Chapter 2: Don't Look Back (commentary)

More questions answered, more questions raised. Are the Petrellis some kind of Wonder Twin duo? Because Peter can only fly when he's around Nathan, apparently. But at least the viewers know he wasn't crazy like his dad. Or maybe he is, but he's a crazy dude who can sometimes fly.

What is up with Claire's dad? Does he really love her, or is he just pretending? Is he evil, or just misunderstood? He knows she can heal herself like Wolverine; Liz and Valerie suspect that he knew even before he saw the tape of her exploits. He's consistently portrayed in a creepy way, but that could just be misdirection.

Isaac is... um, a drug addict? That's about all there is to say about him. The only question is, can the future he envisions be changed? If so, he's a pretty crappy psychic, but at least NYC won't explode.

Hiro clearly has not gotten a good handle on his power yet, but at least he didn't blow up with the rest of NYC in the future. But now he has that comic book to tell him what happens to him. Can you imagine, having an illustrated play-by-play of your future? Creepy.

Mohinder now has a map of where some of the superpeople live, plus a computer program with which to find them. Plus a cute chick to be his sidekick. Things are looking up for him. Now he just needs to figure out who killed his dad and why. Presumably, superpeople are involved somehow.

Matt is adorable and stupid. But then again, what would you do if you suddenly started hearing voices that were actually there, instead of the usual Joan of Arc delusions? Liz and Valerie wonder how his power will evolve and be useful. He is closest to the Sylar debacle, which makes him interesting by proxy.

So about this Sylar... who is he? What is his power? He seems to like brains. He also seems to be a telepath, judging by the woman pinned to the wall by knives. He also seems able to freeze people, judging by the frozen guy. And what is with the brains? Liz and Valerie think he eats them like Hannibal.

Last but not least, Niki. Wow. She's some kind of schizo Hulk. Guys don't just tear themselves in half, you know. Does she have multiple personalities? Very likely. But is her other half a good witch or a bad witch? And who else has she already killed? Those bodies in the desert were there for quite a long time, so she's been schizo for a while, too. Scary.

Chapter 2: Don't Look Back (plot)

In the last episode, Peter Petrelli decided it would be a good idea to test his flying abilities by leaping off a really tall building. Great plan! Thankfully, his brother managed to fly up and rescue him, although Liz and Valerie had kind of hoped that he would plummet to his death for being so stupid. He wakes up in the hospital, and his brother Nathan insists that he tried to kill himself but landed on a fire escape, and no flying was involved so shut up already. Their mom tells Peter that his father didn't die naturally, he committed suicide because he was depressed and--duhn DUHN!--delusional, just like Pete. Maybe Peter really did imagine the whole flying thing? But no! He confronts Nathan again, and Nathan admits that they both flew. Peter calls him a dirty liar, then looks down to see that he's floating about five feet off the floor.

Meanwhile, back in Odessa, Claire "The Cheerleader" Bennett has decided that she wants to meet her birth parents, and her "dad" tells her to think about it more. She does. Later, the police come to her school looking for the cheerleader who pulled a guy out of a burning building. They almost nab Claire, but her "friend" Jackie steps forward and claims she did it. More later, Claire gets tackled by a football player but is miraculously unhurt--after she pops her shoulder back into place, of course. And puts her head back on straight. But she does find out that her cinematographer buddy has lost the tape of her numerous suicide attempts. More more later, her "dad" says the adoption agency is trying to find her parents, but that it could take a while. She leaves, and he proceeds to watch said missing tape of his little cheerleader jumping off buildings, running through fires, etc.

Mohinder Suresh comes home from a long day of driving a cab around to find an alleged exterminator allegedly spraying for alleged bugs, but of course he's somebody's agent installing a bug of another sort. Fighting ensues, and the cute neighbor girl saves him from certain doom, but the guy gets away. The girl didn't know Mohinder's father was dead; they had gotten quite chummy, she says. They listen to Mohinder's dad's answering machine, which has a message from a creepy dude about how some unknown people have been given to him as "a sacrament." Then they find a USB drive with some kind of program that can apparently locate people with supergenes.

Hiro Nakamura successfully teleported to New York City, where to his surprise he finds a comic book detailing the events of his previous day. He is both intrigued and weirded out, and immediately tries to find the artist responsible, who happens to be... you guessed it, Isaac Mendez. He walks into the artist's studio to find one (1) trail of blood, one (1) gun on the floor, and one (1) very dead Isaac with his head sliced in half and his brain missing. Cops storm the place and question Hiro about the murder, but the poor guy speaks less English than Ozzy Osbourne. He calls his friend Ando Masahashi in Japan to translate for him, and Ando asks him where the hell he's been for the past five weeks. Then suddenly, Hiro sees a huge explosion through the window, and naturally he teleports the heck out of Dodge, ending up back in the subway in Japan.

Poor Isaac is still riding the bullet train to heroin town. His latest work of art is an enormous mural of New York City lovingly painted on the floor of his studio. Unfortunately, there happens to be a mushroom cloud enveloping the city. Simone tells him to lay off the drugs.

Niki Sanders woke up in her garage, covered in blood and surrounded by corpse chunks in the last episode. She can't remember a thing, alas. She calls her son Micah and says she's on her way to pick him up, leaving the two carcasses behind but taking the video camera that had presumably been left on during the murder. She tries to watch the tape while stopped at an intersection; no picture, but lots of screaming. Suddenly she's parked in a parking lot somewhere, wearing different clothes. And it's four hours later. She goes back home to find the garage spic and span, with the key to a lovely convertible waiting. A note taped to the steering wheel guides her to a map in the trunk, plus two bodies piled up helter-skelter. Ew! She follows the map, inexplicably with Micah in the car, and ends up in the middle of the desert. A shovel and a pile of already-decayed bodies awaits her. Has she done this before?

Officer Matt Parker makes his debut at a crime scene in LA (that's Los Angeles, not Louisiana). He starts hearing a little girl's voice and heads into the house where a serial killer has gruesomely murdered a man and woman; the woman is pinned halfway up a wall with knives, the man is sitting down to breakfast, but he's frozen solid and his head is sawed in half. Yes, his brain is missing. People keep asking him what the hell he is doing there, but Matt is busy hearing things. He finds the little girl hiding in a room under the stairs, and when asked how he did it, he explains that he heard a voice in his head and why are they looking at him like that? The name "Sylar" slips out, and since no one is supposed to know about Sylar, he naturally gets arrested and taken in for questioning.

Chapter 1: In His Own Image (commentary)

So far, the story is a little bit of Lost with a little bit of X-Men. The characters are fairly fleshed out rather quickly, with the exception of the "villains," who are hovering on the edge of vision looking malicious.

Many questions arise, such as: Who is the dude with the glasses? Did he kill Mohinder's dad? What is going on with Niki? Did she rip those dudes in half with her bare hands? Why is Nathan such a jerk? Why is Peter such a loser? How can Hiro be so cute?

Perhaps episode 2 will connect a few dots...

Chapter 1: In His Own Image (plot)

What happens (not necessarily in order):

Peter Petrelli dreams he can fly. He wakes up and is definitely not flying. He is a hospice nurse, which basically means he takes care of people who are waiting for that last train to roll into the station. His main charge is the father of Simone Deveaux, an art dealer who we eventually learn is dating Isaac Mendez, a painter who can paint the future. The only catch is, he has to be high on heroin for that naughty little power to kick in. He's managed to paint an awesome picture of New York City on the floor of his studio, but unfortunately it's engulfed in a mushroom cloud. Clearly, this is not a happy vision of the future.

A quick flight (not by Peter) over the pond takes us to India, where Mohinder Suresh is giving a lecture on evolution. More specifically, he's talking about how genetic mutations are popping up faster than Republicans at a gun show. He finds out that his father has died in New York, where the once-distinguished professor ended his life as a humble taxi driver. Actually, his father was murdered, but why and by whom are still up in the air. So of course, Mohinder has to fly to New York City to collect his father's belongings (ashes included) and figure out what in Shiva's name is going on.

We also meet the lovely Niki Sanders, a hooker with a heart of gold--or a webcam porn star with a psycho alter-ego, your choice. At this point in the show, all we know about her is that she keeps catching glimpses of herself in the mirror, only the mirror isn't quite reflecting what it should be. She paid a ton of cash to put her genius son in some fancy private school, but now they're kicking him out because she owes them tuition payments. Go figure; when they say you have to pay for the school, they actually mean it! But alas, she is apparently the only porn star who isn't walking around with wheelbarrows full of cash, so not only does she owe all that overdue tuition, she also owes a guy named Linderman $25,000 for an initial investment in the school. A couple of goons come after her for the money, plus interest, but they're willing to let her off easy if she'll take off her clothes. She doesn't, the guy sucker-punches her in the mouth, and she blacks out. When she comes to, lo and behold, she is surrounded by a jigsaw puzzle of body parts and a few gallons of blood. But what happened? The weird chick in the mirror isn't talking!

And who can forget the adorable Claire Bennet, who mysteriously lacks a Texan accent despite the fact that she lives in Odessa. She's tried to kill herself umpteen times, but she just can't seem to make it stick, because her injuries heal faster than you can say "the stars at night are big and bright" and clap four times. On the way home from her latest suicide attempt, she rushes into a burning building and saves its trapped occupant, then runs off, leaving the firefighters to wonder: "Who was that crazy cheerleader?"

The last and best, of course, is Hiro Nakamura. He's doing some kind of office job in a tiny cubicle in Japan--or at least, he's supposed to be doing that. Instead, he's trying to bend space and time through sheer force of will. And suddenly, he does, but no one will believe him. He proceeds to be adorable while trying to convince his friend Ando that he's a superhero--he even teleports into the ladies' restroom in a club, much to Ando's dismay. For his final trick, he teleports himself to New York. Ya ta!

Back to Peter, who meets up with his brother Nathan, a slimy hunk of man campaigning for the US Senate. He tries to convince Nathan that he can fly, Nathan tries to convince him that he's a loony. They visit their mother, who is holed up in the police station for shoplifting. We learn that their father is dead, and their mother is depressed but otherwise fairly emotionless. What a family! Nathan offers Peter a job in his campaign, Peter says he doesn't want it, Nathan basically calls him a treehugger and tells him to get a life but don't screw things up. And for goodness' sake, stop talking about how you can fly, Peter! So of course, Peter decides to put his money where his mouth is and jump off a building. Nathan flies up to save him, at which point they fly around each other dizzily until Nathan loses his grip and Peter takes a dive.

By popular demand

There are those among Liz and Valerie's fan base who join them every Monday night to watch Heroes, which is possibly the only show worth watching besides Avatar. Some of these folks have asked the Perspicacious Pair to provide a brief synopsis of each episode, along with their insights and analyses of the show. Ask and ye shall receive.

Be warned: every single post will contain spoilers of every type imaginable, so if you haven't seen an episode yet, don't visit this site until you are caught up. Otherwise, you will be brought up to date rather quickly and against your will.

Let the mayhem begin!