The good, the bad, and the Sylar

HEROES: 3.10-11 “The Eclipse Parts I & II”

So if you didn’t know, these past two episodes were the BIG episodes of the first half of the season. They’ve been counting down and hinting, and we all knew that “It’s Coming.” Considering this, I was disappointed.

If you ignore the hype (which is what you do when you want to enjoy Heroes) the episodes weren’t bad. Now, they might have just been excuses to get Kirsten Bell (Manface, from here on out) to run around without pants on, but the plot seemed to move, so I can’t complain.

Let’s cover the most obnoxious one of all first: Mohinder. He’s a bug! He cocoons himself (I wonder what he would have come out as) but is miraculously saved when the eclipse hits, taking away his power. Now, for everyone else that has been wrapped up in a cocoon by Mohinder, they can’t seem to get out as humans. Mohinder, though, slides out easily (and naked). Then, of all things, he decides to call up his ex.

That’s what I’d do, clearly. And stupid Maya actually OPENS the door when he says he’s Mohinder. I swear, with her power they must have taken away part of this girl’s memory. Does she not remember Mohinder putting her on a wall in a cocoon? Or the fact that you saw that he tried to kill someone with said cocoons? Why would you open the door for him?

Sadly, Mohinder became Mr. Bug again, so he had to flea [enter drum riff here].

I really don’t care about Mohinder’s storyline, and it really bugs me (yuck yuck yuck) that he went from supervillain to scientist in an instant. Wasn’t his craving making him said supervillain before? His character development is lacking.

Moving on, we all know Claire is the catalyst, and now Bennet gets to protect her. Claire meanwhile has her many daddy issues, which escalate when she is shot then deserted by her father, only to die of infection. How does Claire die? The eclipse, of course!

Let’s sidebar. One thing that I found extremely anticlimactic was the eclipse. Based on previews, we all knew that everyone would lose their powers. So no surprise for the viewers. All the characters, of course, were uber surprised. Ok, fine. I like that Sylar and Elle assumed Claire and Bennet had the Haitian with them–a natural assumption. However, having each group there discovering that it was the eclipse got a little tiresome. “Wasn’t there an eclipse when you got your powers? There’s an eclipse now. Coincidence?” This was said at least twice.

Ok, back to Claire. So she died, then of course, when her powers came back, she came back to life, which was reminiscent of Season 1 when a similar thing happened. I wish we could have seen her mother sneak her out of the hospital, but alas, no cigar.

And where was Daddy this whole time? Bennet was out for revenge, scouting Elle and Sylar.

I enjoyed this plotline, with two powerful villains being chased by a non-powerful human. But here’s my question. We see Bennet with a sniper rifle aimed through the window of the house where Elle and Sylar are kissing. Then, suddenly, the two are on the floor, having finished their…time together, and Bennet rushes in with a handgun. What was Bennet waiting for? He had a clear shot of both. And it’s a little upsetting to think about, since that would just leave Bennet as a Peeping Tom (at least those wire-rimmed glasses are used for something). Personally, I like to ignore that part, but I just wonder why we wasted such angst over the sniper shot if it wasn’t going to be used.

Meanwhile, we have the love story between Sylar and Elle. Ok, so I know everyone wants to know who is the mother of Sylar’s spawn in the future (is that right?), and everyone’s banking on Elle. I guess that’s why we have this exhausting, repulsive love story being dragged out in an action television drama. Blarg. I could really care less, and again, I think the whole reason was so that Manface ran around without pants on. It did humor me to see Sylar running scared in his birthday suit, but eh. I could have lived without. I guess the bright side is that we now know that Manface has more sides than just the biting wit girl (though that’s what she was cast on the show for, so I still consider it typecasting).

As you can tell, I’m not a fan of Elle.

Which might be good! Because she might be dead. In the end, we’re back to the mystery of “Is Sylar good or evil?” In black and white terms, he certainly LOOKS bad. He was opening up Elle’s head like a can opener last we saw him (which she was taking very calmly until we panned out, I might add). I could see this happening for one reason: His brief time without powers allowed him to realize what it’s like to live without the hunger he’s been fighting this season. Unfortunately, when his powers returned, he wasn’t ready for that hunger and went back to it–this time, to Elle.

But on the other hand, this is Heroes. Like with MacGyver and many other series, unless we see a body, we can’t presume the person’s dead. It wouldn’t surprise me if Sylar discovered a way to put a power into Elle–say, maybe the healing power?–to try to save her or to get his defenses up for when the army rises. She’d be unstoppable and on his side. I guess we won’t really know until next week.

Then there was the parts with Peter and Nathan. To be honest, this lost me a little bit with the kidnapping and the saving and the fighting and the kidnapping and the saving and the fighting. In the end, it looks like Nathan took a Hitler approach and left Peter there, which means Nathan switched sides as Peter predicted. I think I missed a few steps in here, though, so if anyone can fill me in, that’d be great.

As for the eclipse in general, I guess I’m disappointed. In my opinion, the eclipse should be like a light switch. If it comes once, it turns powers on. Again, turns them off. I was hoping for some powerless heroes for a few more episodes–until some other natural or unnatural agent made them return. I didn’t expect them to have them back so quickly. Plus, I thought once they did come back, all would be restored to normal, which would mean Peter would have gotten his powers back. Alas, I was wrong.

Oh, and speaking of Peter, will someone please tell him to STOP LOOKING DIRECTLY AT THE ECLIPSE? That boy will go blind one day.

And we can’t forget the rest! Daphne, we discover, can’t walk, but with her powers, she’s faster than anyone. I’m thinking she made a deal with the devil *cough, Arthur, cough* to get her abilities, and the “cure” just ran wild. Perhaps she had to do some bad things to get him to do it, which is why he has such a hold on her.

Meanwhile, we got some good nerdy laughs. Can I say how much I enjoyed Seth Green and Breckin Meyer on the show? Why? Because they were NORMAL guys who were nerdy and funny. Just guys hanging out at a comic book store who are fans of the comic. I think that was great. Especially when they start describing that they heard a rumor that there were unpublished pages… That was so nerdy I could have hugged them.

And Hiro’s mild breakdown really did make me sad. He’s been through some rough time, especially the can opener loss of his redheaded girlfriend. (See? If I put in enough details, you might not notice I forgot her name!) Sometimes it’s hard to grow up.

But I don’t know where we’re going with allowing Claire to see her baby self. I think she’ll get a better understanding of her father, but what else? Seemed like a heavy note to end on, if just to make her family happier. There must be something more significant.