TV Recap: ‘Heroes,’ “Shadowboxing”

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The latest episode picked up some momentum regarding both Sylar and Claire’s plots. Unfortunately, what started out as a touching plot line between Peter and Emma has started to weigh the show down – a show considerably weighed down already.

In this episode, we return to Claire and Gretchen’s harrowing prank-gone-wrong experience, as two fellow sorority girls witness Becky turning invisible and Claire wrenching out of a spike through her chest without any wounds to show for it. The explanation that Claire offers is that they must have drugged their water bottles – and the valley girls just eat this far-fetched morsel up. Gretchen is understandably upset that someone is out to kill her, and she is not sure if she can survive in Claire’s dangerous world. Enter the Haitian, who at the behest of Claire’s dad accompanies Claire to make sure that inviso-girl doesn’t go psychotic again and attack them. Gretchen, weighed down by the pressure of this pernicious world, decides to ditch Claire and return home to a normal life.

Let’s just take a moment to thank God they’ve ditched the bi-curious-lesbian plot line. It simply wasn’t working out, and on top of that, it just felt awkward. Whether by fault of the actress or the nature of the character, Claire is just awkward showing so much affection for another woman. Thankfully this departure wraps up nicely, as Samuel emerges in Claire’s moment of despair to offer her a home and family who understands her and won’t leave her. At the same time, Samuel reveals he’s looking for his niece Becky, and Claire is bewildered that Samuel is casual about Becky’s murder of her former roommate and subsequent attempts to murder her current roommate. We learn, however, that a 5-year-old Becky had to watch Claire’s dad kill her father “for being different,” and that Becky saw a chance for revenge when Claire arrived at her school. Though on the surface this sounds ridiculous, a compelling point arises: on what moral grounds has Noah committed all these atrocities? When Noah stumbles upon Samuel and Claire after a brief confrontation with Becky (who reveals herself as the 5-year-old girl Noah had once hunted down), Noah pulls a gun on Samuel and escorts him to the car (for what purpose, I’m not sure…was he going to send him to jail or something?). Enter Becky, who causes all kinds of mischief, and we end up predictably with Noah pulling a gun on a frightened and visible Becky while Samuel and Claire attempt to stop him. Thankfully for Noah, he does not shoot the girl, but the results of this event are palpable on Claire’s face: she realizes that her father has in fact always pulled a gun first on people with abilities. So the seeds are planted for Claire to feel alienated from her father and from the rest of the ungifted humanity.Once more, the momentum is gathering, but the show still has a ways to go in order to reach the potential of this storyline.

Sylar, meanwhile, has his attempts to find his body foiled by Parkman. From having Sylar accidentally bring a gun to the airport to tripping him on random occasions, poor Parkman does all he can to stop the evil villain from reuniting with his body (it doesn’t help Sylar that he can’t use Parkman’s powers either). Sylar, in response to these acts of rebellion, first kills the man who stops to help him with a flat tire, and then threatens to butcher a waitress at a restaurant. Parkman succumbs to Sylar’s demands and divulges the whole story on how he lost his body — all in order to stop Sylar from killing others. This situation is ironic, as Sylar seems infuriated that so many people conspired to take over his mind, and he threatens to kill every person remotely associated with this event. Once outside the restaurant, however, police surround Sylar, who at this point is wanted for murder (in Parkman’s body). In a supreme show of bravery, and perhaps one of the most powerful moments of the show, Matt takes temporary control of his body to provoke the cops into shooting him – though he will die, he also figures that Sylar will die with him. This event has great potential, but it seems to have been overlooked. Once Sylar/Parkman fall to the ground, the action shifts away from them. I would argue this was a mistake – more attention should have been paid to the possible consequences of this action, not to mention Parkman’s heroics and the remarkable evolution of his character. But alas, the action shifts to Peter.

Peter is saving lives with the power he acquired from the healer, but the amount of energy it takes to heal these individuals seems to be visibly draining. This healing takes place after a train-collision and the resulting flood of wounded men and women who swamp Peter and Emma’s staff. Emma, having once attended medical school, shows her talents as a doctor by stitching up/saving a few victims, and in a predictable subsequent conversation, she reveals to Peter that she stopped going to medical school after her nephew accidentally drowned under her watch (she couldn’t hear him). This conversation takes place at the piano, an object that initially had meaning but is now simply irrelevant and annoying. Yes, we get that sound makes light, and she can hear sound through that light, but what ever happened to her destructive capabilities? How is she going to play into the greater storyline? At this point, I can’t tell.

The episode ends with Sylar (who re-transformed into Nathan’s body, presumably with his memories) rushing into Peter’s house and intoning that he is in grave danger. Yay cliff-hanger!

As I said before, you can find some gems in this episode. Overall, though, the momentum needs to pick up faster. We need to shed off the minor storylines (i.e. Emma’s story) and get to the real action. I think a battle between these mutants is long over due, don’t you?