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
Hiro stares blankly into space, but then gets a mischievous look on his face and starts playing with the clock on his desk, using his power to keep pushing it back by a few seconds at a time. I wish I could do that when I'm on deadline. I have to say, though, that at first I couldn't believe they were recycling so many storylines -- Nathan going back into politics with a certain someone pulling his strings, Hiro visiting an apocalyptic future, and the like. It seemed lazy and uninspired. But I realized, on second viewing, that even little details from the beginning are being copied, such as this one, with Hiro dicking around with the clock, and Claire recording her self-inflicted injuries in the next ep. It makes me wonder if all the repetition is intentional and part of the story they want to tell. Either that, or it's really lazy and uninspired. Anyway, Hiro entertains himself in this vein for a while, each time squeezing his eyes in so tight a manner as to look more appropriate for the executive toilet, before we're told that we're in Tokyo, at Yamagato Industries, which was of course his father's company. Ando brightly enters and asks if he's busy, "sir," and Hiro tells him to knock it off with that crap. They chat in Japanese, with Hiro saying that he's not turning into his father, and Ando contending that regardless, all the power Hiro now has is intimidating, as is the two hundred and fifty million in cash of which he's apparently in possession. Hiro: "I have no interest in money." Well, my boy, feel free to send some of it this way. It seems only fair, given your excruciatingly boring storyline I endured last season. Of course, if it's yen we're talking about, I think he's only got the equivalent of around two and a half million dollars, but still. Ando basically says the same thing more diplomatically, but Hiro starts babbling about his destiny and how he's bored. Hey, Hiro, why not pick up a copy of Oh, The Places You'll Go? It seems especially appropriate in your case. Also, I'm sure your sister is thrilled with your ho-hum attitude toward the business she slaved over while you were busy being a huge disappointment to your dad. Hiro then reaches into the Dusty Drawer of Television Conventions for a call-and-response bit as he says that it's not like destiny is going to come knocking, and just like that, there's a rap on the door. An older Japanese gentleman pokes his head in, and I pictured someone younger with much bigger boobs to be named Destiny, but they do things a lot differently in Japan, from what I've gathered from Babel and Lost In Translation. The guy hands something over to Hiro and leaves, and Hiro tells Ando that that was actually his family's lawyer, and that Kaito apparently recorded a DVD message to him before he died. "He said it was about my destiny." I mean this in the nicest possible way: Shut up, Hiro.