The Heroes Review: Season 4, Episode 3 - Ink

Posted by Jason Chamberlain on 09.29.2009

This week on Heroes, Samuel tests Peter, Sylar torments Matt and Claire tries to clean up her mess!

Welcome back to the Heroes Review! I hope you enjoyed my counterpart Michael Weyer's addition to last week's review! I really enjoyed his half of the review and from the comments I think a lot of you did too. Unfortunately Mike is away this week, so I'm going this one alone! Old school!

The strength of an ensemble show like Heroes is, big surprise, in its characters. When the focus is on the cool ones, the show soars. When the focus is on the not so cool ones, well... not so much.

I guess that’s a subjective thing, though, which probably explains why some people can love Heroes and others can hate it.

As for me, I didn’t quite love this episode, but I didn’t hate it either, and the good outweighed the bad.

When the episode started, I was ready to lump Matt’s story in the latter column, and if not for Sylar’s involvement I would have. For whatever reason, I just can’t get into Matt’s character. Maybe I still see Greg Grunberg and think of Weiss from Alias, a character I found a lot cooler. Maybe it’s the way he’s written. Maybe it’s the whole cop storyline; I generally dislike cop shows. Maybe it’s this ‘power as addiction’. Whatever it is, when Matt appears on my screen and there aren’t any other heroes around, I start to get bored.

But then Sylar went and got involved. I just can’t help but love this guy. Even though he swung all over the moral spectrum last year and killed one of my favourite characters (Nathan) I still love him. I feel like he spoke for the audience, or at least those of us who don’t like Matt, with his constant needling. ‘Why are we stuck in this scene with Matt? Let’s go do something else.’ And with those kind of verbal (mental?) jabs, suddenly Matt’s scenes became the place to be! If it takes a little Matt to get my Sylar fix, I guess I’m cool with that. For now. Clearly Sylar is gaining strength and his use of Matt’s power here is downright scary. Where is this progressing to? Will Sylar gain complete control and turn Matt’s body into his own?

Right now it certainly looks like Matt is doomed to follow his father’s footsteps.

And if Sylar is all in Matt's head, then how much of him is responsible for "Nathan's" current troubles?

Claire. She’s still a moron, but at least now she’s taking responsibility for being a moron. That’s a step! Gretchen as roommate has some potential, especially now that she’s in the loop. Will she have a power of her own, or would that be too predictable? There was definitely an undercurrent of ‘the tension’ in the final scene where they agree to be roommates. Were those candles? I think those were candles!

Peter getting ‘sued’ for saving a guys life definitely struck a chord, cause a lot of people seem to be douches these days. What a screwy society we live in today! But, of course, it was all machinations of the awesome Samuel, who seems to be recruiting Peter to join his ‘family’. Replacing his brother, in fact!

This dude is clearly the master of head games. Heroes could use a Ben (from Lost) type character and this guy might just be it. Granted, he’s got a lot of catching up to do to get to Ben’s level of intrigue, but he’s off to a good start. I’d love to see those two guys sit down for a chat!

Samuel’s end game is far from clear at this point, but he is obviously driven by some sort of moral code. He tests Peter’s morality and comes away impressed, but when he is turned away at his childhood home by insensitive rich people, he fucks their shit UP. Almost reminds you of those stories of angels in disguise, who appear as beggars and people in need to test someone’s character. Peter passed. Rich woman failed.

How about the gratuitous Sprint product placement? At least the show can still draw advertising!

Final words on our new deaf character. Emma! I wasn’t impressed at first but her power is seriously cool. I don’t really understand the applications for it yet, but I’m sure we’ll see some of them soon. That, and we’re obviously being teased a relationship between her and Peter. Could be interesting. I’m looking forward to seeing more of her anyway, as opposed to, say, Maya from season two. That was her name, right? Man, I’ve blacked her right out. She really sucked.

Things I Dug

- “Have you seen yourself eat a burrito?”
- “You’re welcome!”
- “Great.” “Great!” “Great.”
- “Did he just- I can’t believe people actually say that.”
- Pretty much EVERYTHING Sylar says.
- “Retired. But I’m always finding new reasons to go back to work.” *stare*
- Samuel is still the man.
-Deaf girl has an... interesting power.
- Claire and Gretchen hanging out with candles lit and make-out music playing... Giggity!
- Sinkhole. Don’t fuck with Samuel!

The 411: We're no closer to understanding where this season is headed, but it’s a long road ahead. New, interesting characters and new spins on old ones make this volume pretty solid so far.

Final Score:  8.0   [ Very Good ]