By DeAnn Welker
This show finally -- FINALLY! -- starts to get interesting by moving the plot forward instead of just going around and around in circles. Still, I reserve the right to take back this positive opinion of the episode once I've seen the end result (and, really, once I've rewatched it), but so far, it's mostly not bad. But first, the bad: Sylar wants his powers to go away and forces Parkman to try to remove them by threatening Parkman's family. Matt finally buries Sylar's powers and puts him in some sort of nightmare version of his head, then decides he'll put him behind a brick wall (a la Cask of Amontillado and Oz). He's well on his way when Peter shows up looking for Sylar (after having his mom's dream that Sylar's the only one who can save Emma and everyone else), steals Parkman's power and realizes Sylar's in his basement, and heads down to free Sylar from his own nightmare. Parkman warns him not to get trapped in it, and then he seems to. If Sylar's "nightmare" is empty New York City streets. That's where we leave them, but since Emma finds her way to the carnival by the end of the episode, Peter & Co. are surely just behind.
In the Land of Storylines That Don't Suck, some boring buildup eventually brings us to Claire warning Lydia the Tattooed Lady that her dad's coming to kill Samuel and he should surrender so no one gets hurt. Samuel agrees, and Claire calls to tell Bennet (who's watching with Lauren -- and with Samuel in his crosshairs), and he agrees to the surrender. So, Samuel stands on his soapbox and tells his people what he's agreed to. Some of them are upset because they still trust him, even though he sinkholed a town. Then gunshots begin, and the first one hits Samuel. The one hits Claire, though, which is when anyone who's ever seen this show knew it wasn't HRG firing. Another one hits Lauren, but she's still alive enough to eventually call Tracy Strauss (who?!), since Noah told her to call her if anything went wrong. And the deadly one hit Lydia, who Samuel knew was becoming the leader of the carnival, so it's the one he most needed. HRG sees Eli the Replicator shooting and tries to shoot him, but it's a dummy Eli. The real one knocks HRG out and takes him back to the carnival, where everyone's calling for his head for killing Lydia. Claire tries to tell them he didn't do it, and then Samuel pretends to be merciful and has Bennet tied up in the Funhouse instead of killed. It's very creepy-Jim-Jones-manipulation, which seems like it would work on the same type of people that join cults and carnivals. In the end, Emma shows up to doctor up Samuel's wounds and get sucked into the madness. Claire's locked in Samuel's trailer, and HRG's tied up. But we all know Hiro, Peter, Parkman, Tracy (who?!), and apparently Sylar are going to swoop in and save the day. I'm just not sure when.
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