The Return of Heroes

Last year, Heroes became a sensation, NBC's top-rated scripted show. For those unfamiliar, the concept behind Heroes, the central idea is that man is evolving and several people have developed superhuman powers as a result of this evolution. The series focuses on several characters and their individual stories, stories that connect to other stories and an overarching plot. The first season ended with the Heroes defeating Sylar, a serial killer who targeted those with abilities and stole those abilities for himself. Once Sylar was defeated, another crisis was posed -- Peter Petrelli was about to cause a nuclear explosion before his brother Nathan came and flew him into the sky where they were apparently both killed. The final scene featured Hiro Nakamura, who teleported during the battle with Sylar, and suddenly found himself in 17th century Japan.

Season two starts by dropping us into the lives of the Heroes, four months after the events at Kirby Plaza. I will warn you all right now, this review DOES contain spoilers. So if you haven't seen the episode and want to be surprised, then go watch the episode at http://www.nbc.com/Heroes before reading any further. In this first episode, Mohinder Suresh has discovered that the virus which killed his sister Shanti is also targeting others with abilities and eliminating them. We see him in Cairo, but the impression is given that he's been traveling the world, lecturing to try and seek support for his research and finding none -- until a man from the Company offers Mohinder a job.

In Japan during the 17th century, Hiro finds himself face to face with his hero, the legendary samurai named Takezo Kensei. Hiro is quickly shocked to discover that Kensei is actually an Englishman who came over to Japan on a trade ship and relies on dirty tricks to make a living as a wandering samurai. During one such encounter, Hiro attempted to save Kensei's life, an action which resulted in Kensei failing to stop a group of bandits from burning down a village. The swordsmith's daughter angrily confronts Kensei and says she'll save her father herself if she has to, taking back what will become Hiro's sword in the future.

In New York, Ando Masahashi and Kaito Nakamura are still waiting for some sign of Hiro when Kaito receives a photo of himself with the helix symbol drawn over it in blood. Kaito says that this means he will die soon. Also in New York, Nathan has apparently survived the explosion and is an alcholic and divorced, depressed over the death of Peter. He exchanges some harsh words with his mother, Angela, before kicking her out of his apartment and as she leaves, Angela discovers a similar photo of her with a red helix. Angela and Kaito confront each other and sure enough, just as Kaito predicted, he is killed by a mysterious assailant.

Matt Parkman and Molly Walker are living in Mohinder's old apartment and Matt has apparently adopted Molly. Matt uses his telepathy to advance his career by cheating on his detective's exam and Molly is having nightmares, nightmares which are affecting her performance in school because she continues to draw pictures of eyes and the helix. Matt wakes her during one of these nightmares and she talks about how she knows where he is but refuses to elaborate to Matt because if she does, he'll die.

The Bennet family has relocated to California and changed their name to Butler. Claire in particular is having difficulty adjusting to her new life and trying to do her best to "stay out of sight." Noah now works as an assistant manager at a paper company where he has to deal with an annoying manager -- but after taking enough crap, Noah shows the manager just what a former Company man is capable of to improve his situation. While at dinner, Noah gets a call -- from Mohinder, who says their plan is working and the Company sought him out and offered him a job. Apparently, the four months haven't stopped Noah, Mohinder and Matt from trying to take down the Company.

Even more interesting is a phone call Claire has. She calls up Nathan, who is in a bar and this is where things really start to take an interesting turn. Claire says, "I know why you're doing this, I miss him, too." The implication is that it's Peter she misses, but is it really? After he ends the call, Nathan looks into the mirror and sees another reflection -- that of a badly-scarred Peter. Finally, the episode ends with a group of thieves in Ireland breaking into a crate. But instead of finding iPods like they intended, they find a man handcuffed inside the crate, who wears a helix necklace and can fire bolts of energy. The final shots of this scene reveal that the man is in fact Peter, and he apparently has no memory of who he is. And all of this isn't even addressing the new hero introduced, named Maya who has some sort of destructive ability.

So what does this all mean? Well my personal prediction is that Hiro will join the swordsmith's daughter in freeing the swordsmith, thus he will become the legendary Takezo Kensei. The threat Molly sees in her nightmares is the mysterous "bogeyman" she mentioned in the previous season, the one she said is worse than Sylar. As far as Peter's situation goes, I believe Nathan is, in fact, dead. The reflection "Nathan" sees in the bar could simply be a reflection of his guilt, but I think it's far more likely that it's Peter's actual reflection and he's taken on Nathan's appearance because of his guilt. This also fits in with what Claire said to him.

But if Peter is really posing as Nathan, then how does Peter appear unscarred and amnesiac at the end of the episode? One of two things could happen here. Etiher the explosion somehow split Peter into two different forms, or another possibility is this is actually Sylar. The fact that he's handcuffed and wearing a helix necklace could mean he's been imprisoned by the Company. This seems to be a likely explanation, as it's been announced that Zachary Quinto (who plays Sylar) will become a regular cast member this season.

But who is the bogeyman and who killed Kaito Nakamura? Is the bogeyman the one orchestrating the threats on Kaito and Angela? Kaito mentions there are nine left and he mentions three who are dead. Now there are eight left. As with last season, Heroes begins by raising more questions than it answers. But that was one of the draws of the first season, so why fix it if it's not broken?