Heroes, Season 3, again

At last, Heroes seems to be attempting to tie things together into one coherent plot and with a bit of luck that will make for some interaction between the various characters and stories.

They are still doing the "and now, twenty seconds with Suresh! Followed by eight seconds of Sylar!" thing, which is still getting on my nerves. I would love to spend more time in the company of Hiro, or any of the characters really, because as it stands the nature of the show means I really don't know most of the characters. Developing powers have replaced developing characters.

For example, Nathan Petrelli (the flying politico) started out the season convinced, utterly, that his power was a gift from God. That idea has been rather brusquely discarded, in favour of a more scientific explanation and Nathan's character has likewise reverted. What if, even faced with the truth about the source of his power, he continues to believe? As it stands, Nathan Petrelli seems to have shaken off his brush with God in short order; to me this says that he was never that convinced about it in the first place, so can I trust anything about this person? Who is he, really?

The story, such as it is, now appears to revolve around the Petrelli family and an internal feud between mother and father, tugging the kids (Nathan, Peter and Sylar) in different directions. The good news is there are indications that Sylar, now recruited by his Dad, isn't playing the same game as everyone else; the analogy is that while Mr and Mrs Petrelli are playing chess with the assorted characters, Sylar is now playing Poker and has been smart enough to mark the cards without telling anyone.

Peter Petrelli has been a bit of a headless chicken since the start of the season and is still hyperventillating his way through scenes. I feel that if he would just stop for a moment and catch his breath, and perhaps do some actual thinking, he might be a bit more interesting and a lot more useful. As it is, he lurches from one crisis to the next without ever really having a plan. This is all good stuff if you want your hero to be a reactionary mess, complete with knee-jerk responses that seem to come out of nowhere, but less good if you're hoping he might be a character you identify with and want to see succeed. He's outplayed and outclassed by everyone else, never seems to catch a break and instead of being the audience identification character is more a sort of mobile punchbag.

Is it good, though?

Well...yes, sort of. I do hope they wrap this story up, though, because I'm not sure it's good enough for a Season 4.