Mid-season wrap-up
The mid-season break or “final” episode of “Heroes” may have been the season finale.
Whether or not there will be a second half to complete a full season depends on the writer’s strike that began Nov. 5 with no end in sight.
Last week’s episode, “Powerless,” was rewritten at the last minute to be able to serve as a season finale — just in case the strike cancels the second half of the season.
But what happened this season?
Plague
The season’s challenge was to prevent a plague from wiping out most of the world’s population. Disparate storylines converged to determine the fate of the world.
The Company developed a deadly virus strain based on the Shanti Virus, which only affects those with the hero gene. If released, the virus could kill virtually every human on Earth.
New heroes introduced
We met Maya and Alejandro, sister and brother, yin and yang. She kills, he cures. While trying to reach Mohinder they encounter Sylar, sans-powers. Sylar leads them to New York City but kills Alejandro to gain control of Maya and her powers.
Superpowers run in families. We see this with Molly and her parents, Micah, D.L. and Niki and the extended Petrelli family. This season we were introduced to Micah’s cousin, Monica.
Monica was orphaned by Hurricane Katrina and lives with her grandmother, Nana Dawson, who is raising several of her grandchildren, including Micah. Monica is a mimic. She can replicate any action she sees, from creating vegetable art to Kung-Fu moves.
Monica narrowly escaped being injected with the power-inhibiting virus when Mohinder bargained for her freedom.
In California Claire discovered West, a teenage boy with the ability to fly (like her biological father, Nathan). West’s worst nightmare is “the man in the horn-rimmed glasses,” who, of course, is Claire’s adopted father Noah Bennet.
New villains appear
Adam/Takezo Kensei is the most sinister villain to appear yet, initially emerging as a hero but consumed by jealousy and insanity.
Adam, like Claire, self heals and is to all appearances immortal. After 400 years he has seen only the worst of humankind and decided to rid the Earth of humanity, leaving only a few survivors to try again, but under his leadership.
Bob, one of the original Company founders, is all about control. If he cannot control emergent heroes or The Company does not have a use for that power, he either removes their powers or kills them. He is a master manipulator, convincing confused emergent heroes that he is there to help them. In his mind, Bob does believe he is helping them, even as he has them injected with potentially deadly viruses.
Elle is Bob’s adopted daughter. Like Claire, Elle was very young when discovered, and adopted to control those powers. Elle creates and controls electricity, a living lightning bolt generator. Elle is mentally damaged by Bob’s early attempts to discover her limits and enjoys hurting people.
Maurice Parkman, Matt’s father, is the evil man who terrifies Molly and was one of the original founders of The Company. The elder Parkman developed his own mind-reading powers, identical to Matt’s, learning to control other people’s minds, making them see and believe what he wants them to see and believe.
Maurice was a psychic hitman for Adam, responsible for the attack on Angela Petrelli. Matt learned from his father’s tricks, eventually trapping Maurice in his own mental prison.
Our Heroes
New coalitions of heroes were formed this season in response to the appearance of these new villains.
Matt and Nathan team up to capture Maurice, then to bring down The Company. Their plot failed when Mohinder turned on them and ended up working with the company to stop Adam.
Claire fell for West, the flying boy, and set in motion events that eventually drew The Company’s attention to their California home, eventually resulting in Noah’s death. However, The Company uses a sample of Claire’s blood to bring him back, blackmailing Noah into settling with his family, firmly under control of The Company.
Peter began the season in Ireland, sans-memory. Gradually he learned more of his past as his past and, The Company, found him. Peter traveled to the future, a future where more than 90 percent of the world’s population has died of a super-virus, including most of his family and friends. Peter returns to the current time to prevent the virus’ release.
Eventually he fell under Adam’s influence, allowing Adam an opportunity to kill another Company founder and discover the location of the deadly virus. Peter believed that Adam was with him helping to destroy the virus while Adam was using Peter’s powers to obtain and release the virus.
In ancient Japan, Hiro created the man who he held as his personal hero, a legendary Japanese hero who turned out to be a European mercenary using a Japanese name: Takezo Kensei.
When their relationship soured Hiro finds he must kill Kensei, but later learns that Adam/Kensei is still alive 400 years later. Bent on revenge for his father’s death, Hiro seeks out Adam and confronts him at the Texas “paper company” where the deadly virus is stored.
In a final battle Nathan convinced Peter that Adam was up to no good. While Hiro removed Adam from the scene, leaving Adam alive but buried deep in a coffin in Japan, Peter destroyed the virus using his heat-powers, incinerating it.
Sylar’s Return
Sylar began the season without his powers (due to being injected with the virus), and under the control of Candice, The Company’s illusionist. Unsurprisingly he killed her and escaped, discovering he was in the middle of a jungle.
Sylar met up with Maya and Alejandro as they all made a run for the U.S. border. Knowing that he could not take Maya’s killing power, Sylar groomed Maya to join him, either to take her powers or, if he could not get his powers back, as a partner. Sylar killed Alejandro as soon as Maya could control her own power and took her to New York, where he took Molly hostage to lure Mohinder in to find a cure for the virus that blocked his powers.
Using the only remaining sample of Claire’s blood (intended to cure Niki), Sylar got his powers back while Maya escaped to the care of Mohinder and, presumably, The Company.
Heroes died
Hiro’s father, Kaito Nakamura, was killed by Adam in retaliation for being locked in a Company jail cell for three decades.
DL survived the first season finale and became a firefighter. He used his phasing powers to rescue trapped fire victims, only to die at the hands of a jealous “boyfriend” of Niki’s third personality, Gina, a club-scene party girl.
Niki then contracted a virus that shut off her super-strength. While visiting Micah in New Orleans Micah and his cousin Monica try to recover Micah’s stolen backpack from a gang and Monica is caught. Niki rescues Monica but without her powers is trapped and dies in a burning building.
Niki’s death was all but expected, without Jessica to add spice to Niki’s sweetness.
Niki leaves Micah an orphan with an imagination and a grudge and a cousin ready to use showy powers. Without Niki’s intervention and steady hand (assuming one of her other personalities doesn’t take over) this duo is likely to provide the spark for the next season.
The most shocking death was Nathan, who struggled through his belief that Peter was dead and the memory of his severe disfigurement after Peter’s explosion in the first season finale.
Nathan was assassinated at a press conference where he had intended to reveal the heroes’ existence in order to end The Company’s power over them.
Though the next season has no official airing date, it is sure to hold more twists and turns. Stay tuned to the Campus Press for more reviews of your favorite television shows, including “Heroes.”
View episodes and features online at NBC.
Contact Campus Press Staff Writer Arwyn Rice at arwyn.rice@thecampuspress.com
