Chapter 41 - “Eris Quod Sum” – Discussion Thread 10/27/08

[Sentinel X]

I wasnt insulting you because I disagree with you. Quite the contrary. I insulted you because you sounded like a teenage girl throwing a hissy fit because the show, in your opinion, had a bad episode. If you had actually had an arguement that didnt depend on constant eyerolls, I would have actually respected what you had to say, even if I didnt agree with it.

You know what?...its called manners. Although we ARE on an internet forum it doesn't mean you have to act like a complete *******. Its very simple all you had to say was "Why do you feel that way?", theres no reason to try to make fun of my writing. Did you honestly think I would answer you after you addressed me like that?

And secondly, I am obligated to give you an extensive report about why I feel that way just because I didn't like the episode but since you liked the episode its perfectly fine for you to say "its getting better every week" without any explanation why, REALLY funny how that works

 

[Sawyer]

Okay, well lets see...
There was alot I liked this week. One of the aspects that I liked most was the ever-growing relationship between Matt and Daphne. I'm also interested to see what Arthur has over her and why it would make her seemingly turn against Matt, the only person who actually wants to help her.
I was interested in getting more info on the Petrelli families past. I want to know if what Arthur told Sylar about Angela is, in fact, true. I liked getting to see Peter and Sylar bond (if what happened is what you can call bonding).
I liked that the episode didnt shove Hiro down our throats, as the writers of Heroes like to do.
I absolutely loved Elle's return. I wish Kristen Bell was still a regular, but it's still nice to see her come around every once in awhile. Her chemistry with Hayden was absolutely the best it has ever been. I'm also curious to see where Elle is headed. Is she going to allow Arthur to take her ability? If so, is he going to let her leave Pinehearst alive? I cant wait.
And I was very glad to see Maya go. As far as I'm concerned, she's the weakest link in the show, in terms of both writing and acting.
Personally, I feel that both the writing and directing this week were top notch. The season started out a bit weak, but the show is definately improving. I think that, by the time the season is over, this season will stand up against S1 as the better season.

 

[absonic93]

Is Maya gone? I mean she is a regular. I hope she has some purpose, cause I like her.

 

[Sawyer]

Is Maya gone? I mean she is a regular. I hope she has some purpose, cause I like her.

I assume so. She's got no powers now and wants noting to do with Mohinder. Theres really nothing left to do with her.

 

[Gallagher]

Theres only one way to save this show.

THE ECCLESTON.

 

[absonic93]

Well she is still listed in cast list for upcoming episodes although...

Spoiler

If the eclipse coming up reverses the healing effects of Claire's blood, then those rumors of Maya's death may come true...

 

[Sentinel X]

Okay, well lets see...
There was alot I liked this week. One of the aspects that I liked most was the ever-growing relationship between Matt and Daphne. I'm also interested to see what Arthur has over her and why it would make her seemingly turn against Matt, the only person who actually wants to help her.
I was interested in getting more info on the Petrelli families past. I want to know if what Arthur told Sylar about Angela is, in fact, true. I liked getting to see Peter and Sylar bond (if what happened is what you can call bonding).
I liked that the episode didnt shove Hiro down our throats, as the writers of Heroes like to do.
I absolutely loved Elle's return. I wish Kristen Bell was still a regular, but it's still nice to see her come around every once in awhile. Her chemistry with Hayden was absolutely the best it has ever been. I'm also curious to see where Elle is headed. Is she going to allow Arthur to take her ability? If so, is he going to let her leave Pinehearst alive? I cant wait.
And I was very glad to see Maya go. As far as I'm concerned, she's the weakest link in the show, in terms of both writing and acting.
Personally, I feel that both the writing and directing this week were top notch. The season started out a bit weak, but the show is definately improving. I think that, by the time the season is over, this season will stand up against S1 as the better season.

- The incessant killing of charecters that haven't completed their arcs or fufilled their promise. During Season 2 "The Nightmare man" was hyped up to be "much much worse" than Sylar and he was hardly a threat!...he was more like an obstacle for about 2 episode, then they kill him off. So much for Nightmare man

- Plenty of random coincidences such as Claire and Elle just happening to be there when Peter fell out the window....I understand the show has a lot of these however before they were well executed...now they just seemed forced.

- Charecters doing things that are completly out of charecter. First Mohinder injected himself with something that is potentially unstable...and yesterday Elle runs to Pinehearst to take her powers away. That isn't elle. She LOVES her powers and is even a bit cocky (thinking she is better than everyone else because she has them)...I could understand if she went there hoping to FIX her problem however she runs to Pinehearst after finding out they were taking AWAY abilities.

- Annoying charecters that are NOT nearly as engaging as they were in season 1. The African man, Daphne,Tracy, Knox are among the few NEW charecters that I find to be absolutely boring however older charecters like Nathan, Peter, Sylar, Claire have lost their appeal as well. And even though Arthur hasn't been there long enough he is already boring me

- Terrible plot decisions. Including Sylar as a Petrelli (I was hoping Angela was lying to him but it was pretty much confirmed by Arthur yesterday).

- POSITIVE POINT: Maya is gone! She was a terrible charecter however Season 3 is facing an even bigger problem: Most of their charecters are what Maya was for Season 2. Dull and uninteresting.

 

[DIRECTOR]

i just realized that Sylar just killed that doctor who was just standing there. That was kinda brutal for someone who is trying to be a hero

 

[Sentinel X]

You're the dumbass that keeps coming back into the FAN forum for a show you can't stand, just to try and prove that you're smarter than all the rest who still happen to like the show, flaws and all.

...*wondering where the **** this guy came from*

I AM a fan of Heroes that doesn't mean I have to keep my mouth shut when I don't like where the show is going! If you like the show: good for you....I really don't care however last I checked the forum doesn't say "Heroes: NO NEGATIVE COMMENTS whatsoever". I have the right to express my opinion even if its different than yours. If you are so bothered by my comments put me on your ignore list, other than that don't act like I have to keep my mouth ****ing shut just because I disagree with you.

 

[fallenAngel]

I'm so glad Maya was "cured" and not killed.

I never liked her, but this just leaves so much less baggage. And doesn't make Season 2 such a complete waste of time like the deaths of Bob, Maury and Adam all did.

For once a characters arc was actually finished. Sure she didn't have any real potential and since Mohinder is in love with her, she may return someday. But it was just refreshing.

I think the only other major character to exit the show with a credible end was Isaac. I don't remember him having any loose ends of untapped potential as a character. Of course, they just made a clone of him.

but then, I barely remeber season one by now. I am really lost in the incoherent mess this show has become.

Even though, it is at least more exciting than Season two which was just a bore.

 

[fallenAngel]

stupid connection

 

[Asteroid-Man]

Hey guys, let's try and keep it civil in here.The last episode was ok, I love Sylar as a Hero. He freaking kicks ass! I'm hoping a bunch of the heroes band together to create a team in order to take down pinehearst.

 

[Hunter Rider]

Instead of probating people that seem to think opinions should be all in line, I'm gonna give you all one chance to drop the childish insults and realize that in a thread discussing an episode, both positive and negative views are allowed.

 

[Asteroid-Man]

Thank you!

 

[Sawyer]

Okay, to appease the mods and those who like to think they're mods, I apologize for my insult, Sentinel. Now, as for your last post...

- The incessant killing of charecters that haven't completed their arcs or fufilled their promise. During Season 2 "The Nightmare man" was hyped up to be "much much worse" than Sylar and he was hardly a threat!...he was more like an obstacle for about 2 episode, then they kill him off. So much for Nightmare man

I agree that it was kind of stupid to kill Maury off after only a few episodes, but it really illustrated how much of an a**hole Arthur is. And as for him being a threat, I can still see how he was worse than Sylar. Telepathy has been shown to be a very dangerous ability. Sylar would have to be close to do any damage, whereas Maury could mess you up from miles away.

- Plenty of random coincidences such as Claire and Elle just happening to be there when Peter fell out the window....I understand the show has a lot of these however before they were well executed...now they just seemed forced.

I really dont even know what to say. It's been done in shows since the dawn of time. Just a coincidence. It really isnt a big deal.

- Charecters doing things that are completly out of charecter. First Mohinder injected himself with something that is potentially unstable...and yesterday Elle runs to Pinehearst to take her powers away. That isn't elle. She LOVES her powers and is even a bit cocky (thinking she is better than everyone else because she has them)...I could understand if she went there hoping to FIX her problem however she runs to Pinehearst after finding out they were taking AWAY abilities.

Mohinder's always been somewhat of a stupid "smart guy," so it makes sense that he would do this. And as for Elle, I think that she's kind of looking towards a more normal life now that her dad is dead and she's been fired from the company. That, paired with the powers causing her constant agony, would cause her to want to be rid of them.

- Annoying charecters that are NOT nearly as engaging as they were in season 1. The African man, Daphne,Tracy, Knox are among the few NEW charecters that I find to be absolutely boring however older charecters like Nathan, Peter, Sylar, Claire have lost their appeal as well. And even though Arthur hasn't been there long enough he is already boring me

Agree on Tracy and Knox, disagree on Daphne and Usutu. Knox so far seems to be just a henchman and Tracy kind of pisses me off because the writers so desperately want to keep Ali Larter around. But I find Daphne incredibly interesting and Usutu has been a decent addition. He's not so much an actual Hero as he is an oracle.

- Terrible plot decisions. Including Sylar as a Petrelli (I was hoping Angela was lying to him but it was pretty much confirmed by Arthur yesterday).

While it was a bit too out there for me at first, I think it makes for some great stories on the Petrelli family. The dynamic between him and Peter is great now.

- POSITIVE POINT: Maya is gone! She was a terrible charecter however Season 3 is facing an even bigger problem: Most of their charecters are what Maya was for Season 2. Dull and uninteresting.

Agree on Maya being gone. She was amazing looking, but just a crappy character. And I disagree with you alot on the characters not being interesting. I find that Matt, Daphne, Peter, Sylar, Nathan, Angela, Arthur, Claire, HRG and a few other characters to still be very interesting.

 

[carrrnuttt]

Instead of probating people that seem to think opinions should be all in line, I'm gonna give you all one chance to drop the childish insults and realize that in a thread discussing an episode, both positive and negative views are allowed.

It's not about being "in-line." It's about taking it personally when someone disagrees with your negativity and your presentation of said negativity, which is understandable in a FAN forum, then turning around and complaining about how dissent is not allowed, when you are actually "being a female dog" about someone's dissent against you.

Not to mention making it personal with the pejoratives. I understand and admit that I did it in my response to Sentinel X, but I was simply re-using his own words.

 

[The Caped Knight]

Damn Arthur Petrelli is without a doubt the master Manipulator . Prehaps he's been behind the events of season 1 & 2 . (the bomb & The "Shanti virus" )

 

[Abaddon]

He was "dead" then. Linderman and co. were behind the bomb plot.

 

[carrrnuttt]

Hmm. I'll take LOUD_SILENT_MAN's tack, and respond in kind, with my own views:

- The incessant killing of charecters that haven't completed their arcs or fufilled their promise. During Season 2 "The Nightmare man" was hyped up to be "much much worse" than Sylar and he was hardly a threat!...he was more like an obstacle for about 2 episode, then they kill him off. So much for Nightmare man

One of the things that none of you Negative Nancies seem to ever bring up, or even understand, is that some of these characters that they're trying to hack out stories for in the 3rd season, were supposed to have been gone or dealt with in the 2nd season, except that the writer's strike stalled all of the pre-planning for this, so the 3rd season essentially became part "patch" for the shortcomings of the 2nd season, while trying to advance the story at the same time. Personally, them not going off-path, and continuing their planned story-lines in the 3rd season would have been my preference, but it would have compromised their "books & chapters" outlook for their story-telling.

With that being said, what exactly is wrong with depicting the person they want to portray as this season's Ultimate Bad Guy (UBG) as being so, by him offing last season's UBG without any effort or much thought? It also gives a new angle to Matt's motivations, whom everyone, including you, has been complaining about.

- Plenty of random coincidences such as Claire and Elle just happening to be there when Peter fell out the window....I understand the show has a lot of these however before they were well executed...now they just seemed forced.

WHOLE MOVIES have been made based off "random coincidences." And who's to say that it wasn't a coincidence? In world that debates Destiny versus Choice more than most, anything is possible. But let me ask you: Why are you complaining about plausibility in a TV story about people with superpowers?

- Charecters doing things that are completly out of charecter. First Mohinder injected himself with something that is potentially unstable...and yesterday Elle runs to Pinehearst to take her powers away. That isn't elle. She LOVES her powers and is even a bit cocky (thinking she is better than everyone else because she has them)...I could understand if she went there hoping to FIX her problem however she runs to Pinehearst after finding out they were taking AWAY abilities.

You're also talking about a "charecter" [SIC] that's known to be mentally unstable, and who also admitted that her father trapped her into her life with Primatech. She also beats herself about being a bad agent. Maybe she just wants to have a real life for once? My gawd. If you question a fictitious character's motivations like this, I bet you overload your brains daily with the incomprehensible decisions real-life people do on a daily basis.

- Annoying charecters that are NOT nearly as engaging as they were in season 1. The African man, Daphne,Tracy, Knox are among the few NEW charecters that I find to be absolutely boring however older charecters like Nathan, Peter, Sylar, Claire have lost their appeal as well. And even though Arthur hasn't been there long enough he is already boring me

I can only hope they bore you enough to the point that you stop watching. Or at least find it "not worth it" to keep being a female dog about it. With that being said, they still inexplicably entertain me, so I don't know what to tell you, other than I personally believe that you're getting a kick about being "controversial" in here.

- Terrible plot decisions. Including Sylar as a Petrelli (I was hoping Angela was lying to him but it was pretty much confirmed by Arthur yesterday).

At this point, it is what it is. Though it takes some shine off Sylar's villain guise, it also explains a lot, especially the similarity between his and Peter's powers. There's some bad, but there's also some good. I'll just run with the positives on this one, as I look to this show to entertain me, not as something I need to analyze with a bulleted list. As long as it doesn't get Smallville stupid with the fake melodrama, I'll be ok. I do enough analyzing at work (Developer), where I'm ok with turning it off when I sit down in front of a show.

- POSITIVE POINT: Maya is gone! She was a terrible charecter however Season 3 is facing an even bigger problem: Most of their charecters are what Maya was for Season 2. Dull and uninteresting.

See: My 2nd paragraph in this post.

 

[04nbod]

Theres only one way to save this show.

THE ECCLESTON.

I fear that they would kill claude but yes, depending on how the new comic strip with elle and claude resolves I'd love a claude/peter/elle team up!

 

[Hunter Rider]

It's not about being "in-line." It's about taking it personally when someone disagrees with your negativity and your presentation of said negativity, which is understandable in a FAN forum, then turning around and complaining about how dissent is not allowed, when you are actually "being a female dog" about someone's dissent against you.

Not to mention making it personal with the pejoratives. I understand and admit that I did it in my response to Sentinel X, but I was simply re-using his own words.

Being a fan has nothing to do with positivity or negativity, if you're a fan don't you look at what is and isn't working for you and if it isn't then complain about changes made to your favourite show/franchise/comic book etc ?

I noticed all the back and forth exchanges and yes he got defensive b/c of the fact it comes off like he's doing something wrong by bagging the show, all i want is for everyone in this little mix to either ignore each other or discuss minus all the emotions.

 

[Abaddon]

With that being said, what exactly is wrong with depicting the person they want to portray as this season's Ultimate Bad Guy (UBG) as being so, by him offing last season's UBG without any effort or much thought? It also gives a new angle to Matt's motivations, whom everyone, including you, has been complaining about.

Maury appeared in like two episodes, and was easily dispatched by Matt who'd only just discovered he could do cooler things with his powers. And there isn't anything he did that him worse than Sylar. He hardly qualified as an UGB like we were led to believe at the end of season 1.

 

[carrrnuttt]

Maury appeared in like two episodes, and was easily dispatched by Matt who'd only just discovered he could do cooler things with his powers. And there isn't anything he did that him worse than Sylar. He hardly qualified as an UGB like we were led to believe at the end of season 1.

Whatever it may be, he was Molly's "UBG." He terrified Molly, because he's the only one that can "look back" at her, when she's "looking at him" with her power.

Also, he might have only physically appeared in 2 episodes, but the character's presence was implied for a large part of the season that they were able to show. Don't forget my point that the writer's strike halted the more natural progression I am sure the show had in mind for his character.

 

[Mikelus]

Well, some critics are not happy either:

By Marc Bernardin

It's hard work, creating a villain. Really. Finding the right balance of malice and charisma, of danger and desire, is no easy feat. He's a character the audience has to be able to love to hate — otherwise he's a turnoff. And when you've got your Big Bad firing on all cylinders, he's a tougher character to keep viable, more so than your hero. If he's too vile, he's not fun, but he's got to keep applying real pressure on the protagonist in new and different ways. TV villains are so hard to create that I'll wager you can't name five terrific bad guys, ones that have been a consistent pain in the tuchis to the show's hero (and ones that didn't get ported over from another medium — so no Lex Luthor). Spike on Buffy. Ben on Lost. The Cigarette-Smoking Man on The X-Files. From there, I start to draw blanks. But you may be smarter than I am. (And, yes, I just opened the door wide. Go to town.)

Which is why Sylar was such an amazing writing and performance achievement. In the hands of Zachary Quinto, he was consistently viable for a good long time. Never mind the cheerleader: He was the engine that drove Heroes in the first season, and he was so strong he weathered the ridiculousness of the second season with admirable fortitude. And then we came to the third season, in which Sylar looked like he was being recast as a hero, an interesting gamble for a character who'd been so evil for so long.

And they might have gotten away with it, if it weren't for those meddling Petrellis.

Once Angela and Arthur came into Sylar's life, revealing that he was indeed Gabriel Petrelli, brother to Peter and Nathan, the scourge of the civilized world became an obedient mama's boy. First, he's ordered around like a lapdog by Angela (''Go save Peter from his own stupidity,'' ''Go be Noah's arresting-escapees partner,'' ''Go get me a cookie''), and now he's easily swayed by Arthur, whose entire argument is ''I'm not an evil bastard, she's an evil *****.'' Gabriel has, essentially, become the pawn/subject of a custody battle. Heroes has taken its most potent character and turned him into Drew Barrymore in Irreconcilable Differences.

Comic-book storytelling has long carried some of the same touchstones as soap operas (never more apparent than during Chris Claremont's groundbreaking 16-year run on the Uncanny X-Men, which wrapped up in 1991): long, internecine, interlocking tales with a large roster of characters, many of whom would fall in love with each other in between adventures of seeming galactic importance. That's the nature of the serial story beast. But it wasn't until tonight that Heroes began to feel less like a comic book and more like Falcon Crest. Tracy said it best, when trying to understand Claire's complicated parentage: ''He’s the biological father of your illegitimate daughter and you’re the adopted father.'' Suddenly, everyone on this show is related — and that's just silly. All we need is Lorenzo Lamas or Charlene Tilton, and we've got ourselves a nighttime soap. Heck, we even had a girl fight — between Claire and Elle — in which one of them was doused in water.
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20236164,00.html

And most important of all, ratings are down, viewers are getting tired of "The Petrellis" soap:
Heroes = 8.15 millions

http://tvbythenumbers.com/2008/10/2...-with-the-stars-beats-rainy-world-series/6984

 

[Abaddon]

Whatever it may be, he was Molly's "UBG." He terrified Molly, because he's the only one that can "look back" at her, when she's "looking at him" with her power.

Also, he might have only physically appeared in 2 episodes, but the character's presence was implied for a large part of the season that they were able to show. Don't forget my point that the writer's strike halted the more natural progression I am sure the show had in mind for his character.

The writers strike happened long after that episode had been shot.