Heroes: Building 26 - Mania.com



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  • TV Series: Heroes
  • Episode: Building 26
  • Starring: Jack Coleman, Greg Grunberg, Ali Larter, Hayden Panettiere, Adrian Pasdar, Milo Ventimiglia, Zachary Quinto, Masi Oka, James Kyson Lee, Sendhil Ramamurthy, and Ashley Crow
  • Written By: Rob Fresco
  • Directed By: Sergio Mimica-Gezzan
  • Network: NBC
  • Series: Heroes

Heroes: Building 26

Better. Now do it again.

By Rob Vaux     February 17, 2009


Sylar (Zachary Quinto) comes back to help a new potential villain out in HEROES: BUILDING 26(2009).
© NBC

 

Tonight's episode contained several interweaving, but otherwise self-contained plot threads. In the first, Claire (Hayden Panettiere) has it out with her father (Jack Coleman) over all his lies and deceit and trucking-my-friends-off-to-a-fate-worse-than-death shenanigans. After he storms out, she receives a BlackBerry message from her secret contact telling her to warn Alex, the clerk at a nearby comic book store. She tries, but he doesn't believe her--how many hot blondes show up in a comic shop?--until HRG comes sauntering in the door behind her.
 
They flee in Alex's car, apparently before HRG spots his daughter. Claire gives Alex the lowdown, and he reveals his power to her (he can breathe underwater) before she spots a too-familiar car in the rearview mirror. They bolt from the scene, seconds ahead of the Feds. Weary of HRG's deception, Claire returns home and reveals everything to her mother (Ashley Crow), who responds by throwing HRG out of the house. He drowns his sorrows at a local hotel bar, only to discover--too late--that Matt, Peter (Milo Ventimiglia) and Mohinder (Sendhil Ramamurthy) have slipped him a Mickey Finn. 
 
Over in Thread #2, Sylar (Zachary Quinto) and his new buddy Luke (Dan Byrd) head west towards Sylar's father, though the kid's pretty coy about the exact location. That is, until they arrive at a skuzzy local diner for some frosty milkshakes, and Sylar opens up enough for Luke to hand over the address. Their repartee is interrupted by commandoes with assault rifles, whom Sylar evades before driving off without the kid. He apparently thinks better of it however, and returns to slaughter the entire team, toss Luke over his shoulder like a knapsack, and continue their magical mystery tour.
 
In Thread #3, Hiro (Masi Oka) and Ando (Jason Kyson Lee) arrive in India to prevent the wedding pictured in Matt's (Greg Grunberg) precognitive painting. Ando approaches a very unhappy bride (Amrapali Ambegaokar) and--with a brief display of powers--convinces her to call everything off. Hiro is cranky at the way Ando handled it, however. So is the groom (Yawar Charlie), who beats Ando senseless and drags him off in an effort to force the wedding to go forward. It seems to work, until Hiro makes like Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate and busts it all up for good--fulfilling Matt's prophecy in the process. Claire's secret contact faxes them afterwards, and urges them to head to LA, where Matt needs their help.
 
Finally, in Thread #4, tensions between the Hunter (Zeljko Ivanek) and Nathan escalate as a gal from Homeland Security shows up to get a better look at their operation. Nathan shows her Tracy (Ali Larter) chained up under heat lamps to keep her docile. The HS chick is horrified and threatens to shut down the entire operation… until Tracy breaks free and freezes some poor bastard to death in front of everyone. Funding, it seems, won't be cut off after all. After the HS gal departs, Tracy accuses Nathan of deliberately letting her break free in order to prove what a "threat" the paranormals are. She promises that the next time she escapes, it will be "for real." As it turns out, however, Nathan didn't help her escape: the Hunter did.
 
 
The Good
 
Though hardly a masterpiece, tonight's episode demonstrates the potential this show still possesses. Reducing the cast to a manageable number--if only for one hour--helps a great deal. Keep half the players on the sidelines, let the other half bounce off each other, and enjoy the sparks they make. Nathan's arc continues to serve as the show's high point: now with the intriguing question of why (or whether) Tracy was a willing participant in that escape stunt and how Nathan's hand has been strengthened in the process. Said stunt proved to be pretty damn cool to boot, as did the Hunter's twisted rationale for enabling it. The dialogue showed signs of sparkle ("Why don't you apologize to the bloodstain? It's still warm.") and even Sylar proved less of a shameless deus ex machina than he usually does.
 
The Bad
 
The Claire/HRG thread felt extremely forced, serving as little more than build-up for next week's episode. Frankly, getting thrown out of the house is the least of HRG's concerns, and his final speech to Claire about honesty and healing as a family needed to be dropped. This new kid, Alex, seems cute and all, but Heroes has a way of tossing new characters out as a minor distraction, only to throw them into the meat grinder the minute they cease to be interesting. It's getting old. In addition, the Ando/Hiro thread proved awfully shaky at points. It's hard to believe they needed to go all the way to India just to boost Hiro's self-esteem, and the show needs to circle back to the Hindu woman they saved (and I'm not saying it won't), or else risk crippling the impact of Matt's new powers.
 
The Prognosis
 
One decent episode doth not a series make, but it can leave enough interesting suppositions to justify another look next week. Will they finally shine a harsh and unblinking light on the shadowy world of HRG? Or will it just be a come-on? Tracy's aborted breakout carries some juice too: it remains to be seen whether she knew she would be caught, and what she hoped to gain by going along for the ride. Heroes crawled out of the pit this week; time will tell how long it can stay there.

COMMENTS AND RESPONSES

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killerville 2/17/2009 5:12:50 AM

Better than the last 2 weeks to be sure...Still much work to be done. Fuller doesnt come on till ep 19 apparantly...Anyone know when that is?

One upshot for me: Ali Larter is bangin hot when she's all sweaty and pissed.

What  I think this show needs is a REAL antagonist. Sylar is my favorite character in the series (best line last night, "OK, technically Im a serial killer") but he's to sypathetic to serve that purpose. I thought papa Petrelli was gonna filll the role, but he was never insidious enough and then he *SPOILER* died.

If  X-men is the unofficial source material, then bring on Apocalypse or someone equally as menacing.

silversurfer 2/17/2009 5:50:45 AM

I thought that this episode was very good....it definitely left the door open for better things to come...looking forward to HRG's episode...reminds me of Season 1

braveheart79 2/17/2009 8:39:36 AM

Sorry guys, but I'm dunzo with Heroes. I can't tell you how many time I yawned last night. Not only are they seriously lacking in storyline, but they also have the nerve to not move things forward. Okay they ARE moving the story along, but at a snails pace. I don't think people who are defending this show really remember how it was when they watched the first season and the endless possabilities it presented. I don't see this show lasting more that another season. C-

Hobbs 2/17/2009 8:51:00 AM

Rob, I hope you are not caving into all those people complaining about your negative reviews.  This was maybe a "D"  and I stress MAYBE>

The writing for this show still sucks though its my understanding Loebs writing is still going to be around till about episode 17 (is that correct)?  It's not even worth going into all the problems with yet another episode.  Most of you can see all of that for yourself.  I think if Sylar kills all the Heroes and rules the world they can still save this show.  In fact I'm rooting for all the heroes to die they are all so stupid...someone, please cut off Hiro's head already and dump that character. 

I just want to know what everyone that likes this show honestly sees in it.  Do you really think the writing is that good or characters are not that stupid, etc, etc?  I'm not saying that to bash the fans of this show I'm just really curious. I always use the Star Wars prequel syndrome...that those movies sucked beyond belief but because everyone WANTED them to be so good they see what they want to see and miss all the obvious flaws.  Is Heroes the same way? 

braveheart79 2/17/2009 9:24:34 AM

Amen Hobbs! Well put.

aegrant 2/17/2009 9:26:25 AM

I guess I will partially disagree with Hobbs ( you could say i would be Calvin to his Hobbs). I liked this epi - it was much better than last week's.  I am on par to what Rob wrote in the Good, Bad & Prognosis section so I would agree with his B-/C .

As far as the characters go i do agree with Hobbs - they are stupid, especially Hiro who acts like a little bee-yatch (the uestion I ask each week is when he will grow a pair). All these people have all these powers and still get caught up in some trap each week - in that area area the writers of the show must improve.

And Hobbs come on - Episode 1 would have been good if they just kept out JarJar and the whole immaculate conception thing.

gauleyboy420 2/17/2009 9:43:29 AM

WOW! I cant believe I agree with Rob's review. And No Hobbs, I don't think he's succumbing to the crybaby complainers of his previous reviews (like me).

I like this ep, because it seemed to go back to the frmula that made Heroes fun, and it looks like it could be setting the stage for some really cool events to come, we'll have to see. I was also fooled at the end, I thought HRG was drugged by his own govt. buddies, but turned out to be the heroes. I like Ando's storyline, but I wish Hiro would get his story moving forward again, it seems like with Hiro it's always 1 ste forward, 2 steps back. Love claire, sooooo hot, and I like that she is still drive to help, and inadvertanly busted her parents up. Sylar is sweet, I like that he's badass again, and even like that he likes having a little protege around, even though he won't admit it

I wanted to type more, but this is the third time I'm typing this because every F-ing time I hit backspace to re type something the browser goes back to the home page. I seriously would like all of these bugs out of mania, it would be nice.

Anyway cool episode, fun viewing, and thats all heroes ever was. It's not the best show on TV (I reserve that spot for a two way tie between Dr. Who, and BSG)

Braveheart See ya later, but I'll bet dollars to donughts you'll be back.

 

 

 

lracors 2/17/2009 9:44:04 AM

While i have loved heroes this season has still focused on the things that have driven me nuts.

The Bad (In some cases very bad)

1. Clair's insistant whining.  I have gotten to the point that she makes me ill when she's on screen.

2. The nurfing of Hero that whole story line has gone from bad to worse.

3. Sylar trips always take to long have have boring "sidekicks" let's.  Please Please Please get to the point so he can continue to be the bad a** we know he is.

The Good

1. I like Nathan is the bad guy as i never really liked him since the 1st season.

2. Nice to see Peter and Matt working together that's really cool and about time.

3. The "Fugative" story idea has merit and is logical for higher-ups to be fearful when faced with people with uncontrolled powers.  Has a much more grounded in reality feel to it vs society embracing super heros.

C for this episode... I hope it gets better soon.

wraith729 2/17/2009 10:23:56 AM

So far I like this arc better than Volume 3. It's different. Volume 1 was great. Volume 2 was good, but took too long to build up and had to rush to finish to beat the strike. Volume 3 jumped right into the story but how many fucking times can you go into the FUTURE!?! Seriously NO MORE TIME TRAVEL!! I had been hoping for a more personal, man vs man story arc for sometime. You can only stop so many global events before it gets tiring.

hanso 2/17/2009 10:30:58 AM

What was the point of Hiro & Ando's storyline this episode?  They stopped a wedding so they could get a fax?

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