The Second Coming & The Butterfly Effect

It seems like forever since we've seen a new episode of Heroes, so it was a pretty big deal at our house last night. We hooked it up in HD on the big screen and made an evening of it starting with the pre-show. First off, when was the pre-show filmed? It was designed to look live, but since the sun was still up in Texas, there is absolutely no way it was dark in Los Angeles. More importantly, though, why didn't they spend more time on catching up new viewers on what's been going on? It was just a montage of somewhat random scenes that didn't really provide anyone an understanding of the story. Frankly, I was disappointed. That quickly changed, though, once the actual episode started. Highlight below to read more:

Again, Peter is the key. This time, though, he's screwed with time, and apparently messed up all kinds of things in the process. We've seen multiple futures so far in this show: (1) NYC going nuclear, (2) Sylar pretending to be Nathan and ruling the country from the White House with Hiro as a terrorist, (3) The world in quarantine after a devastating virus, (4) Some future where the Specials are hunted for experimentation to understand their powers. Interestingly, in all of these futures Peter has a scar across his face. I guess no matter what he does, he's going to have a bad run in with something that he can't completely heal from.

Interestingly, Peter's plan to avert the future that he existed in was to shoot his own brother before he shared the news of his powers. As he ran, present day Peter gave chase and caught up to him in the restroom. Apparently, future Peter (FP) teleported present day Peter (PP) to level 5 and put him in the body of some bad news dude that was locked up down there. First of all, what kind of power does FP have that allowed him to put someone in another person's body? Is that something similar to Niki's power? Or is it actually Niki's power? But then if that's the case, why doesn't PP have the same ability since he was in contact with Niki at the end of Season One? Obviously, PP doesn't have the power to get himself out of the other guy's body, but PP was in contact with FP who does have the power. Shouldn't PP have picked up the power from FP then? Maybe PP has the power, but just doesn't know how to use it yet.

On the other hand, both FP and PP have been in proximity with the other residents of Level 5. Won't they now be picking up their powers, too? And are we headed to a showdown between FP and PP? This is really starting out a little confusing and complicated.

While all of that is going on, though, Nathan is dying from gunshot wounds. FP gets a call from Claire and tells her not to come to Texas even though her blood could save Nathan. The only thing you can figure here is that FP actually wanted Nathan to die because otherwise wouldn't he have teleported to CA, grabbed Claire, and teleported back before anyone knew he was gone? I probably would have.

Nathan didn't die, though. He came back to life and healed. At first, I thought that Linderman may have healed himself after being punched through the head by D.L., and that Linderman had brought Nathan back to life. As it turns out, though, Linderman is just in Nathan's head. Why? Is Nathan exhibiting some new power of healing? And is he just crazy or is seeing Linderman also a power of some kind?

And what about Niki? Now her name is Tracy and she works for the governor. Linderman knew that it wasn't really Niki, which could mean that Nathan actually knew that depending on how you view the Linderman character (insane hallucination or some kind of power to channel the dead). The question is, was it Niki with a new personality and so she was different in the sense that Jessica was also different? Or was it just someone that looks exactly like Niki who is actually named Tracy? Could be someone that has the power to look like someone else, like Candice, but why would they choose to look like Niki? On the other hand, maybe Mohinder (or the company) did something to Niki while she was there that created Tracy and gave her the cool new freezing power. So is she good or bad?

Hiro is now in control of his father's company and in charge of a secret formula of some kind. It was pretty funny the way that his dad set him up by telling him not to open the safe and then scolding him when he did. The only problem is that Daphne got Hiro's half of the formula as soon as he opened it. How did she know to arrive at just that moment? Kind of puts the family attorney under suspicion to me. He knew that the video was being delivered, and he probably knew what was on the video. He may or may not have known what the secret is, but he certainly knew the timing that would be required to steal it and find out.

Daphne did raise an interesting question to Hiro, though. What if he kept time stopped and chased her around the world, would time be stopped everywhere or just where he is located? I think it's got to be stopped everywhere otherwise things could really get out of synch. Suppose he stopped time in Los Angeles while the sun was setting. If time wasn't also stopped in San Francisco, they would actually have a sunset before Los Angeles. The more frequently Hiro used his power, the closer we would get to having everything totally screwed up and out of synch. Besides, Hiro is obviously not actually stopping time. If he truly stopped time, Daphne would have been stopped as well since she simply moves super fast. The fact that she was still moving tells me that time is also still moving forward just at a very slow pace relative to Hiro. Daphne moves fast enough to appear to be normal speed to Hiro, but time is definitely not standing still it's just moving extremely slow.

Now, when Hiro went to the future, what did he see? Apparently, Ando killed him with a power of his own and took back the formula. Shortly after, some kind of storm began destroying the city. Was that actually Ando? Could it have been FP or anyone else with a similar power posing as Ando for the purpose of getting close to Hiro and taking the formula? FP seems like a good guess since using the disguise and killing with electricity would require two powers. On the other hand, it's possible that Ando pulls a Mohinder, gains powers, and is tired of being in Hiro's shadow. That's just hard for me to swallow, though.

What was the storm that was destroying the city? Is it what rips the world apart in the paintings that both Matt and Mohinder saw? And how did Matt and Mohinder see the same painting half a world apart from one another?

My favorite Hiro line so far, "I stop time and teleport. I do lots of things that you don't see." Awesome!

Speaking of Mohinder, this guy is still the dumbest PhD that I've ever seen. He's is forever doing the most stupid things in the world, and shooting up some untested, unproven, concoction of God only knows what is about the dumbest thing ever. Was anyone really surprised when he started growing scales or fins or whatever in the heck is coming out of his back? What a goofball. Watching the way that he was climbing and moving combined with the way that he was sniffing around Maya, I would say that he's becoming more animalistic. Maybe he's actually regressing evolution-wise.

Maya is back, much to my dismay. At least her brother is still dead. That's about all I have to say about her. She just really gets on my nerves.

Elle is back, and she might even turn out to fight for the good guys now that Angela has pissed her off and her dad is dead. Either way, I like her character and not just for the eye candy although that is a big plus. She could do some really cool stuff with her power.

Sylar is getting back to full strength and is taking powers again. Interesting to see a bit of how he does it when he was dealing with Claire. Apparently, he just needs to see how it works. Kind of funny line, "Eat your brain, Claire?" That would be disgusting." He did screw something up in there, though, since now Claire can't feel anything. I can totally see that being a problem down the road when she gets hurt in front of someone that doesn't know and she doesn't realize it. It already happened with her mom (Sandra).

And now her real mom is back in the picture. Not sure that I trust the Firestarter, but there's really no reason to doubt that Noah has Claire's best interest as his number one priority. I guess if he trusts her, then I probably should, too. He definitely knows more about the Specials than anyone else.

Back to Sylar. He's still in Level 5 with Angela who had some interesting revelations. First, she told us that her power is predictive dreams. That explains where Peter gained that power, and we all know now for sure that it wasn't from Charles Deveaux as I have had to say multiple times to some of you. If that wasn't clear enough, let me remove any ambiguity: TOLD YOU SO!

Sorry, got a little sidetracked doing the happy dance. Angela also revealed a dream of the future in which some of the prisoners from Level 5 have killed Hiro, Claire, and Noah for some unknown reason and she is among the prisoners and alongside Sylar. Interestingly, she also told Sylar that she is his mother. What does that mean? Is she saying that to be figurative in the sense that she will be the only person caring for him while he's in Level 5? Or does she mean that literally she is his mother? There is some sense to him being a missing Petrelli brother since he and Peter share a similar power of being able to absorb the powers of others. If he's really her son, though, what is she going to do with him? Heck, even if he's not her son, what will she do with him? Will she help him, kill him, or keep him locked up? Based on some of the previews shown during the pre-show, it appears that she will help him, but I don't know to what end?

I think that about covers it for this week, but there was a lot going on, so let me know in your comments if you think I've missed any important points. I may not have picked up on them, or I might have just forgotten to write them down. Let me hear from you.