TVSquad

(S04E02) Things are definitely getting interesting again. I'm glad Heroes went with a two-hour premiere, because it wasn't until the end of this hour that we had enough to really grab our attention again. As expected, Samuel Sullivan and the Sullivan Brothers Carnival are right at the heart of the mystery right now.

There's another mystery brewing at Claire's college. Or maybe there isn't. Could what happened with Annie be as straightforward as everyone seems to want us to believe? But now that's the least of Claire's problems, due to her little impromptu experiment.

This episode focused primarily on four main storylines, and it progressed very smoothly for it. It wasn't too confusing, and I came out if it with a sense of confidence that there's a plan for the season. I'm still not sure if it's accessible enough for new viewers, but you never know. Maybe people are smarter than I give them credit for.

STORY A
The main story of the episode was the story of Samuel's wayward ability-detecting compass. See, I told you the carnival element was the most intriguing so far. Noah followed the trail of a key in Danko's stomach to the compass. Maybe that's why the little bastard was so crabby all the time. Noah got Peter involved, figuring Edgar would try for it again, which he did. Peter did it for Edgar's super-speed, but I can't blame him for that. It would be an even better ability than Suresh's super-strength.

I was impressed that Peter continues to be an expert at everything he tries. Edgar has been doing the super-speed knife thing for god knows how long, and yet when Peter borrows his ability, of course he's now an expert at knife combat and even more proficient than Edgar. He must absorb all their skills as well as their abilities.

STORY B
I'm not sure yet what Samuel's intentions are with Hiro, but he jumped himself back fourteen years to have Hiro change Ando's past. Hiro didn't change his own destiny, but he did prevent his sister from hating Ando for years. Back in the present, Ando and Kimiko have now been involved for years, but nothing else seems to have changed. No "butterfly effect" here. How does this benefit Samuel, though?

He was very adamant in getting Hiro to do what he wanted, but why? Why put Hiro on this new mission of righting the mistakes he's made in his life? How can Samuel possibly see the outcome of that? Does the ink he puts into Lydia's back show more than faces?

STORY C
But enough about new villains, we've still got an old villain hanging around ... sort of. We didn't check in with Nathan/Sylar at all, but that sliver of Sylar that's trapped in Matt's psyche got plenty of screen time. It's an interesting hallucination for Matt to have, and perfectly symbolic of Matt's apparent fall into ability addiction.

That's what led Sylar down his destructive path. Is Matt capable of such darkness? It certainly was a dick move what he did to poor Roy, the water boy. Out of sheer jealousy that Roy is friendly with Janice, he twisted Roy's mind around and got rid of him for good. How sweet that kind of power must taste. Lest he forget the path his father went down, I see a rough path in Matt's future.

STORY D
Somebody had to go and save the cheerleader, so we're still getting stories about her. So far, they seem completely inconsequential, but maybe there's more to the death of her roommate than we know. And maybe there's more to Gretchen than we know. It may not have been an accident their becoming friends.

Gretchen didn't seem as mind-blown as she should have if she truly witnessed Claire falling to her "death" and then snapping herself back together. Maybe she's an agent of Samuel's? I'm going to start seeing Samuel's machinations in everything. He did show Claire, along with Sylar and Peter, on Lydia's back as the next ones he needs to gather, whatever that means.

They got my attention by the end of this premiere. I want to know what Samuel is up to, and I want to know more about this carnival and all the "special" people who make up its crew. So far, I'm digging all of them.

As always, you can find behind-the-scenes bits, clips and even a few full episodes of Heroes at SlashControl.