• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Heroes: "The Fifth Stage" 11/30/09 - Grading & Discussion

Grading

  • Excellent

    Votes: 5 13.9%
  • Above average

    Votes: 8 22.2%
  • Average

    Votes: 10 27.8%
  • Below average

    Votes: 8 22.2%
  • Poor

    Votes: 5 13.9%

  • Total voters
    36
I mean, she DOES know this is the same guy that sent Becky to kill both Gretchen and Noah, does she not?


To be fair, she does NOT know that. Remember, Samuel pretended to "save" Claire from poor, troubled Becky. As far as Claire knows, Samuel is just this nice guy who was trying to get his emotionally disturbed niece under control.

She has no idea that he's the one who sicced Becky on her in the first place.
 
Wow, what a dung heap! Peter is dumber than Parkman's turtle.

If Samuel isn't trying to get to Claire and can get to Peter and Noah any time, who is it he's trying to get?

I liked the Haitian more when he was just called that and didn't speak.

The show is beyond help. If it didn't come back from this break I wouldn't mind.
 
I mean, she DOES know this is the same guy that sent Becky to kill both Gretchen and Noah, does she not?


To be fair, she does NOT know that. Remember, Samuel pretended to "save" Claire from poor, troubled Becky. As far as Claire knows, Samuel is just this nice guy who was trying to get his emotionally disturbed niece under control.

She has no idea that he's the one who sicced Becky on her in the first place.

Hmm. Okay, either I'm thinking of HRG or I just didn't remember that part correctly. Still doesn't excuse the poor writing in this episode, though.
 
What was that clip at the end of Hiro, Mohinder, and Ando running through the woods? I don't remember anything about that from last week. Confused!
I think we are suppose to assume that when Hiro disappeared last week he grabbed Ando and then went and broke out Suresh from the asylum. I guess those of you who will watch the show come January will find out.

*sigh*, they fragment the show so much it's difficult to keep track. And guess what? HEAPS of other TV shows do it in 42 mins. Why can't they?

Deadwood, Sopranos, BSG. These shows had huge casts, with many minor threads interweaving a few main plotlines. Very rarely did an episode go by without touching on a minor plotline with side characters, just to keep them in your mind.

Besides that overall nitpick, I enjoyed last night's ep. simply because a few things happened. Sylar vs. Peter, and the carnival was kind of neat. It's always a relief on this show when *something* happens.... ANYTHING.
 
That was total bullshit! I understand why Tracy has moved to the carnival. She's a perfect candidate. I even understand why Hiro is still there. He has a motive for playing along. What's Claire's excuse? Boredom? It's not lack of a family. She's got Noah and Peter. It's not friends, because she has or had Gretchen. So, what was it? I don't get it!

I mean, she DOES know this is the same guy that sent Becky to kill both Gretchen and Noah, does she not? The same guy who not five minutes after Gretchen left Claire "for good" confronted her and wouldn't shut the fuck up (same as he does every time he's been on camera)? She knows all this, right? ....RIGHT?! So why in the hell did she even go to the carnival, much less decide to abandon Gretchen and stay there after just a few hours of hanging around Samuel and his freaks? Never mind that Claire was getting cold feet until Gretchen talked her into entering the carnival. Now suddenly it's Claire who actually wants to stay after all that she knows about Samuel and after how little she has seen while there. At least Gretchen has some common freaking sense. No, I'm sorry... strike that. At least Gretchen was written consistently as a character.

PLEASE tell me there was something in the popcorn to make Claire turn that complete 180! Something that either only affects people with abilities or was only in Claire's popcorn box. Something that would at least give a half-assed explanation for this, the worst episode of Season 4! :scream:

This season has been very much about Claire feeling like a freak with her abilities and wanting to quit hiding and just be open about it. To have a community where everyone has ablilities with seeming solidarity and openness would be appealing. The writers might deserve a slagging but I think that this at least has been consistent this season.
 
*sigh*, they fragment the show so much it's difficult to keep track. And guess what? HEAPS of other TV shows do it in 42 mins. Why can't they?

Deadwood, Sopranos, BSG. These shows had huge casts, with many minor threads interweaving a few main plotlines. Very rarely did an episode go by without touching on a minor plotline with side characters, just to keep them in your mind.
The myriad plotlines and large cast of characters has always been a part of this show even back in season one which was much more fast-paced than this season has been.

The writers back in season one would jump manically from plot to plot, the characters were all split up, the episodes would alternate threads and character focus where some weeks certain characters sat out an episode while others were showcased. They never had every character in an episode until the very end of the season when all the plotlines converged.

I don't know about anyone else but I had to look up on wiki or write what happened in each episode back in season one so that I could keep track of which character knew what & when versus what the audience knew and what questions had yet to be answered because there was almost two episodes worth of material in each one hour episode--much like with LOST.

But now that the writers don't care or pay attention to details I really can't muster much enthusiasm in being that dedicated.
 
Then it must have something to do with the budget slashing. The fragmentation never seemed this bad last season.

But I digress, as chapters 2-4 were quite forgettable.
 
We need a new poll option. I wanna vote: FRAUD! :rommie:

Some "death." Nothing happened this episode that didn't happen to Sylar-Nathan when he was murdered while in Nathan's form by Swoozie Kurtz's hit man, buried in a shallow grave and rebooted to Sylarhood. That didn't kill Nathan for good, so why should this so-called suicide be any different?

Nathan is therefore still kicking around in Sylar's head, by whatever metaphysical definition has held true for the past several months. It shouldn't take Peter too long to realize he has to find Claire and inform her that her bio-dad is dead. Then he'll meet Eli, and the obvious plan will start to hatch, leading to a permanent split between the Sylar and Nathan halves.

Since I've been predicting since last summer or so that they'd introduce a multiplying character in order to pull off just that very plot twist to resolve the Nathan-Sylar situation, either that's exactly where they're going with this or I've developed amazing psychic powers because how the heck did I know about Eli last summer? :rommie:

Adrian Pasdar isn't fired. This is all just a scam, so we'll be "surprised" when the inevitable occurs at the end of the season.

Nathan's "suicide" was handled in the most corny way possible. Claire's story was unbelievably boring and pointless. However, it was fun seeing Peter and Sylar reduced to an actual fistfight (with assistance from power tools). :D

Yes, it's the best comedy on television.
"You'll need a lot more nails than that." Heh.

Wow, what a dung heap! Peter is dumber than Parkman's turtle.

I'm afraid so. Why did Peter take Rene's power instead of enlisting Rene's help? Hey, how about tracking down Matt and taking his mind-control power and, while Rene neutralizes all Sylar's powers, including regeneration, Peter orders him to commit suicide? Scratch one psycho serial killer.
 
Last edited:
For the multiplier to work, Sylar would have to take his power (which would kill Eli) and then some how have Nathon split from him. The only problem I can see is that we are shown that is if something happens to a clone they just go poof and Noah said they had to kill the prime, so I'm not sure if a clone can live on its own and at what distance away from the prime. I dunno Temis, sounds like a stretch, but then again it's Heroes so who the hell knows.
 
Wow, what a dung heap! Peter is dumber than Parkman's turtle.

I'm afraid so. Why did Peter take Rene's power instead of enlisting Rene's help? Hey, how about tracking down Matt and taking his mind-control power and, while Rene neutralizes all Sylar's powers, including regeneration, Peter orders him to commit suicide? Scratch one psycho serial killer.

Wel..here's the thing: Sylar should be able to detect the Haitian...as quiet as he is, Sylar has super hearing, and could then know if the Haitian (or somebody) is around, and therefore keep out of range.

With Peter, Sylar would have no way of knowing that his current power is Haitian's (which i think is forgetfulness...either permanent --or temporarily "forgetting' how to use their power).

So Sylar would be willing to get close enough to Peter for Peter to use his power.

Also, let's not underestimate Peter's optimism...he still believes in his brother. He really wasn't planning on killing him.

Nathan was the one who set up a scenario where he was going to try and die. Peter still had hope that Nathan would win.

i hope we will finally get a battle royale with Peter vs. Sylar....but Nathan helping handicap Sylar.
 
They can retcon away the poof problem because Sylar actually has two full people bopping around in him so both are real. Or something. Plus shapeshifting makes them uh more solid! :rommie: This is the last show where we need to be sticklers about logic.

Here's how it goes down:

1. Peter finds out about Eli and takes his power.

2. Peter enlists Claire's and Matt's help in his hairbrained scheme.

3. Peter confronts Sylar, intending to lose the fight (not too hard to arrange).

4. Sylar opens Peter's skull and takes the multiplying power.

5. While Sylar is playing with his new power and splitting off selves, Claire grabs Peter's hand before he totally buys it and he gloms her healing power.

6. Sylar is distracted realizing Peter is still alive.

7. Matt takes advantage of this to push "all" of Nathan into one body and "all" of Sylar into another (do not think too hard or logically about this!) :D

8. Thus we have Nathan and Sylar fully returned as independent characters.

On the ratings front, a bit of an uptick for Heroes: 5.90 million; A18-49: 2.5/ 6. The demo numbers have been stable around that mark for most of this season. That combined with the utter failure that is NBC might just get it another season (whether they another season worth doing is another thing entirely).

Sylar should be able to detect the Haitian...as quiet as he is, Sylar has super hearing, and could then know if the Haitian (or somebody) is around, and therefore keep out of range.

I think super hearing was one of the powers he lost in S2 for no particularly good reason since he retained the TK. I can't remember any time since S1 when he's used that power. Unless Sylar knows who Rene is (have they ever met?) he'd probably figure he was just another one of Peter's dopey friends and/or co-workers. If they were smart, Rene should dress up as a paramedic.

Sylar is not the cautious type. He attacked Peter blithely knowing that he's got some power. What if Peter had been smart and glommed Matt's mind control power (assuming Sylar hasn't retained that, and is therefore immune) or some power Sylar doesn't even know about. Peter could have a power that kills anyone who touches him for all Sylar knows.
 
The writers have created the splodgy mess that is the Slylar/Peter/Not!Nathan storyline because...

1. They won't kill off Sylar.
2. They won't kill off Peter.
3. They don't want Slyar to be free and un-nerfed.

So here we are, going round in circles. Sylar and "Nathan" take turns existing. Peter won't kill Sylar because he believes he can still save Nathan...BTW - have they retconned things and made it Nathan's actual "soul", now? Or is it still Matt's false creation in there? In any case, it's a mess.

I agree with those of you who are coming to regard this show as a comedy - it makes less sense than "All My Circuits", so let's treat it as such!

:D
 
So how much of this suckage is still Tim Kring and how much of it is just due to a bad writing staff?

I finally watched this episode. If after Gretchen drove off it showed the invisible girl reappearing -- suggesting she followed them and eavesdropped in on them the whole time while they were there -- and then Gretchen reports back to Noah and tells him that Claire went undercover at the carnival knowing that he wouldn't approve... then maybe something could've been salvaged from this episode.

Instead, it's just characters being treated like chess pieces and moved around wherever the plot dictates.

How soon can we reboot this show with new showrunners on a new network?
 
Chess pieces? Don't you mean darts, thrown at a spinning dartboard?

Morpheus Sylar doesn't have super hearing anymore. He lost it when he had the virus. And it was too overbearing for him to use properly when he had it anyway.

Also, something occurred to me reading about people having wiki Heroes to keep up in season 1 due to the divergent plotlines and separated characters. Well, this shows just bad it is and how incoherent it is - as far as Hiro or Ando is aware right now, Sylar died and stayed dead at Kirby Plaza. They've had no contact with him since. Absolutely stupid.
 
Yeah, what the hell happened with Hiro, anyway? He got his memory wiped back to the beginning of the season, and then he jumped away. And then... well, that was it. What the fuck?

This episode was pretty pathetic. The only storyline worth watching was Peter/Nylar, and that only worked because it was so over-the-top. Splaying Sylar out and shooting nails through his appendages to hold him down? Awesome! :lol:

But I'm with Temis, they're trying to pull a Starbuck here and will bring Pasdar back with the duplication power. If they don't, I'll actually be surprised by their defiance of convention--for once!
 
. Unless Sylar knows who Rene is (have they ever met?) he'd probably figure he was just another one of Peter's dopey friends and/or co-workers. If they were smart, Rene should dress up as a paramedic.

Sylar has met Rene when Arthur finally died, Peter was going to shot his dad and rene was holding Arthurs powers back. Sylar then comes in and the bullet that was stopped goes thru Arthurs head. I forgot the exact exchange but Sylar does now about the haitian and what he looks like.
 
Last edited:
If it weren't for the news that came out a few weeks ago, I never would have known that his was supposed to be the end of Nathan. And maybe it isn't. It is looking more and more like a fakeout. If it is, maybe he can become President afterall. I know Pasdar was looking forward to that. Of course, that's assuming the show doesn't get cancelled before that happens.

Also, I've been a big believer that Nathan could be brought back, but if even if they didn't go that route, what they set up with Sylar being Nathan could fit into the future we saw in "Five Years Gone" where Sylar was pretending to be President Petrelli.

BTW - have they retconned things and made it Nathan's actual "soul", now? Or is it still Matt's false creation in there?
There was a good opportunity here for an examination of what makes a person a person, but they didn't bother and are instead asking us to just accept that it's Nathan. It is simple and expedient and I wasn't expecting too much anyway.
 
Who is Samuel really after?

Wasn't there a conversation between him and Lydia I think, with Lydia saying that she doesn't think Claire is what Samuel needs. To which Samuel replys It's not her that he is after...

Who is he talking about? Is it Gretchen? With the presumably invisible Becky hitching a ride on Gretchens car when she left the carnival?

Or is it Peter? Peter and Claire are cousins. Plus peter has a cool absorption ability that might help Samuel grow his own powers somehow?

Can't really think of the person that Samuel is really after?


PS--Love the idea above about Nathan coming back via the Eli/Parkman mental push sandwich. I kinda wish I would see how that happens compared to how Heroes will handle it.
 
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top