Episode 6 - Dying of the Light
11 January 2009
Review
Synopsis: Arthur Petrelli has the ability to steal other people’s powers. He takes Adam’s cell regeneration, giving Arthur his strength back and killing Adam. Daphne continues to recruit for him, sending Hiro to Africa, peaking behind Mohinder’s curtains and warning Matt not to come to Pinehearst. Matt wants to save her and tries to convince her that they are soul mates. Nathan and Tracy ask Mohinder for help but he ties them up. Hiro gets the run around from the pre-cog in Africa. Claire and Mrs Bennett track down Meredith and are forced into a game of Russian roulette by Eric Doyle. Claire saves the day and Noah asks Meredith to be his partner. Sylar seeks Peter’s help now that Angela is in a coma. Peter knocks Sylar out and heads to Pinehearst alone where Arthur hugs him stealing all his powers.
The Good: The focus in Heroes is usually on powers rather than people. So Peter losing his huge array of abilities to his father is a big twist. In fact that ought to make Arthur practically invulnerable now that he can’t be killed (Claire), can travel through time (Hiro), read people’s minds (Matt) and will absorb other people’s abilities when they are near him (Peter). Bear in mind the sheer scope of those powers as his story develops. I give credit to Adam Monroe for his very genuine screams of terror as he led to his death.
In the meantime the writers do slow things down and we get a few better paced stories. The highlight is Claire and her mothers taking on the creepy Eric Doyle. For all its flaws (see The Bad) there is definitely a sense of drama and danger as he taunts them into shooting at each other. What gives the scene its edge is when Doyle starts guessing how the three are related to one another. It actually gets you thinking about how Claire must feel to have both mother’s in such danger. The story is pretty simple but plays out logically with Doyle ignorant of Claire’s healing power. Claire’s dismissive attitude to Noah is good to see, continuing the mistrust developed in the previous episode.
Hiro has an even simpler plot as he tries to track down our African friend in childish fashion. His fake blood and sword trick with Ando was predictable but made sense. These stories are very basic and based more around our heroes abilities than around their personalities. But building slowly is better than the convoluted mess the show can get into.
Like Mohinder, Peter suffers the consequences of his own arrogance when Arthur takes his powers. Hopefully both will learn valuable lessons which can inform their future decisions. The writers have started to explain why Daphne is working for the “bad guys” which is good to see. Matt at least has an excuse to try and help Daphne now he knows she will die, otherwise his story is lacking a lot (see The Bad).
The Bad: Matt’s story follows the shaky logic that a character would blindly behave one way because he saw it in the future. You don’t need to see the future to know that smoking or heavy drinking aren’t good for you but people do it anyway. So the idea that if someone showed you the future you would just change all your plans immediately doesn’t ring true. The writers try to cover themselves by having Matt claim he felt all that he experienced in the future and therefore his “love” for Daphne has kind of been instilled in him. But he still seems desperate by telling her they are soul mates and not going a bit slower with that side of his story.
It’s worth asking at this stage what Parkman does for a living. Last season he was made detective and now he seems like he has no job. It’s definitely worth asking what all the characters are doing for money these days. Or why no one is asking why Claire isn’t in school. But seriously, have the company still got accountants paying Noah and Mohinder for doing whatever they please? I love how Primatech seems completely empty. There are no nurses tending to Angela or guards looking after Sylar and the other prisoners. It’s all so lazy and endemic of what’s wrong with Heroes.
Another major point of laziness is what exactly the characters can or can’t do. Peter punches Sylar in the face repeatedly. We have to ask if Peter is using Nikki’s strength (absorbed in 123) or even Knox’ (taken in 304). Both those characters tear people’s bodies apart, so why isn’t Sylar a broken, bloody mess? He has no such power beyond Claire’s ability to heal. I assume the writers never thought about it and would argue Peter just used enough strength to knock Sylar down but with better definition these fight scenes would mean so much more. Similarly Eric Doyle apparently makes the movements which his victims must then imitate. Of course this is impractical for the show where he is holding three people captive simultaneously. So he can also just flick his hand and make people freeze or obey his various whims. Again with better definition of what he can or can’t do these scenes would have been even more dramatic. As it is it looks a bit haphazard and made up as it goes along.
The most baffling part of Doyle’s story is that he seems to have returned to his own private theatre. Isn’t he worried that the company will come looking for him there? He only just escaped so he ought to be. But no he is so comfortable that he is willing to take a birthday party booking. Again you could plausibly imagine he would take the deposit money and then skip town but he doesn’t seem in any hurry to run away and looks very foolish as a result. It’s also a bit weak that he is a generic “bad guy” who is happy for a young girl to be shot dead for his own amusement. Aren’t there any villains who are creepy and bad in their own unique way? You know like based around the fact that they have their own insecurities and neuroses rather than just being generally evil. Claire saying “Show’s over!” when she knocks Doyle out is pretty tone deaf. A few seconds ago she was crying and afraid she might have to murder her own mother. Now she is suddenly in good enough spirits to make a super hero quip?
Mohinder taking Tracy’s hand a few minutes after she demonstrated her freezing power is mindless writing. It makes Mohinder look like a complete fool. Her transparent empathy shouldn’t have been enough to make him forget what she was capable of.
The Unknown: What has happened to Angela? Did Maury do this to her or is this another power Arthur has? What is keeping Daphne in line? Apparently Daphne can run with people. That needs defining. Does she have to physically carry them like Nathan does when he flies (as in 123)? Or do they get caught up in her slipstream in some spurious fashion? These things do need explaining or else fight scenes and confrontations become meaningless. Viewers will soon learn that the characters can just have new made up parts of their powers which get them out of any jam.
Best Moment: The show of real emotion from Claire and her two mothers as they play Russian roulette. Doyle does seem a genuinely creepy person and those scenes are decent television.
Epilogue: Heroes slows down a bit here which is good. It also dumbs down, which isn’t.
There is such a sloppy, casual attitude to what each hero is capable or not capable of. In season one it was built up so carefully exactly what Hiro, Peter and Claire could do to stop Sylar. Now it seems powers are much more haphazardly written in and they have begun to have much less meaning. The whole show seem less interesting as a result because I have lost faith that the writers are consistently building toward anything. I still find it shocking that a superhero show doesn’t have better fight scenes.
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