Heroes: Company Man of the Hour

I’m just going to come right out and say it — “Cold Wars” was the best episode of “Heroes” since season 1.

Of course, it turns out that the best episode of “Heroes” of the past two seasons is the first one I did NOT watch on a Monday night since the show’s first year, but I caught this one on Sunday afternoon and it’s definitely a case of better late than never. So thanks for showing the rerun, G4 — I still don’t understand why an alleged videogame channel is showing sci-fi series, but I appreciate it.

The fact that “Cold Wars” was so good is both a mild surprise and not a surprise at all. It’s mildly surprising that the show could deliver such a strong episode despite completely missing some of its more popular characters (Claire, Hiro, Sylar). However, it’s no surprise that, when the show chooses to focus on giving a smaller group of characters better material, instead of trying to give everyone in the huge cast something to do, the quality improves.

It’s also no surprise that the show’s best episode in two years revolved around Jack Coleman, the best actor on the show. (Yes, I know I’ve said it before and, no, I’m not going to stop — it’s true!) I don’t even mind that the episode shamelessly revisited (ripped off?) the fan-favorite “Company Man” episode from the first season, which chronicled Noah Bennett’s early days with the company, his fight to keep Claire under his protection and his introduction to his signature Horn-Rimmed Glasses.

In “Company Man,” HRG’s past was revealed through a series of black and white flashbacks as Parkman and an out-of-control, grief-stricken Ted (the Nuclear Guy) held the Bennett family hostage in their home. “Cold Wars” picked up where last week left off after Parkman, Peter and Mohinder drugged and kidnapped Bennett (pictured, right). This time, HRG’s more recent past (his involvement with Nathan’s plan) was revealed through a series of black and white flashbacks as an out-of-control, grief stricken Parkman held Bennett hostage and invaded his mind in search of clues. (Sound familiar?) Maybe the flashbacks aren’t so much “black and white” as they are “morally gray” which is where Bennett feels comfortable. I only hope Parkman was also able to see the helpful timeline-establishing title cards the audience was privy to.

The problem with more recent time-jumping episodes of “Heroes” (other than there are too damn many of them) is that they didn’t really reveal anything new or very significant about the characters. By contrast, the very first flashback in “Cold Wars” gave me a bit of a surprise — HRG practically begged to be put back into action.

All this time I’d assumed Bennett had been pressed back into hero-hunting duty in order to protect Claire, and that he was secretly in cahoots with Nathan about his plan. In fact, it turns out that the guy was just tired of doing crossword puzzles (“what’s another six-letter word for “kidnap”?) following a forced retirement from Angela Petrelli (Cristine Rose is the second best actor on the show if you’re scoring at home). I should’ve known this was the case because, for all his talk about how petulant and restless Claire is, the guy is just as bad. I’m thinking of him miserably working at that copy store in season 2 and beating up his manager. He and Claire are a lot more alike than they think. (Except for the huge talent gap in the actors portraying them, of course. Sorry, I just can’t help it.)

Eventually, Nathan paid him a visit, HRG showed him his secret stash of guns that he wasn’t ready to let go of, and HRG was back at work. The only problem was that Bennett wasn’t in charge, like he’d assumed. He’d be working under creepy, hero-hating Danko, whom he instantly clashed with. All this time, I’ve thought Danko may have a power himself given the unnatural contempt he has for people with abilities (and that may still be the case), but now I’m thinking the only power he has is to be an irredeemably cold bastard. I think Zeljko Ivanek is a great actor, but thought he was an odd choice for this character. However, after watching the two actors together and the contrast between Ivanek’s short, all-black attired, heartless character and Coleman’s tall, always-wearing-a-suit, charmingly-manipulative Bennett I finally got it — Danko is the anti-HRG.

The flashbacks gave Parkman the information he needed to send Peter on a couple of errands. Parkman was determined to bring the fight to the people hunting them, Peter seemed willing to go along with it, but Mohinder was less sure. First Peter flew to HRG’s secret stash and was nearly captured before getting away relatively easily (nice special effect). Then he was sent to Danko’s apartment to assassinate the hunter. Danko was ready to die to prove that people with abilities were dangerous, but Nathan flew in just in time to stop his brother from committing murder. (Thank you, writers, for having Danko, who’s supposed to be clever, note how quickly Nathan got there.)

Unfortunately for team unity, one flashback revealed that HRG had approached Mohinder about Nathan’s plan, but Mohinder had kept the information to himself. Since Nathan’s plan led to Daphne’s murder, Parkman took his pain out on Mohinder, allowing HRG to get away momentarily. Bennett certainly played his captors against each other, but I was expecting more mind games out of him in this episode. Nevertheless, these scenes delivered (Matt was badass-ish! Mohinder and Peter were tolerable!) and resulted in the episode’s twist that Daphne survived her shooting and is being kept in Building 26.

As someone who has never, EVER been a fan or a believer in the Matt/Daphne relationship, my reaction was a strong “meh”, but it justified giving Parkman a reason to keep Bennett alive, which is always ok by me. It also led to Mohinder FINALLY doing something brave on this show, allowing himself to get captured so that Parkman could get away. (I realize it didn’t exactly work out this way, but Parkman was eventually rescued by Peter, so I guess things worked out.)

The episodes ended with two twists. It turns out that Bennett is in league with Angela Petrelli and one of their goals was to get Danko’s trust. I like this because anytime you can get the two best actors on the show in one scene, that’s a good thing.

The other twist was another group of paintings that revealed an explosive future. Really, “Heroes”? We’re going back to that well again?! I mean I get that the show is trying to recapture its season 1 glory (which is a great goal), but that doesn’t mean they have to go out and do an episode-by-episode remake of the first year. (Were Peter and Parkman really in Isaac Mendez’s loft?!) At least we should be glad that this time they’re blowing up Washington, D.C., instead of NYC again.

So what’d you think of this episode? Why is HRG apparently the only character who sees the past in black and white when other episodes chronicling the past are in color? (Do the glasses help with that condition?) Does Danko already know Nathan has an ability or is he still putting it together? Am I too hard on Hayden Panettiere? Finally, if “Cold Wars” wasn’t the best episode since season 1, what was?