The opening of this episode had the same general feel as the season premiere, where we got to see the Bennets as a semi-normal family unit…um, except for Claire’s little brother. Funny that he showed up later in the episode. I’d already written this in my blog entry before he showed up: “What’s the story on him? Did I miss when he was essentially written out of the show…? I’ve already forgotten if we’ve seen him at all this season, but if we did, it certainly wasn’t for more than about two seconds, given the lack of impact it made on me.” Of course, he still didn’t make any impact on me, but at least I can confirm that he’s definitely been on.
When Claire accepted the application for the cheerleading squad, I instantly thought, “Oh, geez, she’s just stupid enough to do that, isn’t she?” I have to admit, though, that there were moments in the scenes with Claire and FlyBoy that actually felt less fake than their previous one-on-one conversations…well, except for Claire’s lame lie that her dad’s just super protective. (Actually, Claire’s a pretty consistently crappy liar, based on the way she came up with that lame-ass going-to-the-library ruse…but at least she admitted it herself later in the episode.) Overall, though, the romance angle is way too schmaltzy for my liking; I know I’m always blaming network suits and their demographic studies, but, honest to God, I just sense that, over the summer, someone at NBC said, “You know, everyone already knows the whole ‘save the cheerleader, save the world’ line, so let’s make sure she’s front and center this season, too!” Thing is, I’m just not entirely sure that Hayden Pantierre is all that great an actress to warrant that much of the spotlight…but maybe that’s just me. Anyway, I think it’s safe to say that Claire’s totally gonna screw up across the board by being a cheerleader and dating FlyBoy…and almost certainly sooner than later.
Maya and Miguel meet Sylar, eh? I know Sylar’s powers are MIA, but my first thought when they came across him was, “Okay, what would be totally awesome is if Sylar killed Miguel, and then we had to deal with the repercussions of Maya without having her brother to help reign in her powers.” I laughed out loud when Sylar told them his name was Gabriel, but I wasn’t laughing at that look he shot at the camera as he drove away with his two new pals…or, for that matter, when it cut over to dead ol’ Derek, lying in a pool of blood.
Wow, I hadn’t really noticed how much Micah had grown up until tonight. I actually liked that scene with him and his new family, mostly just because of the way Micah just kept smiling so happily; unfortunately, it looks like his desire to be liked has the potential to backfire, based on the whole stealing-cable thing. All I can say is, don’t let Nana find out, ‘cause Nichelle Nichols will kick your ass! On a related note, I enjoyed her moments in this episode; I hope they utilize her as much and as successfully as they did her former “Trek” cohort, Mr. Takei. I must say, I felt like all of the Katrina-related sequences with Monica were rather heavy-handed, but the shot of her having carved the perfect tomato flower had just the right soaring music. Marvel Comics geeks, am I the only who immediately associated her apparent power – to reproduce any talent she sees – with The Taskmaster?
When she started watching the wrestling match, I realized that, damn, maybe it’s Monica who’ll kick your ass! I knew she’d use those abilities before the episode was over, but for some reason, I thought it might be on her little brother rather than an armed gunman…
We’re still not getting much information about what led Nathan to lose his wife, but whatever it was, his kids clearly weren’t bothered by it, given how excited they were to see him. As far as Mama Petrelli telling Matt, “Let it go,” I’m sure no-one was shocked that Matt had every intention of ignoring her…and that Nathan did, too.
Nathan: “Are you reading my mind?”
Matt: “No.” (Hesitates) “Yes. Sorry.
We got another episode of “My Two Dads 2007” this week, with Mohinder offering a little serenade to Molly after she had a nightmare about that mysterious big bad who’s hovering out in the world somewhere. So now we know what happened to Parkman’s marriage: the baby his wife had been pregnant with the guy she’d been cheating on him with. Ouch. And then to find out that Steven Tobolowsky is Matt Parkman’s father…? I actually said “WHAT?!?” out loud. (Just ask my wife.) Now, however, I’m not sure I was right about that. That was who she was pointing to…wasn’t it? I could’ve sworn that’s who she was indicating, but Mohinder indicated otherwise with a later comment. Eh, either way, I still followed it up with an “oh, SHIT” when it turned out that Molly’s Nightmare Man was in the picture as well. At that point, I decided that this week’s episode was possibly the best of the season to date…and the fact that the episode ending with Molly unconscious but Matt nonetheless hearing her screaming in his head was just the icing on the cake.
