Episode Report Card Couch Baron: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Crash Course
By Couch Baron | Season 3 | Episode 14 | Aired on 02.02.2009
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Welcome back to the show, those of you who are still watching! Two months have passed, and many of the main Heroes are trying to blend in and lead normal lives. Not surprisingly, given how the last chapter ended, Nathan is now the Chairman of the Senate Commission on Homeland Security. On TV, he tells an interviewer about his churchy beliefs and his efforts to protect the American people from an unnamed threat, and as he does, Tracy gets captured by a commando team whose protective suits, it seems, were designed to repel her powers. They're also led by Zeljko Ivanek, which is pretty sweet.
Hiro is still powerless, but instead of being bitter, he's thrown himself overenthusiastically into training a reluctant Ando as a superhero. Ando's not particularly interested until Hiro is captured by the commandos, but he doesn't manage to do anything about it. Needs a little more training, I'd say.
Claire's hanging with Angela and considering colleges, but is worried that Sylar is still out there somewhere, even though Angela tells her Sylar's dead. But Claire is in the right, of course, as Sylar is not only alive but has found his real father, who tells him that his brother gave Sylar to him. Sylar goes to find the brother, but instead at his house the commandos try to take him. However, they're completely unprepared for how powerful he is as he makes mincemeat of them. Meanwhile, Claire is horrified to learn that Angela is conspiring with Nathan to keep Claire distracted while he "takes down" Matt and Peter. Claire calls Paramedic Peter to warn him, so he gets in a cab -- driven by Mohinder. Oddly, there's no mention of their last meeting at Pinehearst, nor is there any sign of the lesion the show went to such dramatic lengths to reveal at the end of last episode. After Peter gets out, Zeljko Ivanek gets in and forces Mohinder at gunpoint to drive to his minions, but Mohinder uses his super-strength to get away and run until he's intercepted again -- by Bennet, who's in cahoots with Ivanek. Back at the Petrelli ancestral mansion, Peter finds Nathan and accurately calls him a "self-loathing hypocrite," and Nathan responds by using Peter's weakness for brother-touching to distract him so Bennet can incapacitate him. Cold, but very smart.
Matt and Daphne are working as bodyguard and delivery girl, respectively, but even as Matt tells Daphne not to use her powers so they can just live normal lives, he's still seeing foreboding visions of NeoIsaac, who eventually tells him that he's been called to be a prophet, just like he was -- and just like that, Matt's drawing the future, and then Claire turns up just in time for them both to be captured. Next time he'll want to draw the future far enough in advance to be able to do something about it. Nathan has Claire released, but the rest of the prisoners are put on a plane in shackles -- but Claire escapes her driver and stows away right before the plane takes off. On board, she manages to arrange for Peter to absorb Mohinder's super-strength, and soon Peter is taking down the guards while Claire's heading up to the cockpit -- to find Bennet acting as co-pilot. Awkward. Peter then absorbs Tracy's power (seems he can now only hold one power at a time) and accidentally freezes part of the plane, blowing a hole in it and sending it hurtling to the ground as Peter desperately hangs onto Mohinder's hand. Despite what seems like a blatant attempt to rip off Lost, the show made me forget all about Chapter Three here. Not that I wasn't eager to do so anyway, but I appreciate the thought regardless.
Want more? The full recap starts right below! As I said in the recaplet, welcome back! And to try to start the new chapter off on a positive note, whatever else can be said about this episode, it most certainly was not boring, which already puts it ahead of almost anything in the two previous installments. (The Sylar scenes excepted, that is.) So:We open on a closeup of a digital clock that reads 7:12. I wouldn't normally mention such a trivial detail, but since the show seems to want to be Lost all of a sudden, maybe the numbers will be significant. The phone rings, and Tracy looks at the caller ID before answering and kittenishly greeting the Governor, who apparently tells her to turn on the TV. She complies, and we see Nathan being interviewed by some guy who talks about his "seemingly meteoric rise" in the Senate and how his access to private citizens' life information basically makes the Patriot Act look like the creation of bleeding-heart liberals by comparison. Nathan disingenuously chuckles like the good neocon he is as he describes himself as a "humble junior senator" from New York who just happens to be the Chairman of the Senate Commission on Homeland Security, and if Nathan achieved this in a few months you have to figure Hillary Clinton is watching and wondering where she went wrong. Tracy, looking not all that amused, assures the Governor that she knew nothing about Nathan's little interview here, as she hasn't talked to him in almost two months. After suggesting rather strongly that she's resumed providing, er, free services to the Governor, she hangs up, and the tone of the scene changes as the interviewer brings up rumors of "frequent private meetings" at the White House, and asks what's up. Nathan tells the guy that they're protecting the American people from a serious threat, and they need to take "precautionary measures." At that moment, Tracy focuses in on the open bathroom window, and then looks warily back at Nathan before moving and shutting and locking said window. But she quickly comes face to face with a man dressed like some sort of commando, all in black with a mask over his face. She grabs his arm and tries to freeze him, but is terrified when she sees his clothes somehow absorb her power. She tries to flee, but a few other commandos appear and surround her, weapons at the ready. After a stupid assertion about how she doesn't beg, a last begoggled commando, clearly the leader, appears and unceremoniously zaps Tracy with what seems like a flying taser charge, and she goes down as Nathan is changing into a t-shirt that reads "I'm A Religious Zealot! Ask Me How!" As he tells his minions to be sure to cover Tracy's hands, the commando leader removes his headgear to reveal that he is Zeljko Ivanek, who is awesome in every way and who I haven't had the pleasure of recapping since he played the Pernicious Peewee on Oz, and it was at this moment I knew prospects for this chapter were looking up indeed. ZI makes a call and tells whoever answers to inform "Petrelli" that they got "the first one." And for the first time in a while, the show has earned this: DUN!