But don't stop the talkbacks. Seriously, the new CW shows get 10 posts, while Heroes is second only to Lost in tb. You want web hits, man!

*sniff* I feel like I've arrived now

'Nuff Said.

Two great segues

"You don't read much, do you?"

"What he said! ... I do?"

Only 3 possible Ali Larter characters. 1 down, 2 to go.

Also:

When I kick you that means go faster!

*runs*

That line is filled with awesome.

Peter's power is about duping too, but more on an intuitive level. There's no understanding there. Peter's just a hapless emo schmuck with no sense of just how powerful he really is.

I suspect that Peter's more intuitive absorption power, combine with Sylar's insight ability might enable him to be the single most powerful being on the planet. Right now, he's got the powers, but no instruction manual. Like the Greatest American Hero. =) He's potentially the greatest deus ex machina around, which is probably what they're hoping will save the future.

BTW: WTH happened to Sylar in the future? I know that he used radioactive Ted's powers and blew up, taking Peter & Claire with him. However, they both clearly survived and he already has Claire's invulnerability/immortality power too. I sincerely doubt that he died in the explosion, as Peter survived the same thing in Season 1. Was that him tied up on the table next to Peter? I forgot to DVR it.

Probably not what they were going for but I'd personally rather have an episode that makes me laugh, more than one that makes me cringe.

*Tomahh's excellent analogy.

The plotting is more random than intriguing; the performances are getting worse, if that's possible, with Clair Bear about as threatening that name would indicate and Stallone Jr's screwface "acting" is laughable; I don't give a sh*t about Hiro and Porkman or the other 15,000 characters. Unlike Lost, which had to dig out of a sophomore slump that ran into its 3rd season, I don't see Heroes pulling out of its death spiral.

5000 G.

Were there problems? Yeah. Nate's flying did suck. Nate did save Ali Larter (Boooo). I caught a 24 and a Kingdom Come vibe (ammo for the 'Heroes steals all their plotlines' folks).

But compared to last season and the season so far, this ep has given me hope that tptb have finally figured out what made the show so good in the first season. It's given me hope.

Of course, next week's ep might suck. But I'm feeling a lot better about it than I did 3 hours ago.

anyone seen chuck?

There's just too much good shit on television for me to waste my time with a show that has consistently insulted my intelligence.

The core issue I have with Heroes is that the plot has always driven the characters, instead of the characters driving the plot. Every character keeps making dumb ass decisions, not because it makes sense for that character based on what we've learned about them as a person, but based on the fact the writers need the plot to advance from point "A" to point "B".

So, suddenly Suresh is going to forget everything he's learned about the dangers of the blind pursuit of science over the last seasons and just inject himself with that shit? Why? Because the writers needed that puzzle piece to advance their plot. Well, I'm done tolerating that crap. I've removed it from my DVR.

How about if the guy hosting the article turns into a f*cking troll?

I don't watch the HEROES but this TB is hysterical.

also, why's that black spanish chick all of a sudden the typical girlfriend to Mohinder's Jekyll? how diappointing was that?

show needs to trim down and streamline, off some characters, keep the storylines to single digits. Larter is dead weight, never been relevant to this show.

also, to the nitwit who compared this to comics, Hey man, the really good comics make sense and have coherant storylines and plausible plots. Someone kidnap Geoff Johns to write this sucker.

Doesn't sound like it's improved much since.

Is Herc's column the only part of AICN you read?

_

Everybody that dyes on this show

changes color.

Everybody that diets on this show

loses weight.

Everybody that dines on this show

gets to keep the salad fork.

Everybody that Dianetics on this show

is a kook.

Everybody that's Diana on this show

is either a dead princess or Wonder Woman. What, not soon enough?

Everybody that Dial-up's on this show

should switch to high speed cable for the faster download times.

Everybody that dials on this show

gets a wrong number.

Everybody that dices on this show

rolls a seven.

Everybody that diametrically opposes someone

...else on this show is, by definition, their arch enemy.

Everybody that digs on this show

is really far out and groovy.

Everybody that disses on this show

posts to the AICN talkback.

1) Couldn't Peter have found a better way to stop Nathan that shooting him in front of a press conference?"

Future Peter, as has been established, is not an expert in time travel. He's made a LOT of mistakes. Hiro would have never tried to do something like that cause he learned his lessons.

"2) Why didn't Peter go back in time to stop Sylar from attacking Claire?"

As explained in the same episode, there is somehting called the butterfly effect. Everytime you go back in time, you screw it up. Peter realized he totally was mucking things up. Time Travel is not an easy answer in the Heroes world.

"3) If the future can't be changed, why is Manhattan not a smoldering, radioactive crater?" As per episode-Future Peter already screwed up the timeline for Matt and his future wife. As already established in the series-things change: Not always for the better.

"4) If Noah could afford to buy Claire a new SUV, why did he take that minimum-wage job at Kopy Kingdom?"

That's a second season question: He had money saved up for when he had to run.

It is a good episode in HEROES if the majority of the episode is spent in the future. Apart from that, the other episodes seem rather bland.

Tim Kring: I've never seen G.I. Joe: The Movie, what are you talking about??

Time Travel is possible in the Heroes universe.

Rule 1 You cannot change the past to your desired result easily. (established first season by Future Hiro)

Responsible use of time travel is to 1) Find out information from the past. 2)Look to the future to see potential problems.

If you need to change the past-you need to use the people in that timeline. (hinted at first and second season-established firmly by Mama Petreli in the third.

I think it may be the end of the line for Heroes for me. I gave them a few chances but continue to get let down. It has a GREAT premise that has been bogged down since the end of season 1. Now we are in season 3 and the main theme is "Save the World"? Really?? Again?? They need to have a REAL showdown between Sylar and Peter where they end up killing each other. That way, no more overly super powered people. For a season called "Villains" we haven't really seen much of them aside from a bank robbery and a "future" story. And is it just me or is 4 years too short a time to go all evil? I could see maybe 10. But 4? I give up.

Thank God there's Supernatural (pun intended). I LOVE that show.

Sylar, on the other hand, can knock out the Haitian and then steal his ability, as he only needs to get access to the brain.

Last night's episode was entertaining, but they can seriously drop Parkman and Ali Larter's storylines.

I absolutely love the crack in the Earth being the Kensei symbol

Sylar would definitely survive that explosion, just like Peter did

Talkbacker ChrTh says We Should Have a Supernatural Talkback!

I mean, I don't watch it, but it's obviously popular enough that people want one. You never hear anyone say "I can't wait for the Pushing Daisies talkback!"

MNG: I'm just sitting here watching the wheels go round and rounnnnnnnd

Meaning, there is n't just one Peter from 4 years in the future. If you jump to 10/7/2012 at 8:33 and 10 seconds you would find Peter at that time. If he leaves, then comes back to the future he would have to come back at the same exact second or he would come across Peter from 10/7/2012 at 8:33 and 15 seconds.

My point is there is more than just a Future Peter and a Present Peter.

If your still confused think about the second Austin powers movie. Austin went back in time and met Austin from ten minutes ago. Why isn't Peter meeting Peter from four years and 10 seconds from now and Peter from four years and 15 seconds from now.

I'm confused.

Maybe I just have a different meaning of kick ass.

But seriously, no he wouldn't. Peter leaves at 10am and comes back at 11am. There's no Peter between 10am and 11am.

Now, if Peter leaves at 10am, comes back at 9am, and stops the 10am from leaving, yes, then there's an extra one. Or if the 10am one comes back at 11am, then there will be two Peters from 11am onward.

As long as Peter never comes back before he leaves, he won't duplicate himself.

One thing that did tick me off last night was how much trouble Peter and Sylar were having with the 3 that showed up at Sylar's house in the future. Telekinesis alone (which both Sylar AND Peter have) should have been able to subdue them. But the story didn't call for them to use their powers in a smart way, so they didn't. Not to mention PETER CAN STOP TIME.... AAAGHH.... still, I was entertained and enjoyed the episode, but there hasn't been an episode of Heroes in a long time that hasn't been groan inducing.

That was easily the worst episode to date. Yes, they're showing more powers (albeit with worse CGI), but the story is getting exponentially dumber as time goes on. I watch television to relax, but this show is only reminding me how everything is crumbling down around us, in all areas of society. It's actually gotten worse than Smallville, which I never thought possible.

I remember when I forgave the show for not killing off Sylar, cause he was such a cool character. Now I wish they had since they've made him such a goof. The Parkman story is fucking unbearable! Nathan finding God is un-fucking-bearable too. Why the fuck didn't Peter stop time when his nephew was taken hostage? Oh yeah, then they couldn't have their neat explosion. All of the future crap was so heavily contrived that I was actually yelling at the TV set.

I keep hoping that this show can pull its ass out of the fire like Lost did in S4. But I'm thinking now that it's unfixable. And there's definitely no hope for it unless NBC fires ALL the writers in a last ditch attempt to rescue it (can't they hire one person to monitor the boards). There is nowhere to go but up at this point. Any other writers will likely be better so they have nothing to lose by shaking things up. This is shaping up to be the worst TV season for every show I've watched so far (Entourage aside - that actually made a comeback, surprisingly enough).

If you think I care if you like heroes or not, you are wrong.

(Pardon me but I'm bored.)

Maybe I missed something.

I think Herc's whole problem is that Heroes isn't Buffy. In fact, I think that's Herc's problem with ANY show. If it's not Buffy, America's Top Model or Gilmore Girls, Herc doesn't seem to like it for very long.

I hated Heroes at the end of last season, but so far this season is entertaining in a soap opera kind of way.

And honestly Chrth, (whose posts I generally admire as rather eloquent all things considered) web hits to justify keeping a Heroes TB up? Really? THAT says more about how bad the show has actually become than anything else.

Next week should be interesting... SPOILER...

but the "surprise return" is totally not surprising to me, I think many including myself expected him to show up at some point since he was mentioned way back in the first or second episode.

And Hayden Panettiere is proving to be a pretty hack actress, is it me or did it seem like she really phoned it in this episode.

All in all, I did think this was a pretty good episode, really forwarded the plot of the show. Aside from Haresh, is he turning into Spiderman? And good to see that they were able to bring back Adam, and the way they did it was awesome.

And hey, if you're TRULY enjoying the show without mounting frustration at the ever increasing stupidity of the characters more power to ya. For my part, my disappointment mounts with each episode and I lament what could have been. (I'm watching it until the end of this volume because one of my OCD's is "complete-ism")

There is definitely room for improvement on Heroes, but if I didn't enjoy watching it I would stop. I stuck with The 4400 to the bitter end (actually... they didn't end it... it got cancelled before it could get a proper ending) and I'll stick around for Heroes. I just wish the writing could be as tight as other shows I watch. If Heroes were ultra shitty, in the realm of Flash Gordon, Painkiller Jane, Moronic Woman, or the new Knight Rider (which I admit to having never seen... but I never saw Disaster Movie either, and I feel I can take a massive dump on that if I like) then I would say cancel it.

Right now, it's keeping me interested, so let the show go on. If I ever decided to stop watching it live, it would at least be good fodder for a rainy weekend or during the holiday or off season when the tv schedule is a wasteland.

2. Why shoot Nathan with a gun? Future Peter shot Nathan rather than fry him, or whatever, because he was testing what an action (the shooting of his brother) would do to the future timeline. The main point was that he didn’t want Nate to tell everyone that there were people with abilities, so frying him would have also pointed to that, so he chose a garden-variety style of assassination.

3. Why not go back and stop Sylar from stealing Claire’s power? Butterfly Effect. Future Peter says it wasn’t supposed to happen, so will try another time fix to make it right. Present Peter was trapped in another’s body, so he didn’t even know it happened.

4. If the future can’t be changed…? Yes the future can be changed, yada, yada, just not to ones desired effect, necessarily.

5. Who needs the Kwicki Kopy? Yeah, cover, or what looked like rather lame cover, because I’m not entirely convinced that Noah actually ever did leave the company, but it was just a game they were all playing with Suresh, Claire and others to get them in line. Where the Hatian is always present, maybe Noah also doesn’t ever really know what his bad self is up to either.

6. Peter does not have the Hatian’s powers because Peters powers do not work around the Hatian, duh-hoy.

7. “Didn't Sylar lose all of his powers except for Intuitive Aptitude and Telekinesis due to the virus from season 2?” Erm… yeah, Claire’s healing powers restore them all, over time, I suppose, but in the future, he had learned to suppress them and was trying to live a normal life without them. So much so, that the Clairebear Kids clearly caught him off-guard when they attacked the house.

8. “Also, how did the fear eating guy survive the nuclear explosion?” And wouldn’t Claire and Peter been vaporized, too? I mean, how far does this healing power go? Oh, wait, I’m supposed to be apologizing. Peter transported everyone in the room out of there before Sylar went off, except for Flash-Girl, who tried to run for it. Yeah… that’s what happened, while the writers were busy manipulating the emotions of parents with small children.

9. “And you can just kill peter while the Hatian is around? He wouldn't just come back alive as soon as the Hatian left the room?” Didn’t Claire say that a bullet in the base of the head should do it? The Achilles Heal, I guess. It might also be that Scarface Peter, having made too many “terrible decisions” and “stepped on too many butterflies” knew he would/should die then, and was passing the buck back to his past self.

10. “Where are Nathan's wife and children?” Nate is quite divorced from his first wife.

11. “Why was Clairebear torturing Peter?” Just for kicks, and she’s become just like her “Dad.”

12. “…My point is there is more than just a Future Peter and a Present Peter.” No doubt that Peter and Hiro have proliferated themselves throughout many timelines to varying degrees of influence. (?)

13. Why did Hiro have to dig up Adam? Let’s see YOU teleport into a tiny coffin underground and back out again with its contents, big shot. And who said Hiro teleported him there in the first place. Hiro said himself that he buried him “so deep.” *ahem*

14. “Four years in the future and the "locate anyone on a map" kid's still the same damn age?” Uh… yeah, that’s right, one of her abilities is slow-to-no-aging. Really, it is. *cough*

15. “Is HRG so protective of claire not because she's his adopted daughter, but because she is really his mother, and if she dies, he does not exist?” Dude! You are freakin’ me out?! Could be, though, could be….

16. “So Adam's hair doesnt' grow?” He had some stubble, but presumably, he went into a kind of suspended animation limbo, neither dead or alive, or maybe it has just been a few days.

11. Why doesn’t Peter just do X? OK, Peter is a deeply confused and troubled individual, no doubt about that. He’s reluctant to use his powers, usually doesn’t even know how to, and is clearly becoming more and more disturbed and disassociative as things progress. Fact is, he hasn’t been able to assimilate anything properly and is merely reacting to things as they happen or will happen. Scarface Peter is a vision of a Peter who does use all of his powers (freeze time, etc…), but doing so has backfired and made him a villain in everyone’s eyes (why?). Once driven by the simple urge to “do right,” and, now, having absorbed future Sylar’s powers, he has also has “the hunger,” so his sanity and soul are in serious jeopardy.

Yeah, the show's silly, but I still like it.

The "hunger" of the power angle spits in the face of the excellent S1 episode with his mother that explained why he was so fucked up in the first place. But hey, they wanted to show him in a goofy domestic role so they tied his darkness to his power so that he could will himself good. They're actually undoing the good parts of S1 with this season.

re: Devil's Own, you're right about internal consistency. If they could get that down, the rest would follow.

"Heroes" Sucks.

Joe Pokaski proved to be pretty decent, having written "Five Years Gone" in season 1 and "Cautionary Tales," probably the best episode from S2. Aron Coleite's not that bad, either. However, they're both fairly inexperienced, so I wouldn't make either of them a showrunner (though could they really be worse than Kring?).

I say bring in some new blood to run the show. Obviously, they probably couldn't get any of the great HBO showrunners, so I won't even go there. But David Greenwalt proved to be very good at long-term character arcs when he was Angel's showrunner, and that show was in a similar vein as this. He's not up to anything now, why not give him a call? Daniel Cerone, Dexter's former showrunner, is quite adept at running self-contained season-long story arcs, so maybe if his gig with Dirty Sexy Money doesn't work out (doesn't that show have issues keeping showrunners?), they can give him a call.

Honestly, there are plenty of options out there. Tim Kring has had more than enough shots to get it right. They need a regime change before its too late.

I always liked that idea. Seemed to make the story of Heroes more cohesive. Wonder if it'll ever happen.

1. too long?

2. not negative enough? 3.

concluded that the latest episode had addressed and corrected some of his reservations? or

4. (and I think this is most likely) that mentioning the Y! group and the Blog(get) where the full length article had been posted constituted some sort of spam>

I mean, Ando's pretty cool and it was a pretty inoffensive piece and specifically on target for this talkback. Anyone have any theories on why it would be removed?

But lets face it, it's better than most of the tripe on TV. I think your enjoyment of it depends on how much you can overlook/explain away the plot problems, which I am finding increasingly difficult. Every time I see one it brings me right out of the show and irritates me to the point of almost switching off. I almost see it as a personal insult and that the writers are taking liberties because they see me, the viewer, as someone who is mindless enough to not notice as long as there is something badass on screen to distract me.

I am very disappointed with most, if not all, of the shows I watch this season. My expectations were probably too high as I assumed writers would have had a huge amount of time to map out upcoming stories in their head's due to the strike. Shows were cut short last season which also meant I was looking forward to them more as we got so much less last year and had to wait longer for their return. I guess I should lower my expectations and just be grateful that someone is actually funding these shows, otherwise I would have nothing to watch.

I liked that Episode, most of these mega series style tv shows ebb and flow, some of the episodes are terrific, some are ok, some are slow and tedious, some have no bearing whatsoever on the story. Lost is also a big culprit.

I would wedge this one somewhere in between ok and terrific, its certainly a step up from anything season 2 offered, and a step in the right direction to return this series to the way it was mid way through season 1.

I can understand the apologists being on here defending everything that's questionable about the show... but for the rest of you, what are you doing here? i understand you're frustrated, you can no longer be entertained by it. If you're going to bail on the show, that's cool, I don't really the show doesn't need you. But say your not going to watch the show and be done with it because it would seem that you now feel cheated to the point of channelling all your time on here trying actively to bring it down. it seems strange to me...

"by the way, Claire DID say in the autopsy room that Peter's "still alive". So saying that Claire killed peter with bullets is wrong."

Didn't she mean the younger Peter is still in that timeline, therefore there is still a Peter who is alive? That's how I took it anyway.

House of Yang was an interesting early American Manga attempt, though inferior to Marvel's Kung Fu titles. Pete Morisi's work on Vengence Squad was stiff but interesting and I loved JoeStaton's Mike Mauser back-ups.

and of course the Charlton Spotlight fanzine was interesting if only for the other wise unpublished Layton, Staton, Byrne and Giordano work it contained. I believe that Layton worked on Hercules comics for Charlton, Marvel and DC at different times, but don't bet on that on my say so.

I haven't dug any of those out recently to reread them, but I don't think my tastes have calcified that much in old age. While I don't know if any TV superhero series will ever strike upon such a perfect combination of character, actor and reinvention as Jeffery Combs portray of the paranoid conspiracy buff Question on JLU, I would watch a television series as good as the Charlton comics I just mentioned.

Especially E-Man, where I actually prefer the subtlety of the Charlton run to the broad humor and spoofery of the First Comics revival that's influenced every subsequent comeback attempt. But that's just me.

Claire could shoot Peter because the Haitian was there to stop his powers. Once they had him injured (and while the Haitian was still present) they could finish him by putting a bullet in his brain.

But at least the characters and writing aren't dumb. That's the difference between this and Heroes this year. Although, I will say that Chuck feels a little off this season too (not that much though).

As for Mohinderfly. Fans have always hated his character, so why no just kill him off already? He could have been good since he was suppose to be a genius, but we now know that isn't true.

But perhaps the most frustrating aspect of this show is how they insist on spending a majority of the time in a future that will ultimately not come to pass, with characters who will ultimately end up not existing come season's end. Not to mention the fact that their time travel mythology simply doesn't make a lick of sense.

I will continue to watch the show, but now it's more out of mild curiosity than of actual affinity for it.

I think I'll just tough it out and wait for BSG and Lost(assuming it doesn't fall off the tracks again...) in January.