Heroes - season four, episode six

[lathany]

Last night's BBC 3 Heroes offering.

Details: Sylar takes control of Matt and makes love to Janice as an additional warning to return him to his body. Matt tries to get Janice to leave, then gets drunk. As he downs units, it seems to be damaging Sylar; so Matt continues. After Sylar disappears, Janice rushes back in with Matt's partner as Matt passes out. However, when Matt regains consciousness, it seems that Sylar is now in control.

Noah finds that Jeremy isn't easy to help as the town, in an extremely cliched "small town" example, all hold him responsible for his parents' deaths (and others). Noah calls Tracey to help and pretend to be Jeremy's aunt - to help remove him to a new identity. Tracey is briefly kidnapped by Samuel (who knows about both her and Jeremy), shown the fair and given a compass (she is also seen by Sylar who recognises her from Nathan's memories). Noah and Tracey fail to have Jeremy released as, when he is let out, he is taunted into killing someone. After he is returned to the jail, two policemen take him, taunt him, then chain his feet to a truck. Jeremy declines to attack them and dies. Tracey blames Noah, tells him not to contact her again, and then leaves using the compass. Samuel appears at the end and levels the police station / jail.

Claire and Gretchen are kidnapped (there's a lot of that this episode) as part of a sorority prank with two other girls. They are taken to a slaughter house where Becky (invisible girl) tries to kill Gretchen. She fails, is caught by Claire, then reveals herself to the other two girls whilst escaping. Plus Claire's regeneration is revealed to the other two girls.

General comments: Most Depressing Heroes Episode Ever. I found myself rooting for Gretchen to be saved just because Matt had been shafted and Jeremy died; a deeply scary state of mind. Needless to say, I didn't like this episode much. To start with, I'm sick and tired of Sylar this season. He's not only been in every episode, but is now appearing in two different forms; both utterly over-loaded with powers (like how did he manage Matt's so quickly?). At this rate, there won't be any Sylar-less scenes (consequently I'm now thoroughly of mrlloyd's opinion that they should have removed him at the end of season one). And, could we stop watching Matt having cr*p volumes (following on from dead Daphne of Fugitives)? I'd be right behind the prospect of Sylar having a cr*p season; or is that too original an idea? As least Becky's been outed to Claire and Mohinder gets summoned (here's hoping we'll get him back).

Character by character:

• Claire - Some advancement and I liked Gretchen more here than before. I also liked the slaughterhouse as a setting.
• Matt - Poor guy. Is it some sort of theme that his wife ends up sleeping with someone else every season she's in?
• Noah - Bit of a shame that he had to become incompetent in order to lose Jeremy. And why doesn't he still have Company connections (he was ringing the Haitian from the curry house a few episodes ago)? Nice line about song lyrics though.
• Nathan/Sylar/Matt - I think I've had my rant on this one. About the only outstanding point is that the Sylar with Nathan's memories is basically stuck in neutral (but still on screen too often in neutral).
• Tracey - What is it with Tracey, that even when's she joins the good guys she's still the first to switch to The Side Of Darkness?

Title: Is that supposed to be a reference to the conversation Gretchen has with Claire about the two of them? Surely they could have come up with something better!

Themes: I think this is the closest this season's yet come to suggesting that the carnival option might be a non-awful one.

Refer back moments: Sylar is apparently the new Jessica(/Gina) - which I'd like more if I didn't feel been-there-done-that.

Continuity errors and other weirds: For heaven's sakes, when did the utterly subdued and inexperienced Gabriel from flash-backs (with Elle in Villains) becomes Sylar-The-Sex-God who just knew how to make Janice scream? I was left feeling we were playing out some writer's little fantasy there (and what is it with sci-fi writers wanting to make serial killers sex gods?). Whilst I'm in rant mode, they'd better get round to explaining the "Summon Carnival" spell as something other than Samuel automatically joining the ranks of over-powered villains. Just for once, I'd like an intelligent villain rather than an over-powered one (Adam was good for that at least).

Comments

[bateleur.livejournal.com]

Adam was good for that at least

Where by "good" here you presumably mean relative to his peers? He'd still score 3/10 at best.

I would so love to watch a Heroes season with decent supervillains in. I'm not sure Tim Kring's up to the task though. Let's get the team who did The Lost Room in to write the script.

[lathany.livejournal.com]

He was pretty excellent at not being over-powered. And, yes, I agree; he's a more intelligent villain in comparison.