After a week that’s brought us an apology from “Heroes” creator Tim Kring for the slow pace and iffy elements of this second season, perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that Episode 2.9 was one of the best of the season to date. Then again, it also probably spurred more than one wag to suggest that, had the show picked up from this point originally, maybe Season 2 would’ve been a hell of a lot better to begin with. Whatever the case, we were given a decent amount to chew on this week as several blanks were filled in.
Well, obviously, we knew that neither Peter nor Nathan really had truly blown up over New York City, but now we understand a bit more about what happened immediately afterwards. Nathan scored himself a trip to the hospital after getting a considerable amount of flesh burned off, losing his family in the process, thanks to the meddlings of Mama Petrelli…and, of course, we also finally learned conclusively that Mama’s power is that of suggestion, as well as how Nathan ended up recovering from his burns.
Peter, meanwhile, got picked up by Bob (Steven Tobolowsky) and Elle (Kristen Bell), and in the case of the latter, you could argue that that’s a double entendre. Man, Elle was all about the “grrr, baby” tonight, wasn’t she? I’m going on the record, people: when it comes to sexy, Kristen Bell puts Hayden Panetierre to shame. (Screw the obvious pun; that kiss was electric.) As far as the other goings-on during Peter’s confinement, I felt like the relationship between Peter and Adam was built up reasonably over the course of the time they shared as “guests” of The Company, so no complaints there.
With Nikki and D.L., I gotta say, I was surprised to find that that was a pretty decent subplot. Frankly, I’d written D.L. off as dead after the season finale; it was a damned cool way to utilize the uncertainty of his fate and provide both a “yay, D.L.” moment when he saved the young girl from the fire, as well as the inevitable but no less effective “oh, shit” moment by having him meet his death outside the L.A. nightclub.
I have to say, though, that I was perhaps most surprised by how much I enjoyed the Maya and Alejandro sequence at Alejandro’s wedding. Damn, that was dark. If we’d gotten that impressive an introduction for these two from the get-go, maybe we wouldn’t have been mocking them so mercilessly all this time.
