Arthur Petrelli’s Power Revealed on Heroes

The Petrellis are a complicated family and apparently the heart of Heroes.  Tonight on “Dying of the Light” we see a perfectly healthy Petrelli patriarch use his power on his own son while the rest of his family is incapacitated.

Adam learns that Arthur Petrellis is alive.

Let’s start with Arthur.  If you thought Peter’s ability was cool, you haven’t seen anything yet.  But it’s easy to see how Peter is his father’s son, if to a lesser degree.

First Arthur meets with Adam.  And without saying a word, he puts enough fear into Adam to empower Knox.  Then he touches Adam, making him age so rapidly that he turns to dust.  Did he just use Adam’s ability to stay young against him?

And if that didn’t wow you, suddenly Arthur is Mr. Healthy, up and out of bed.  So not only does he absorbs some else’s power, but he uses it against them too.

So I have to wonder if Maury is pulling the Linderman sightings or if it’s Arthur doing it with a power he stole from Maury?  Could explain why Maury is so afraid of him? And last week, Arthur used Angela’s premonition power against her to put her into a catatonic state.

Meanwhile, Daphne continues her recruiting efforts for Pinehearst.  We pick up with her meeting with Hiro and Ando and learn how Hiro faked Ando’s death.  No big surprise there – most fans had figured out that scenario or a similar one already.

But she sends Hiro (and his sidekick) to Africa to kidnap Usutu for Pinehearst.  Instead Hiro plays how many times can I get hit with a shovel before finally having a conversation with Usutu.  Usutu tells him he’s relying on his powers too much and shows him a painting of the real villains.  Anyone get a good look at the painting?

In the meantime, Matt has returned from Africa with turtle in tow.  Just how did he get the turtle through customs?  Did he declare it as his totem?  Either way, the turtle need not lead him any further because Daphne is waiting for him at the airport.

After thinking Hiro had turned into a killer, she gives Matt a half-hearted sales pitch.  But Matt is giving his own pitch – he’s trying to convince Daphne that Pinehearst will get her killed and that she is his soul mate. 

You can see that she wants to believe him, but Arthur and company are obviously holding something over her so powerful that she can’t leave them.  Did they give her her power and are threatening to take it away if she doesn’t cooperate?  Or do you think it’s something else? 

Needless to say, she continued her recruitment by visiting Level 5.  She frees Flint and Sylar.  But Sylar refuses to go with her, saying “I’m not a killer anymore.”

But the freed Sylar did check on Mama Petrelli.  When he finds her incapacitated, he wakes Peter from his coma.  Instead of joining forces with his brother, Peter puts the smack down on Sylar, leaves him in a coma and heads to Pinehearst.

Shocked to find his dad alive, Peter falls for the give-dad-a-hug gag that leaves him powerless and Daddy walking around with a whole lot of new abilities.  Since Peter obviously leaves Arthur more powerful, why didn’t he send Daphne to recruit Peter?  Was their relationship that bad?  Or did he just know that Pete would find his way to him?

Meanwhile the eldest son Nathan and his girlfriend Tracy are playing fly bait for Mohinder when Daphne stops by to visit.  She walks in on his cocoonville, but does nothing to help his victims, just leaves him a Pinehearst card and tells him he’s as bad as the rest before dashing out.  She obviously doesn’t understand Nathan’s connection to Pinehearst’s founder.

Obviously Pinehearst isn’t worried about keeping a low profile.  Daphne has left the card with the double Godsend symbol all over the country.  But I guess the real question is who is left to stop Arthur?

And lastly we have little Claire Bear, who is often playing hero again, this time with Sandra in tow.  The mission is to free Meredith from Eric Doyle, the puppeteer. It seems that Eric and Meredith have a past relationship.  He tells her, “I’m going to make you love me again.”

But the girls have different plans for him.  After playing a game of Russian roulette combined with spin the gun, Sandra finally shoots Claire.  Thinking her dead, a surprised Eric gets knocked out by “Barbie.”  Next thing you know HRG is on the scene bagging and tagging the puppeteer.

Even after being praised by Daddy, Claire won’t talk to Noah.  Anyone else think it’s ironic that Claire is following in the footsteps of the man she doesn’t trust?  Well, if HRG can’t get Claire on his side, he’ll settle for partnering with Meredith.

Aside from seeing Arthur’s power in use (but not totally defined), the episode had no big reveals.  But the story seemed to move along.  What was your favorite storyline?  What questions did the episode leave you with?

————————
Related Posts

Heroes Takes a Look Back in ‘Villains’

Heroes Form, Break Alliances on ‘Eris Quod Sum’

Arthur Petrelli Lives on Heroes, But is He an Angel or a Monster?

Who are the Real Villains on Heroes’ ‘I Am Become Death’?

Heroes’ Sylar Goes to Work for Mommy in ‘One of Us’

Heroes Returns with Double Feature Season 3 Premiere

Arthur Petrelli Lives on Heroes, But is He an Angel or a Monster?

On tonight’s “Angels and Monsters,” Heroes dropped a bombshell.  The yet unseen patriarch of the Petrelli family – long thought dead by his own hand – was show still alive and running his own “company.”  And guess what this company’s logo is?

Papa Petrelli is alive, although bedridden, and guess who is helping him -- Maury Parkman (left)

Here’s what we know:  Arthur Petrelli (Robert Forster) is alive, or at least for now hanging in there.  He is bed ridden.

Here’s how I see it:  Arthur had a parting of ways with The Company, probably over the issue of giving people powers.  Seeing Arthur as a threat, Angela – or another member of The Company – killed (or at least thought they killed) him, making it look like suicide.  But Arthur didn’t die – not sure if that a result of his power (which is what?) or just luck.

I think for the last two years Papa Petrelli has been hiding away regaining his strength and forming a plan of vengeance and/or domination.  Given what he looks like now, he must have been in really bad shape.

So now Arthur is back in the game with his own company – Pinehearst – and the company’s logo is two Godsend symbols intertwined.  Given that he’s the guy that Daphne has been working for, I’d say that the formula – which can be used to give ordinary people power – is a major part of his plan.

But what exactly is his end game?  An army of people with abilities?  Why?

We also know that he’s been recruiting his oldest son Nathan through the imaginary Linderman.  It turns out Linderman is not so much a figment of Nathan’s imagination as the work of Maury Parkman.

Major questions here.  How did Maury come to work for Arthur?  Correct me if I’m wrong, but the last time we saw Maury he was in the hands of The Company and was trapped in his own mind by his son Matt.  How did he escape?  Has Maury always sided with Arthur?  If not, what did Arthur do to win him over?

Furthermore, I want to know why Daddy is working so hard to win over Nathan?  As we learned tonight, Nathan’s power is synthetic.  Wouldn’t the powers of Peter be more useful to Daddy?  Or is it the synthetic power that Arthur needs?  Although it’s never made clear tonight whether Peter and/or Sylar’s powers are natural or synthetic, I got the feeling that at least one of them was born with their power. 

The next question would be is Arthur Peter and/or Sylar’s dad?  Maybe Pete’s not his, that’s why he didn’t try to recruit him.  Speaking of which, why are they recruiting certain people?  Is it because of their family connections or their abilities? 

When Daphne was requested to recruit, Maury (as Linderman) gave her files for Knox and Mohinder and she falters calling them “pretty nasty people.”  It seems Mohinder is moving up on the badass list, maybe it has something to do with the fact that he spent the entire episode collecting people (Maya included) and storing them cocoon-like on his wall.

Daphne recruits Knox, who then kidnaps Adam for Pinehearst.  And someone from Pinehearst had already talked to Stephen Canfield (Andre Royo).  Plus now we know how Daphne and Matt (another family connection) meet since he’s on her recruit list.

Or is Pinehearst just looking for easily swayed people?

Yes I’m thinking of the Japanese Nazis, as Adam called them.  “We are the worst heroes ever?” Yes they are.

First they – or rather Hiro despite Ando’s protests – lost Kaito’s half of the formula to Daphne.  Then they got caught by the Haitian while trying to steal the second half and tonight they unbury Adam only to lose him moments later in a “cantina” after being distracted by a Star Wars reference.

Then Hiro kills Ando in an effort to prove he’s bad ass enough to join Daphne and Knox.  I don’t for one minute believe Ando’s dead.  It’s probably another Scooby plan of Hiro’s.  I just haven’t figured out to what end.

While I’m pretty sure that Nathan isn’t entirely buying the “dead mobster telling me he’s a messenger from God,” I think it’s going to be Angela herself that pushes her son into Arthur’s waiting arms.

After confirming that The Company did give the Tracy – and her sisters Niki and Barbara – their powers and revealing to Nathan that Daddy wanted his son to have powers even if they were synthetic, Angela tried to sound repentant.  But it’s kind of hard to see past the fact that she has Peter subdued in another room with a medically induced coma.  Now that’s a mother’s love for you.

And Peter almost got a chance to pay her back for all her motherly kindness with a little slice to the head, but brother Sylar stopped him.  It seems that Angela has at least one obedient child.  And she’s going to need it now that she knows Arthur’s back thanks to that little premonition.

Meanwhile we were introduced to two new heroes villains people with powers – Stephen Canfield and Eric Doyle (David H. Lawrence).

Claire, in all her infinite teenage wisdom, decided to go hunting for escapees solo.  She found Stephen.  But so did HRG and Sylar.

Stephen can create vortexes and accidently killed his neighbor over a lawn mower dispute before being hauled away to Level 5 two years ago.  Now that he escaped all he wanted to do was reconnect with his family.

Claire just wants to help him, HRG just wants to use him to kill Sylar and Sylar just wants to play father and daughter off each other.  In the end Stephen sends himself into a vortex.

In the meantime, Meredith and Sandra discover that Claire is missing and start trolling through the Primatech files looking for clues.  But when Meredith spots Eric she calls him a horrible man.  It seemed like she had some history with him or at least knew something she wasn’t telling.

But if she knew he was a puppet master why would she go there?  And how are Claire and Sandra going to end up there next week?

I think this episode was pretty good.  I hope it was critical to forming this season.  Let’s hope I was right and it wasn’t just another tangent.

What did you think of the episode?  Did you know it was Arthur behind it all?  Who are you cheering for – Angela or Arthur?

—————
Related Posts

Heroes Form, Break Alliances on ‘Eris Quod Sum’

Who are the Real Villains on Heroes’ ‘I Am Become Death’?

Heroes’ Brea Grant Interview

Heroes Scoop:  Elle Bishop Returns – With an Agenda 

Heroes’ Sylar Goes to Work for Mommy in ‘One of Us’

Heroes Returns with Double Feature Season 3 Premiere