Lower Decks

The following contains spoilers through the episode “Brother’s Keeper,” originally broadcast 11/16/09.

Whether you love it or haven’t been convinced, the ‘Redemption’ arc reached a high point this week. At this point, the season is no longer accepting new viewers, or even those curious if it’s gotten back to first year goodness, but rather is now firmly back in the cumulative effect a serialized show ought to work best in, counting on awareness of developments from last season and hoping you care enough about Samuel Sullivan as a foil to register that “Brother’s Keeper” just spelled out his threat once and for all.

Personally, I couldn’t think more highly of the work the creators have done this season, from the carnival plot to the arcs done with new and old characters. There’s still plenty to do before this story’s through (how does Emma fit into everything?), but this was the pivotal episode after a string of strong entries, the “Villains” of the season (the flashback episode that revealed Arthur Petrelli’s past during last season’s opening arc, also called ‘Villains’) that finally brought back Mohinder (believe it or not, but he does still have fans), got Nathan to the point where he realized he was Sylar, studied how some of the familiar characters were doing in relation to the carnival, and yes, explained Samuel. It’s was a classic, “cluttered” episode, one that is probably impenetrable to the uninitiated, but all the more dazzling, exactly the kind of work that drew so many fans early on in the show’s run (“Home Coming” from the first season is another crossroads entry “Brother’s Keeper” may be compared to, and if you know that one, you can get an idea of this week’s impact even if you’re reading this review without having seen the episode).

First, let’s talk about Matt Parkman. Last week it seemed like he bravely sacrificed himself in a hail of police bullets to stop Sylar, but the teaser for “Brother’s Keeper” quickly dispelled the certainty of his death, a somewhat controversial move (in this show, as in the comics it’s more or less derived from, no one ever seems to stay dead). This in itself, an unwillingness to part with original cast members, has been a show tradition. Nathan and HRG have both tasted death, Tracy did, and Claire has made a career of it. The biggest instance would have been the end of the first season, when viewers might have assumed that’s exactly what Peter was doing, even when Nathan swooped in, bringing down both Petrelli brothers in one fell, er, swoop. Maybe that’s why so many original fans stopped watching, because they began to question the integrity of a show that kept teasing something it rarely equated with finality. Regardless, Parkman is revived by Peter’s healing touch (acquired a few episodes earlier and lost by episode’s end), which sets up a nasty situation when the monkey in the room, Sylar, has the chance, at last, to reunite body and mind. Some of the best moments are the tension caused by Nathan wandering a bit too close to Parkman. By the end, Parkman’s free of Sylar at last, but there’s doubt (which the teaser doesn’t entirely dispel) about whether or not Sylar got what he wanted.

This will lead, for some, into yet another interesting set of circumstances. For some, it’s another chance to see if Sylar can redeem himself. Inside Parkman’s mind, he doesn’t seem to have been very much interested, but inside Nathan/Sylar? The episode is the first time in weeks that we’ve gotten an extended experience of Nathan, and as I said, he finally learns the truth. As Nathan and with Sylar’s mind displaced, all he has to struggle with, supported by his brother, is what this makes him: more Nathan than Sylar? more Sylar than Nathan? It’s a struggle either way, at least during “Brother’s Keeper,” and exactly the kind of compelling drama “An Invisible Thread” set up, and a long-running series is capable of. Being such a fan of Nathan, I see this as a chance for the character to continue grappling with the part he’s played in the series, which is exactly the flipside of Sylar’s arc (see why this has also been such an appropriate pair, as Parkman and Sylar were?), where he has been at the periphery pretty much the whole time. Both have made a lot of bad decisions, and have struggled with the ramifications (at least from time to time). Forcing the two to literally travel the same road is the best thing that could have happened to them, and the show.

Mohinder, that annoying Indian guy constantly researching the same stuff his father did, who used to do the narration to every episode (and see how it was appropriate, too, that Samuel replaced him in “Orientation”?), could never decide if he worked with the good guys or bad, and hadn’t been seen all season, finally got back into the game. We’d already seen what happened to him, but we spend about half the episode in flashbacks as he discovers, once again, that he can’t leave the research alone. Viewers from last season will again be rewarded (“1961”) when the topic of Coyote Sands is revisited, almost as a ’Heroes’ answer to the Dharma Initiative from ‘Lost.’ Mohinder watches a film that holds crucial information times hasn’t been kind in preserving, which causes him to do some research (invent a certain compass), and eventually visit the Sullivan circus, where he meets Samuel’s brother, who tells him things Samuel wasn’t supposed to know, and so of course Samuel overheard and killed Mohinder for. But Samuel has already gotten Hiro in his camp in the present, and the task he wanted was to retrieve the film before Mohinder burns it, so he can find out his powers increase when he surrounds himself with others who possess special abilities. Hiro saves the film, but he also saves Mohinder, but ends up doing pretty much the same thing to him that Samuel did with Charlie. End result: Mohinder’s back in play.

Also in play this episode are Tracy and Claire, who’ve paired up and eventually realize both have been courted by Samuel. Tracy has begun losing control of her powers (which have finally switched back from water to freezing), and needs a little help coping. HRG eventually shows up to notice some of this, but not before Tracy has decided maybe she ought to run away to the circus after all.

The preview for next week feels like something straight out of the first season, believe it or not, like things are really heating up, building in a way, and not to take away anything from them because I’ve grown fond of the whole series, the previous two seasons really haven’t. I can’t speak highly enough about ‘Heroes’ in its fourth season.