Episode 14 - Let It Bleed
28 March 2012
Synopsis: Claire is angry with Noah for what he did and asks him not to come to Nathan’s wake. Peter is in deep mourning and leaves the wake looking to be a hero. Claire helps him take down a man shooting up his office. Sylar heads to the carnival aiming for a feast but finds himself unable to kill. Samuel takes him down and offers to put a tattoo on him which will show him where he needs to be. The tattoo leads him to Claire. Edgar comes looking for Noah and gets tazered for his trouble. Noah and Lauren interrogate him and try to persuade him to bring Samuel down for good.
The Good: With Nathan finally gone it is logical that there would be lots of grief around the Petrelli home. Peter’s depression is handled ok as he rushes off to save someone else and forget about Nathan’s passing. Claire too has every reason to be mad at Noah. The idea that she was deceived into treating Sylar’s body as that of her dead father’s is really creepy when laid out like that. She ends up saving Peter from a bullet wound and makes the point that he needs to be smart because he doesn’t have the powers to save everyone he wants to.
The interrogation of Edgar was a nice logical story too. Instead of swearing vengeance on Samuel for kicking him out, the carnival is Edgar’s home. Lost and alone he was intending to find a way back into Samuel’s good graces. Lauren finally spells out the real analogy of the carnival, that of a cult. It’s a good analogy because it communicates both Samuel’s affection for his “family” and his ultimate ends being for his own benefit and no one else’s. I really liked that Edgar had no interest in bringing down the carnival. That is his family and he doesn’t want them split up and sent back into the community, it made good sense and avoided the cliché of him joining the good guys immediately. Though how good is Noah? Whether the writing intended it or not his idea to reintegrate the carnies into society is the same old Company talk which never worked out all that successfully. This was a confrontation between two flawed philosophies and that made it seem more real and intriguing.
Sylar’s inability to kill may well be a delaying tactic to explain why he isn’t slaughtering everyone in his path. But seeing him haunted by memories of Matt and Nathan did make some sense. His mind and body were separated and a certain amount of disorientation is understandable. I liked the way Samuel calmly and logically explained why Lydia was required to go seduce Sylar. It’s that type of warped logic that makes good villains. Sylar going to see Claire feels like maybe it would have some consequences for two characters whose paths rarely cross.
The visual of Sylar being smashed to death by rocks was a good one and a rare bit of action in this still oddly static show. The idea that Hiro’s prediction (of Sylar dying alone) would bother Sylar is intriguing. It’s almost impossible to know which lines are significant in Heroes because so much of what happens has no consequence.
The Bad: I don’t often point out production errors because everyone makes mistakes and TV shows aren’t easy to make. But Claire picks up a note from Gretchen wearing bright red nail polish. Two shots later she picks up her phone and is wearing none. Pretty sloppy.
There isn’t much wrong with this episode except that my faith continues to wane as to whether any of these stories are going anywhere significant. As I said before, Nathan’s death was long overdue so the grief can be somewhat tiresome to watch. Ditto Sylar’s story. He has been through so many changes of heart and mind yet remains a brutal unrepentant killer. It’s very difficult to care about his actions when surely everyone ought to be ganging up to kill him for good.
The Unknown: Who is Samuel’s love interest Vanessa? Other than getting around quickly, did Peter have something specific in mind to need to fly once again? Why did the tattoo show Claire?
Best Moment: Edgar sticking up for his family, a good piece of writing.
Epilogue: If these stories go somewhere interesting then this was a good build up but again it feels like this whole season has been building to things which never happen.
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