Episode Report Card Couch Baron: B+ | 1531 USERS: B- YOU GRADE IT Future Imperfect
By Couch Baron | Season 3 | Episode 1 | Aired on 2008.09.22
Mohinder drops some cloudy liquid onto a slide, babbling about the test he's running on Maya's blood or saliva or tar or whatever. While he waits for a reaction, he tells Maya that she was very brave to come to him. Well, if there's one thing this decade has taught us, is that's many people that are called brave are actually massively stupid. He goes on that although he knows her power is scary, he thinks it must be cool to be so special. And I get that he's setting it up so that what happens at the end of the episode doesn't seem so out of left field, but it seems rather uncharacteristic that he's suddenly forgotten that Hero abilities were used to kill his father. But story-wise, I am beyond ready for Mohinder to have something cool to do, so I'll let it go. He gets excited and announces that the experiment worked -- he's isolated the "genetic building blocks of these abilities. I've found the source." He babbles about going to the loft and verifying the results, but when Maya asks him to explain, he tells her that what's in the syringe he just filled up could give powers to anyone, and with adrenaline thrown in the mix, the effects would be instantaneous. Maya doesn't even get a chance to complain about her sucky power before he's out the door.
In the pantry, Claire sits in terror as the door shakes violently. The chains won't give, though, so Sylar tries the effect of conversation instead, saying that he knows he's scared. "I would be too, all alone in this house with someone like me. A man you barely know." I don't think going out for ice cream or a shopping excursion would make her less afraid of you, Sylar. But it does make me giggle to picture it. As he continues that he lost everything that made him special, he opens a box marked "Dad's Office," and inside, sees a lot of Bennet's Company records. We see a closeup of a group of files marked "Level 5," with the names "Jesse Murphy" and "Knox" visible. Sylar gloats that what was lost now is found, as he opens the records and sees pictures of three men -- one a burly shaved-headed white dude with a goatee who looks like a biker type, one an African-American looking to be in his late thirties, I'd say, and the last another bald but less beefy white guy. Sylar muses that he's got a whole shopping list of abilities at his fingertips, but he's going to begin with the best. He starts to continue his musings, but when he turns around, Claire is there, and stabs him right in the chest with that big knife. I'm guessing his super-hearing is one of the powers that's on the fritz. Claire runs, but Sylar's telekinesis is still in working order, and he slams her into the wall, turns her around, and, index finger pointed, starts to slice her forehead open as she screams. We cut down to her feet, still suspended off the floor, and a splat that should make the Foley guys proud sends us to a commercial break.