‘Heroes’: The hunter, a Rebel and Sylar’s search

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The hunting party that Nathan Petrelli put together to round up the powered posse is quickly getting out of the senator’s control on ‘Heroes,’ but we knew it would. Heck, everyone knew that it would, except, it seems, for the flying man himself.

Rebel, the enigmatic, omniscient computer guru helper knew it, and he/she took a bigger role in shaping the lives of the heroes this episode. Rebel fed Matt Parkman and Peter Petrelli information and helped them escape (kind of) from Building 26. Peter got away, at least, but Matt was captured. Was kind of annoyed with Matt this episode -- crazed, obsessive people sometimes annoy me -- but what he’s being set up for turns the show in a different direction.

Danko the hunter was always the bad guy in this situation, but despite his single-mindedness and black-and-white morality, ‘evil’ was not the right word to describe him. But he got on the annoying list this episode as well by blatantly disobeying Nathan’s do-not-kill orders and then by strapping a bomb on Parkman to make him a terrorist. I was just waiting for the line ‘Do you think I’m stupid, Petrelli?’ as he threatened not only to out Nathan, but also to lock him up with ‘his people.’ Also, it’s actually great that Peter has to pick his powers now. Makes him a lot less powerful, and it makes many of his decisions a lot more measured.

Funny thing ... there were three stories going on at once with the Matt-Peter-Nathan-Noah saga, Sylar’s search for papa and Claire’s mini hero act -- and it seemed to work. The multiple-storyline complaint has been going on for a while, but there’s no complaint this time. Each plot kept our interest, each one kept moving, and we even got a little insight into Sylar.

Claire’s desire to help is admirable, but like Alex the aqua guy says, she’s just a high school girl and she’s in ‘way over her head.’ Claire is resourceful, fearless and we could go so far as to say smart, but she’s not good enough to cope with the government. Good enough to smooch underwater -- surely it was just so she could breathe, right? -- but government agents could take her out easily. Mom, though, knows things, and as the mother-daughter duo team up to get Alex out of town, their smarts could help others escape. But NOT the puppet master! How the ... ? Why is ... ? Where did he ... ? Yeah, I don’t know why Rebel would tell Doyle to seek out Claire either after he forced her mom to shoot her point-blank. We’ll see next episode.

We’ll also see how Sylar plans to take out his anger on his pop. While he and the punk kid Luke kicked around in a dusty diner, surely it was building inside Sylar with each returning memory. His father sold him (apparently), then went out to the car and telekinetically sliced open his mom’s forehead. A little kid standing there saying ‘Mommy?’ as his mother lay dead in front of him with her skull cut open is probably traumatizing. Really thought this was the end for Luke and that Sylar was going to take it out on him, but Luke’s dangerous need for a male role model has caused some attachment to form within Sylar. The volatility of this union keeps it fresh.

So ... may as well put it out there. I, and probably many of you, think Rebel is machine-minded Micah. Probably working with muscle-memory Monica, with maybe a back-door assist from Angela Petrelli (or even HRG somehow?). It’d be cool if it is, maybe even better (for the sake of being unpredictable) if it isn’t. Such a great power, though he rarely used it as actively as this. Agree or disagree? Any other theories?

Speaking of a technological power, many of the actors on the show apparently can be Rebels themselves ... on Twitter. Our Technology blog has an interesting article about Greg Grunberg, Brea Grant and others who are tweeting while on the set.

This is playing out interestingly, and we still don’t know how/when Hiro will get his powers back or how dangerous Sylar’s dad still is. Glad they’ve kept a bit of mystery in a sometimes predictable show.

-- Jevon Phillips