Zach's Heroes Watch - "The Fifth Stage"

Previously on Heroes: Noah might be dating his old partner, Nylar – now Sylar – isn’t quite so dead, Claire and Gretchen go on the strangest road trip ever, while Samuel’s about to get all evil up in this show.

Lydia tells Samuel that she won’t spill the beans on him, and Samuel muses about hope and extinction. With Edgar gone, Samuel hires Eli the Multiple Man to be his right-hand man and take out Noah. Noah’s been trying to piece together all this business about Samuel and the compass, but he’s put on hold when Lauren drops by to pick him up for their movie night – which it turns out is actually a date. She’s intrigued by his bulletin board of super stuff, but Noah frets over the lost compass and tracks Claire with Lauren’s help. You can do that with Google Maps? Noah reveals that he’s been after the carnival for years, and Lauren gets to give the “Lying is how we live” speech that characters on this show give about every other episode.

Emotional moment: Noah bums us all out with a speech about how he’s driven everyone away, referencing the mindwipe flashback a few episodes ago. Lauren feels conflicted about this, and Multiple Man shows up. Noah uses every gun he’s ever hidden in the apartment, but Multiple Man disappears with the Primatech box of files. Noah’s pissed like Liam Neeson in Taken.

Claire and Gretchen have made their way to the carnival, the “freak show” Claire’s always felt she belonged to. Gretchen gets all cutesy about Claire being her guardian and tells Claire that she has to check out her options. Samuel’s pleased she’s visited, though, and tells her not to be scared, giving her free tickets. Samuel says he’s trying to find a more permanent way to live. He gives the girls some popcorn and tells them to explore the carnival and meet the family.

Lydia gets naked (which seems to be her superpower at this point), Gretchen gets excited, and Claire gets her fortune told – it’s all ambiguous and maybe she’s meant to be here. Claire thinks she might have a great time at the carnival as “the girl who gets sawed in half every night,” which might actually be a fun job. Somehow Samuel knows that the ladies are out of popcorn and invites them backstage for storytime with the kids. Gretchen voices concern about exploiting abilities, but Claire’s cool with it; she’s even cool with Doyle the Puppetman showing up and giving her a big hug.

After a little tiff with Overprotective Gretchen, Claire gets drafted for storytime and tells a sentimental “Once upon a time” about a frog who’s a thinly veiled version of herself. Samuel tells Gretchen that all his carnival wants to give Claire is love. Claire’s frog story ends “happily ever after,” and one of the carny kids gives Claire a hug; “they love you,” Samuel says, but when a disgruntled customer storms backstage and attacks Samuel, Claire steps in for the rescue. Samuel smiles maliciously, almost as if he planned all this.

Samuel says that life is about choices, telling Claire that he could have defended himself but didn’t want to harm the outside world. He tells her that “we can be more... we can be bigger” if they just band together and help each other, inviting her to stay for a few days and do some soul-searching. Claire tells Gretchen that she’s going to do just that; surprisingly, Gretchen understands the whole “being accepted” thing. Samuel promises Lydia he’s going to make things right, strangely suggesting that it’s not Claire he’s after. Meanwhile, the disgruntled customer is dead.

Angela visits Peter and tells him to get into the “acceptance” stage of grief. But Peter insists that Nathan’s not quite dead, and he borrows The Haitian’s power (I’m still not going to call him Rene) in order to “settle for revenge” with Sylar. Little does Peter know that Sylar’s in disguise, attacking him in the elevator and picking a fight in the basement of the hospital. Little does Sylar know that his powers don’t work right now. Actual fisticuffs ensue until Peter reaches for the nail gun, but Sylar just keeps laughing.

Peter tries erasing Sylar’s memories from the Nylar thing in front of him, and Nathan emerges, which makes the whole nail gun thing really awkward. Now-Nathan says he’s tired, and he doesn’t think he can handle Sylar much longer. Peter tells him he needs air and takes him to the roof, where they reminisce about Season One and about denial. Nathan says he can’t keep fighting Sylar and throws himself off the roof – the second time someone’s tried to kill Sylar by killing himself. Peter gets all weepy, but at the last second, Sylar gets up and walks away. Blast, it was all a trick!

Samuel gets the closing monologue – “How long can we live like this?” he asks, saying that they need to stop running and offer a home to people with abilities. At Joseph’s grave, Samuel says that he’s going to take up roots once he’s gathered the rest of the heroes. Is he so evil after all?

Verdict? I remember being a bit hesitant about the idea of the carnival, and I may have even called it a hokey plot device, but I’m glad that Heroes is proving me wrong (probably the only time I’ve ever said that about this show). I continue to be in love with Robert Knepper, who’s still keeping me guessing on Samuel. Part of that is to his credit, but part of the credit has to go to the writers; this is the mark of a good villain, that we keep empathizing with him and wanting him to do the right thing for the right reasons. My sole disappointment is that we only got a sneak peek at what Hiro’s up to; the “Beam me up, Scotty!” cliffhanger has left me guessing.