Lower Decks

The following contains spoilers through the episode “The Art of Deception,” originally broadcast 1/25/10.

‘Defying Gravity’ (now on DVD, by the way) creator James Parriott, in a recent interview, recently divulged an anecdote when explaining what the series arc for his show would have been had ABC not cancelled his show. He related how, during the first season of ‘Lost,’ when he was working press for ‘Grey’s Anatomy,’ that its creators admitted they didn’t know where their show was headed. He said he couldn’t imagine how ‘Lost’ could operate that way. As much as I admire and miss ‘Defying Gravity’ and what Parriott had intended to do, I can’t say that I agree that the best and only way to tell a rich and engrossing story is to know exactly how it’s going to end from the moment you begin it. Maybe that makes me a bad storyteller in my own regard, I don’t know. A lot of folks have been wondering the same sort of thing about ‘Heroes’ for a long time now, whether or not its creators know what they’re doing. I can’t say what Tim Kring and company’s approach has been, either from the start of the series or even during this fourth season, but what I can say is that “The Art of Deception” does go a long way in justifying a particular course of action that wasn’t followed earlier in the season, when it was decided Matt Parkman wasn’t going to be responsible, at least then, for the destruction of Sylar.

It’s a tremendously easy thing, especially when most of the popular support of a once red-hot show has dissipated, to question the creative decisions being made. It started with ‘Heroes’ during its second season, ‘Lost’ (at least heavily) during its third (and those creators are still admitting that maybe their fans were right, which is fine for a show that actually won back its support). My experience with this sort of thing used to be that the original creator had moved on, and so it was certainly easy to say, once Robert Hewitt Wolfe had left ‘Andromeda’ that all the best energy was gone (which I still don’t agree with, but that’s beside the point), but with ‘Lost,’ with ‘Heroes,’ that wasn’t the case. It was a matter of fans losing faith in creators very early on, either because they had others like Joss Whedon and J. Michael Straczynski who had formed cults around a central figure that could never be questioned and so any time there was more than one individual it was easier to begin suspecting a dampening of influence from a single vision, or because they really didn’t like what they saw, for whatever reason. Either way, it’s become difficult, even for a show like ‘Battlestar Galactica,’ for fan support to stick around for very long.

So for ‘Heroes,’ it was always only a matter of time, an inevitability, that it was going to transform into a punch line, it was only a matter of how soon. Now, three seasons in with this status, it’s difficult to imagine that Kring and company know what they’re doing, but maybe they still do. “The Art of Deception” chronicles Sylar return to the Parkman household, now that he’s formulated a new plan, a desire to rid himself of his powers so that he can finally, at least in his own mind, redeem himself. The funny thing is, what anyone else could have predicted, what the fans who stopped being entertained by Sylar and all the characters who’ve watched him be a monster for four seasons could have seen coming, Parkman doesn’t quite see it the same way. After just what’s happened this season, he’s more ready to trick Sylar than help him. This whole episode is a culmination, a terrific little turn of events, a sudden act that wouldn’t have been possible if we hadn’t followed Sylar over the course of events that began in “An Invisible Thread” (to say the least, but really, from at least “Six Months Ago” in the first season). Just as it seems Parkman has finally gotten his revenge, for everyone’s sake, for all the misery Sylar’s caused, Peter Petrelli pops up and immediately tears the whole thing apart!

Peter, of all people? And saying only Sylar can save the day? You can say that’s the thought of desperate creators trying to keep Sylar relevant because they really want to retain the services of Zachary Quinto, or you can see it as the very kind of delicious irony this show has been dealing with from the very start, when Hiro first showed up from the future, in the first and only real instance where he was an integral part of the greater plot (“Save the cheerleader, save the world”).

The great thing about “The Art of Deception” is that you wouldn’t even have to watch it for this half of the episode to walk away feeling it was a banner hour for the series, because there’s also Samuel’s own machinations. He manages to dupe his carnival friends into forgiving him for destroying a town by setting up a decoy in the form of an attempted assassination, that conveniently takes care of the dubious Lydia and delivers scapegoats Claire and Noah Bennet, brings Edgar back into the fold, and even finally draws Emma into the family. (Then again, Lauren places the call that finally reactivates Tracy Strauss, who hasn’t been seen in ages, so it’s not all roses for Mr. Sullivan.) The episode completely redeems Samuel as an active player for me, after stretching a little to try and give the viewer a concrete explanation for what pushes him over the edge with the whole failed romance angle.

The season’s going to be over in a matter of weeks, a little strange for a (more or less) full season, and with it, speculation that the series itself may be over, unless Kring can convince NBC that he can come up with something more satisfying for wide audiences, if that’s still possible. The network could decide to replace him, or finally cut losses and let its reputation stay on retail shelves, where the DVDs still hold a respectable status. Who knows? This late in the game, with an episode like “The Art of Deception,” I certainly no longer need any kind of convincing. As for as ‘Redemption’ goes, I’m pretty sure at least one satisfying conclusion is in the works.