Power Plays

Holy crap, what a cliff-hanger! I mean, wow. Last week's was clearly the best episode that Heroes has yet aired, but with us not having another one until April 23, I'm totally on the edge of my seat until then. I've grown to love this show more and more each week.

So let's get into it, starting with some leftover business from last week. H.R.G., our erstwhile villain — who might now be the character on the show that elicits my sympathy the most — cannot catch a break. To have Eric Roberts, playing Thompson, give H.R.G. the smackdown after he came back brainwashed with a bullet wound and his daughter missing was harsh. The biggest indignity must have been pairing H.R.G. with that new girl, Candice the shape shifter. She's got a hell of a mean streak and she is so hot while doing it. I loved the way she played with a grieving Isaac. Or the way that she probably deliberately wore a short skirt and high-heeled boots when she went to see the Bennets just so she could make the wife jealous? Or the way that she tricked H.R.G. (he is in trouble!) into spilling the beans about Claire? Mean, mean, mean. But what's going to happen? They're not going to kill H.R.G., are they? Especially since they just offed the show's second main character: more on that later.

I kind of glad Mohinder is the one that bit the dust. He was the weakest link on the show. We all guessed, from the moment that he and Sylar teamed up, that the junior Suresh probably wasn't going to make it until the end of the season. And just when I thought the supposedly smart scientist couldn't get any stupider, just when I thought he was going to ignore Sylar's continual creepy statements about not being lonely anymore, he came through in a big way and proved that science plus revenge equals really scary. I mean, Mohinder started pulling a Jack Bauer there, drugging Sylar, tying him up, torturing him with a tuning fork, stabbing a needle into his spine, and then actually trying to shoot his captive. I didn't think the guy had it in him. And, with the camera positioned behind Sylar's head, I thought he was a goner — until he stopped that bullet like Keanu Reeves in The Matrix, which is cool.

Alas, the bad guy got loose. And, in what was far and away the most convincing acting that Sendhil Ramamurthy has ever done on the show, once Sylar was free, Mohinder started to tremble like a child. Then — unfortunately — he got pinned to the ceiling. Bye-bye Mohinder. It was nice to have known you. And although the big cliff-hanger was Peter's forehead getting sliced open in his second encounter with Sylar (now we know where the scar that future Hiro spoke of came from), it's a given that he's going to survive. Even Heroes can't kill three main characters in three consecutive episodes.

And for all that excitement, the thing that thrilled me the most about this episode was that super-long scene between Nathan and Linderman. Behold, he was finally revealed as Malcolm McDowell. An inspired choice, I say. The man can play powerful, the man can play scary. I also found the following piece of dialogue one of the most interesting and insightful on the show yet.

Linderman: "There come a time when a man has to ask himself whether he wants a life of happiness or a life of meaning."

Nathan: "I'd like to have both."

Linderman: "Can't be done. Two very different paths. To be truly happy, a man must live absolutely in the present, no thought of what's gone before and no thought of what lies ahead. But a life with meaning, a man is condemned to wallow in the past and obsess about the future."

The following lines also sent a chill of excitement up my spine.

Linderman: "I can offer you more than just information, Nathan. You're going to win your election, I'll see to that. And two years from now, through a series of fluke circumstances, you'll find yourself in the White House, a heartbeat away from the presidency. A life of meaning, Nathan. Think about it. The choice is yours."

How awesome is that? Nathan in the White House? That line there was one of the first indications to me that the show might actually branch off in some interesting, unexpected directions in future seasons. I know he's going to be a congressman, but as the show progresses, if the existence of these heroes get out, it'd be fascinating to have one of them in a higher level of government than just being one of 435 people in the House of Representatives.

A question remains, though: How does Linderman know this? Is he screwing around with Nathan, taking advantage of Nathan's power lust? If that's the case, it was well played, because Nathan folded easily. Why does he have all of Isaac's paintings? He has to be in charge of the Company, the organization running this whole conspiracy, right? So much covered, yet so much left out. Was that Isaac, headless, in his final painting? What's the deal with Mrs. Petrilli? Does she — like apparently all the older people on the show — know much more than we thought? Has she known about her sons the whole time?

We have a whole lot to digest. We will have time though, until April 23rd!