Heroes — Fallout

It used to be that about this time of the year, the networks would start airing annoying holiday season reruns. But now they've given a fancy name to the last episode before the usual holiday hiatus, and that's going to make it all better. Now it's the Fall Finale, it's hyped as such, and tonight is the fall finale of Heroes.

This was another solid episode, again bringing several pieces of the puzzle together while driving the story forward. Several of the Heroes' plotlines intersected tonight, as they begin to realize they're not alone in the world. Claire has unloaded her big secret on her dad, only to be told he's known about her powers for a long time, and has been trying to keep her safe. Unfortunately, "keeping her safe" seems to involve memory wiping her brother, her best friend (who forgets not only her powers but also their entire friendship), and her mother. This episode, and particularly this turn of events, made me very much not like Mr. Bennett—not that I was particularly fond of him before. He seems to be very much an "ends justifies the means" guy, and while I can understand him wanting to protect his daughter, he's hurting her too much. The scene where she realized Zach had lost all memory of their friendship was heartbreaking.

Matt is using his telepathic powers for good—or trying to—acting like a sort of lie detector during interrogations. He's also popping Advil like M&Ms. That can't be good. And when he tries to read Claire's mind, he encounters static. This is explained when it's revealed that Mysterious Black Dude (whom Eden refers to as "The Haitian," so we can call him that now) is lurking around a corner. Later, even with the Haitian present, Matt is able to suss out a single word from Bennett—Sylar.

So what is Sylar up to this week? He's in a cell at Bennett's stronghold, which seems to be a sort of research facility/hospital/holding pen. Bennett wants him dead, because Sylar seems pretty determined to get Claire's powers so he can be indestructible, but his bosses put the kibosh on that. Eden's on Bennett's side and suggests that she tell Sylar to kill himself.

Elsewhere in what Eden refers to as "the reservation" (she's Fun Nickname Girl, isn't she?), Isaac is sketching again, but now he's off the heroin so he's pretty sure nothing he's drawing is precognitive. Eden assures him he'll be able to access his powers without the drugs. He just needs to practice. She gives him a cellphone and a number to contact Hiro.

Hiro is excited to hear from Isaac. Hiro is definitely still my favorite character on this show. Even faced with failure, he's determined to soldier on. He and Ando meet up with Isaac. Isacc is, indeed, drawing precognitively without benefit of drugs. And now he's drawing an exploding man. This really can't be good, people... And even worse, after Hiro and Ando encourage him to draw some more, he conjures a picture of Future Hiro facing off against a dinosaur. Okay...there's a twist I didn't expect. Really have to wonder how that one's going to play out.

Elsewhere in Heroes-land, Jessica pursues DL and Micah, while Nikki tries to reassert control. And DL can phase-shift around bullets—in a very cool moment, a bullet passes right through his head. In the course of "protecting" Micah, Jessica hurts him. Spurred by this, Nikki regains a foothold, and finally she takes control and turns herself in to the police. This plotline so far has been pretty minor, and I'm a bit confused as to what's going on with Nikki/Jessica. I assume Nikki is asserting control over her powerful but evil alter ego, and that eventually they'll assimilate into one person. In the meantime, it's not always clear which one is which in this episode. Maybe that's on purpose, to show that they are starting to merge. But in the middle of the Nikki/Jessica faceoff I started picturing them as Gollum/Smeagol, and that made me laugh. No, seriously. Picture Nikki making those faces. It's funny. Trust me.

Okay, never mind.

Eden calls Mohinder, telling him she's going to kill the man who murdered his father. She then confronts Sylar, ordering him to kill himself. But Sylar overpowers her from his cell, and Eden kills herself before Sylar can help himself to her powers of persuasion.

The big cliffhangers of the episode lie with Claire, and finally with Peter. The Haitian comes into Claire's house, where she's alone, and tells her he's been sent to make her forget, as he did to her friends (interesting that he tells her anything at all, since Eden stated earlier that he couldn't talk). But he's not going to do it. He wants to know if she can keep a secret.

In his holding cell at the police station, Peter has developed a cough and a penchant for hallucinations. The kicker hallucination comes at the end of the episode, when, coughing, he collapses on the steps outside the police station. He finds himself in a deserted New York City, full of empty cars and buildings. The Heroes appear, but move away from him. Claire mouths, "I'm sorry." Peter starts to glow, and then explodes...

Cut to the police station steps. Nathan tries to revive his brother, who has stopped breathing.

So Bennett's sidekick, the Haitian, is working another agenda, probably that of the higher-ups who ordered Bennett to keep Sylar alive. But what is this agenda, and how does Claire play into it? The twist of Peter being the exploding man makes sense—what if he inadvertently absorbed the powers of Radioactive Man, had no idea what was happening to him or what power he'd absorbed, and lost control of it? Boom? It seems likely.

Looks like we'll have to wait until January 22 to get any more answers.