plague of the Latinos is to kill them."My geography is shameful; it never occurred to me that their flight path made no sense geographically.
I went on to HeroesWiki.com and compiled a travel-line:
1. "Four Months Ago..." (2.08 ) places their initial power activation at Alejandro's wedding in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
1a. Maya flees and Alejandro finds her at a convent in Zulia, Venezuela -- which, okay, is directly south of DR (DR being part of an island, btw) across the Caribbean.
2. The graphic novel (#51) places them hitching somewhere, terminating in San Cristóbal, Honduras.
2a. To get between Venezuela and Honduras, they would have had to pass through: Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua.
3. "Lizards" (2.02) places them in Guatemala near the Mexican border.
4. They are then "somewhere in Mexico" for a lot of episodes.
4a. And cross the border into Texas ("The Line" -- 2.06).
comics #57: Team Building Exercise
"Them" should be abbreviated " 'em" not " 'um." *rolls eyes*
I like the continuity of having Ivan mention onscreen his and Noah's first case ("the liquid man") and then getting the actual story in the comics.
I'll grant Noah's hands-on-ness, but "We wouldn't want them having all the fun"?
voiceover:
"When you're trying to capture a cat, you need a hint of subtlety, lest you scare the cat into realizing it's in fact, a lion.
When dealing with powers, any number of things can go wrong. This is why you need to control the environment as much as possible.
["Your job, Marteen, is to take away his exit options."]
Most of these people aren't exactly trained. Unsure of exactly what they are capable of.
They revert back to normal human responses. Someone fires a gun at you, you run the opposite way.
Even if your body can mimic the density of water -- splashing someone out of fear and reacting to a ball of fire or a hail of bullets is a different story.
These types of situations are invaluable for us.
We learn about their inability to see themselves as something more than human. For the most part, these anomalies fear themselves as much as they fear us.
So when they are given the choice of fight or flight, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, we know they choose flight.
Knowing this, we can set the cage so they fly right into it."
The "revert back to normal human responses" also helps explain Peter's behavior when Elle's after him the first time ("Four Months Ago"). I've seen various commentaries asking why he didn't turn invisible and/or fly, for example, and not gonna lie, it didn't even occur to me for him to do so -- apparently both Peter and I "revert back to normal human responses."
#58: Quarantine
Meh. Are we gonna meet Howard Lemay in the tv show?
On Sunday, I was noticing the signs in the space CWM uses (from the group that uses the space before us) and how much they talk about "Shanti," which someone (Trevanna?) said probably meant "peace" or something. Which is a perfectly legit name for a kid, and obviously the virus just gets named for the first known carrier, but it is a little weird/interesting to have that as the name of this virus that nearly obliterates humanity.
#59: Man on Fire
Meh. Someone on
bobthehaitian commented, "We'll killed him off, but we still want to use him for the tearjerker factor!"Lyle: "What are you talking about, Claire? Dad does not abduct people."
I hadn't realized until that moment that while I've been thinking of Mr. Bennet as being honest with his family since... I'm not sure exactly what point last season since it all blurs somewhat, but some point anyway... but it wouldn't really make sense for him to tell Lyle the whole truth about what he used to do.
Claire: "No matter what I do, this is never gonna end, is it, Dad? We'll always be running."
I was alternately creeped out and validating when Noah picked up the duct tape. It didn't actually occur to me until "Mr. Bishop from the Board of Education, about the Debbie incident" showed up that, duh, we saw early in S1 that both Mohinder and Sylar were tracking "specials" through newspaper clippings so of course The Company would be doing the same. So I actually thought he was overreacting in insisting they leave, but I felt that if they really were in imminent danger from the Company (as he seemed to believe they were) then he was justified in overriding Claire because he was saving her from a far worse danger than being tied up and dumped in the backseat of the family car -- which, okay, sounds really awful when I actually say it, but on a macro level... being abducted by her own family is far less horrendous than being abducted by The Company, right?
I like that "Cautionary Tales" written on a standing stone in a graveyard.
Ando: "Now go back up there. Honor your father."
Hiro: "No. To eulogize him is to admit he is gone. And I'm not ready to let him go."
Hiro's walking off the podium threw me because I'm used to thinking of Japanese culture as one where people do what is expected of them, what is right and proper; so I'm not sure if I'm being racist in my simplistic understanding of Japanese culture or if the writers are having Hiro act excessively American-ish.
Is there a reason Hiro comes back to our present moment? (I mean an in-story reason, obviously.) Is the idea that a comparable number of weeks passed in ancient Japan? Though I still don't really understand how that would work. Does your body say, "I've aged four months, thus we will return to your timeline four months after we left"? Wouldn't the default be to return to the exact moment at which you left? I understand why the writers do it this way, but it's still annoying.
Angela: "So you think one of us sent these?"
Kaito: "Yes. For the pain we have caused. The people we have killed. There is no end to our suffering."
Does that sticky note name "Bob" as "Robert Bishop"? [Later in the episode confirms yes.]
Matt: "How'd you sleep?"
Molly (brightly): "On my pillow!"
Oh, children :)
Dude, Matt, the mistake was in pushing Molly to find the one guy she was truly scared of. There's no foreseeable problem with letting her find the remaining people in the picture. You're overcompensating due to your guilt.
Matt to Molly: "Help me put the Nightmare Man behind us, so we can get back to normal."
Dear show, why you gotta keep making Matt creepy? His reading of his wife's mind incessantly after his powers first manifested was creepy enough, now you got him mind-controlling Molly? I know the first time he didn't mean to and the second time he was just testing to make sure his interpretation of what had happened was correct, but still... CREEPY. At least he looks creeped out at the breakfast table, thinking about what he's done and its implications.
Matt [thinking]: "Just do it, okay? For me?"
Molly [aloud] "Okay, I'll do it for you. Back to normal."
Was that inflection intentional? 'Cause that sounds like she's being his proxy -- like "Okay, you can't do thus-and-such, so I'll do it for you" (which, okay, as the episode progresses we do see him using his powers like whoa).
+
I liked Claire writing "sorry" in stones on West's flight path to school.
I'm amused that he thinks she's a Company spy given that like half of fandom had/has been thinking he was a Company spy.
Claire: "But I'm not going with them. I'm staying here because of you."
Except that West really doesn't deserve that at all. I understand her desire to not up and leave again, but because of West? Especially since last episode we saw him totally rejecting her (understandably, given that he'd just found out that the man who abducted him was her father and she knew this and she didn't tell him).
Matt on hold with the FBI: "Some of that interdepartmental cooperation I've been hearing so much about on the news."
Matt: "Some kind of organization, back in the 70s."
boss cop: "Like a disco?"
What kind of stupid line is that?
[I started watching in realtime, but then I got an important phonecall, so I finished online the next day. They have closed-captioning now. As a sidebar. Interesting.] http://www.nbc.com/Heroes/video/episodes.shtml
Props to Noah for actually telling Sandra the truth about his history with West.
Sandra: "Honestly, I don't know why I'm not getting in the car with the kids and leaving you."
Sandra [on the painting of HRG "dead"]: "Is that...?"
Noah: "Claire's right. It's all about me."
Sandra: "The man with the gun -- is he gonna shoot you?"
Noah: "Believe me, I've considered it. But Suresh is one of the good guys."
Sandra: "And you think West has something to do with it?"
Noah: "I don't know, but he's the reason Claire won't leave town, and I need to talk to him."
[me, speculating: So Elle kills Noah long-distance and Claire huddles with West in grief?]
Noah: "It's all falling apart. I really need you now." [holds her hand]
Sandra [pulls her hand away] "I'm gonna... take Lyle to school."
Noah to Mohinder: "Is Molly well enough to use her ability? I need to track down a boy, and I don't have time to run all over Costa Verde."
[me: So I suppose looking at the school he attends given that it's a schoolday would be too easy?]
Elle: "Do you know what happens when you change your plans midstream?"
Mohinder: "No."
Elle: "Neither do I. Because we don't do it."
Mohinder: "Let me put it this way. We do it my way, or I blow the whistle right now. Tell Bennet everything."
Mohinder is asked whether he doesn't think Noah would... I forget what exactly, probably turn on him like he did his mentor Ivan... and Mohinder says no.
Elle: "He's adorable. Can I keep him?"
This is gonna get old if it keeps up, but in this scene I can see Elle being all "oh, your optimistic naivete is adorable."
Kaito (to Angela): "I sought redemption, by helping Hiro fulfill his destiny to save the world. How did you help your son?"
Which, super ouch, since she believes one son dead, and her other son's turned into an alcoholic (Nathan is out of the hospital at this point, right? -- oh, he must be, since Adam's now at large and he escapes with Peter, during which he heals Nathan).
Kaito (to Hiro): "We have the power of gods. That does not mean we can play God."
me: "We"!!! We still have no idea what Kaito's power is (was), but I love the reminder that he does (did) have one.
Hiro: "No. You are being stubborn."
Kaito: "And you are letting your emotions cloud your judgement."
Hiro: "You felt this way once. I was young, but I remember. In fact... I will show you."
Noah: "I can't just wait around. He goes to school with Claire -- I know where that is."
Wow, was West hovering waiting for HRG to leave the house? I'm impressed. And I wasn't expecting West to go after him like that at all, so I was generally impressed that they pulled off a surprise (okay, mildly so at least) plot twist like that.
West: "You know I don't have super-strength. I can't hold on forever."
Noah: "She never even mentioned you existed. You hear me? She lied to me. So I'm guessing she thinks you're pretty important."
I liked that Bennet found out Mohinder had turned on him with the location lie (Mohinder says Verbeena and Palm, and we pan to the street signs of Ocean and 4th where Noah and West are).
Bob calls Claire "Miss Bennet" and she bolts.
Mohinder: "Have you killed many people?"
Elle: "How is that any of your business?"
Mohinder: "I guess it's not."
Mohinder: "I'm here to ask you to give us Claire. We need her blood."
Noah: "You've gone native."
[me: That's just such a squicky phrase.]
Noah: "Are you kidding me?"
Mohinder: "She'll be returned to you safe, unharmed. You have my word."
Noah: "No offense, Mohinder, but your word isn't what it used to be."
Mohinder: "Claire is very important to the work we're doing. She can save lives."
Noah: " 'The work we're doing.' You sound like me ten years ago."
[coming on the heels of Sandra's distrust of Noah and the things he did with the Company]
Noah: "This is what they do; they indoctrinate you. I couldn't have been more clear about this when you agreed to go in."
Mohinder: "They're not who you think they are."
Noah: "They are not getting Claire."
Mohinder: "I have to do what I think is right. Start driving. [cocks gun] Please."
Claire sees the painting! Score!
Claire: "Dad was right, I messed up and they found us. We gotta go."
Sandra: "Go where?"
I had a moment of terror that The Company somehow had The Haitian working for them again and had mindwiped Mrs. Bennet.
Noah: "So who's your partner?"
Mohinder: "Excuse me?"
Noah: "Company policy. One of them, one of us. So who's yours?"
West swoop-attacks Elle! I did not see that coming at all.
Noah: "You lie to me, betray me, come after my daughter. How did you think it was gonna end?"
West: "Mr. Butler... what are you doing?"
[closes trigger]
Noah: "No one's taking my little girl!" [kicks Mohinder]
Okay, it does ring a little false that West's all shocked that HRG's a willing murderer given that he knows HRG abducted him and experimented on him -- and Claire tells Mr. Bennet that when West saw him, she'd never seen anyone look so terrified. But I do like that West is horrified and this restrains Mr. Bennet. Though yes I'm moral-grey ends-justify-means girl, so I do actually support the idea that there are gonna be things that look bad and you'd rather people not know about but which are worth doing anyway, but still.
Noah: "It's okay. We're gonna get her back. [...] I've got collateral."
Sandra: "What do you mean, collateral?"
West: "Hi, Mrs. Butler! It's good to, uh, see you again."
Sandra: [watches West carry a blonde girl]
Noah: "Did you pack Mr. Muggles' doggy bath?"
Yes, I admit I was somewhat charmed by West there.
Noah: "I need to speak to your father."
Elle: "What do you think this is, my first day?"
Does she not notice the metal, and the water? She must know how electricity works (if for no other reason than that it makes sense to learn how one's own power works).
Noah: "Stings like a bitch, doesn't it?"
I know Elle's a sociopathic sadist, but I still feel a little uncomfortable that I feel like I'm supposed to cheer for her getting electrocuted.
+
Noah: "I know all about your ability, Elle."
Elle: "You don't know anything about me."
[me: He said he knows how your ability works, not that he's an expert in your psychological background.]
Noah: "I was there. When your father first brought you in. You were a normal girl. Unicorns and rainbows. And then they started the testing. The human brain isn't built to take that much electricity. [deadpan] You poor girl."
Elle: "My father would never let that happen."
Noah: "Your father was leading the charge."
Elle: "I don't remember any of that."
[me: Well, duh.]
Noah: "No memories, huh? Kind of like someone took them away? Why do you think I never let the Company anywhere near Claire? I didn't want her to become you. Now I need to talk to your father. To arrange a trade. Claire for you."
Elle: "What if he doesn't want to make a deal?"
Noah: "You'd be surprised what a father would do for his daughter."
[me: This is kind of ironic, that he's just insisted to her that her father "led the charge" to perform painful experiments on her -- which is interesting given that another poster reminded me that Bob actually is a "special," we just never see any of that after that one meeting with Mohinder -- and then wiped her memories of it, and now he's saying yes he'll put getting her back over bigger Company plans.]
Bob: "Elle, where are you?"
Noah: "You touch my daughter and I'll kill yours. And then kill you."
Bob: "Noah?"
Noah: "We'll be at the Imperial Beach Parking Lot in two hours."
Claire tells Bob they can take her blood, and I recall previous LJ discussions about how we saw back in S1 Claire's desire to use her ability to help people.
Claire: "Let me talk to him. He'll listen to me."
Bob: "He's not big on the listening. And once he sets his mind, it's stuck. Which is why we gave you to him in the first place. We thought he would be loyal to the end. Turns out we were right."
Dude, Hiro, what does bringing your father back to your mother's funeral prove? In theory you could go back in time and prevent lots of people's deaths, but that doesn't mean you should. I thought you learned that from Charlie -- you told Ando there were some things too big for you to control or something.
Hiro: "Your father paints his own name red as a promise to join your mother. It will stay that way until he does."
[...]
young-Hiro: "No! I must stop it. I am a hero!"
Hiro: "Some things even Takezo Kensei cannot change."
[...]
young-Hiro: "But I must honor him."
Hiro: "Listen to him. Learn from his lessons. Strength, responsibility, and justice."
I really liked that Hiro came to realize he was being "childish" but that also we see the emotion in Kaito's eyes and I for one got the impression that he was realizing just how painful his death would be for Hiro and sympathizing with his desire to avert this.
Noah: "It's too dangerous."
West: "Exactly! And I'm the quickest way to get Claire out of there."
Sandra: "They say girls tend to find boys just like their dads."
Noah: "Because he can fly?"
Sandra: "No, her real dad."
[me: Yeah, I clearly keep forgetting that Nathan's actually her biological father.]
Sandra: "You. All he cares about is protecting her."
Noah [hands Sandra the gun] "If anything happens..."
Sandra: "Nothing is gonna happen, except you bringing Claire back."
And Hiro and Kaito teleport back to the roof at nighttime.
Hiro: "Please give my love to Mother."
me: *woobies*
Hiro doesn't stay to see who kills his dad?
The killer shows up, Ando returns, and freeze.
Hiro: "You were right, Ando. I can't save him. But I can learn who killed him."
Oh man, I should have totally guessed Adam since they purposely had Matt mention that it was all the people in the photo plus some guy named Adam Monroe.
+
Angela: "I knew your father when he could do it. I'm even less impressed with you."
Does she have a power that helps her block mindreading, or did she just get very very practiced at it? I imagine the latter (especially since Angela Petrelli would want to minimize all vulnerabilities.).
Angela: "The truth is that our generation mortgaged our souls to protect yours. Show a little respect for that. Get over your Daddy issues and leave us be."
Matt: "But Adam is still out there, and this woman is on his list."
Angela: "All she wants is to be left alone. I made her a promise. If you take this secret from me, you're not just like your father [delicately wipes her bloody nose, extending her bloody fingers toward him as she rests her hand on the table] you are him."
LOVE the blood imagery.
Noah and West and Elle are out on the beach and Elle's just tied up, but she's dressed regular, she could totally shock them right now. I get that they can't exactly truss her around in a bathtub, but wouldn't they at least want to keep her soaking wet? She doesn't exactly seem the type to say, "Okay, we made a deal, I'll stick to my end wholly." There's no risk to her if she kills Noah and West. Bob wants Noah dead anyway, and they can draw Claire's blood without her consent (Elle can electrocute her into unconsciousness).
Hehe, father-boyfriend bonding over first cars.
Noah: "No matter what I do, we'll always be running. But if you die, Bob, the Company dies with you."
Mohinder shoots Noah in the eye, and West flies away with Claire, like he promised her father.
But dude, there's no way you killed off Jack Coleman.
+
Claire: "The last thing I really said to my dad was, 'I hate you.' "
West: "You didn't mean it."
Claire: "No, I did. I keep playing it over and over, how I'll never get a chance to take it back."
When this time Hiro said "I refuse to eulogize him, to eulogize him is to admit that he is gone," I knew he was gonna do the "he lives on" thing.
Interesting sequence of moments as we listen to the "eulogy."
Highlights:
Elle in the car looks like she distrusts her father.
Matt got the name of the woman in the photo: Victoria Pratt
Hiro: "Every hand I extend in kindness is his hand. And every blow that I strike for justice is his fist."
Eric had mentioned that no one really dies, which bothered him 'cause the promos had been all "zomg someone dies," so I totally called that Noah got healed with Claire's blood.
***
I became really fond of West, and I suspect that other people are right that we're supposed to think of him as a good guy now and let that erase all his creepy stalkeriness and mistreatment of Claire and suchlike from his early episodes, which is definitely problematic. I want to like him, though. I don't like disliking the people I'm watching on my tv screen (or movie screen or reading in a book).
I am impressed at how much honesty there was.
I really really do not like this turning Matt into a dark guy. (Other people have mentioned that in last season's future-jump we saw him working for Homeland Security, and not only did he do that creepy stuff with his wife but he took the bag of diamonds from the crime scene, so we've seen plenty of evidence of less-than-saintliness on his part. And I do think he really believes he's big picture helping, though I also don't think the other cop and Angela are wrong to point out his daddy issues. -- Sidebar: He locked his father inside his father's own mind, so the guy's eventually gonna starve to death, no? 'Cause he's basically in a coma. I don't think Matt thought of this, and I doubt the writers have or will either, but it just occurred to me.)
oyceter has rage, pointing out stuff I hadn't noticed like "Two women/girls in bondage being traded off by groups of white men." -- I mean, obviously I watched that scene, but I hadn't thought about it quite that way before. I think in part I feel like we've been shown Elle and Claire in active roles (even if whether they have "agency" is arguably suspect), so I didn't immediately see them as being victimized. I felt like the issue was protecting your family.I left this episode feeling, on the whole, strongly positive about the episode, but the criticisms other people raise bear thinking about as well.