HEROES 3x05 "Angels and Monsters" Discuss and Grade

[Hermiod]

That's why I think Matt will be the only person who can stop Evil Peter's impending rampage.

Nah, that'll be Sylar. You wait.

Then all the "what's Matt good for?" folks will learn their lesson!

Apart from reminding us all that men whose diet consists primarily of doughnuts can still get work on major television productions ?

No, that's not fair, I keep hearing Grunberg called "fat" and it doesn't really work for me.

And if Matt is blocked from imposing his will on Peter, it stands to reason that Peter has the will-controlling power (once again, it's the feedback problem) but maybe Peter doesn't realize he should have that power. He can't even remember to turn invisible when someone is shooting at him.

Like I said last week, a speedster and a guy who feeds off fear should have been no match for Peter but because he's so dumb he doesn't use that power properly. A guy who can freeze time, turn invisible, heal virtually any injury, burn them to death, irradiate them, electrocute them to death, walk through walls, read minds, fly, rip them in half (thanks to Nikki's strength) and do all of that at superhuman speeds thanks to Daphne shouldn't be sweating those guys.

To be fair, though, when Claire was shooting at him he wasn't able to use his powers as the Haitian was with her.

 

[the Dagman]

But Peter never needed to be taught how to use any other power.

Sure he has. You don't remember Christopher Eccelston, the Invisible Man training him? The whole first season was Peter not knowing how to use his powers and afraid of blowing up uncontrollably. And, continuity speaking, not that much time has passed since he blew up. Just over 4 months, and most of it he spent powerless in a cell next to Adam Monroe. Hell, he still can't get back to the future where he lost Caitlin. Jeez. Short memory.

 

[Hermiod]

^Claude taught him how to access powers when their "donors" weren't around which is not quite the same thing.

The future where he lost Caitlin doesn't exist anymore which complicates matters significantly. It was aborted when Peter destroyed the virus.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

^Claude taught him how to access powers when their "donors" weren't around which is not quite the same thing.

I thought the upshot of the Claude story was for Peter to get rid of the problem of "overloading" by having too many powers. He had the problem pre-Claude but now, it's been forgotten. Either way, that part of his powers has been swept under the carpet, whether it's his inability to use powers independently or not die from overloading. More retconning courtesy of the writers...

That's why I think Matt will be the only person who can stop Evil Peter's impending rampage.

Nah, that'll be Sylar. You wait.

Okay, it'll go down this way. Matt will come close to stopping him via his powers but fail. Sylar will stop him by superior force of moral will.

The future where he lost Caitlin doesn't exist anymore which complicates matters significantly.

At the very least, Peter should acknowledge that he got Caitlin killed (if she really went poof when that future did, I'm far from certain about the logic such as it is.)

 

[Hermiod]

^I don't call it retconning, I call it practice.

 

[the Dagman]

^Claude taught him how to access powers when their "donors" weren't around which is not quite the same thing.

The future where he lost Caitlin doesn't exist anymore which complicates matters significantly. It was aborted when Peter destroyed the virus.

But he couldn't get back there at will before he destroyed the virus now could he? It's been shown time and again that Peter is very inexperienced in how to use the powers he absorbs. He has been shown having problems turning then on (such as when the donors weren't around as you say, the time travel mishap with Caitlin, etc.) as well as turning them off (season 1 finale). The overloading was him not knowing how to turn off the powers. His problem even now is not knowing how to turn off Sylar's power he absorbed. It is all one and the same problem.

 

[Hermiod]

^The side effect of Sylar's power, this "hunger" is always on. Sylar can and does manage it but Peter needs to learn. Claire's is too, otherwise he wouldn't be able to recover from some of the injuries he has suffered as they happened too suddenly for him to turn the power on.

Peter has always shown that he will put others first, the virus was a bigger problem than Caitlin.

He was not able to use Hiro's powers or any of the other powers he'd absorbed properly before Adam helped him restore his memories. When Claude taught him how to access the powers he had previously absorbed, it was linked to remembering how those people made him feel, the emotions he associated with them. With no memory he had no access to that knowledge.

There is also the argument that time travel is not as simple as popular fiction might make out. By travelling to the future and observing the effects of the virus and then returning, Peter had already set in motion the events that would change that future. He may have already erased the future timeline just by returning, and thus was unable to go back to it.

 

[A Clockwork Lim]

When has Peter or Matt successfully read the mind of the other? I don't recall that. It would be significant if the feedback were passive vs active. I was under the impression it was just a passive force that always existed and blocked them out of each others' minds.

They haven't. But they also haven't tried doing it when the other was unaware of the attempt. Every time it has been obvious to the other with both of them trying to read the other's mind.

That's what causes the feedback. You can't have feedback if they're not hearing the other hearing them hearing themselves hearing the other as they try to hear what the other is hearing... and great, now I have that shocked look on my face that they get.

 

[Vendikarr]

^Peter only seems to absorb abilities when they are being used.

Not true. In season two we were shown Peter has D.L.'s phasing ability. Peter was never near D.L. when he was using his ability. Peter only got close to D.L. once, just before he exploded at the end of season one.

Peter has many more abilities than he realizes. He just doesn't know he has them. I don't think he knew he had Sylar's default ability until his mother in the future told him to go to Sylar and get it.

Once he learned of it from Sylar, he was able to use it.

 

[Dorian Thompson]

Peter has many more abilities than he realizes. He just doesn't know he has them. I don't think he knew he had Sylar's default ability until his mother in the future told him to go to Sylar and get it.

That's why I think he's the one who healed Nathan without knowing he did it when he touched him right before Nathan revived.

 

[Mallet]

That's why I think he's the one who healed Nathan without knowing he did it when he touched him right before Nathan revived.

The only one we've seen with that power is Linderman and unless I am forgetting something, Peter has never met him. So where would he get "healing touch" from?

 

[Dorian Thompson]

From someone he came across in the future, I suppose. Lots more people with abilities in the future he came from.

 

[Aragorn]

Linderman is a friend of the family. Don't know if it counts if Peter knew him before he was aware of his powers.

 

[Mallet]

I don't think Linderman was a family friend. He was a business partner of Aurthur Petrelli, but he had no problems having his goons force Nathan's car off the road and crippling his wife in order to warn him not to go ahead with the investigation into Linderman's business activities. Linderman also blackmailed Nathan by setting up and filming his night with Nikki at the hotel.

 

[Sakrysta]

Quick question that has bugged me since the beginning of the season. Peter can heal. Why would Future Peter have a scar?

 

[Mallet]

Quick question that has bugged me since the beginning of the season. Peter can heal. Why would Future Peter have a scar?

Yah, it makes no sense from what we've seen so far unless Peter can somehow lose powers and future Peter has lost the ability to heal.

(If he can lose powers that would also explain why he didn't turn invisible when confronted by Claire (or any other time that it would have helped) or why Future Peter hasn't used some of his other flashy powers.)

 

[Mallet]

It's been shown time and again that Peter is very inexperienced in how to use the powers he absorbs. He has been shown having problems turning then on (such as when the donors weren't around as you say, the time travel mishap with Caitlin, etc.)

Yet he seems way better at using Hiro's powers then Hiro is. Peter seems to be able to teleport through space & time perfectly. He always ends up where he wants to go, never ends up in the wrong location or time (although he ended up in the "dark future" in Season 2 that was because the future changed. He ended up in the right time and location, just it wasn't what he was expecting). He went straight to Sylar's house in the future. He jumped back in time and right to Level 5 with out any problem & he never has to "scrunch" his face up and super concentrate to do it, unlike Hiro who always seems to have problems using the ability (especially time travel).

 

[Kryton]

Perhaps he suffered the injury while under the ability-dampening effects of the Haitian's powers....

 

[Temis the Vorta]

The side effect of Sylar's power, this "hunger" is always on. Sylar can and does manage it but Peter needs to learn.

Because of the differences in intelligence, will power and temperament, I think Peter is going to have a fundamental problem learning to control the hunger, moreso than Sylar.

And I haven't interpreted Peter's ineptitude with his powers as anything more than the writers conveniently forgetting that he has some power that could end the scene in two seconds flat when they need the scene to go on for ten minutes.

On another topic, I do think we'll see Vortex Man back - because in the hands of someone who couldn't control it well or who had malicious intent (such as Peter), a vortex could be the thing that tears apart Earth...I guess it would stop there and not swallow the universe because the weilder would die of suffocation when the atmosphere disperses. Even someone who couldn't die would pass out from lack of oxygen(?)

They haven't. But they also haven't tried doing it when the other was unaware of the attempt. Every time it has been obvious to the other with both of them trying to read the other's mind.

That's what causes the feedback. You can't have feedback if they're not hearing the other hearing them hearing themselves hearing the other as they try to hear what the other is hearing... and great, now I have that shocked look on my face that they get.

The feedback could also happen passively, even when they aren't trying to read the others' mind. We don't know whether this is the case because like you said, neither has tried it when the other was unaware, so the rules of the game are still unclear. I think storywise it would be more interesting if Peter and Matt were mutually immune. The writers will probably opt for whatever logic fits the story best, because that's their modus operandi so far.

Quick question that has bugged me since the beginning of the season. Peter can heal. Why would Future Peter have a scar?

When Claire was cutting him with a knife, he didn't heal immediately because the Haitian was in the room. Presumably even when he got away from there, he should have still had the scars. However, I don't recall him having the scars in his later shirtless scenes (perhaps I was too distracted to notice ). That would have been a nice detail for the writers to throw in. Anyway, in any future timeline when Peter gets cut on his face around the Haitian (by Claire?!?), he will have the scar.

I don't know if it's logical that he doesn't heal after he's away from the Haitian, but I'll give em that one as a freebie. It's not obviously illlogical, at least not by Heroes standards.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Holy cow, an excellent actor is joining the show.

Spoiler: casting & name of next volume spoiler

Zeljko Ivanek, who just won an Emmy for Damages, will be joining Heroes later this season. He'll appear in a 10-episode arc as a character named the Hunter.

According to insiders, the Hunter's first appearance is in episode 14, which kicks off Volume Four: Fugitives. (Heroes creator Tim Kring is writing the Fugitives premiere!)

I've only seen this guy on really well-written stuff on cable...they must be paying him a lot? Or maybe his kids like the show.