Heroes: Season 3, Episode 3 Review: One of Us, One of Them

One of Us, One of Them
Original Airdate: September 29, 2008
Writer: Joe Pokaski
Director: Sergio Mimica-Gezzan

As this season is split into two halves, the thirteen episode "Villains" and the twelve episode fourth volume, the arcs are a little different than a full season arc. Instead of a 6-8 episode introduction, it's likely going to be four, five tops. Therefore the plotting feels a lot faster than last season, where they meandered. It feels like the introduction is winding down as the complication phase is set to start, and that's what the show needs now.

The central piece of the episode involves the squad of villains with Peter holding up a bank, at first just to steal some money, but quickly the stakes escalate and soon they encounter both Sylar and Bennet. Knox is the leader of the gang, pulling strings even the rest of the squad aren't aware of. Unbeknownst to his associates, he alerted the police in hopes that it would draw Bennet out, which it did. He also takes care of NotMagneto, which is a more than welcome development. Clearly he's the one escapee with the other villains in Angela's dream for a reason.

As expected, Peter's imprisonment in Jesse's body is somewhat explained. Jesse was still there, but Peter's personality took over. As for Peter's powers, it's unknown whether he go any of them when he was freed in frozen time, or if he was still able to take them in Jesse's body (if he uses The German's power we'll know for sure). We'll have to see if it's in the future Future Peter helped create by silencing Nathan.

Angela is clearly playing Sylar, and the game is definitely twisted: moments after telling him she's his real mother she gets away with bringing in a fresh victim to "feed" him (after confirming he didn't eat the brain they pile on a whole lot of hunger/feeding metaphors). Also, why exactly was Bridget on board to have her head sliced open at the beginning of this episode? Angela is playing with some dangerous toys here, giving Sylar a justification to kill as many people as he wants. There isn't much keeping Sylar from taking her precognitive dreaming for himself.

Her endgame is simple enough: to control Sylar, possibly motivated by that image of Tracy, Maury, Adam and Knox where Sylar's her last line of defense. Peter's gone in the vision (and just forget Future Peter), and her attempt to manipulate Nathan failed miserably in the past. Assuming she is telling the truth, he's the last son for her to control.

Bennet and Sylar working together was fun with the two butting heads as Sylar, up until the scalping, turned out to be a pretty good agent. It's no surprise why Bennet doesn't want to work with him, but Sylar, at behest of Angela, is cooperative, helpful and even saves Bennet from what was likely going to be a fatal punch from Knox. However, Angela's mixed messages come into play when Sylar, instead of transporting the three, decides to take Jesse's power while Knox escapes. Too bad we'll never get a real scene between former Veronica Mars' co-stars Francis Capra and Kristen Bell.

With Sylar, they are at a crossroads: he probably shouldn't have survived the showdown at the end of the first season and was kept along because Quinto worked so well with the character. Now, Sylar's future could go either of two ways: he's killed off (unlikely) or he switches sides. They seem to be building up to one of them, as he dismisses chances at redemption (which only happens when a character is going to redeem himself), since Sylar as is can only be viable for so long.

Bennet has shown himself to be the guy who if his daughter is threatened will kill anyone in his way to keep her safe. With Sylar, he can't just shoot him. He has to be patient and cunning. Clearly, the Adam loophole will be brought up as Bennet figures out how to kill a man who can spontaneously heal and stop bullets or projectiles with his mind. Of course, he could have The Haitian block said powers and use that weakness against him, but Bennet may want to have responsibility rest solely on him, since this time it really is personal. Also he can be useful with eight escapees still on the loose, even if that means giving Sylar a little more power.

As Bennet deals with working alongside his daughter's attacker, so does Claire learn a bit from herself courtesy of her biological mom. Claire was ready to get involved in the fight despite her father's wish for her to stay at home. Considering she can heal from almost every injury and now doesn't feel pain, she has some formidable assets in a fight. However, her motivation doesn't stem from nobility so much as it's her way of dealing with her attack. This is certainly telling of not only Claire's mindset, but Meredith's history.

Tracy's pursuit of who she really is leads her to New Orleans and the reveal that Niki was killed in the explosion from the season finale. While it is a bit of a cop out to kill off the character only to have the actress play another (unless established in the mythology like on Battlestar Galactica), the avenue they're going has potential with all the talk of genetic experiments this season. At the funeral she runs into Micah, who uses his technopathy to uncover that they were born at the same hospital on the same day, although he conveniently can't find any more information (seriously, he doesn't even try with no hint of a road block).

Dr. Zimmerman hints at experiments done on Tracy and Niki by calling Tracy "Barbara" when they meet and says that he "created" her. While many people are going to take that and assume that this means only cloning, it could also be connected to test tube babies. Those experiments were performed back in the 70s, and the first successful one happened a few years after Niki's birth. It wouldn't be too hard to believe that there were secret experiments, possibly Company funded, to instill powers on ordinary embryos, and may be connected to the formula.

Hiro and Ando's comic adventures with Daphne are beginning to wear a little thin. Unlike a lot of other elements so far, there isn't much to it. The formula is really the interesting piece of the subplot. It's been basically the same thing in each hour so far. She's mean to Hiro and always gets the upper hand, which feels more like the relationship of two people who are bound to get together romantically.

Also, why is Hiro so quick to call Daphne her nemesis? Wouldn't that be more appropriate title for Adam? She's an annoyance and clearly what's going to happen is partially her fault, but with Adam there was a more personal dynamic that would make the nemesis title appropriate.

Daphne continues to exploit the growing rift between Hiro and Ando, and it works on Ando. Clearly lacking power, Ando wants to prove himself and that's increasingly hard when your best friend can bend space and time and you're not the smartest when it comes to strategy. This would be the likely motivation for him to use Mohinder's serum and possibly pointing to his villainy, of which I'm still skeptical.

While Hiro and Ando are now held captive in Level 5 next door to Sylar, there's no danger of Hiro having his ability stolen, which would certainly be a game changing ability. It wouldn't be surprising for him to show up and try to scorch them with Flint's blue flame though. It's an interesting set up, especially with the unclear rules over use of powers in these cells. Flint can scorch his cell, but why couldn't Hiro and Ando teleport away?

Usutu has to have one of the lamest powers in the history of the show, somewhere between liquefying stuff and negating only one person's power. Only seeing visions of some guy from LA (when you're in Africa) lacks any practicality until Future Peter sent him there. The interesting catch though, is how he induces it with music, a feat that works on Matt towards the end of the episode. Hopefully there's more to that that will be explored in future episodes.

There is more hinting at the dramatic altering of the future, as Usutu covers up a painting of Matt, a woman and a baby with one of Matt holding the limp body of the woman. Considering the hairstyle, it's likely that that woman is Daphne, setting up for a meeting down the road. Matt in Africa risks being another orphaned subplot, but at least there is an idea for them meeting up with the main story.

So far the season is shaping up well. The stories are all moving at a brisk pace with a lot of entertaining reveals and developments. While many were crying the end of Heroes last year, I'm cautiously optimistic this is the start of an uptrend.

Overall Score: 8/10